A young Muslim girl from a poor family in Badaun district of Uttar Pradesh has created history with a remarkable display of talent and determination. Noor Jahan painted portraits of 15 Indian freedom fighters simultaneously, holding multiple pens in her mouth at one time, and completed all 15 portraits in a single frame.
The feat left many stunned, including industrialist Anand Mahindra, who called it nothing short of a miracle. Mahindra was so moved by Noor Jahan’s extraordinary skill that he announced a scholarship to support her education in painting and the arts.
Noor Jahan grew up in a poor household in Badaun, a district in western Uttar Pradesh. Despite limited resources, she developed a rare artistic ability. Her technique of holding multiple pens simultaneously in her mouth to draw detailed portraits of historical figures is entirely her own.
The portraits she painted feature 15 freedom fighters who played a role in India’s independence movement. Completing all 15 in a single frame, using only her mouth, drew wide attention across the country.
Anand Mahindra, who regularly highlights exceptional talent on social media, described Noor Jahan’s work as astonishing and pledged to fund her further studies in the field. His support has brought significant national attention to the young artist from Badaun.
Noor Jahan’s achievement carries a clear message: poverty places obstacles in a person’s path, but hard work and genuine skill remove those obstacles. Her story also challenges stereotypes about Muslim communities in India, proving that talent and ambition exist across every background and economic condition.
She has shown that a Muslim girl from a struggling family in rural Uttar Pradesh can write history through skill and effort alone.
source: http://www.radiancenews.com / Radiance News / Home> Arts & Culture> Latest News> Markers of Excellence> Report / by Radiance News Bureau / September 07th, 2026
Those who supported partition sought the then Hyderabad PM’s intervention to stop funds to Darul Uloom in UP
An image of the complaint sent to Sir Akbar Hydari against Maulana Hussain Ahmed Madani; and other connected documents preserved at the Telangana State Archives and Research Institute.
It was the time when Hindus and Muslims joined hands to fight for India’s freedom, and Darul Uloom at Deoband in Uttar Pradesh and scholars of the Islamic seminary played a vital role.
So much so that those who opposed the strong anti-partition stand of celebrated freedom fighter Maulana Hussain Ahmed Madani, who taught hadith (tradition of Prophet Muhammad) at the institution, termed it ‘anti-Muslim’, and even sought a rescinding of a grant to the seminary from the State of Hyderabad.
Documents preserved at the Telangana State Archives and Research Institute reveal that on August 22, 1938, one G.H. Siddiqui from Bijnore had complained to Prime Minister of Hyderabad, Sir Akbar Hydari, saying that Maulana Madani had unfurled a Tricolour atop his allotted quarters. He then proceeded to describe the seminary as an ‘institution which has now become a political centre of anti-Muslim religious propaganda and is now, no more an institution to give pure Islamic education’. He then sought to know whether it would be possible to briefly stop the annual grant to teach a ‘lesson’ to the staff.
Sir Hydari’s handwritten note, polite in tone and tenor, found its way to the Vice Chancellor of the seminary, Maulana Shabbir Ahmed Usmani, another celebrated Islamic scholar, to know whether this was true, even as he requested him to investigate the matter.
In his response, Maulana Usmani said that not only was the incident true, but the small flag that was once atop the quarters was replaced by a much larger one. The maulana, whose political leanings were diametrically opposed to those of Maulana Madani, supported the creation of Pakistan and eventually moved there. He had pointed out that the incident had happened in his absence. While Maulana Madani’s office had responded to inquiries, he himself had not.
The letter shows that there was not much that Maulana Usmani could do. In the letter he writes, “Esteemed sir, you may remember that as I have previously informed you that 10 or 11 years ago, when my predecessors appointed the maulana as principal of the institution, they had accepted all his conditions, that his political activities and leanings would not be restricted.”
Academic and author Shamsul Islam, in his book “Muslims Against the Partition of India”, writes that Maulana Madani, who was fiercely against partition, was famous for saying in 1937, nearly a year before the incident as mentioned in the letter to Sir Hydari, that ‘nations are based on homelands, not religion’.
Speaking to The Hindu , noted cleric and president of Jamiat-e-Ulama Hind (Arshad Madani group) Maulana Arshad Madani, who is the freedom fighter’s son, opined that the staunch opposition to partition was a result of foresight, and conviction in peaceful coexistence of communities.
“He was of the strong opinion that partition would not auger well for Muslims in India and Hindus in Pakistan. He believed that for 1,300 years, both communities lived next to each other without problems. We saw what happened after partition. He was imprisoned for a total of nine years, including in Sabarmati jail, and in Matla,” he said.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by Syed Mohammed / August 14th, 2021
Many parts of India, including parts of Kananda-speaking states, witnessed revolts against the British Raj following the mutiny of 1857. The following 132 names of the martyrs of the 1857 War of Independence are from Karnataka (hundreds of martyrs remain unaccounted for). These included Hindus-Muslims-Sikhs as well as people of all Castes and sections, women included. These names have been gathered from Dictionary of Martyrs: India’s Freedom Struggle 1857-1947, v. 5, Ministry of Culture, Government of India & ICHR, 2018. It is based on contemporary British official documents including ‘Mutiny Records’. This list has been compiled by Dr. Shamsul Islam, former Associate Professor of Delhi University, and published as a Poster during the BV Kakkilaya Oration 2023, held at University College, Mangalore on September 9, 2023.
Koppala Durga (Fort) Battle 1858
The bloodiest anti-British rebellion was at Koppala Fort under the leadership of Bhima Rao Nadagouda, also known as Mundaragi Bhima Raya. Bhima Raya was born as the son of Ranga Rao, Tehsildar of Bellary. Bhimaraya himself served as a Mamledar (a land revenue official) in Bellary, Hoovina Hadagali, and Harapana Halli. He could not stand the exploitation of peasantry under British rule and he was finally dismissed from his position as a result of his protests against the British exploitation of the peasantry. He led the anti-tax propaganda in Dharwad and urged people to join the anti-British movement. In 1857, he gathered 300-400 people and planned a revolt at Hammigi.
However, he had to hold the plan as the information leaked and the District Collector got to know about their plan. He was a friend of Nana Saheb and the latter urged him to revolt in his letters.
He contacted various groups of Beda fighters and started accumulating arms and creating ammunition dumps at various places. He organized an anti-British alliance of patriotic chiefs like Kenchan Gowda Sirnagowda of Govenkop, Srinivas Desai of Dumbal, and Bhaskar Rao Bhave of Nargund, and raised an army of over 3,000 soldiers. On 23 May 1858, the founder of Dambal raided one such arms cache of Kenchan Gowda at Hammigi and sealed it. Rao and his comrade Soratur Desai gathered supporters and marched on Hemmigi took back all the arms and ammunition and shifted to a safer place in Shirahatti. Then he started raiding British armories in various places. Many local landowners and kings supported Bhimaraya and joined him in the revolt. When the British took Bhimaraya’s wife and kids as hostages, Bhimaraya came with his army freed his family went to the fort in Koppal, and prepared to fight with a large stock of food, arms, and ammunition. By May 30, they and Kenchan Gowda had fled to Koppal Fort after killing the security guards, looting the weapons, and attacking the treasuries at Dambal and Gadag. British gathered a large force from their stations at Dharwad, Raichur, Hyderabad, and Bellary and marched on Koppal fort. After a fierce fight, Bhimaraya fell to the bullets on 1 June 1858. British carried out brutal reprisals against Bhimaraya’s associates and supporters.
Martyrs of the Koppaladurg Battle 1858
Bhim Rao Nadgowda: Mundargi, Gadag. Leader. Fell at the battleground after gallant resistance and died on 1 June 1858.
