Of love and other demons

Sahira and Rahat Kazmi talk about everything from acts of creativity, living the bohemian dream and what makes love last.
By Amina Baig


We know them as many things. Celebrity couple. Actors. Director. The Teesra Kinara duo. The Dhoop Kinarey team. The oft-criticized Repertory Director for Napa (National Academy of Performing Arts). The highly empowered woman director with a proclivity for highlighting women's issues in particular in Pakistan who has been quietly sitting in the backseat for at least a decade now. We know them as Rahat and Sahira Kazmi. We see them as a couple exuding charisma by the bucket and as individuals who have charmed an entire nation while politely rocking the boat. How does it all even work?

For Rahat, or RK, as Sahira lovingly refers to him, the philosophy is simple. “My goal in life,” says Rahat, “has always been, and still is, that one should be a non-conformist. Conformism is anathema. It is death. It's a graveyard. Avoid it.”

Okay then, Mr Kazmi, of the fantastically good looks and brains. God, we believe, has been kind to you. Rahat is quick to point out his conflict in life though.

“My struggle in life has been to prove to myself that yes, it is possible to live a life that challenges things around me, and I did. I came from a conservative background, I rebelled. I went into civil service, I rebelled. I went into television, I rebelled. I gave it up. I don't give interviews, I don't talk to people; I rebelled.”

“Everything about me is about rebellion,” says Rahat, catching a breath. “I think that's the most important thing, to not conform. Hopefully not ever.”

It is little surprise then that Sahira Kazmi, gifted and highly passionate in her own right, is the one who has been Rahat's companion, wife, and friend for many a decade now. Having very recently been named as one of the recipients of the President's Award for Pride of Performance, Sahira is definitely one of the people who have earned this honour, which may have come belatedly, but nonetheless, has.

Sahira had begun her career as an English newscaster at the Rawalpindi Centre for Pakistan Television (PTV). The job was really a fluke for the then 20-year-old Sahira, who had moved with her family from Karachi to the Capital. Even then, recalls Sahira, for whom films had become a fixation early on, she had wanted to join the station as a director. Back then however, the establishment was still new, the academy wasn't functional, and Aslam Azhar promised her that it was a job that was best learnt hands on. Sahira has of course acted in many plays, one of the first of which was Qurbatein Aur Fasley with Rahat, but she soon gravitated towards direction. From the outset, it was women, and their lives that Sahira was talking about.

“My first series was called Hawwa Ke Naam,” Sahira refers to a set of 50-minute plays she had directed around '74, which dealt with the various issues facing women at that time. “As an educated person I thought I could bring these [problems] to the masses and tackle the troubles women and girls faced. As my career progressed, I got more heavily involved. Most of my work has been socially pertinent - of course I have done music and comedies, but I thought this is the least I could do - I felt so strongly about it. I have taken risks and experimented and I felt could relate to the masses.”

Having come from a family though, that was progressive enough to allow their daughter to work in television, and then being one half of a highly progressive couple, it is kind of surprising the kind of insight and involvement that Sahira has showed in her work, which has mainly involved speaking of the tribulations of a class to which she did not belong, with problems that she did not face.

“I must say I give TV a lot of credit for exposing me to a broader side of life,” admits Sahira, “and for exposing me to [members of] other classes who worked alongside me. Coming from a certain place, as a girl, I felt I could impart some knowledge to our masses about social issues that are part and parcel of our people, who automatically assume that a woman is not equal [to a man].”

“I'm a firm believer of the visual arts and as I studied people around me, I realized that this is a medium through which I could put a lot across. And that is what I did from the first, to my last play for PTV, Zaibunissa, which touched upon domestic violence. Even that play ended with the abusive husband realizing his mistake and being contrite. It was my way of suggesting that this too can be an option.”

For his part, Rahat too has worked hard to bring about his fair share of revolutions. In 1978, he quit the civil service and turned to acting in films (a conformist act, his wife points out), but one which he stresses was a necessity.

“In life, certain compromises have to be made,” he says. “Cinema was an economic necessity because when I left my government job, I had no money, no resources. The only way out was to do movies. I had a family, I had to earn some money,” he remembers. “In those days, in good times you got Rs 75, 000 for a film. That's a lot of money, and that stabilized us economically.”

That though was not the only pull cinema had for Rahat Kazmi circa 1978.

“When you are young,” says Rahat, “you think you can change the world, you feel so powerful. I thought once the industry is in my grip I'll change it around. It didn't happen. I tried. Of course I tried.”

Though they speak of the very personal paths they have tread in life, every single incident that is related by the Kazmis is wrapped around a little piece of history of that time, and the decline of Pakistani cinema decades ago put in context with the careful steps being taken to revive it now, is fascinating.

“Zia, who was in power back then made it a prerequisite for producers to have B.A. degrees,” Rahat says. “He said, 'Yahan bohat unpurh filmein banti hain (The films made here are crude), let's improve the standards.' His idea of improving standards was having 80 per cent of the films made at that time banned by the censor board citing them as vulgar.”
Rahat, at that time, with Nadeem and Shabnam was looking into an idea called United Artists which would produce films of a different genre, and Nadeem produced a couple of films under that too. Pakistani cinema, Rahat tells me, quoting data from Mushtaq Gazdar's Pakistan Cinema, went from producing 121 films in 1979 to 11 in 1981, not counting regional films.

“So I started life again,” Rahat smiles. “I was offered to be Editor-in-Chief of TV Times by Riaz Mansuri and I took that on and that did well for its time.”

This begs the question, how did Sahira, being a wife and mother, deal with all the upheavals in her husband's career?
Sahira is very breezy about it all. “We believe in a lot of similar things, and we disagree on a lot of things at the same time,” she explains. “Like our lack of love for materialistic things. He is lucky to have a bohemian wife like me or he wouldn't have been able to support me for so long!” she laughs. “I love and respect him for what he does. He's highly educated, and he's done what he's wanted to do - besides, I have brought humour into his life, which is very important!”

