Umran Hussain
Although drawing was an interest since childhood, it was in college that Afaaq Hamid began making cartoons on social issues, and day-to-day happenings. “I would draw funny, issue-based cartoons and upload them on my social media handles initially only after my work was recognized by a web portal namely “The Kashmir Radar,” who started publishing my cartoons on daily basis.
With Facebook, the reach of my work grew wider. That’s when I started working on broader themes,” says Afaaq, whose cartoons have started featuring in hundreds of other web portals and News papers.
Afaaq believes that Cartoon making is a graphic art which is done with a purpose of conveying a social commentry or comedy and says that he loves making cartoons because it lightens his mood.
“Whatever I observe around me I try to illustrate that through this art and it gives me immense delight when I see a huge number of people giving me a positive feedback regarding my cartoons. What I love the most is that I am able to observe the vicissitudes of life and without any narration, the image just pops out in the form of my cartoon.” Says Afaaq Hamid.
An engineering graduate Afaaq coming from Kupwara district of Jammu and Kashmir has an immense love for making cartoons and depicting the present scenarios of politics, health, education and other fields pertaining to day-to-day life.
“I have started making cartoons from last five years and the main reason being undoubtedly is our society. looking at our society, it apparently seems to be overtaken by numerous evils which became the subject of my satire initially.” Said Afaaq.
“Being an engineering student and at the same time being unemployed is something which prompted me to start making satirical illustrations about goverment policies and such illustrations received a huge response from the youth. My cartoons started making their way into hundreds of Facebook pages and group with millions of subscribers and then I started loving my work.” Said Afaaq.
Afaaq Hamid doesn’t use any animation tool or a software to make his cartoons, instead a simple pencil and paper is what he uses to portray the feeling of his fans.
A very recent cartoon by Afaaq Hamid about the third wave of pandemic led by Omicron was a hit. The cartoon was shared multiple times on various social media platforms by valleys prominent medicos, journalist and other public figures.
