It was the mid of 19th century when a number of scientist achieved the goal of wireless communication by sending and receiving different sounds in the form of electronic signals from one place to other with out any wire connection. Jagdesh Chandarboass from India was also one of them who did a great job but the Italian scientist Guglielmo Marchese Marconi was the person who succeeded by sending the sound from 1800 km distance and registering his invention in common wealth meeting in June 1886.
After this invention Radio communication gets some marvelous achievement in very few years and radio become the part of lives of human being all across the globe.
Indian people get access to this invention in the year 1923 when first Radio station was established in Bombay. Just three months later another radio station was established in Calcutta and soon after that in Madras.
In 1928 radio station was established in Lahore and soon after in Peshawar. It was the initiating of radio transmission in the area which is now known as Pakistan. The credit of establishment of radio station in Peshawar goes to all the time great Sir Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum Khan, founder of Islamia College and University of Peshawar. He was on visit of England for participating in round table conference when he met Marconi and requested for the establishment of radio station in Peshawar. His request was honored and a radio transmitter of just 0.5 watts power was gifted to NWFP province of India. It is notable that power of transmitter installed today for radio Pakistan Peshawar is 300 KW, while the most powerful transmitter of NWFP is of 400 KW installed near Pabbi district Nowshera.
Along with 0.5 watt transmitter, 50 receiving sets (radio sets) were also provided to NWFP. These sets were distributed among the Khans of Nowshera, Charsadda, Mardan and other side by areas. They kept those radio sets in Hujras and people of village use to go for listening the transmission in those Hujras.
It was the beginning in NWFP but radio network was expanding with a stunning speed all across the sub-continent. New stations were establishing and people were getting closer to this machine. This fame and rapid expansion was based over some solid foundations. Radio was informing the masses. News, updates, commentaries, live discussions about current affairs and a lot more was broadcasting.
Radio was educating the masses. People were guided to follow the right way; people were getting informed about newly happenings all across the world. People were being guided about the day to day problems. So the fame was genuine.
Radio was entertaining the masses. People were entertained by musical programmes, songs and melodies. People were entertained by live story telling. People were provided with joy and happiness by gossiping and comedies. And people were entertained by Radio Drama.
Radio Drama contributed not only in entertaining the audience but educated them as well. It is really interesting to read about the drama all across the world but I will try to be focused over its NWFP status.
It was the spring of year 1935, when the first radio drama was broadcasted from All India Radio Peshawar. Aslam Khan Khattak, son of Ali Qulli Khan, was Director General at Peshawar radio station. Father of Nisar Mazloom wrote the script which was translated and published in English by Aslam Khan Khattak, graduate of Oxford.
This drama was broadcasted with title ‘دی وینو جام ’. This play was just of 15 minutes duration, as usually radio dramas are, but it get country wide fame and open doors for writers to meet the challenge of creation in that passion.
History of initiating radio drama in Peshawar is very interesting. In 30s neither the proper infrastructure nor the suitable artists were available for recording and broadcasting the drama. In those days theatrical artists were use to came Peshawar from Bombay and show their play here. These plays not only entertained the people of Peshawar but also inspired some of them to do the same. Prithvi Raj the founder of famous Kampoor family of Bollywood and Khalil Khan from Chamkanni, father of Umar Daraz and Ishrat, actors of Pashto films were also two of them. They laid the foundation of theatrical drama in Peshawar.
When it was decide that drama will be broadcast from All India Radio Peshawar, theatrical artists were asked to do the job. Although theatrical artist cannot be fit for radio drama yet it was the only choice. In this way دی وینو جام was aired from Peshawar radio.
It was proved the first drop of rain and than a history started formulating. Z.A Bukhari, brother of Pitras Bukhari, become the director of Peshawar radio when Pitras was Director General of All India Radio. Z.A Bukhari was a renowned dramatist who not only wrote some famous drama serials like ‘لائٹ ہاؤس کے محافظ’ but also develop a pool of dramatists in Peshawar station.
For the appointment of staff writer at Peshawar station a test was conducted in those days. This test was taken by two towering personalities of Pashto Literary world along with other people. Samundar Khan Samundar and Amir Hamza Shinwari appeared for the test. Fortunately test was qualified by Samundar Khan Samundar who declared the father of Pashto Drama writing in history. Although Amir Hamza Khan Shinwari the great Pashto poet of its time could not qualify the test yet he kept contact with radio and produce a number of booming dramas in Pashto language.
Samundar Khan Samundar produced an exceptional serial about the imposters of societies ‘د اوچے خان’ which was highly valued by people of all walks of life.
In early days of Peshawar radio stations some top class dramatist came to Peshawar and done a great job for establishing the trend of drama writing and production. Kartar Singh Dugal was one of them who later embrace Islam and become the citizen of Pakistan for ever.
