Tribute
Bulleh Shah
بلھے شاہ
c. 1680 – c. 1757 · Uch, and later Kasur, Punjab · dates reconstructed, not recorded
The Punjabi Sufi poet whose verse is still sung, argued over and quoted daily.
Bulleh Shah wrote in Punjabi at a time when the language of authority was Persian, and he wrote against authority. His kafis take apart clerical hypocrisy, caste and the certainties of the powerful, in a register ordinary people could repeat from memory.
That is why the verse survived. It was carried by singers rather than by libraries, and it is still sung: at shrines, in qawwali, and in film and popular music that reaches audiences he could not have imagined.
His shrine is at Kasur. His exact birth year is not settled, and the dates given here are the ones most commonly cited rather than a documented record.