Bulbul, Villu - movei and Bahadur Shah II

 

A lovely picture of Passerine birds,  some from Tamil cinema and some History !!  

Vadivelu as Maadaswamy "Maada", the village audiographer – especially that bullock cart scene made us laugh in Prabhu Deva directed movie ‘Villu’ released in 2009 – it starred   Vijay in the main dual lead role as father and son alongside Nayanthara, Ranjitha,   Vadivelu, and many others.  It was a remake of the 1998 Hindi film Soldier ,which itself was inspired from Tamil film Thaai Naadu . The film follows Pugazh, an undercover police officer, who avenges the death of his father who was an honest army officer falsely accused and killed by corrupt army officers.

 

Bahadur Shah Zafar ruled over a Mughal Empire that had by the early 19^th century been reduced to only the city of Delhi and the surrounding territory. The Maratha Empire had brought an end to the Mughal Empire in the Deccan during the 18th century and the regions of India formerly under Mughal rule had either been absorbed by the Marathas or had declared independence and become smaller kingdoms. 

Bahadur Shah II (Abu Zafar Siraj-ud-din Muhammad( [1775 –  1862),   was the twentieth and last Mughal emperor and an Urdu poet. He was a titular Emperor with his authority limited to the Walled City of Delhi, but was recognised the Emperor of India by the forces opposing East India Company forces across the Indian subcontinent during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Zafar was exiled to Yangon in British-controlled Burma in December 1857 by the East India Company after rebel defeat in the war.  He was the second son and the successor to his father, Akbar II, who died in 1837.  After the dissolution of the Mughal Empire following the war, the title of Empress of India was assumed by Queen Victoria (but only after 1876). 

Bahadur Shah Zafar's father, Akbar II, had been imprisoned by the British and he was not his father's preferred choice as his successor. One of Akbar Shah's queens pressured him to declare her son, Mirza Jahangir, as his successor.  However, the East India Company exiled Jahangir after he attacked their resident in the Red Fort,  paving the way for Bahadur Shah to assume the throne. Bahadur Shah Zafar was a devout Sufi. Before his accession, he lived like "a poor scholar and dervish", differing from his three royal brothers, Mirza Jahangir, Salim and Babur.  

The bulbuls are members of a family, Pycnonotidae, of medium-sized passerine songbirds, which also includes greenbuls, brownbuls, leafloves, and bristlebills. The family is distributed across most of Africa and into the Middle East, tropical Asia to Indonesia, and north as far as Japan. Pictured here is a variant – Red-whiskered Bulbul.  

 

The Red-whiskered Bulbul has a distinct red ear patch, and red tail coverts. Both features are very distinctive from other birds. This bulbul averages seven inches in length and can weigh from 23 to 42 grams. The birds are brownish above and white below their stomach region from birth until an age six months.  The plumage above is mostly brown.  They have a tall pointed black crest, red face patch, and thin black moustachial line. The tail is long and brown with white tips (some subspecies lack the white tips). The vent area is red. This species is more often heard than seen, especially in the mornings when they call from the tops of trees. 

The red-whiskered bulbul (Pycnonotus jocosus), or crested bulbul, is a passerine bird native to Asia. It is a member of the bulbul family. It is a resident frugivore found mainly in tropical Asia. It has been introduced in many tropical areas of the world where populations have established themselves. It has a loud three or four note call, feeds on fruits and small insects and perches conspicuously on trees.  The red-whiskered bulbul was formally described by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 under the binomial name Lanius jocosus. 

"Bulbul" is a motif in a famous Urdu couplet (sher) by Bahadur Shah Zafar, the last Mughal emperor of India. The line uses the image of a bulbul (songbird) to express themes of fate and captivity during the decline of the Mughal Empire and his subsequent exile by the British.

The specific couplet is:

 

Bulbul ko baaghbaan se na sayyaad se gila

Qismat mein qaid likkhi thi fasl-e-bahaar mein

Translation:

The bulbul has no complaints with the gardener, nor with the hunter;

Captivity was written in its destiny, even during the springtime.

 

Bahadur Shah Zafar   was a renowned Urdu poet too (using the pen name "Zafar", meaning "victory") in addition to being the nominal emperor with authority limited to the walled city of Delhi.  This specific couplet is seen as a reflection of his own feelings of helplessness and resignation to his fate as a prisoner, contrasting the beautiful natural imagery of a bulbul in springtime with the harsh reality of his imprisonment. His poetry, much like his life, often captured feelings of loss and despair during a period of intense political turmoil.  

 
Interesting !
 
Regards – S Sampathkumar
15.11.2025