Sayad Zahoor Shah
Hashmi was born on 21 April 1926 in a noble and literate family of Gwader Balochistan. He got his early education from his father Sayad Muhammad Shah Hashmi and secondary school Gwader. Beside being a distinguished poet, a prominent writer and a research scholar of Balochi language, he was adept at Persian, English, Arabic and Urdu. In 1949, he joined Radio Pakistan as Section Head of Balochi Service. In 1969, he was invited to Poona, India by Dr. Hans Strasser, a renowned linguist at the Educational and Research Center of daccen Collage. There he met Dr. N. S. Shukla a scholar of Avestan and Indo Iranian language. Their association and later work resulted in the development of the theory regarding the linguistic relation between Balochi and Aventan and Indo-Iranian languages.
Sayad Zahoor Shah Hashmi was a naturally talented and genius personality. He did the pioneering work to disentangle the complications of Balochi orthography. In this context he wrote a book “BALOCHI SYAHAG-E-RAST NABISSAG” (Proper Balochi Orthography) is a living testimonial of his abilities in the field of linguistics. Till the day he breathed his last, on 4th March, 1978, Balochi remained a passion for Zahoor Shah. He traveled extensively for his researches particularly in the Gulf and within Balochistan. He has 25 books of prose and poetry, to his credit. His magnum opus is a translation of 30th chapter of Quran-e-Hakim titled “JUZ-HAMM BALOCHI”. Also important is “SAYAD GANJ” the first and authentic Balochi dictionary.
In 1983, Sayad Hashmi Academy (SHA) was established for the survival and development of Balochi language, SHA has since published ten books. Publishing of “SAYAD GANJ” however remained an important and cherished dream for everyone at SHA for over 17 years. With the help of the Almighty the multifarious problems of completion of words, arrangements in alphabetic order, calligraphy, proofreading, illustrations, hae finally been overcome. The result is now in your hands.
The Academy would be more more than pleased to receive your comments and suggestions for the future. We regret the errors and omissions if any and hope that you will patiently bear with them.
