Siddiqi has worked in theatre. He was national vice-president of
Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA), and later contributed to the origin and functioning of the
Marathi IPTA, and has been associated with it as a national member. His play
Tumhari Amrita, an adaptation of
A R Gurney's classic American play
Love Letters attained cult success. It had only two actors (
Shabana Azmi and
Farooq Sheikh) reading out letters to each other with neither change of set or costume. It ran for 21 years until
Farooq Sheikh's death on 28 December 2013, and is one of the longest-running plays in India. Critic
Vijay Nair wrote "Javed Siddiqui's lines are as poignant as ever. They leap out of the letters as little gems. At times they plead with the incoherence of hurts long stifled. At times they flare up like little flames scorching the audience. At times they soothe like fresh raindrops after a scorching summer. But at all times they have a life of their own and make their presence felt like an invisible third character on stage." His play
1857: Ek Safarnama set in the
Indian Rebellion of 1857 was staged at
Purana Qila, Delhi ramparts by
Nadira Babbar and
National School of Drama Repertory company, in 2008. His plays include
Hamesha,
Begum Jaan,
Aap Ki Soniya and Kacche Lamhe.
Personal life Javed Siddiqui belongs to the family of great freedom fighters,
Mohammad Ali Jouhar and his brother
Maulana Shaukat Ali. His father was an assistant librarian at
Raza Library. His early education was in
Rampur's Hamid High School and Jaame-ul-uloom, Furqaniah. He passed his high school in English in
Aligarh Muslim University. At the age of 17, he moved to Bombay and under the guidance of his uncle Maulana Zahid Shaukat Ali, Javed started his career as a journalist in his Urdu newspaper
Khilafat Daily. He worked in newspapers such as
Inquilab and
Hindustan and then started his own newspaper named
Urdu Reporter. Siddiqui started his career in films as a dialogue writer and assistant director to
Satyajit Ray in
Shatranj Ke Khilari. He also assisted
James Ivory as chief assistant director. Siddiqui has four children. Two of them,
Lubna Salim and Sameer Siddiqui, are involved in film and theatre. ==Urdu literature==