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Brief Biography
 Harivanshrai
Srivastav Bachchan (November 27, 1907 - January 18, 2003) was a distinguished
Hindi poet, but is perhaps better known as the father of Bollywood movie
superstar, Amitabh Bachchan.
He was born in an ordinary Kayasth family in a small town near Allahabad. He was
called "bachchan" at home, which means "child." He received his formal schooling
in a municipal school and attended Kayasth Paathshaalas to learn Urdu, which was
the family tradition as the first step to a career in law. He completed his
later education both at the Allahabad University and Banaras Hindu University.
Since he gave up his university education to participate in the great upsurge of
nationalism that began in 1930.
Realizing that this was not the path he wanted to follow, he went back to
university. From 1941 to 1952 he taught in the English Department at the
Allahabad University and after that he spent the next two years at Cambridge
University doing his doctoral thesis on W.B. Yeats. It was then, that he used
‘Bachchan’ as his last name instead of Srivastav. Bachchan was the second Indian
to get his doctorate in English literature from Cambridge. After returning to
India he again took to teaching and also served at All India Radio, Allahabad.
In 1955, Harivanshrai shifted to Delhi to join the External Affairs Ministry and
during the period of 10 years that he served he was also associated with the
evolution of Hindi as the official language. He also enriched Hindi through his
translations of major writings. As a poet is famous for his poem 'Madhushala' (a
bar selling alcoholic drinks). Besides Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat, he will also be
remembered for his Hindi translations of Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Othello and
also the Bhagvad Gita. However in Nov 1984 he wrote his last poem 'Ek November
1984' on Indira Gandhi’s assassination.
He got married to Shyama his first wife, who was 14 years old, in 1926. But she
died 10 years later after suffering from a long spell of TB. Shortly after her
death Bachchan married Shrimati Teji Suri in 1941. The birth of his two sons
Amitabh and Ajitabh changed the course of his life as his days of hardship ended
when both his sons did extremely well in their careers – Amitabh became a
superstar Bollywood movie actor. Ajitabh became a successful businessman in
England.
Bachchan was nominated to the Indian Rajya Sabha in 1966 and received the
Sahitya Akademi award three years later. In 1976 he was honoured with the Padma
Bhushan for his immense contribution to Hindi literature. He was also honoured
with the Saraswati Samman, the Sovietland Nehru Award and the Lotus Award of the
Afro-Asian writers’ conference, for his unique contribution to the world of
letters. But if ever asked to introduce himself, he had a simple introduction:
Mitti ka tan, masti ka man, kshan-bhar jivan — mera parichay. (A body of clay, a
mind full of play, a moment’s life - that is me.).
Dr. Harivanshrai Bachchan passed away on January 18, 2003. Dr. Bachchan was 95
years old and had been suffering from serious respiratory ailments.
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