We have come to Lahore with the four and a half thousand year old tradition of Faqir Mian Amir, in which only love is love, Sindh Education and Culture Minister Syed Sardar Ali Shah.

A nation whose culture dies cannot survive, we are trying to develop our culture, President Arts Council Muhammad Ahmad Shah

Anwar Maqsood, Iftikhar Arif, Hamid Mir, Nayyer Ali Dada, Kamran Lashari, Justice (R) Nasira Iqbal, Kishwer Naheed, Zafar Masood, Mian Faqir Ejazuddin, Fateh Muhammad Malik, Pirzada Qasim Raza Siddiqui, Razi Ahmed and others participated in the festival.

The three-day Pakistan Literature Festival of Arts Council of Pakistan Karachi started on Friday afternoon at Arts Council Lahore (Alhamra) and will continue till Sunday night. Sindh Provincial Education and Culture Minister Syed Sardar Shah inaugurated the festival. While Anwar Maqsood, Iftikhar Arif, Hamid Mir, Nayyer Ali Dada, Kamran Lashari, Justice (R) Nasira Iqbal, Kishwer Naheed, Zafar Masood, Mian Faqir Ejazuddin, Fateh Muhammad Malik, Pirzada Qasim Raza Siddiqui, Razi Ahmed and others were also present.

As there was no space in Al Hamraqa Hall No. 1, thousands of people attended the opening ceremony on the screen outside. Before the opening ceremony, banners and posters were displayed on major roads and intersections of Lahore city, Al-Hamra Arts Council was decorated with flags, posters and banners, while book stalls will also be set up. A majority of them were young people who gave an enthusiastic welcome to Anwar Maqsood and Hamid Mir and Ahmad Shah. During the speech of Provincial Minister Syed Sardar Ali Shah, the youth welcomed him by clapping repeatedly, whose talk was about the culture of the Indus Valley and the Sufis of Punjab. Amjad Islam Amjad who was supposed to join this festival but died suddenly this morning, his picture was placed on Amjad Islam Amjad’s empty chair, Arts Council Karachi Director Admin Shakeel Khan prayed for forgiveness of Amjad Islam Amjad while Iftikhar Arif and Kishwer Naheed expressed their wordings on the services of Amjad Islam Amjad, Provincial Minister of Education and Culture of Sindh Syed Sardar Ali Shah started his speech with the poem of Amjad Islam Amjad and said that he cannot be away from us even if he is away. He said that under the leadership of Ahmad Shah, the four and a half thousand year old Fakir Mian Amir tradition has been brought from Sindh and there is only love in it. Mian Amir was taken to lay the foundation stone of the Golden Temple. He was the trustee of inter-faith harmony. This work belongs to the institutions, Arts Council of Pakistan Karachi and Ahmed Shah are doing this work in a good way but the governments are patronizing and we will continue to patronize, he said that we have lost a lot now we have nothing left to lose. The message of the poetry of Sachal Sarmast, Lal Shahbaz Qalandar and Bhulay Shah needs to be publicized, so the Punjab government should patronize people who are trying to publicize the message of peace of the Sufis, he said. It flows from Punjab to Sindh, but today Ahmad Shah has come to Lahore from Karachi on the opposite side of the Indus River with the river of literature. This journey is our five thousand years old journey, which is a culture from Kashmir to the Indus Valley. In this culture, there are no big weapons and no king, but all the poor and advocates of peace. He said that these young people cannot be left behind. Today they have gathered in Al-Hamra in the name of literature and culture, they are the heirs of Shah and Baba Farid and the message of these Sufis shows them the way to peace. Not only in Punjab but also in KPK, Balochistan and Azad Kashmir, President Arts Council Karachi Muhammad Ahmad Shah said in his welcome speech that a nation whose culture dies cannot survive. There is a lot of hatred and fighting in our society. We have to end these hatreds by developing literature and culture and we have come to Lahore with the message of brotherhood, peace and friendship in all units to connect the youth of Pakistan with literature and culture, so we have to promote cultural activities. It should be given and this is our purpose of coming to Lahore today, he said, Lahore, Multan and Sindh They are part of the same Indus civilization, but Lahore is an ancient cultural city which has its own history and culture. However, the friends of Lahore insisted that a conference should be held in Lahore on the style of the International Urdu Conference. Thanks to those who are present in this conference today and the youth participated in the festival and put four moons to the festival, Ahmed Shah said that if this spirit of Lahoreis remains – love, then we will hold such conferences again and again in collaboration with Al-Hamra. Renowned intellectuals Anwar Maqsood, Hamid Mirfaqeer Ejazuddin and Zulfiqar Zulfi also expressed their views. They also thanked Zulfiqar Zulfi and his team.