Kenchan Gowda Sirnagowda: Hammigi, Mundaragi, Gadag. Leader. Killed during the battle near the gateway of the fort on 1 June 1858. Captured by the British during the battle, sentenced to death, and shot dead by firing squad or blown away with a cannon in June 1858
3.Bala Saheb: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag
4. Baramappa: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
5. Barma: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
6. Bani Saheb: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
7. Barmappa: Nowli, Hadagali, Ballary.
8. Basava: Mundwad, Mundargi, Gadag.
9. Basavanna: Navalagund, Dharwad.
10. Basayya: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
11. Basayya: Wadarhatti, Mundargi, Gadag.
12. Basayya Talari: Tahrargi, Mundargi, Gadag
13. Bawa/Baba Saheb: Kurlahalli, Gadag.
14. Beemah: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
15. Beemnah: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
16. Bassya: Kundgul, Dharwad.
17. Bhim: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
18. Bhima: Kukanur, Yelburga, Koppal.
19. Bhima: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
20. Bhimanna: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
21. Bhimappa: Hirenandihal, Koppal.
22. Burmah: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
23. Channappa: Betageri, Gadag.
24. Chenna: Singtalur, Mundargi, Gadag.
25. Chunia Virappa: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
26. Daud Saheb: Venkatapur, Mundargi, Gadag.
27. Durga: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
28. Ella: Hammigi, Gadag.
29. Eman Saheb: Kurlahali, Mundargi, Gadag.
30. Fakeer Saheb: Kurlahali, Mundargi, Gadag.
31. Girianna: Kurlahali, Mundargi, Gadag.
32. Gograppa: Hemmigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
33. Gograppa: Kurlahalli, Gadag.
34. Gurda: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
35. Hamid Sahib: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
36. Hammanna: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
37. Hanagowda: Gangapur, Mundargi, Gadag.
38. Hanumanna: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
39. Hareah Saheb: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
40. Hayat Saheb: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
41. Hayat Saib: Bannur, Koppal Hiriyappa:
42. Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
43. Hulgia: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
44. Hunma: Waddarhatti, Mundargi, Gadag.
45. Hunnamah: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
46. Hussun Saib: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag
47. Jivan Sahib: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
48. Junah: Hammigi, Raichur.
49. Kajah: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
50. Karka: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
51. Karka: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
52. Karyanna: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
53. Lakshmana: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
54. Latchma: Bagewardi, Gadag.
55. Laxmana: Bagewadi, Mundargi, Gadag.
56. Linga: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
57. Linga: Harpanahalli, Bellary.
58. Linga: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
59. Madarangah: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
60. Malliah: Waddarhatti, Mundargi, Gadag.
61. Mudallaner: Kuran, Koppal.
62. Mulla (II): Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
63. Mulla (I): Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
64. Peeru: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
65. Pongari: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
66. Punee Saheb: Hammigi, Gadag.
67. Ramannah: Singatalur, Mundargi, Gadag.
68. Ranga (II): Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag
69. Ranga (I): Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
70. Sahib Husain: Kurlahali, Mundargi, Gadag.
71. Shidda: Bagwadi, Mundargi, Gadag.
72. Syed Budin: Bankapur, Haveri.
73. Tammanna: Kukanur, Yelburga, Koppal.
74. Tammayya: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
75. Timma: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
76. Tummanah Talari: Hesarur, Mundargi, Gadag.
77. Ukunda: Kurlahalli, Mundargi, Gadag.
78. Urvee: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
79. Vallabhadas: Bagewadi, Mundargi, Gadag.
80. Veerappa: Raichur.
81 .Vobul Doss: Begewadi, Gadag.
82. Yalya: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
83. Yllya: Hammigi, Mundargi, Gadag.
84. Balakristayya: Bhalki, distt. Bidar is a descendant of the royal family of Satara. Captured by the British and sentenced to transportation for life, died in penal servitude.
Nargund Revolt
The principality of Nargund was under British overlordship and Bhaskar Rao Bhave also known as Baba Saheb rose to the throne of Nargund in 1842. As he did not have a son, he wanted to adopt one to create an heir for Nargund. The British refused permission and this enraged Baba Saheb and he got in touch with several rulers in Karnataka like Mundaragi Bhimaraya, Surpur Venkatappa Nayaka, the Desais of Hammigi, Dambal, Soratur, and many others. He was aware of the North Indian uprising and wanted to time his revolt in June of 1857. However, he postponed the date at the last moment. In May 1858 when the British sent a force to prevent his networking with other rulers, he attacked them and brought the decapitated head of Officer Manson, the head of the British force sent to suppress him, to his fort and displayed it to the people. The British army marched to Nargund Fort on 1st June. Baba Saheb, upon realizing the treachery of his close associates sought help from Bhimrao and Kenchan Gowda. But they were busy fighting the British at Koppal. The British force killed around 70 men and burned the possessions of Saheb. Though he escaped from the fort, he was later captured at Toragal forest. He was tried and hanged at Haystack Hill at Belgaum on 12 June 1858.
Martyrs of Naragund Revolt
Bhaskar Rao Bhave: Ruler of Nargund Princely State, Gadag. Revolted against the British for the question of adoption, murdered S. J. Manson. He was caught and hanged at Haystack Hill at Belgaum on 12 June 1858.
2. Vishnu Hirekoppa alias Vishnu Kulkarni: Hirekoppa, Nargund, Gadag. Reported to have beheaded the British Officer, Manson, at Sureban on the night of 29 May 1858. Hirekoppa was captured and hanged publicly at Nargund in 1860.
3. Srinivas Veenkatadri Desai: Dumbal, Gadag. Joined the Chief of Nargund, Bhimrao Mundargi, and others on 24 May 1858. Caught and blown away with a gun on 12 June 1858.
4. Bapu: Nargund, Gadag. He was Naik (leader) of the Shetsanadis of Nargund. On the charge of assisting the Chief of Nargund in his rebellion against the British, he was caught on 10 June 1858 and hanged in front of the Petah of Nargund.
5. Arjun: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and hanged on 24 June 1858 in front of the Petah of Nargund.
6. Basappa: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
7. Basappa: Amargol, Nargund, Gadag. Caught on 18 June 1858 and hanged in front of the Petah of Nargund Basappa
8. Sindagi: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and shot dead by musketry at Nargund on 12 June 1858.
9. Basappa Tambe: Nargund, Gadag. Caught and hanged at a public place at Dharwad in June 1858.
10. Bhawani Singh: Koppal, Kiledar of Koppal. Captured and shot dead
11. Fakir Mohammad: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested, shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
12. Faras Khan: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested, shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
13. Gangadhar Chintamun alias Anna Sahasrabudhe: Nargund, Gadag. He was a Clerk in the Nargund Princely State; aged 24. Arrested, hanged to death at a public place at Dharwad in June 1858.
14. Govind Dhanagar: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 12 June 1858.
15. Govind Narayan Parachure alias Anna Parachure: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and hanged at Dharwad in June 1858.
16. Guddu: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested, shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
17. Hanumant Ghatage: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and shot dead by firing squad on 28 June 1858. Hanumanta: Nargund, Gadag. Captured and hanged at Dharwad in the last week of June 1858.
18. Imam Ismail: Nargund, Gadag. Shot dead by musketry at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
19. Kallappa: Shirole, Nargund, Gadag. Captured and shot dead by firing squad on 28 June 1858
20. Laxman Janardan: Nargund, Gadag arrested and shot dead by musketry at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
21.Linga: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested on 18 June 1858 and hanged in front of the Petah of Nargund.
22. Piraji: Nargund, Gadag. Captured, shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
23. Raghoba Limaya: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and hanged in front of the Petah of Nargund on 16 June 1858 at 6 p.m.
24. Rehaman Khan: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and charged with waging war against the British between 24 May and 2 June 1858, was shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 12 June 1858.
25.Raju: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and hanged on 24 June 1858 in front of the Petah of Nargund.
26. Ramappa: Nargund, Gadag. Captured, shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
27. Shankrappa Desai: Kalas and Madathi, Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and hanged on 24 June 1858 in front of the Petah of Nargund.
28. Tammanna: Nargund, Gadag. Captured and shot dead by firing squad on 28 June 1858.
29. Timmappa alias Rangappa Mazumdar: Nargund, Gadag. Captured and hanged by neck on 28 June 1858.
30. Tukaram: Nargund, Gadag. Captured and shot dead by firing squad at Nargund on 10 June 1858 at 5 p.m.
31. Venkappa Naik: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested, and hanged on 24 June 1858 in front of the Petah of Nargund.
32. Vyanakatrao Bhosle: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and shot dead by firing squad on 28 June 1858.
33. Bhikajipant Ganesh Gokhale: Nargund, Gadag. Arrested and sentenced to transportation beyond the Sea for life. He was deported to the Andaman Islands where he died in custody.
Bedas of Halagali
Bedas were one of the fighting tribes that fought the British tooth and nail from the 1820s and formed the backbone of many uprisings in the Deccan. Bearing arms to protect themselves and the community and their king was part of their life and they did it with great pride. The prince of Mudhol had accepted British overlordship and the Bedas in the area were seething with dissatisfaction. The East India Company announced on 11 September 1857 that all Indians should disarm, submit their arms to the company and then get licences to carry arms. This was simply out of the question for Bedas. Hence when the Company Sarkar’s edict was sought to be implemented by the King of Mudhol principality, the Bedas of Halagali and surrounding areas considered it a great insult and defied him. Declaring that bearing arms was their birthright and that they did not need anybody’s permission for the same, they did not allow any official to enter their villages. The revolt, which started in Halagali, kept snowballing and started spreading to surrounding areas. The British Raj saw it as a serious threat to its rule and when the local ruler was not able to suppress it, the southern Maratha regiment led by Lt Col Seton Karr was sent to quell it. The Bedas, though vastly outnumbered, fought fiercely for their rights. The British after the final battle captured 290 Bedas and hanged 19 leaders of the uprising in Mudhol market in December 1857.
