Distinguished poet and lyricist Gopaldas Neeraj(1925-2018) was born Gopaldas Saxena in a village called Purvali, Etawah Uttar Pradesh. A Professor of Hindi literature from Dharma Samaj College,Aligarh and author of several Hindi poetry collection as well, Neeraj had been felicitated with numerous literary awards including the prestigious Sahitya Shiromani. He had also written several hindi songs like 'Ae bhai, zara dekh ke chalo', 'Kaarvan guzar gaya','likhe jo khat tujhe','shokiyon mein ghola jaye',etc. Neeraj was conferred with Padma Shri in 1991 and Padma Bhushan in 2007 apart from Filmfare (thrice) for his excellent work in the field of Liiterature and Cinema. Neeraj has left behind a huge amount of literary works,some of them include collected poems entitled Sangharsh (1944), Antardhavani (1946), Vibhavari (1948), Prangeet(1950, Dard diya hai (1956), Badar baras gayi (1957), Neeraj ki paati (1958), Kaarvan guzar gaya (1964), Phir deep jal gaya (1970) etc. He died in 2018 after a prolonged illness.