Ustad Bismillah Khan’s 5 shehnais stolen

​Varanasi: Thieves have stolen five shehnais of late Ustad Bismillah Khan from his son's residence in this temple town.

Khan's son Kazim Hussain had gone to his ancestral home in Hadha Sarai on November 30 and returned late on Sunday night to find the lock of the main gate of his house, situated in Dal Mandi, broken.

He went in and was shocked to see that five of late Ustad's most precious shehnais and other gifts and mementoes were missing.

Of the five shehnais, four were made of silver and one was a wooden one. The wooden shehnai was the most precious as the late Ustad used to play it on the 5th and 7th day of Muharram to present 'Aasuon ka Nazrana'.

The loss of these invaluable items of his great father's legacy has left Kazim heart broken.

As per Kazim, the silver shehnais were gifted to Ustad Bismillah Khan by late Narasimha Rao, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, Congress leader Kapil Sibal and Shailesh Bhagat.

“We were hoping that there would be a museum in his memory where we will preserve his memorabilia but who knew they would be stolen like this,” he said.

The family is now left with Bismillah Khan’s Bharat Ratna medal, Padma Shree and some other medals, he added.
The police have filed an FIR in the case and has begin investigations.

However, it is not the first time thieves have set their eyes on personal items of the late Shehnai king.

Two years back, Bismillah Khan's 'riyazi' shehnai, the one he used to play daily morning on the Ghats of the Ganges, had gone missing. It is yet to be traced.