Martyrs of Halagali
01. Babaji Sovaji Nimbalkar: Halagali, Mudhol Princely State, Bagalakot. The chief organizer of the revolt against the British. Killed in a clash on 30 November 1857.
02. Balappa: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalkot, Karnataka. Arrested and shot dead in the Belgaum prison.
03. Basappa: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Captured and hanged at a public place at Dharwad in the last week of June 1858.
04. Bhimanna Mandagai: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Caught and blown away with a cannon at Halagali on 14 December 1857.
05. Dadanna: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Killed while fighting on 30 November 1857.
06. Dyamavva: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. She was killed while fighting on 30 November 1857.
07. Jadagannavar Jadagappa: Halagali, Mudhol. Killed in the course of a battle on 30 November 1857.
08. Madar Dyamanna: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Killed in an encounter with the British on 30 November 1857.
09. Pujari Hanamma: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Killed in fighting on 30 November 1857.
10. Rama: Halagali, Mudhol, Bagalakot. Killed in fighting on 30 November 1857.
Surpur Rebellion
Surapur or Shorapur near Yadgiri, was ruled by Beda Nayak kings who had a fighting tradition. When Raja Krishnappa Nayak died in 1842, Prince Venkatappa Nayak the 4th was only 8 years old. Although he was enthroned, Meadows Taylor a British administrator was appointed as the Regent. In 1853 Taylor handed over the reins to 19-year-old Venkatappa Nayak. In 1857, the British got wind that some representatives of Nana Saheb came to Surapur and had secret meetings with young Raja Venkatappa Nayak. The information that Venkatappa Kayak was closely working with other rebels in the neighboring areas such as Koppal, Naragund, Raichur, Miraj, etc., increased the anxiety of the British. In February 1858, they sent troops led by Capt Windham and Maj Hughes to attack Surapur and a fierce battle ensued. When they were outnumbered, the Raja escaped to Hyderabad but he was handed over to the British. The Raja was sentenced to life imprisonment and while he was being transported to Chenglepet jail from Sikandarabad, shot himself dead on 11 May 1858 at Ambatur
Martyrs of Surapur
01. Venkatappa Nayak: Raja of Surapur, Yadagiri. Arrested for his refusal to bow down and for organizing an anti-British revolt. While being escorted to Chinglepet Prison in Madras Presidency, shot himself dead on 11 May 1858 at Ambatur.
02. Mahipal Singh: Bujora in Banda in Bengal Presidency. He was an emissary of the Chief of Surapur to organize the revolt against the British at Belgaum; he was caught and executed on 14 August 1857 at the age of 35.
03. Hanamappa Naik: Surapur, Yadagir. Played a prominent role in organizing the rebellion of the Arab troops stationed in the area. He was captured by the British and promptly executed by hanging in 1857.
04. Tasdiq Husein: Surapur, Yadagiri. A chief leader and organizer of the rising of the Surapur army, Husein was caught and publicly hanged at a marketplace of Surapur Town, on 3 July 1858.
Other Martyrs
05. Basalingappa: Jambagi, Bijapur. A peasant proprietor. Captured by the British in Jambagi, he was hanged in 1858.
06. Chhattu Singh Rajput: Jamakhandi, Bijapur. A farm laborer refused to surrender arms and to give land revenue; was arrested by the British and executed by hanging in 1857.
07. Chhotu Singh: Commandant of the troops in the Jamakhandi Princely State. Arrested by the British, he was blown away with a cannon in October 1858 at Jamakhandi
08. Mohammed Hussain (Munshi): Poona, Maharashtra. A disciple of Nurul Huda of Poona, he was sent from Poona to Belgaum to give the Sepoys anti-British hostilities. He was apprehended there and executed on 14 August 1857 on the charge of treason.
source: http://www.english.varthabharati.in / Vartha Bharati / Home> Karavali / compiled by Dr Shamsul Islam / September 09th, 2023
The Academy has formed a committee comprising academicians and researchers, and they will be publishing a book on the lives of the freedom-fighters from Karnataka titled ‘Yaaroo Ariyada Veeraru’.
“59 persons from Karnataka, who were part of the 1857 rebellion, were imprisoned in the Cellular Jail in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. We don’t want their names to be erased from the chronicles of India’s freedom struggle,” says L.N. Mukundraj, president of the Karnataka Sahitya Academy.
Aiming to study the lives of these incarcerated people, the Academy has formed a committee comprising academicians and researchers. Soon, they will be publishing a book on their lives titled ‘Yaaroo Ariyada Veeraru’.
The Cellular Jail in Port Blair in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands was used by the British to exile freedom fighters and political prisoners who had to endure brutal and inhumane conditions.
Committee set up
Mr. Mukundraj explained, “We formed a committee led by writers and historians K.P. Suresh and Vijay Poonacha to study those from Karnataka who died in ‘Kala Pani’, as the punishment was called.” In the State Budget 2026-27, former chief minister Siddaramaiah had announced the publication of such a book.
The committee comprises 15 persons, of which eight will collect documents, and seven will do the fieldwork. The documentation team will search for documents in places that were earlier part of the Bombay Presidency. “Dharwad district is one place where we might find the details of many of these freedom fighters in government archives and libraries. The majority of them hailed from Nargund town in Gadag district.”
South Indians forgotten
Mr. Suresh added that those from southern India rarely figure in the annals of the freedom struggle. “These 59 persons incarcerated in Cellular Jail were mostly from north Karnataka and Uttara Kannada district,” he said, adding that often only big names like Hindutva ideologue V.D. Savarkar are highlighted while talking of those who suffered in Cellular Jail.
Some of these individuals were part of the rebellion of Halagali Bedas in 1857-58, from the village of Halagali near Mudhol. Writer Latha Guthi has published a book on the theme, called Kari Neeru. “This book is a source for us. Our field team and documentation team will head to different places in Karnataka to find such sources. We have decided to put up banners in the villages of these freedom fighters urging people to come forward, and tell us if they know anything, or have documents,” said Mr. Suresh.
Some names…
Among the 59 persons from Karnataka imprisoned in Cellular Jail were Balakrishna from Bidar, Gopal Bhandari from Karwar, Faras Khan from Nargund, Bikaji Ganesh Gokhale from Nargund, Vitu Gawli from Karwar, and Abdulla Moiuddin from Nargund.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> India> Karnataka / by Rashmi Patil / June 30th, 2026
It is a commonly held notion that the states of India are natural units, each a homeland of a particular language and culture that existed long before 1947. The formal recognition of these states after India became a Republic was nothing but natural.
A Slice of History
History shows that the political boundaries most Indians live inside today were drawn by a three-member commission that submitted its report on 30 September 1955. This means that the line that separates a Kannadiga from a Malayali or a Bihari from a Bengali was an innovation.
Till then, India had simply carried forward former British provinces, princely states and centrally administered territories, classified under a four-tier system of Part A, B, C, and D states inherited from the Government of India Act of 1935. It was Sir Syed Fazl Ali, a judge from Benares (Varanasi), who led the work to define the boundaries of Indian states,
Born on 19 September 1886 in Varanasi to Saiyid Nazir Ali, Fazl Ali belonged to a family of lawyers, with roots in Bihar. He studied at Muir Central College, Allahabad (now Prayagraj), and at the Middle Temple, London.
Oner his return to India, in 1912, set up practice in the district courts of Chapra, Bihar, arguing criminal cases before subordinate judges. This apprenticeship carried him to the Patna High Court in April 1928, with a deputation to settle labour disputes at the Tata steel works in Jamshedpur.
He was knighted in the New Year Honours of 1941, became acting Chief Justice of Patna in 1938 and permanent Chief Justice in January 1943.
Fazl Ali also chaired the inquiry into the Royal Indian Naval Mutiny of February 1946, one of the last rebellions against the British Empire in India. Later he sat on the Calcutta Disturbances Enquiry Commission, investigating the killings during the partition.
Fazl Ali was elevated to the Federal Court in June 1947. In three months and an Independent India, he went as India’s delegate to the second session of the United Nations General Assembly, where he was elected chairman of its Fifth Committee. In 1950, he became one of the eight judges of the Supreme Court of India. He was also the first Muslim to sit on that bench.
