A war hero who proved that 'pen is mightier than sword'

Kanpur: It was in 1921 that legendary freedom fighter Maulana Hasrat Mohani coined his famous revolutionary slogan 'Inquilab Zindabad'. The slogan rang across the country, filling the hearts of freedom fighters with courage and rousing revolutionaries against the British. The slogan was but a mere reflection of the sharp writings of the Maulana in times when writing anything against the British regime was a crime.
The writings of the Maulana fetched him two years of imprisonment under the Press Act of 1908 for promoting anti-British ideas. The arrest, however, did not deter Mohani. He continued to write against the British and was again sentenced to jail for many years for participating in India's freedom struggle.
After his release from jail in 1928, Mohani took out another Urdu daily 'Mustaqbil' against the policies of the British government. An Unnao-born brilliant Urdu writer, Mohani, after completing his graduation from Aligarh Muslim University, joined the freedom moment and made Kanpur his workplace. Along with Ganesh Shankar Vidhyarthi, he choose the writing path to prove that the pen is always mightier than the sword.
Mohani used to reside in Kamal Khan Ka Hata in Nai Sadak, a prominent area of the city, a place visited by the father of nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Today, two of his grandsons inhabit the same house.
To put Mohani into contemporary perspective, he penned the ghazal 'Chupke Chupke Raat Din' sung and popularized in more recent times by Ghulam Ali and Jagjit Singh.
On the eve of the 70th year of Independence, talking to TOI, his grandson Rashid Mohani said his "Dadaji was a master of words and knew how to play with them. "At the time of partition, when Mohammad Ali Jinnah asked Dadaji to cross over to Pakistan, his much-remembered words were 'Kya rakkha hai tumhare tute-langde Pakistan me, Jo rakkha hai wo rakkha hai mere Hindustan mein' meaning 'Nothing lies in your ramshackle Pakistan, My India is everything to me'," said Rashid Mohani.
Speaking of a pre-Independence era incident when Mohani was once arrested and jailed in Kanpur and hung upside down, Rashid said, "Even at that time Dadaji was calm and replied in his own style by saying 'Chahe Mujhe Aseer Karo, Chahe Meri Zuban Kaato, Mere Khayalat Ko Bediya Pehna Nahi Sakte' which means 'You can imprison me or slash off my tongue, you cannot imprison my thoughts." Maulana Mohani played an active role in the Congress, along with Ram Prasad Bismil, and helped get the much-debated proposal of 'Poorn Swaraj' passed in the General Body meeting of Congress.
Setting a fine example of communal harmony and his love for Lord Krishna, Mohani had also written many songs and poems on Krishna during both the pre- and post-Independence era.