SIVASAGAR, Dec 20 � In collaboration with the Directorate of Cultural Affairs, Assam, the north-east segment of Sangeet Natak Academy�s three-day Zikir Zari Mahutsava concluded today at the Natya Mandir here today.
Speaking on the topic �the influence of folk lyrics of Zikir and Zari on the people as a presentation for entertainment�, Professor Tofail Zilani of Kakojan College asserted that Zikir and Zari are valuable cultural resources of the Assamese Muslims. He pleaded for refinement of these folk songs by keeping their peculiar significance. These folk songs created by Shah Meeran (Azan Peer), bound the diverse society with harmonious bond, Zelani said.
Litterateur Saidul Islam who chaired the workshop concluded that Professor Sayed Abdul Malik with great pain collected since 1950s for five decades these Zikir and Zari from various village choirs and left these in disciplined volumes of books. Islam has divided the Zikir and Zari into (I) folk songs for religious education, (II)propagation of the religion (III) with social pictures and scenes Azan Fakir focused his message through Zikir, he said.
Dr Bhuboneswar Deka, the Zikir and Zari Scholar from Baihata Chariali said that Zikir and Zari were influenced by wide and all pervasive Bihu songs, Diha Nam, Biya Nam, Deh Bichar Geet, Kirton and Ghokha etc. of that time. Although the language of Zikir and Zari was rustic Assamese, yet, they were mostly translations of Seikh Farid, a Muslim clergyman of the undivided Punjab province, Deka said. In these folk songs, he found rich Assamese idiomatic phrases chiefly used to propagate religion and to synthesize communal segments. Deka also said that many Arabic and Parsi words thus came to our Assamese language.