One of his dissenting notes as a Supreme Court judge made history. Indian Parliament had passed the Preventive Detention Act of 1950, allowing the state to jail a person without trial. In A.K. Gopalan versus State of Madras, decided on 19 May 1950, Chief Justice Harilal Kania led the majority in holding that a citizen could be stripped of his liberty by any procedure Parliament chose to enact, however unfair, so long as it was called law.
Two of the six judges who disagreed were Fazl Ali. Fazl Ali held that the procedure established by law had to rest on four elementary principles, which he summed up in a single line: “the right to be heard before one is condemned.” It took twenty-eight years and the government’s arbitrary seizure of a young woman’s passport, without explanation, for the Supreme Court to agree with him.
In Maneka Gandhi versus Union of India in 1978, the Court finally read fairness back into Article 21, and nearly every later right to dignity, privacy and due process in India has been built on that foundation. In fact, less than two years after Gopalan, Fazl Ali had already sat with the majority in the State of West Bengal versus Anwar Ali Sarkar, striking down a law that let the government to select certain cases for trial in Special Courts, bypassing ordinary procedures.
The Court held that such discretionary power violated Article 14 of the Constitution, as it allowed arbitrary and unequal treatment of similar offences. Indian courts still apply the test of reasonable classification under Article 14 that this judgment helped establish.
In 1952, Potti Sreeramulu fasted for a separate Telugu state. He died in the process, and there was unrest in the region. This forced Jawaharlal Nehru’s government to concede to reorganisation of India along linguistic lines.
In December 1953, Ali Fazl Ali, then Governor of Odisha, was asked to head a commission with the historian-diplomat K.M. Panikkar and the veteran liberal parliamentarian H.N. Kunzru as members for the purpose. For almost two years they toured the country, took evidence region by region and read memoranda from parties, princes and peasants. They weighed every demand against four tests – national unity and security, linguistic and cultural homogeneity, financial and administrative viability, and the welfare of the people in each proposed state.
The Commission submitted its report on 30 September 1955. The report said that it was guided by the principle that “the unity of India must be regarded as the paramount consideration,” and refused to accept one language, one state as an absolute rule.
Not every line the commission drew was viable. For example, it kept Maharashtra and Gujarat together as a bilingual Bombay state. The plan was not acceptable to both Marathi and Gujarati speakers, and the state was split into Maharashtra and Gujarat in 1960.
The commission had recommended 16 states and three union territories as against the final Reorganisation Act of November 1956 going for 14 states and six UTs. However, the template was intact. Punjab and Haryana followed it in 1966. Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand followed it in 2000. Telangana followed it in 2014. Every one of these reorganisations has worked within the same administrative and legal vocabulary that Fazl Ali’s commission wrote, that a community’s claim to its own language and government must be weighed against, never simply surrendered to, the unity and coherence of the nation.
Fazl Ali spent his last years as Governor of Assam, working to bring the Naga hills into the administrative mainstream. He opened a college at Mokokchung, Nagaland that still bears his name.
Fazl Ali’s son, Syed Murtaza Fazl Ali, became Chief Justice of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court and, in 1975, a judge of the very Supreme Court his father had helped inaugurate. Sir Syed Fazl Ali was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 1956. He died in office on 22 August 1959.
Sir Syed Fazl Ali led no mass movement. But every time an Indian under arrest demands to know the grounds, every time a citizen calls a law arbitrary before a court, and every time someone crosses from one state into another without a thought for how that border came to sit exactly there, they are repeating an argument first made by a Varanasi-born Bihari judge.
source: http://www.awazthevoice.in / Awaz, The Voice / Home> Stories / by Saquib Salim / September 11th, 2026
Started as a local bi-weekly newspaper, Madinah soon commanded a massive subcontinent-wide circulation. While most newspapers at the time focused on major colonial urban centres such as Lahore, Delhi or Calcutta, Madinah instrumentalised its place of inception—Bijnor—as a political shield.
‘Madinah,’ a bi-weekly newspaper founded in 1912 by Mohammad Majeed Hasan, began in his courtyard in the small qasbah of Bijnor in the Northwest United Provinces (present-day Uttar Pradesh). Its inception is later recounted in a dream narrative published in Madinah’s silver jubilee edition in 1939, which describes how Hasan dreamt of “a bright moon shining in the sky, being eclipsed by another moon appearing from behind and drifting away from it, becoming brighter as the dream continued.”
Hasan had been working as a journalist in Lahore while also preparing for a career as a judge. He is said to have had the dream shortly after abandoning his training and returning to Bijnor to continue working for the family newspaper Sahifa, whose modest readership had already begun to dwindle. Hasan later interpreted the dream as a sign that he should start his own newspaper, symbolised by a new shining moon.
Hasan’s first wife, Muhtarma Kaneez Fatimah, whose altruistic nature and firm belief in his venture compelled her to help him start the paper, sold her jewellery to support it. She later proved to be an intelligent and capable assistant in the newspaper’s production, despite being unable to read or write.
It was she who inspired the newspaper to include a separate women’s section named Akhbar-i-Nisvan on one of its last pages. The section frequently appeared during the newspaper’s first three years, from 1912 to 1915, and was intended to serve the interests of Muslim women by including editorials and creative pieces written by both men and women.
Soon, the paper had distinctly identified itself among its audience by creating a space for Muslim women, with a special focus on mothers, to discuss their issues through genres such as poetry and fiction.
The unlikely epicentre: importance of the Qasbah
Started as a local bi-weekly newspaper, Madinah soon commanded a massive subcontinent-wide circulation. While most newspapers at the time focused on major colonial urban centres such as Lahore, Delhi or Calcutta, Madinah instrumentalised its place of inception—Bijnor—as a political shield. In the same year as Madinah’s inception, Maulana Azad, at the age of 23, started the paper Al-Hilal in Calcutta, which was lauded among the Muslim elite and others for its publishing style and genre, soon reaching a pinnacle of readership.
In contrast, Madinah’s unique approach, which embraced the values of the gentry while also appealing to a broad readership beyond the traditional urban elite, distinguished the paper from the incessant urban cynicism that was becoming a prevalent theme throughout the landscape of production. Due to better readership and the greater availability of resources in urban areas, similar endeavours to Madinah redirected themselves to these spaces.
In its founding years, Madinah also addressed British officials, adopting varying strategic and bargaining stances against surveillance and strict government policies through explicit deference to colonial authorities. For instance, Hasan, the proprietor of the newspaper, cited the Ijazat (permission) of the Magistrate and Collector of Bijnor in its inaugural issue. This attentiveness to British intelligence provided the necessary immunity required for the functioning of the newspaper, unlike Azad’s Al-Hilal, which came under heavy scrutiny from the colonial government and had to cease publication by the end of 1914.
Newspapers in urban centres, such as Awadh Akhbar, persisted in their efforts to speak to a broad audience delineated more by language and culture than by religion, while papers such as Madinah reinforced an already rich discursive tradition surrounding religion and identity in the social crevices known as qasbahs (small towns). They also engaged with contested political themes debated by scholars and leaders, including the shaping of early narratives of separatism and communalism among Indian Muslims.
The success of Madinah can be attributed to the spatio-temporal advantages of the qasbah, which can be defined as a place of bureaucratic and market significance where a Muslim minority or majority lived alongside populations from other communities, alongside an influential enclave of intellectual vivacity and economic and political importance for Muslims. Scholar M. Raisur Rahman described qasbahs as “an alternative site for contestation with strong autonomous networks of culture, literature and religion”, while simultaneously defining them as a ‘unique space’ and a ‘microcosm of larger idealized national life’.
These spaces have been significantly important sites in the history of South Asian culture, shaping identities and literary traditions while remaining distinct from the typologies of urban environments, where modernity had already seeped through the sutures of cultural exchanges with the outside world.
Madinah and its role in politics
The political trajectory of Madinah transformed profoundly during the period of World War I, following the Balkan Wars. The paper broadened its purview by juxtaposing the localised ethos and culture of the qasbah with larger international crises, particularly the imminent dismantling of the Ottoman Empire.
Navigating the intricacies of a contested political landscape, Madinah supposedly guarded a global Islamic consciousness through its promotion of the Khilafat Movement and its shared affiliation with Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind. Consequently, its support for the Indian National Congress and its anti-separatist stance against Jinnah became apparent, aligning with Jamiat’s idea of Composite Nationalism, as Madinah continued to anchor itself in the secular, anti-colonial bedrock of Urdu journalism.
