Hazrat Amir Khusrau

Amir Khusrau
Amir Khusrau teaching his disciples in a miniature from a manuscript of Majlis al-Ushshaq by Husayn Bayqarah.
Background information
Birth name	Ab'ul Hasan Yamīn ud-Dīn K͟husrau
Born	1253 Patiyali, Uttar Pradesh, India
Died	October 1325 Delhi, Delhi Sultanate
Genres	Ghazal, Qawwali, Ruba'i, Tarana
Occupation(s)	Sufi, musician, poet, composer, author, scholar

Ab'ul Hasan Yamīn ud-Dīn Khusrau (1253 – 1325) (Urdu: ابوالحسن یمین‌الدین خسرو‎‎, Hindi:अमीर ख़ुसरो, Persian: امیر‌خسرو دهلوی‎‎), better known as Amīr Khusrow, was a South Asian Sufi musician, poet and scholar. He was an iconic figure in the cultural history of the Indian subcontinent. He was a mystic and a spiritual disciple of Nizamuddin Auliya of Delhi. He wrote poetry primarily in Persian, but also in Hindavi. A dictionary in verse, the Ḳhāliq Bārī, containing Persian words explained in Hindavi terms is often attributed to him. Khusrow is sometimes referred to as the "parrot of India".

Khusrow is regarded as the "father of qawwali" (a devotional music form of the Sufis in the Indian subcontinent), and introduced the ghazal style of song into India, both of which still exist widely in India and Pakistan. Khusrow was an expert in many styles of Persian poetry which were developed in medieval Persia, from Khāqānī's qasidas to Nizami's khamsa. He used 11 metrical schemes with 35 distinct divisions. He wrote in many verse forms including ghazal, masnavi, qata, rubai, do-baiti and tarkib-band. His contribution to the development of the ghazal was significant.