Amitabh Bachchan’s father, poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan, was Cambridge University scholar, a literary icon. Superstar once said: 'His public presence is greater than mine...'

Remember the fiery poem in Agneepath, which becomes the life mantra of the protagonist Vijay Deenanath Chauhan? The poem, which later became an anthem of emotional resilience and self-sufficiency, was penned by none other than leading man Amitabh Bachchan’s father, the late poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan. While the action drama did not set the box-office on fire when it hit the theatres in 1990, over the years, it did become a cult success, and Harviansh’s poem remains iconic even today.

While Big B eventually became a "one-man industry” (French auteur Francoise Truffaut once described him as such) and was hailed as the “sadi ke mahanayak” (leading man of the century), his father, Harivansh Rai Bachchan, was a luminary in his own right. An eminent poet and writer of the Nayi Kavita literary movement of early 20th-century Hindi literature. He was also a poet of the Hindi Kavi Sammelan.

An Illustrious Academic Background

According to a Hindu report, Harivansh Rai Bachchan taught in the English Department at Allahabad University from 1941 to 1952 before moving to Cambridge University, where he spent two years researching W. B. Yeats for his doctoral thesis. According to an article published by The Print, he was the first Indian to complete a PhD in English Literature from Cambridge University.


After returning to India, he resumed teaching and worked with All India Radio in Allahabad.

In 1955, he moved to Delhi to serve as a Special Officer for Hindi in the Ministry of External Affairs. He helped preserve the language’s accessibility by resisting efforts to distance official Hindi from everyday speech. Bachchan also enriched Hindi literature through translations of major works, including the Rubaiyat, Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Othello, and the Bhagavad Gita.

An Enviable Career

Known mostly for his poetic trilogy Madhushala, Madhubaala and Madhukalash, these books catapulted him to being a national craze. According to the Hindu report, the extraordinary success of Madhushala can be fully appreciated only when examined against the social, political and literary circumstances of its time. Interestingly, 1935 also marked the publication of Jaishankar Prasad’s Kamayani, another landmark in the evolution of Hindi poetry, a coincidence that may have held deeper significance. The following year brought the release of Godaan, Premchand’s final completed novel. While Premchand’s realistic portrayal of society anticipated emerging literary sensibilities, Kamayani, composed as a traditional Prabandh Kavya, reflected both the achievements and shortcomings of the quest for freedom expressed through Hindi Chhayavaad, the romantic literary movement of which Prasad was a leading figure.

Madhushala’s unapologetic romanticism set an ultimate challenge to the Chaayavaadi school’s mysticism and was an instant hit among the masses.

He became a household name almost overnight after the publication of Madhushaala. Such was the impact that he was often invited to Kavi sammelons, and his poems became a craze. Years later, Big B reminisced about his father’s stardom. “I have been in public life from the day I was born. I was always the son of Dr Harivansh Rai Bachchan, eminent poet, litterateur, having a public presence far greater than mine,” he told IANS.

Aside from the poem, Harivansh is also considered a pioneer in the genre of autobiography in vernacular language. He penned his life in four volumes. He was also a prolific translator – he translated works like Rubaiyat and Shakespeare’s works like Macbeth and Othello to Hindi.

Bachchan passed away in 2003 from respiratory failure. He was 95.