According to scholar Gyanendra Pandey, Madinah served as a vital barometer of Muslim public opinion across this shifting timescape. Driven by the ideological synergy of Hindu-Muslim unity during the Non-Cooperation and Khilafat movements, the publication commanded an astounding peak circulation of 12,500 copies by 1922. However, this radical nationalism invited severe repercussions from the colonial state, notably resulting in the paper being banned in Punjab following its courageous and explicit reporting on the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre. Following the ban, the paper was relaunched in August 1919 under a new name—Yasrab (Madinah in Arabic)—as an act of strategic defiance against the colonial government, with a couplet from Iqbal:
Khāk-i Yasrab az do ‘ālam khūshtar ast, Ā’e khunak shahre ke ānjā dilbar ast
(The dust of Madinah is better than both worlds, How wonderful is the city where the beloved is.)
As the landscape of production became increasingly fragmented by communal cynicism and the mass political momentum of the early 1920s waned, the paper witnessed a decline in readership, with circulation dipping to 6,500 in 1927 and further to 6,000 by 1931.
Despite this dwindling circulation, Madinah remained a formidable and persistent critic of communal separatism throughout the 1930s and 1940s. Engaging with the contested political themes of the era, the paper sought to dismantle the early narratives of the All-India Muslim League. Pandey highlights a remarkably bold editorial from the 1930s that dismissed the League as being “neither dead nor alive”, asserting that its existence was confined merely to “the brain and mind of Mr. Jinnah”.
By 1942, the newspaper had effectively transformed into an open town hall, enabling ordinary citizens to debate and largely resist the looming Pakistan movement from within the landscape of the qasbah.
The script and scripture
The prevalent Urdu script, Nastaliq, which had been used throughout South Asia for centuries and was imported from Persia, featured intricate details, ornamentation and a complex structural form forged through the meticulous amalgamation of the Naskh and Ta’liq calligraphic traditions. It became the most recognisable Urdu script and developed strong cultural and ideological ties with the Urdu language. However, due to the rise of globalisation and the growing demand to produce literature for the public, it became increasingly difficult to produce works in the script lithographically on a mass scale. By the end of the 1970s, Nastaliq began to advance with the help of Mirza Jamil Ahmad, who created more than 20,000 combinations to bring the script into the digital world under the name Noori Nastaliq.
By the time the digitisation process began, Madinah was already out of business, shutting down its press with its last issue in 1976. During the seven decades that the paper survived, its editors had no keys to the press and no screens to reflect upon. Instead, the issues of Madinah were produced solely by hand, by calligraphers and artists alike.
The Urdu script Nastaliq had been established as the standard for almost every copy of the holy book Quran in South Asia since the Mughal period. By the time Madinah began using the same script as its standard, it already carried connotations of purity, holiness and divinity within the cultural landscape. Combined with the organic practice of producing it by hand rather than by machine, the paper was considered by its readers to embody a deliberate resistance against illegitimate mechanisation and the rising industrialisation of the subcontinent, curating a new political discourse based on the cultural symbolism of the script.
By using and retaining lithographic practices in an era when other papers were increasingly relying on mechanical typography for efficiency, Nastaliq was perceived as a tactile and handcrafted discipline that preserved the inherent spirit of prose, shielding the paper’s contributions from the mechanical and indifferent processes of Western print capitalism.
The inevitable descent
By the 1940s, Madinah had begun engaging in intense print debates with the supporters and proponents of pro-Muslim League newspapers and writers, arguing in a polemical fashion that religion could not be the sole determinant of a nation’s survival. Despite the paper’s persistent efforts to resist the pro-League and separatist stance, it witnessed the partition of the Indian subcontinent into two parts. The social capital of Madinah was on the verge of collapse, as the paper saw affluent members of the Muslim community, who had constantly contributed to its production and editorials, leave for the other side of the border.
The Language Act of 1951 became a huge blow to the publishing house of Madinah, as Hindi was soon adopted as the state language in Uttar Pradesh, mandating officials and government offices to maintain all data in Hindi and extensively replacing Urdu in institutions under the newly formed Indian government. Although the apparent marginalisation of the paper’s foundational language and the loss of its social capital were significant blows in the paper’s history, they were unable to overshadow its continuing legacy.
Madinah, managing to survive, remained a prominent, albeit ageing, symbol of pre-Partition nationalist Muslim political identity, advocating for the preservation of Urdu heritage amid the growing socio-political shifts in Uttar Pradesh. At the same time, it continued to struggle against declining circulation as newer, faster-printed typographic dailies overtook the market. Its reports on the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 and the creation of Bangladesh vindicated the paper’s historical assertion that religion alone could not hold a nation together, while it also continued reporting on rising communal tensions in the country.
The prodigious endeavour was about to culminate in the years following the Indo-Pakistani War. Near the end of its operational life, the paper’s traditional lithographic format and qasbah roots struggled to attract younger, urbanised readers. The deteriorating health of Hasan finally caught up with him, leading to his death in 1972. The handling of the newspaper remained in the hands of Hasan’s family until its last editor, Syed Hasan, finally ceased publication, quietly closing the press in 1975.
References
Jones, J. (2023). Megan Eaton Robb: Print and the Urdu Public: Muslims, Newspapers, and Urban Life in Colonial India. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021; pp. xi + 247. Journal of Religious History, 47, 151–153. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9809.12917
Abduhu, G. R. (1973). The Educational Ideas of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. Sterling Publishers.
Rahman, M. Raisur. (2014). “Beyond Centre-Periphery: Qasbahs and Muslim Life in South Asia.” South Asian History and Culture, 5, 163–178. https://doi.org/10.1080/19472498.2014.883762.
At 80, revisiting the Muslim lives, movements and sacrifices that shaped India’s struggle for freedom, and the politics of forgetting them.
Stroll through the pages of India’s history, because academia has failed to acknowledge some names and contributions in the Indian freedom struggle. From the Taj Mahal, Red Fort, Qutub Minar, Humayun’s Tomb, Gol Gumbaz, Charminar, to Fatehpur Sikri and the bustling lanes of Chandni Chowk, they all speak volumes louder. But the cultural pattern of ‘selectively remembering’ and ‘selectively forgetting’ has downplayed nation’s history into one-dimensional narratives , while external sources of learning like cinemas, textbooks, public places re-branding, etc, are getting colored with contemporary political dynamics, to legitimize their plans and policies.
To fathom India’s past sincerely, we must be willing not only to learn but also to unlearn. Learning involves discovering forgotten contributions, while unlearning requires shedding inherited biases, political narratives, and simplified versions of history. Because, as eminent historians have speculated, the past is constantly reinterpreted in the light of new evidence and new questions. Consequently, the framing of our past will affect the present, which will further be read as a past in the future, thus entrusting us with sheer responsibility of weaving a lineage of conscience, not insidious storytelling.
The lost dots of the Indian freedom movements
Revisit in Indian history afresh because erasure never happens all at once, it happens slowly and systematically.
Independence Movements did not count from the very battles fought, but from the conditions laid down before and after to formulate and fixate Indian society and culture altogether. Resistance to the economization, politicisation, and, ultimately, colonization by the Britishers was confronted by the collective plurality which our country possessed with pride. Testifying that resistance was not always born on the battlefield, often it began with communities refusing to harbor animosity for one another.
Hindu sanyasis and Muslim fakirs whom the British Company wanted to fragmentalise, chose each other instead. Naga ascetics of the Dashnami order like Pandit Bhabani Charan Pathak stood beside Muslim fakirs of the Madari and Burhana sects, Majnu Shah Fakir, Chirag Ali, Musa Shah, and together resisted the oppressive taxation and economic exploitation the Company had imposed. It was one of the earliest organized rebellions against British rule in India, and yet how many of us have even heard these names?
Tipu Sultan
That same defiance carried into Mysore, Tipu Sultan, a name antagonized in recent years that people even slipped away from the fact that he is the man who invented Missiles in India, a ruler who terrified the British. He built iron-cased rockets before most of the world imagined such a weapon, and fought the British across four wars, refusing again and again to let his kingdom bow. And what do we do with that legacy today?
Islamic gallantry didn’t halt there. Moulvi Ahmadullah Shah, one of the key leaders of the First War of Indian Independence in 1857 was called the lighthouse of rebellion in Awadh, an epitome of the Ganga-Jamuna culture of Faizabad. The rebel army of Awadh was led by Barkat Ahmad and Maulvi Ahmadullah Shah, with Barkat Ahmad declared Chief Army Officer of the rebels after the Battle of Chinhat.
