Writer, historian and restorer of Dastangoi: All you need to know about Mahmood Farooqui

There are many prefixes people use to describe co-directer of Peepli Live Mahmood Farooqui who is making headlines after being arrested on charges of rape. He’s a historian first, having studied history at St. Stephen’s in New Delhi and then Oxford University. But Farooqui is famous in the art and culture circles of Delhi as the man who has revived of the 16th-century Urdu story-telling art form, “Dastangoi”.  It all started with the need to share narratives with a performance hungry audience. The dying Urdu art slowly and steadily gained momentum with many theatrical shows across major cities in India, and Farooqui was either the brain behind them (director) or starred in them. “We perform 25 stories—ranging from tales from Tilism-e-Hoshruba; Mantoiyat, on the life and times of Manto; Dastan-e-Sedition on the arrest of Binayak Sen;Dastan Jai Ram Ji ki, based on 300 Ramayanas; Alice, based on Lewis Caroll and on contemporary themes,” said Farooqui about Dastangoi, in this Outlook interview. [caption id=“attachment_2306444” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Aamir Khan, Anusha Rizi and Mahmood Farooqui. Image by AFP.[/caption] Where there are narratives, written literature isn’t far away. A  Times of India report pointed out that that Farooqui had done contributed to the research for William Dalrymple’s White Mughals and eventually authored his own book on the Revold of 1857 called Besieged: Voices From Delhi 1857.  But his familiarity with the literary world isn’t surprising. His uncle is noted Urdu poet and scholar SR Farooqui, and his grandfather, Ghulam Rabbani Taban, was also a poet and a part of Progessive Writer’s Group. Given his artistic and cultural influences, his foray into cinema didn’t come as a complete surprise. According to this Tehelka feature, he moved to Mumbai with his wife, Anusha Rizvi, who he met while working in NDTV, to take a shot at making movies in Bollywood. In 2005, the germ of Peepli Live came from a TV show about farmer suicides and it took the couple 5 years from 2005-2010 to bring the story from paper to celluloid. Being the researcher and historian that he is, Farooqui extensively travelled to find a good cast for the film, even after Aamir Khan Productions had come on board. Thirty-five artists from Habib Tanvir’’s Naya Theatre in Bhopal and a myriad of local troupes were zeroed on eventually. But it all came naturally to him. “My experience in storytelling came in handy here. The difference is that in cinema you have to manage more people and logistics,” he said, speaking to Indian Express. Before the controversy of his sexual assault arose, Farooqui and Rizvi were back in New Delhi, continuing their endeavor to spread ‘Dastangoi’ across Indian cities. They are also working on the official screen adaptation of Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies, according to another Indian Express article.