Dramatist Haseena Moin passes away in Karachi

Writer and dramatist Haseena Moin has passed away in Karachi. She was 79 years old.

The cause of her death was not immediately announced.

Twitter was instantly flooded with an outpouring of grief at her death.

Moin, one of the most prolific dramatists in Pakistani history, was known for writing classics like Tanhaiyan, Anakhi and Dhoop Kinare. She was also the one who introduced Zeba Bakhtiar to Raj Kapoor for the movie Henna, which Moin also wrote.

Read more: Haseena in lockdown

She was last seen in public at a Pakistan Day event at the Arts Council of Pakistan in Karachi on March 23.

A day before that, she visited the Arts Council of Pakistan to get vaccinated against Covid-19.

A web-series she wrote on breast cancer is scheduled to release next month. Moin was a breast cancer survivor.

Moin was in her teens when she started writing a column for the popular children’s monthly Bhaijan. When she was in her 20s she wrote skits for the popular weekly radio programme Studio Number Nau. But it was the new audio-visual medium of TV which brought the best out of her.

She made her debut with a light comedy Happy Eid Mubarak which featured Neelofer Aleem and Shakeel. The ‘long play’ proved to be an immense success. Neelofer then played the title role in the serial Shehzori, which was Moin's adaptation of Azeem Beg Chughtai’s novel with the same name.

Read more: Haseena Moin Profile

Those were the days when PTV did not have much confidence in Pakistani writers’ ability to pen serials based on original stories. Moin was, however, encouraged to write what became Kiran Kahani, Pakistan's first original script. Iftikhar Arif, the script editor, had a good look at the script and backed her to the hilt. To say that the serial was a grand success is to state the obvious.

Her serials that followed — Zer Zabar Pesh, Ankahi, Dhoop Kinaray, Aahat, Uncle Urfi, Parchhaiyan and Tanhaiyan, to name a few, though not necessarily in the same order — were widely successful. She also wrote plays and serials for producers across the Wagah Border.