Moulvi Ahmadullah Shah
At the head of that same uprising stood Bahadur Shah Zafar, lending his name and his throne to the rebellion we call the Sepoy Mutiny. He gave everything a king could give, and the British broke him in the cruelest way. After his surrender, his sons Mirza Mughal and Mirza Khizr Sultan, and his grandson Mirza Abu Bakr, were stripped and shot in cold blood by Major William Hodson at what is now called Khooni Darwaza, and their severed heads were brought before their own father as a trophy. So many lives were lost in that struggle, so many families broken, and it is widely said that nearly 5 lakh Muslims were martyred, close to 50,000 of them ullema who chose the battlefield over silence. After rotating around 79 years of India’s independence, we are still cynical over the contributions carved by Indian Muslims.
Bahadur Shah Zafar
Another buried name is of, Ashfaquallah Khan, was hanged on 19th December 1927, at just 27 years old, along with other Kakori comrades who were sent to the gallows. This Kakori robbery was to pull back the wealth of Indian soil to channelize it for the national struggle. Khan revolutionized nationalist movement with his participation in Hindustan Republican Association (HRA), founded by Ram Prasad Bismil along with two others. Like Kakori robbery, many other raids were rolled out to confront with required force rather than abstracting the notion of peace towards the gruesome tortures. Have we ever lent an ear to these lines of Khan’s ‘Hasrat’ poem- “Kuch aarzoo naheen hai, hai aarzoo to yeh hai, Rakh de koi zara si Khaak-e-watan kafan men” who as his last whim, recited this poem soaked in patriotism. Are we made to remember these lines by a Muslim freedom fighter when we are reminded about the terrified misapplication of the divine slogan “Allah-u-Akbar” to polarize the Islam?
Ashfaqullah Khan
Walking further, Abdul Habeeb Yusuf Marfani, gave away his entire estate for a freedom he’d never see honoured. His courage was never separate from the cause, it was central to it, and it’s long overdue we remember it that way.
Abdul Habeeb Yusuf Marfani
Muslim participation in India’s freedom struggle was not boxed in a specific time or way, it encompassed armed resistance, societal reforms, mass mobilization, revolutionary events, and non-violent protests. The hurls on the invasions done by Muslims are widely made, but onlookers of the contributions by very same people, are tactfully airbrushed.
Sacrifices for the Indian motherland were proven on silent or loud battlefields, not by the mere recital of ‘Patriotic Songs’ such as Vande Mataram as a contemporary reference. That is turned down by Indian Muslims lyrically, not soulfully, because of the religiosity which the Indian Constitution guarantees them. When did the recital of patriotic songs begin to outweigh the very acts of sacrifice they were meant to spring up?
Freedom fighters such as Maulvi Ahmadullah Shah, Begum Hazrat Mahal, Fazl-e-Haq Khairabadi (clarified the Jihad term through his war against the British), and Azimullah Khan were also important in the 1857 uprising. Barely, we learn or are made to learn about them? While vilifying other names of this very same community.
The Ali brothers, Shaukat Ali (1873-1938) and Mohamed Ali Jauhar (1878-1931)
Even the popular moments like the non-cooperation movement and the Khilafat Movement were helmed by some unheeded names: Mohammad Ali Jauhar and Shaukat Ali. Erected on the former’s name, there stands a university in Rampur, U.P. which recently has fallen prey to the communal politics, staking Indian youth’s future at darker stage, thus disregarding the blood of these freedom fighters.
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan who spent three decades in prison and headed the non-violent Khudai Khidmatgar Movement among Pashtuns against British rule, wherein he combined social reform, service, and discipline. His demise took place during his house arrest in Peshawar.
Abid Hasan Safrani
Without a single community-led leader, ideologies often find a loose hand to wrestle for their individual existence rather than collective results. Abid Hasan Safrani, prominent INA member, mobilized the Muslim youth and committed to Subhas Chandra Bose’s movement (Azad Hind Fauj), which underpinned armed resistance in the Indian Freedom Struggle rather than non-violent means, brewing the unity for winning back the motherland.
Having said that, the famous Ghadar Party, founded in 1913, was pioneered by one more buried name- Maulana Barkatullah Bhopali. He was the first Prime Minister of the Provisional Government of India (Government-in-Exile), which was established in Kabul in 1915. He traversed across Europe, Asia, and North America to usher in the momentum for the Indian freedom struggle. His death took place in the US, leaving him deprived of bidding adieu to his motherland one last time.
Maulana Barkatullah Bhopali
Then, “Inquilab Zindabad”, the popular hymn echoed at Jantar Mantar very recently, was originally coined by Urdu poet-politician Hasrat Mohani at the Congress’ Ahmedabad session, while Bhagat Singh solely made it popularized. Mohani had been a soulful Krishna Bhakt, leaving him writing eulogies for ‘Hazrat Krishna’ (Hazrat is not a religious tag; it is an honorary title). He, being the co-prisoner of Gandhi ji, presented him with the USSR idea of federalism for empowering the localized and regional pockets of the agglomerate India. His courage and values proved his patriotism in the debates of the Constituent Assembly and confrontations with the Britishers.
Hasrat Mohani
We remember Mahatma Gandhi more than any other freedom fighter, but are we mindful of the fact that the man who saved him was Batak Mian Ansari during the Champaran Satyagraha in 1917? He was the cook deployed by the Britishers, who then ordered Batak Mian Ansari to serve venomous milk to Gandhi ji. His integrity made him stake his life to save Gandhi ji. He sneakily warned Gandhi ji, and, as anticipated, he was kicked out of his job by the Britishers, further leaving him battered by the villagers and ousting him and his family from his residence. To date, his family couldn’t receive what was promised for his courage by India’s first president, Rajendra Prasad. Questioning how much we have honoured the honorable personalities on the ground?
Batak Mian Ansari
The last Nizam of Hyderabad, Mir Osman Ali Khan, is also in this queue of the buried names. Independence movement is not merely the swing between direct confrontation with colonial regime, it too laps over the pre and post period that either nudged the movements or repaired the damages caused to India. He has reportedly granted mammoth donations across educational and religious institutions. From BHU, AMU, IISc, publication of critical editions of Mahabharata, Golden Temple, Amritsar and many more places . We rewind through cruel rulers who demolished Indian structures, to attack their community and make them accountable in the present, but are we awakened with these submerged realities as well? One-sided history or evolving history, rationality comes with the choices citizens make to discern their roots.
Mir Osman Ali Khan
The history of Muslim resistance to British colonial rule also travelled deep into Malabar in Kerala, where Variyankunnath Kunjahammad Haji, Ali Musliyar , and Sayyid Fazal Pookoya Thangal emerged as formidable names in a long tradition of anti-colonial mobilisation. Fazal Pookoya Thangal, the 19th-century Mappila spiritual leader of Malabar, became an influential voice against British authority and the oppressive agrarian order sustained under colonial rule, eventually being forced into exile in 1852. Decades later, that inheritance of resistance found powerful expression in the 1921 Malabar uprising, with Ali Musliyar, a religious scholar and Khilafat leader, and Variyankunnath Kunjahammad Haji becoming among its most prominent leaders. Haji challenged British authority in parts of Malabar and established a parallel administration in areas under rebel control, while Ali Musliyar mobilised people against colonial rule before being captured and executed by the British. Haji, too, was eventually captured and executed by firing squad in January 1922.
Ali Musliyar
Culture can marginalise women, but religion pours courage
“Khoob Ladi Mardani thi, Wo Jhansi Wali Rani thi”, Whenever we speak of women who took up arms for this land, Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi is the name that comes to every tongue, and she deserves every bit of that memory. But here’s what gnaws: she was not alone. There were other women just as fearless, standing in the same fire, and history simply didn’t bother to write their names down.
Begum Hazrat Mahal
Begum Hazrat Mahal was one of them, and she wasn’t a side character, she was one of the rebellion’s most formidable forces. Even William Howard Russell, a British correspondent writing for his own side, couldn’t deny her fire. In his My Indian Mutiny Dairy, describing her as a woman of remarkable energy who had stirred all of Oudh into rising for her son’s cause and had herself declared undying war against the British. At Musa Bagh in Lucknow, she didn’t issue orders from a distance, she personally fought alongside and rallied nearly 9,000 rebel soldiers, moving from camp to camp, lifting morale with speeches that set entire camps on fire.
Abadi Bano Begum
And then there’s Abadi Bano Begum- the woman history remembers, if at all, only as “Bi Amma.” A widow with six children, one of the sons Maulana Shaukat Ali, and the other Mohammad Ali Jauhar, above-mentioned together known as the Ali Brothers. She could have used every excuse the world hands a woman to stay silent. widowhood, motherhood, the weight of raising children alone. She used none of them. When the country needed people brave enough to stand up to the British, she stood up too. She became the first woman to address a political rally while wearing a burqa and let that sink in for a moment. She didn’t have to remove a part of her identity to be taken seriously in public life; she broke the idea that a veiled woman couldn’t also be a fighter, a leader, or a voice loud enough to move a crowd. She urged women to stop hiding at home and join the struggle, organizing funds and meetings where they were addressed as political beings for the first time, and taught why boycotting foreign goods mattered. She convinced them to donate to the Tilak Swaraj Fund, set up by Bal Gangadhar Tilak to finance India’s freedom struggle.
