Over 200 people gathered on Friday, December 5, to pay
tribute to prominent Bay Area Urdu poet and community leader Tashie Zaheer. The program was arranged by the friends of
Tashie Zaheer and was led by Khalid Rana.
The event was emceed by Arshad Rashid.
Khalid Rana, Abdus Sattar Ghazali, Jafar Shah, Nagesh
Avadhany, and G.S. Falak paid tributes to Tashie Zaheer for his leadership at the
Urdu Academy of North America.
Tashie Zaheer’s business associates who spoke at the
program included D Lawless, C Camacho, and Imran Jaffer.
Muhammad Nazir khan, Suman Taneja, Rubina Qureshi, and
Nilofer Khan spoke about Tashie Zaheer’s services for the community.
Two family members who also spoke at the event
included Ammar Zaheer, Tashie’s older son, and wife Naheed Zaheer.
Performing Kathak, Farah Yasmeen Shaikh paid a dance
tribute to Tashie Zaheer. Farah Shaikh
was accompanied by Ben Kunin on sarod and a tabla player.
In a music program that followed the dance and
continued till the wee hours of the morning, Almas Shabvani, Atiya Hai, Nagesh Avadhany, Tina
Mann, and Syed Sarwat sang Tashie Zaheer’s poetry. Music was provided by Ali Shahabuddin on the
keyboard and a very talented Ashneel Singh on tabla.
Listen to a partial audio of the program here:
https://archive.org/details/TashieZeheerTributeSpeeches
Labels: Tashie Zaheer, Urdu Poetry
