Anantnag, Oct 9: Mukhtar Ahmad Qasid — the celebrated Kashmiri and Urdu poet, fiction writer, and broadcaster, known to many by his pen name Zahid Mukhtar — passed away on Thursday morning at his residence in Nai Basti, Anantnag. He was 73.

According to family and friends, Mukhtar had been battling neurological ailments for the past year. His death marks the end of a luminous literary journey that wove together the themes of identity, love, resistance, and human emotion with rare eloquence.

Born in 1952 to Haji Sana Ullah Qasid of Nai Basti, Anantnag, Zahid Mukhtar rose to prominence in the 1970s as one of South Kashmir’s most versatile literary voices. Over the decades, he distinguished himself as a poet, fiction writer, dramatist, editor, and independent broadcaster.

His poetry, writt

See Full Page