Kulsum Sayani
Not every battle was fought with a sword, some were fought with pen and paper. Kulsum Sayani, awarded the Padma Shri in 1960, waged her own war against illiteracy through the Jan Jagran movement, teaching under “each one, teach one” and leading centres for Muslim women that grew from 50 to 600 by sheer will. Begum Rokeya, a fiercely prolific feminist writer at a time when a woman dreaming was seen as rebellion, imagined a world turned upside down in Sultana’s Dream, then built that vision into reality, founding a girls’ school in 1909 and the Muslim Women’s Association in 1916, giving women space to learn and speak.
Begum Rokeya
80th Indian Independence Day’s call to unwind the narratives
As the author of ‘Sare Jahan Sai Achcha, Hindustan Humara’– Allama Iqbal penned- “The freedom lovers of the nation stepped forward with such dignity that even those long imprisoned by deprivation watched in admiration.” It has been shouldered on the present generations to soak in the evolving history to sanitize the present from groans of hatred, rotting the Indian society.
These lost chapters from Indian history wouldn’t have been possible to muster without the effulgent works of Salim Khan, Romila Thapar, Ramachandra Guha, S. Irfan Habib, Mushirul Hasan, A. G. Noorani, Rana Safvi, etc. Grinning us with the fact that the pluralistic framework of India is not only designed by the constituent makers, but it is also originally earned by all the freedom fighters, from pre- to post-independence.
Adeena Navaid is a law student and writer covering legal, social, and feminist issues, with work published in Maktoob, Bar & Bench, The Quint, Siasat, SheThePeople, and other platforms. Aiman Tabassum is a final-year LL.B. student at the University of Mumbai who writes on constitutional law, legal history, and socio-political issues, with work published in Bar & Bench.
source: http://www.maktoobmedia.com / Maktoob Media / Home> Opinion / by Adeena Navaid & Aiman Tabassum / August 14th, 2026
EVERY year on August 15, India’s Prime Minister addresses the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort in Delhi. It was at this same fort, in 1945, that Major General Shah Nawaz Khan stood trial for waging war against the British Empire. A Muslim officer in Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s Indian National Army, he had led troops into battle against colonial forces across Southeast Asia, been captured, and was sentenced to death. His court-martial, alongside Colonel Prem Kumar Sehgal and Colonel Gurbaksh Singh Dhillon, provoked mass protests across the country and became one of the final catalysts for British withdrawal from India. The slogan that echoed through the streets of Delhi became a rallying cry of the independence movement: “Lal Qile se aayi awaaz, Sehgal, Dhillon aur Shah Nawaz.”
After his release, Shah Nawaz Khan chose the path of non-violence at Mahatma Gandhi’s urging, joined the Indian National Congress, and went on to serve as a Union Minister for over two decades. He represented Meerut in Parliament through four terms, held portfolios ranging from Agriculture to Petroleum, and chaired the commission that investigated the circumstances of Netaji Bose’s death. He was buried near the Red Fort with full state honours in 1983.
Beyond politics, Shah Nawaz Khan was connected to one of India’s most recognizable families. The Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan’s father, Mir Taj Mohammed Khan, was his cousin and migrated from Pakistan to India alongside him after Partition.
His story traces an arc from armed resistance to democratic nation-building, from a death sentence in a colonial courtroom to the highest levels of Indian government.
Early Life and Military Career
General Shah Nawaz Khan was born on 24 January 1914 in the village of Matur, in the Rawalpindi District of British India (now in Pakistan). His father, Lieutenant Sardar Tikka Khan, served for nearly three decades in the British Indian Army with the 58th Vaughan’s Rifles (Frontier Force), instilling in him an early exposure to military life.
After completing his early education, Shah Nawaz Khan went on to study at the Prince of Wales Royal Indian Military College in Dehradun, one of the premier institutions established to train future military leaders in colonial India.
From Prisoner of War to Leader of the Indian National Army
In 1940, Shah Nawaz Khan was commissioned as an officer in the British Indian Army. In December 1941, as part of the Second World War, Japanese forces launched a major offensive against Singapore, and the British deployed nearly 60,000 Indian soldiers, including Captain Shah Nawaz Khan.
The British forces were ultimately defeated, and Khan, along with thousands of other soldiers, was taken prisoner of war. During his captivity, he came into contact with Indian nationalists and revolutionaries aligned with Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. Deeply influenced by their vision of an independent India, he joined the Azad Hind Fauj, also known as the Indian National Army (INA), and rapidly rose to positions of leadership.
Role in the Freedom Struggle
Recognized for his leadership abilities, Shah Nawaz Khan was inducted into the cabinet of the Indian National Army’s (INA) Provisional Government of Free India. Between 1942 and 1945, the Azad Hind Fauj engaged British forces across Southeast Asia and, for a period, established control over large stretches of territory during its campaign against colonial rule.
In December 1944, he was appointed commander of the INA detachment stationed in Mandalay, Burma (now Myanmar). Owing to the close trust placed in him by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, he was later selected to lead the Subhas Brigade—a special unit formed from elite INA soldiers.
During military operations in Burma in 1945, General Shah Nawaz Khan and several of his comrades were arrested by British forces. The INA’s senior leadership at the time included Major General Shah Nawaz Khan, Colonel Prem Kumar Sehgal, and Colonel Gurbaksh Singh Dhillon. In 1946, all three were put on trial for mutiny at the Red Fort in Delhi.
These trials ignited widespread public protests across India and became a turning point in the independence movement, significantly intensifying popular resistance to British rule. Facing overwhelming public pressure, the British government was ultimately compelled to release Shah Nawaz Khan and his associates. During this period, he remained in contact with leading figures of the national movement, including Mahatma Gandhi, and was defended in court by Jawaharlal Nehru.
Gandhi’s Colonel of Non-Violence
General Shah Nawaz Khan was regarded as one of Mahatma Gandhi’s close associates, a relationship reflected in Gandhi’s letters and public speeches, in which he frequently referred to him by name. Their association symbolized the bridge between armed resistance and the philosophy of non-violence that shaped India’s independence movement.
On the occasion of the 50th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Shah Nawaz Khan declared, “While living outside India, we fought for our country’s freedom with arms; now we shall serve India through non-violence.” Mahatma Gandhi echoed this sentiment while addressing members of the Indian National Army in Madras on 22 January 1946 and later reiterated it during his prayer meeting in Mumbai on 18 February 1946.
Contemporary records further document their close interaction. According to a report in the Bombay Chronicle dated 13 March 1946, Shah Nawaz Khan met Gandhi at Birla Bhavan in Delhi on 12 March, where the two held discussions for nearly ninety minutes. On 22 March 1946, Gandhi visited a military camp in Aravalli Kanchan, Maharashtra, and once again mentioned Shah Nawaz Khan while addressing the soldiers. Their engagement continued through personal meetings as well as an exchange of letters, many of which survive as historical evidence of their dialogue.
At Gandhi’s urging, following the dissolution of the Indian National Army in 1946, Shah Nawaz Khan joined the Indian National Congress. Later that year, he worked in Bihar to assist victims of communal violence, alongside Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan. He remained in the region during this period of unrest, and was present at the funeral of Professor Abdul Bari, who was assassinated in Bihar in March 1947.
Gandhi repeatedly acknowledged and praised Shah Nawaz Khan’s relief and peace-building efforts in Bihar during 1947. He spoke at length about Khan’s work during his prayer meetings on 29 April and 1 May 1947, and earlier, on 15 April 1947, the two were together at Gandhi’s camp in Patna. During one such conversation, Gandhi expressed his faith in him, saying: “I have great hopes for you. I wish to make you a complete soldier of non-violent weapons. You became a colonel under Netaji; in the same way, I want to make you a colonel of non-violence.”
Political Life After Independence
Even after India achieved independence in 1947, Shah Nawaz Khan continued to work in Masurhi, Bihar, focusing on relief and rehabilitation efforts. In a letter dated 7 October 1947, Mahatma Gandhi wrote to him: “Dear General Shah Nawaz, If the work you are doing there does not go to the dogs in your absence, you may leave it to go to the Punjab-Pakistan.” Despite this, Shah Nawaz Khan chose not to return to his ancestral home in what had become Pakistan; instead, his family migrated to India.
