Life
Born in 1912 in Lucknow, Saleem studied at the Christian Mission College in Lucknow then did his BA and LLB at Osmania University in Hyderabad. As a politician, he was an active senior Indian National Congress member who represented Lok Sabha and served as cabinet member in different ministries. When the Congress Party split in the late 1970s he was a member of the Parliamentary Board of Congress (Urs) and as the party localized to Maharashtra under Sharad Pawar, he joined Choudhary Charan Singh's Lok Dal. He was the Vice President of Lok Dal and also a member of its parliamentary board. During the Congress Party's expulsion of V. P. Singh in 1987 and the formation of Jan Morcha, he joined the newly formed party. He played an active role in bringing all parties together and in the formation of Janata Dal. As a lawyer during his early career, he worked as an assistant to Barrister Mohammed Wasi at Hyderabad High Court. He lived in a house in Urdu Galli, now behind the Ram Krishna theatre, Hyderabad.
Before moving to Hyderabad, he lived in Lucknow with his father, in a mosque. He was quite ambitious and a bright student. When the Nizam of Hyderabad Asaf Jah VII (Osman Ali Khan Bahadur who ruled Hyderabad between 1911 and 1948) was in Lucknow on a state visit to see Sir William Malcolm Hailey, home member of the Executive Council of the Governor-General of India, Yunus went to meet the Nizam and offered him a very rare manuscript of the Holy Quran. The Nizam was very impressed with this selfless gesture and asked his Prime Minister Mir Yousuf Ali Khan, Salar Jung III to nominate him for a scholarship so that he could continue his studies. When Yunus didn't receive the scholarship even after a long wait, he went to Hyderabad. Despite continuously following up, he never ended up receiving a single rupee that the Nizam had awarded. Mohammad Yunus decided to remain in Hyderabad and take on students as a source of his livelihood and enrolled himself at the University. He was keenly interested in Urdu and from a very young age wrote poems. It was once he settled in Hyderabad that he added his pen name Saleem in his name, and henceforth was known as Mohammad Yunus Saleem.
He died on January 14, 2004, following a brief illness, in his residence in Delhi. He is survived by his two daughters Zeba and Shehla, and his son Junaid Abdul Rehman, who lives in the USA.
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