This is pretty intriguing, as it is hard to imagine, in the first place, two such hugely creative people (who are all by default, a little mad) live together, and so well, for so long. Luckily for us, Sahira and Rahat Kazmi are not stingy with sharing the key to a happy life together.

“You have to accept the good with the bad. Like RK and I have been disagreeing on many subjects from the beginning but that's okay - it didn't in any way spoil our relationship,” Sahira states simply. “At the same time, we could accept each other, or not. I was a successful director and it didn't bother RK, being the man. Love is important, there's no two ways about it, but that can fizzle out. It is important to trust and respect each other; when you live together and are friends, you figure that out.”

Rahat takes a slightly more philosophical view of things. “As she rightly says,” he tells me, “had we been interested in making it in a worldly manner, it would have been difficult. One sacrificed a lot, one is not saying that in a boastful manner, but one did not abandon what one wanted to do. But that required courage, and the help of someone like her, who could say, 'Okay, let's go on'.”

Of course, there's always that curiosity though, whenever you come across a particularly attuned-to-each-other couple, of whether they knew from the get go if they had met the fabled 'One'.

“It took three years!” exclaims Rahat. “From '71 to '74, for a relationship to develop. It wasn't love at first sight; it took time in maturing and coming to fruition. One learnt much more of each other than one could in a flashy instantaneous relationship.”

“We got to know each other and that grew into love,” agrees Sahira. “Back then I was getting a lot of proposals, but there were so many girls with broken marriages who had married boys who lived abroad whom they knew nothing about. RK was friends with my family too… he even had loads of girlfriends at that time and I used to make fun of him!”
Not hard to imagine, as Rahat Kazmi has been known to be quite the heartthrob in his time, and beyond.

“The point is, about this it should be said: 'The past is another country, and now the wench is dead,” improvises Rahat.
“What is the male of ‘wench’?” Sahira asks laughingly.

It is probably with this humour and camaraderie that Rahat and Sahira have walked through life together easily. As Rahat made his transition to theatre in 1985 with the company Theatre Walay, formed on a whim with friends while sitting on a wall at the Clifton Beach, Sahira proudly remembers “Sitting in the front row at every show, clapping the loudest so others would as well.” Rahat Kazmi ventured into education in the '90s, becoming, towards the end of that decade one of the most sought after tutors, most prominently for Urdu, in Karachi. Suffice it to say he has been a much adored teacher as well. Of course, then came Napa, where he heads the theatre program, and was subsequently made head of the Repertory in 2008.

Of course, it has been said that Napa plays are often hard to get through because of the language (or the serious classical-ness) employed in them. Rahat does not agree.

“Out of 17 plays, only four were classical,” he argues. “And maybe in difficult Urdu. But if we're doing a play by Intezaar (Hussain) Sahib, or Agha Hashr, will the language used not be of a certain level? The Seagull maybe was tough, but how can Jungle Mein Mungle, or Aadhey Adhooray be anything but simple? The language of 80 per cent of the plays, I feel is below the standard I would set. It is not good enough for me.”

As for the newer entrants in the field, he feels Napa has offered nothing but support. “We unfortunately are the only ones who have empowered them and we are the ones who are abused. Be it sets or music, we help without compensation. With one group we helped with the set, the lighting, the space, and on the last day of the performance, the lady at the helm of the play stood up and referred to us as the 'swinish institute across'.”

As for Napa not having worked yet with an original script, Rahat expresses helplessness. “We have offered a lac rupees for an original script,” he reveals. “And called everyone from Intezaar Sahib to Dr Farrukhi to Amjad Islam Amjad.”

All the while that Rahat's career was developing new corners, Sahira too was burgeoning ahead with her work. With the '90s play Nijaat, she hoped to educate the masses about child molestation, a subject she could barely touch upon at the time because of censorship policies.

“At the time that I was working, there were different regimes, always with different codes, it was hard to get things across,” she says. “Now while it is great to see so many young people involved in TV, with so much money being invested in it and 80 channels or more, I'm sorry to see that even with so much freedom, important things are not being said anymore.”

“But surely some of the plays right now are qualitatively and quantitatively fairly watchable?” interjects Rahat.

“Yes the content has improved some,” she agrees. “But TV, which I consider to be Pakistan's parallel cinema, has developed an exaggerated and superficial aura - exactly what we had tried to move away from back then. The kind of things being done are narrow, like dealing with marital issues, yes they are important to our society, but they are not the only thing to be said.”
Sahira is also upset with the fact that PTV has “started pandering to the lowest common denominator,” moving away from its motto of infotainment. She does have a small remedy though.

“PTV has a treasure of material from over the decades which needs to be digitally archived,” she suggests. “Perhaps [they could] save some of the best work, from the people whom we have lost and are in the process of losing, and start a Classics channel.”

Perhaps Sahira herself could take the initiative for this project, or if she is ready to now, come back to her director's seat. As for Rahat, his seven year itch is returning now that Napa sees its seventh birthday. “I have to move on,” he says. “If people don't move on, how will other people, younger blood, move up?” It is all very quiet at the moment, but perhaps we will be experiencing celluloid, Kazmi style, sooner than later.

As night settles more deeply over Karachi, the Kazmis see me out, and I see a side of them that is heartbreakingly sweet. I spot a picture of their daughter Nida, herself an actor, and remark how much she looks like her mother. “She does! Especially as she grew up,” enthuses Sahira.

“Yes,” Rahat says quietly. “But you're prettier.”
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“Conformism is anathema. It is death. It's a graveyard. Avoid it.”

– Rahat Kazmi