After the partition, when All India Radio turned to Radio Pakistan Ajmal Khan Khattak, another legend of Pashto literary world was stepped forward and took part in the development of Pashto Drama. Although he was expelled from the services by charging him Pakhtoonistani, yet he played a sparkling role and contributed in excellent passion.
In early fifties a number of eminent dramas were produced by those big names. ‘سور پہ ز وان’ , ' داسمان منجھاری ‘ , قسمت او عقل' ‘ were some of them. Main Said Rasool a well educated person wrote an outstanding play ‘سقراط مرگ’ which was highly appreciated by the audience.
Another famous drama was produced by Major S.A Rahmani focusing the life in ‘بازار حسن’ in sixties.
Along with newly written plays, dramas from other languages special from Urdu were translated in Pashto and broadcasted from Peshawar. Drama serial ‘اس دیوانگی میں ‘ by Bano Qudsia, dramas written by William Shakespeare those were usually translated by Agha Hasher, Pitras Bukhari, Saadat Hassan Minto and many others were also broadcasted from radio Pakistan Peshawar either in same language or in Pashto.
‘بوڑھا اور سمندر’ by Abu Saeed Qurashi and ‘اس منجدھار میں’ by Saadat Hassan Minto was also aired from Peshawar.
It may be interesting to mention that in decades of 50 and sixty drama writers were rewarded with just 30 rupees for any single production. In spite of this miserable financial condition writers did a great job with dedication, enthusiasm, and passions.
‘تلقین شاہ’ by Ishfaq Ahmad in early 60s was blockbuster all across the country and broadcast for a long time. Impact of this drama was long lasting and it set the trend of producing quality educational and moral dramas.
Peshawar Radio also telecast some famous Hindko drama serials and series as well. ‘ قہوہ خانہ ‘ was a famous feature drama about the social and cultural issues of the society. It was a soap serial continuously aired for 17 years. ‘لالہ فدو’ and ' خالہ بی’ were two characters of this serial. They got vast fame and honor all across Hindko speaking community and become representational character.
Radio Pakistan has the tradition of celebrating drama week every year since early sixties. It was one of those kinds of competition when a youngster belonging to Peshawar produced ‘رنڑا’ and won the best dramatist award. At that moment no one could percept that one day this youngster will become the icon of radio Pakistan and will earn global fame for radio Pakistan. Producer of ‘رنڑا’ also produce ‘پلوشے’ which transmitted continuously for nine years but his exceptional production was ‘نوے کور او نوے ثوند’ that was not only broadcast from radio Pakistan Peshawar and BBC London in Pashto but also aired from Quata radio station in Dari language with title ‘خانہ نو زندگی نو’ for ten years continuously under his direct supervision and still on air since 1994. Umar Nasir, a great name of radio drama in Pakistan joined radio Pakistan Peshawar in 1960 and released himself in 2003. His production نوے کور او نوے ثوند’ or خانہ نو زندگی نو' ’ is the drama serial broadcasted in dual languages at the same time from three stations. This serial was selected for the first category in world drama festival, which is celebrated every year in USA, five times consecutively. Once in 2004 this serial beat more than 10 thousands dramas and won the first prize for Radio Pakistan.
Mushtaq Shabab, another big name of radio Pakistan, also has the credit of producing some very useful and famous drama series and serials. ‘کل اور آج اور کل’ by Mushtaq Shabab is on air now a day and has a great contribution in educating people about their health.
Basit Saleem Siddiqui production of historical dramas is also a great asset of radio archives and has played a key role for developing the fashion of historical drama production in radio.
Masood Anwar, editor of ‘شہباز’ also produced a number of famous dramas for radio Pakistan.
Khaliqdad Umeed, Dr. Muhammad Azam, Hamayun Humaa, Sahir Afridi, Zatoon Bano, Zahida Haleem Qurashi, Younas Qiasi who wrote his first drama in 1st year of his college, and a number of other people have done a great job for the development of radio drama in Peshawar. The job of many distinguish dramatist could not be portray here fairly that is just due to lack of knowledge and insufficient access to resources but there is no doubt that many people done sufficient efforts to develop the drama production in such a diffident and backward part of the world.
Radio Pakistan… in 21st century
Radio Pakistan now a days broadcast its transmission from 25 radio stations spread from Sakardu to Gawadar. It broadcast for 300 hours a day in 20 local and international languages covering the 75% land area and more than 90% of population of Pakistan. It is the misfortune of radio drama that this immense network has reserved just 2% of its air time for drama while 48% has been granted for musical programs. But this bad luck is not only for drama the same case is with health and technology having 2% airtime each and only 3% of its airtime for youths and students.
Anyhow radio drama is still playing an important role not only for entertaining and educating the masses but also for strengthening the financial condition of radios all across the world as well as in NWFP.
