Mustansar Hussain Tararਮੁਸਤਨਸਰ ਹੁਸੈਨ ਤਾਰੜ

Who is Mustansar Hussain Tarar?

Mustansar Hussain Tarar, born in 1939, is Pakistan's best known travel writer and one of its most widely read Urdu novelists. Over more than fifty books he has carried readers from the streets of his home city Lahore to the base camp of K2, from Spain to Alaska, and his years hosting PTV's morning show made him a household name across Pakistan as Chacha Jee.

He writes mainly in Urdu, with some work in Punjabi and English. His travelogues, called safarnamas, changed the way travel was written in Urdu, mixing vivid description with humour, dialogue and close observation of people. His novels Payar Ka Pehla Shehr, Bahhao and Raakh are regarded as modern classics of Urdu fiction. Pakistan has honoured him with the Pride of Performance in 1992 and the Sitara-i-Imtiaz in 2017, and in August 2025 he was announced as a recipient of the Nishan-e-Imtiaz, the country's highest civil honour.

Early life in Lahore

Tarar was born on 1 March 1939. Profiles differ on the exact place of his birth: reference works generally name Jokalian, a village in Mandi Bahauddin district, while Tarar himself wrote in his book Lahore Awargi that he was born at his maternal grandparents' house in Ghakhar Mandi. What is not in doubt is that he grew up in Lahore, the city that remained the centre of his life and work.

His family came from a farming background in Gujrat district, and his father, Rehmat Khan Tarar, ran an agricultural seed store in Lahore called Kisan and Company. Tarar spent his childhood in Lakshmi Mansion on Beadon Road, where the short story writer Saadat Hasan Manto lived in the same neighbourhood. He was a child in Lahore when Partition divided Punjab in 1947.

He was educated at Mission High School in Rang Mahal and Muslim Model High School, then at Government College Lahore. After completing his F.A. he travelled to Britain and spent nearly five years in Europe, watching films and theatre, reading widely and studying textile engineering. In 1957 he visited the Soviet Union for the World Youth Festival in Moscow, an experience he wrote about in London se Moscow Tak and in the novella Fakhta.

The travelogues that made his name

Tarar's first book, Niklay Teri Talash Mein, was published in 1971. It told the story of his travels through seventeen European countries and started a new trend in Urdu travel writing. He has since written more than forty travelogues, a body of work with few equals in Urdu literature.

His northern travelogues did the most to fix his reputation. Books such as Berfeeli Bulandiyan, K2 Kahani, Nanga Parbat, Chitral Dastan, Hunza Dastan, Deosai and Safar Shumal Kay introduced generations of readers to the mountains and valleys of northern Pakistan. Tarar is himself an active mountaineer who has trekked to the base camp of K2 and to the Chitti Buoi Glacier, and his writing about the north helped to draw visitors to a region few Pakistanis had seen described in their own language. A lake in the northern areas is named Tarar Lake in recognition of that bond.

His journeys went far beyond Pakistan. Andalus Mein Ajnabi took readers to Spain, Moscow ki Safaid Raatein to Russia, Nepal Nagri to Nepal, and later books covered America, Australia, Alaska and the road from Lahore to Yarkand. In an interview he summed up his approach in a single line: “I am not a writer, a columnist, an actor or an anchor. I am just a vagabond.” He has said that what travel taught him is that good people exist in every religion, and that one person's truth is not the only truth.

Novels: Payar Ka Pehla Shehr, Bahhao and Raakh

Tarar's novels brought him a second, even wider readership. Payar Ka Pehla Shehr, published in 1974, became one of the most popular Urdu novels of its time and has run to more than fifty editions. Bahhao, his most admired novel, reaches back to the ancient Indus Valley civilisation and is regarded as his masterpiece. Raakh takes up the fall of Dhaka and the political realities that followed, and it won him the Prime Minister's Literary Award in 1999.

Other novels include Khas-o-Khashak Zamane, Qila Jangi, Qurbat-e-Marg Mein Mohabbat and Dakia aur Julaha, alongside collections of short stories, essays and newspaper columns marked by wit and close observation. He has been described as Pakistan's best selling fiction writer over two consecutive decades, and two of his books form part of the Urdu curriculum at Moscow State University. The Indian scholar Gopi Chand Narang once placed him alongside Abdullah Hussain and Intizar Hussain, saying, “In fiction, I believe in three Hussains.”

Television: actor, dramatist and Chacha Jee

Before he was famous as a writer, Tarar was a familiar face on television. He began acting in television plays in 1967 and played leading roles in hundreds of plays and serials, including Siraj-ud-Daula, Ashfaq Ahmed's Aik Mohabbat Sau Afsane and Aakhir-e-Shab. As a dramatist he wrote serials for PTV including Hazaron Raaste, Parinda, Shehpar, Sooraj Ke Sath Sath and Fareb. Hazaron Raaste, adapted from his own novel, was among his best known serials.

His widest fame on television came as a host. From 1988 he hosted PTV's live morning show Subah Bakhair for many years, the first presenter of a morning show on Pakistani television. Children knew him as Chacha Jee, the paternal uncle of all Pakistani children, a name he gave himself on air. The show mixed interviews with guests from many walks of life with a daily cartoon, sketching and calligraphy lessons and songs for children. He later hosted the Geo TV matrimonial show Shadi Online, which ran for more than 350 episodes, and travel and social programmes on other channels.

Honours and later life

Tarar's honours trace a long career. The Pride of Performance came in 1992, the Prime Minister's Literary Award in 1999 for Raakh, a lifetime achievement award in Doha in 2002, and the Sitara-i-Imtiaz in 2017. In 2022 the Pakistan Academy of Letters nominated him for the Kamal-e-Fun lifetime achievement award, to be shared with Ashu Lal Faqeer, but he refused to accept half an award. In August 2025 the government announced him as a recipient of the Nishan-e-Imtiaz, for conferment on Pakistan Day, 23 March 2026. He has also received a gold medal from Moscow State University.

Alongside his books he has been a newspaper columnist for Dawn and Daily Aaj and wrote a weekly column for Akhbar-e-Jahan. Collections of his columns, including Tarar Nama, Guzara Nahin Hota, Ullu Hamare Bhai Hain and Karwan Saraye, show the same humour and eye for detail as his travel writing. In October 2026 the ECO Cultural Institute and the Lahore Arts Council honoured him in Lahore at a ceremony titled Beyond Borders, celebrating him as a living literary figure of the region.

Asked once how he would like to be remembered, Tarar answered that he would like to be remembered as a person who devoted his whole life to his study table, as a travel writer and a novelist. Readers new to his work can start with Niklay Teri Talash Mein for the journeys, Bahhao for the novels, and Lahore Awargi for the city that shaped him.