Shakir Ali was the principal at the National College of Arts in Lahore at that time.

He opened up an art gallery (the first ever in Karachi) at Kutchery Road in 1965 but in 1969 left town to go abroad.

His exhibition "DAWN OF DEMOCRACY" was inaugurated by Begum Nusrat Bhutto and sporadic highs and lows followed in his career.

There were subsequent lukewarm exhibitions, the latest being at Chawkandi in August 1999 just months before his death on 19 January 2000.

Besides Bashir Mirza, the other 9 painters are: Laila Shahzada, Zubeida Agha, Sadequain, Ali Imam (painter artist), Shakir Ali, Anna Molka Ahmed, Zahoor ul Akhlaq, Ahmed Pervez and Askari Mian Irani.