Rahim: The poet, soldier and one of Akbar’s nine gems
Perhaps the most lasting legacy of Rahim is in the form of the 700-odd couplets that have over the years become an important part of Hindi school textbooks. “That is his immortality. A man from Akbar’s time whom every school child in the Hindi region knows,” says Harish Trivedi, professor of English at Delhi University.
Writer Rakhshanda Jalil says the greatness of his couplets lies in their simplicity and pragmatic wisdom. “They discuss philosophies and sensibilities that have stuck over centuries and are easy to understand by a 13-year-old even today,” she says.