Introduction

Gul-e-Bakawali is a popular medieval romance in many versions. The seventeenth-century poet Nawajish khan was perhaps the first to write a Bangla version of Gule Bakawali, a story in verse about the love of Prince Tajulmulk for the fairy Bakawali. There are numerous adventurous and miraculous incidents in the story, which is set in India. 'Bakawali' is the name of a flower there. The Sprinter catalogue records an Urdu Gule Bakawali written in verse in 1625. In 1722, Sheikh Izzatullah, a Bengali

Bengali people

The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...

, wrote a prose version, Tajulmulk Gule Bakawali, in persian. It is not known on which version Nawazish Khan based his poem.

There were several variant versions of Gule Bakawali, such as the poetic versions by Muhammad Mukim (1760–70), Muhammad Ali, Munsi Ebadat Ali (1840), Umacharan Mitra (1834), and Abdus Shakur, and the prose version by Bijaynath Mukhopadhyaya (1904). Kedarnath Gangopadhyaya wrote a play based on the story in 1978. Ebadat Ali's Gule Bakawali is a dobhasi puthi.

The story was also popular in Urdu

Urdu

Urdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...

. Thus, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Munsi Nehalchand Lahori wrote a prose version titled Mazhabe Ishq (1803), and Dayashankar Nasim

Daya Shankar Kaul Nasim

Daya Shankar Kaul Nasim was a Urdu poet of the 19th century who won fame for his epic Gul Bakawali. He was defended by Brij Narayan Chakbast when it was suggested that he was not the author of this book. The poet lived from 1811–1845.-External links:...

 wrote a masnavi (poem) called Gulzare Nasim (1835).

Other references

• A Novel written by Daya Shankar Kaul Nasim
  Daya Shankar Kaul Nasim
  Daya Shankar Kaul Nasim was a Urdu poet of the 19th century who won fame for his epic Gul Bakawali. He was defended by Brij Narayan Chakbast when it was suggested that he was not the author of this book. The poet lived from 1811–1845.-External links:...
  
  (1811–1845), a Urdu poet of the 19th century. His Authority was defended by Brij Narayan Chakbast
  Brij Narayan Chakbast
  Brij Narayan Chakbast, also spelled, Brij Narain Chakbast, was an Urdu poet.- Life :Chakbast was an Urdu poet. He was born in 19 January 1882 in a Kashmiri Pandit family settled in North India in 15th century A.D.. Chakbast was born in Faizabad in 1882...
  
   when it was suggested that he was not the author of the epic.
• A 1938 Punjabi
  Punjabi language
  Punjabi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by inhabitants of the historical Punjab region . For Sikhs, the Punjabi language stands as the official language in which all ceremonies take place. In Pakistan, Punjabi is the most widely spoken language...
  
   movie based on this flower, directed by Dalsukh M Pancholi, starring Noor Jehan
  Noor Jehan
  Noorjehan or Noorjehan was the adopted stage name for Allah Wasai who was a legendary singer and actress in British India and Pakistan. Her career spanned seven decades...
  
  .
• A 1955 Tamil
  Tamil language
  Tamil is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of the Indian subcontinent. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and in the Indian union territory of Pondicherry. Tamil is also an official language of Sri Lanka and Singapore...
  
   movie based on this flower, directed by T R Ramanna, starring M.G. Ramachandran,T.R. Rajakumari and G. Varalakshmi.
• A 1962 Telugu
  Telugu cinema
  The Cinema of Andhra Pradesh, also referred to as Telugu Cinema or Tollywood, is the Telugu film industry in India. The Telugu language film industry is known for being one of the three largest in terms of no.of films produced yearly in India. The Prasads IMAX theatre in Hyderabad is one of the...
  
   movie based on this flower, directed by Kamalakara Kameswara Rao, starring N. T. Rama Rao
  N. T. Rama Rao
  Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao , also known as NTR and fondly referred to as Anna Garu, was an Indian film actor, director, producer, and a politician...
  
  , Jamuna, refer Gulebakavali Katha
  Gulebakavali Katha
  For information on the nocturnal flower Gul-e-Bakavali, refer Epiphyllum oxypetalum.Gulebakavali Katha is a 1962 Telugu fantasy film directed by Kamalakara Kameswara Rao and produced by N. T. Rama Rao...
  
  .