Daily Times

I have known him to be a very humble person with an amiable personality. Parvez Mehdi was born in 1947. He died on August 28, 2005 at the age of 58. He received his initial training in classical music from his father Bashir Hussain Rahi. Later he was trained by singer Mehdi Hassan, who also renamed him as Pervez Mehdi. He also learnt sitar from Siraj Ahmed Qureshi. His first breakthrough as reiterated above was in Radio Pakistan in 1968. He was a versatile singer with a soft voice resembling that of Mehdi Hassan’s.

Parvez used to travel widely to perform. He used to sing ghazal, geet, folk and film songs with effortless ease in all modes of media. He was the recipient of Sitar-i-Imtiaz by the president of Pakistan on the occasion of Independence Day. He lived at Fayyaz Park, Mughalpura. Parvez left behind a widow and five children. He was suffering from diabetes and on the advice of doctors, used to take long walks at the Race Course Park but that too was intermittent. Accompanying him on the jogging tracks, I used to advise him to burn his sugar by exercising regularly.

In one of the PTV interviews with Bashir Hussain Rahi and Parvez by moderator Kanwal Naseer of Islamabad, a question was asked from Rahi as to what brought him to theatre. He said that his love for music brought him there. During pre-Partition and post-Partition days, the hero, leading lady and all other important characters had to sing in theatre. He rendered a song during the interview, of which lyrics were “Dhut Pyar Da Maan Gaya Oei Badli Akh Teri Sara Badal Jehan”. Rahi shared that he had two sons, including Parvez whom he called lovingly as “Paijee”. Parvez informed that his first tutor was his father. This particular mehfil was attended among audience by Tufail Niazi, who was a famous folk icon also.

During his school days, Parvez used to render qawwalis with Khalid Asghar, who was the music producer/director at Radio Pakistan, and who retired as station director of Lahore. When Khalid was head of Radio Pakistan’s Central Production Unit, he composed and recorded a geet “Tera Mera Kya Rishta Hai/Main Tanha Tu Bhi Tanha Hai” in Parvez’s voice. Parvez sang a duet with Indian actress and singer Sulakhshna Pandit “Kya Zamana Tha Ke Hum Roz Mila Karte The”, a ghazal originally sung by Parvez as his solo item. This Nasir Kazmi’s ghazal has been given a geet touch in its composition.

Globally recognised Punjabi pop and playback singer Daler Mehndi, considers Parvez his spiritual mentor and also took formal training from him. Ustad Riaz Ali Khan states that despite being trained under the auspices of Ustad Mehdi Hassan, Parvez developed his own unique style of singing. Apart from his professional achievements, one must not forget that he was a great human being and the loyalty with, which he served Hassan in his personal life cannot be described in words. Parvez released quite a few albums, both in Pakistan and in India.