An important Urdu poet once remarked about Asrar-ul-Haq Majaz, "Urdu Shayari mein ek Keats paida hua tha jise taraqqi-pasand bheDiye uTha le gaye". This unique poet of romance and revolution did not get to live long owing to his excessive drinking habit. Along with his poetry, his sense of humor and quick-wittedness, too, is quite famous.
Once in Lucknow, Raja Mahmudabad advised Majaz with great affection:
“Dekho Miyan! Agar tum sharaab piina chhoD do, to main tumhare guzare ke liye chaar-sau rupiye maah-var vazifa (monthly allowance) muqarrar kar dunga.”
Majaz politely responded:
“Magar Raja Sahib! Ye to sochiye kih agar main sharab hi piina chhoD duu.n to phir char-sau rupiyon ka kya karunga?”

Pretty much the same sense of humor has passed down to Majaz’s nephew, the famous poet, lyricist, and scriptwriter Javed Akhtar’s genes.

Nida Fazli (1938-2016), whose real name was Muqtada Hassan Fazli, is obviously very famous as a poet and film songwriter, but he has also written his autobiography in a very unique way. “Diwaron Ke Baahar”, “Diwaron Ke Biich” are his two autobiographical works in which he tells his life story like a narrator. Nowhere is the first-person singular "I" used; throughout he maintains his pen-name ‘Nida’ as a character of some novel. All the characters in his autobiographical works are mentioned with their real names, and all the events are real, too.
Nida Fazli wrote forthrightly about his family, childhood, student years in Gwalior, experiences in Bombay, and love interests. And with the same forthrightness, he wrote about many others which included famous names from literature and cinema, many of whom became enraged at him.

“Marne Ki Duaa.en Kyun Mangu Jine Ki Tamanna Kaun Kare”

This famous ghazal of Moin Ahsan Jazbi (1912-2005) was sung twice in Indo-Pakistani films but both times he did not get credit for it.
Kishore Kumar sang this Ghazal in the film ‘Ziddi’ (1948) which was made by Shahid Latif, the husband of Ismat Chaqtai, and the story was written by Ismat. In 1970, the same Ghazal came out in the voice of Habib Wali Mohammad in the Pakistani film Chand Suraj and became very popular. On one hand where the Ghazal’s the closing verse was entirely omitted in Ziddi, the one in Chand Suraj kept the closing verse but removed Jazbi’s pen-name. The line, “Duniya ne hamen ChhoDa ‘Jazbii’, ham chhoD na den kyun duniya ko” was sung as:

Duniya ne hamen ChhoDa aye dil, ham chhoD na den kyun duniya ko
Duniya ko samajh kar baithe hain ab duniya duniya kaun kare

Jazbi was a professor of Urdu at Aligarh Muslim University. When one of his students asked him to write this ghazal on his autograph book, he simply replied:
“Ye Meri Ghazal Kahaan Hai…”

Distinguished Urdu satirist Mushtaq Ahmad Yousufi (1923-2018) never spent a day in his life without peeking several times into the dictionary, except for when he was ill. He was of the opinion that if he were to choose 3 books while deserted on an island, he would first take the dictionary, second Mir’s poetry, and lastly Shakespear. 

Yousufi was born in Tonk, Rajasthan. He did his MA from Aligarh Muslim University and then moved to Karachi. A banker by profession, he had masterful command over both Urdu language literature and English literature, which he used creatively in his writings. He made interesting parodies and pun on words not only of poetry but also of old prose pieces, and terms.

For the English word ‘Caricature’, Yousufi conjoined the Urdu words MasKH (metamorphosing) and KHaaka (Sketch) and created the word ‘MasKhaaka’.