Shah Nawaz Khan entered electoral politics in independent India and was elected to the first Lok Sabha (India’s lower house of Parliament) in 1952 from Meerut, representing the Indian National Congress. He went on to win the same constituency in 1957, 1962, and 1971. Over the course of his political career, he served as a Union Minister for a total of 23 years.
Beginning in 1952, he served as Parliamentary Secretary and later as Deputy Minister for Railways. From 1957 to 1964, he held the portfolio of Food and Agriculture. He was again appointed Minister of Agriculture in 1965, followed by his tenure as Minister of Labour, Employment, and Rehabilitation in 1966. Between 1971 and 1975, he served as Minister for Petroleum and Chemicals, as well as Agriculture and Irrigation. From 1975 to 1977, he additionally served as Chairman of the Food Corporation of India while continuing as Union Minister for Agriculture and Irrigation.
In 1956, the Government of India constituted a commission to examine the circumstances surrounding the death of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. Shah Nawaz Khan was appointed chairman of this commission, underscoring the trust placed in him by the national leadership. He also authored a memoir on the Indian National Army and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, regarded as an important firsthand account of the INA movement.
Representing the Meerut constituency for decades, Shah Nawaz Khan played a stabilizing role in public life, and the city remained free of major communal disturbances during his tenure. From 1977 to 1983, he served as the national in-charge of the Congress Seva Dal, the party’s volunteer organization. He remained associated with the Indian National Congress until the end of his life, continuing his commitment to public service and national unity.
General Shah Nawaz Khan passed away on 9 December 1983 while still serving the Indian National Congress. His life—spanning armed resistance, political leadership, and a steadfast commitment to unity and nation-building—remains a powerful testament to the ideals of freedom, sacrifice, and service. He is remembered not only as a soldier and statesman, but as a figure whose legacy continues to inspire generations in independent India and beyond.
— IAMC
source: http://www.clarionindia.net / Clarion India / Home> Editor’s Pick> Opinion / by Afroz Alam Sahil / August 08th, 2026
It’s not a small number and there are very few who could match the sacrifices of Ahle Hadees for this country, Qasmi says.
Malegaon (Maharashtra):
In the strongest ever rebuttal of baseless allegations raised against Ahle Hadees, Jamiat Ahle Hadees Maharashtra on Sunday reminded the country of the sacrifices made by the group during the freedom struggle of India.
“Over five lakh (500,000) Ahle Hadees had sacrificed their lives during India’s freedoom fighter. People travelling in villages and towns saw their corpses hanging on trees all around”, Jalaluddin Qasmi, an alumnus of Darul Uloom Deoband, said quoting Tara Chand.
Renowned archaeologist and historian, Tara Chand, who taught at Allahabad University and also served as its Vice Chancellor in 1940s, is the author of ‘History of Freedom Movement in India’.
“It’s not a small number and there are very few who could match the sacrifices of Ahle Hadees for this country”, Jalaluddin Qasmi addressing the day-long Manhaj e Salaf conference jointly organised by Jamiat Ahle Hadees Maharashtra and Jamiat Ahle Hadees Malegaon Sunday.
“Nothing can be more shameful and condemnable than the act of some people and a section of media who despite such a glorious history of Ahle Hadees level unfounded allegations against them just to fulfill their vested interest”, he added.
To further draw his point, Jalaluddin Qasmi quoted Jawaharlal Nehru, former Prime Minister of India and one of the frontal leaders of India’s freedom movement, who praised the sacrifices of Ulema of Sadiqpur Patna, Bihar for the country as extraordinary and unmatchable.
“Nehru had said if sacrifices of the Ulema of Sadiqpur Patna Bihar are put on one side of a balance and our entire efforts are put on the other, their’s will be heavier and our’s will be worthless in comparision”, Qasmi said.
Qasmi also said that it is because of the strong and firm stand taken by Ahle Hadees against terrorism and extremism because of which terrorist organisations hate Ahle Hadees the most.
Taking forward Jalaluddin Qasmi’s assertions, Mohammad Rahmani Sanabili, President of Jamia Islamia Sanabil, New Delhi, while addressing the valedictory session of day-long Jamiat Ahle Hadees Manhaj e Salaf conference shared of historical evidence to prove the contributions of Ahle Hadees during the Indian freedom movement.
“It is Ahle Hadees who called terrorists and violent groups Khawarij and ran campaigns to exposed them”, he said.
In his keynote speech of the conference, Mohammad Rahmani Sanabili condemned once again Pulwama terrorist attack and reiterated Jamiat Ahle Hadees’s stand against all kinds of violence,.
At the same time, he urged the Ahle Hadees, especially the youth, to focus more on practices based on the path laid down in the Holy Quran and Sunnah of the Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him).
Earlier in the morning, the day-long national conference organised by Jamiat Ahle Hadees Maharashtra opened with a strong condemnation of the terror attack on the CRPF convoy in Pulwama district of Kashmir in which more than 40 CRPF troopers were killed and a large number of others were left injured.
“Terrorists will never succeed in their evil design to weaken our country by such cowardly attacks”, Razaullah Abdul Kareem, senior cleric of Jamiat Ahle Hadees Hind, said while opening the day-long conference.
“We want to make it very clear that the Indian Muslims and Jamiat Ahle Hadees are with the country in its fight against terrorism and violence”, he said while condemning the Pulwama terrorist attack.
Presided over by Dr Saeed Ahmed Faizee, president of Jamiat Ahle Hadees Maharashtra, the day-long conference was held at the SM Khaleel High School in Malegaon and was attended by a large number of delegates from all over Maharashta and the neighboring states.
source: http://www.ummid.com / Ummid.com / Home> India / by ummid.com staff reporter / February 18th, 2019
In ‘Print and the Urdu Public’, Megan Eaton Robb writes about the impact and role of popular Urdu newspaper Madinah and how it pushed back against censorship.
File photo | Gen. Reginald Dyer | Wikimedia Commons
Madīnah’s community of editors, subeditors, and proprietors illustrate the interconnected network of professionals working on newspapers across North India, with a shared commitment to confounding censorship laws. Editors of Madīnah were products of qasbahs and lived in Bijnor or nearby while employed by the publication. At least one assistant editor, Ḥamīd Ḥasan “Fakīr” Bijnorī (1903–1991), was a relative, having married Majīd Ḥasan’s daughter in the 1910s before he became the editor of Madinah Press’s children’s magazine Ghunchah after 1922. Ḥamīd Ḥasan would later be listed as an assistant editor from 1930 to 1935 and even take over as editor for several months when the need arose in 1945. When a new editor took over the work of Madīnah and was not already resident in Bijnor, he would move into the Ḥasan compound, which acted as the administrative office of the paper. Several small apartments attached to the main verandah, so editors could live in comfort with their families, remaining accessible to the newspaper office while maintaining privacy. Maulānā Majīd Ḥasan’s name, along with the name of the current chief editor, always appeared on the paper’s title page. At any given time there could be up to three editors of the paper, with the chief editor being referred to as “mudīr-i mas’ūl.”
Although Majīd Ḥasan’s proprietorship provided continuity for the newspaper, its different editors influenced the paper’s tone and focus. The turnover between editors could be rapid when legal troubles emerged. For instance, in 1924, when the editor Qāẓī Badrul Ḥasan Jalālī (1891–1956) was prosecuted by the British Raj for an article, he resigned his editorship, but he stepped back into his position once the dust of government scrutiny had settled. If Majīd Ḥasan attracted too much scrutiny from government surveillance, he could retreat from view behind the shadow of his prominent editors, continuing to exert the same influence behind the scenes. This allowed his outfit to survive draconian censorship measures while retaining the continuity essential to the newspaper’s success.
When he launched the newspaper in 1912, Majīd Ḥasan had little local influence. The only person of significance attached to the newspaper initially was a prominent journalist of the period, Nūr ul-Ḥasan Zahīn, who wrote for Ṣaḥīfa as well. Colonial censors initially dismissed Madīnah as a “bigoted Muhammadan organ, inclined to make trouble between Hindus and Muhammadans.” Madīnah first earned the ire of colonial administrators by criticizing the headmaster of Bijnor High School for complying with the British Educational Code. This was only the first of many encounters with censorship legislation.
April 1917 marked the beginning of Editor Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn Shairkoṭī’s tenure, and the newspaper’s shift to publishing more explicitly political, anti-British stances. Shairkoṭī, a novelist as well as a journalist, was born in the Shairkoṭ qasbah of Bijnor in 1888. Initially educated by Maulānā ‘Abdul Qayūm Arshāq and Miyānji Sa‘ad Allah Sahib, he had attended Deoband as a pupil of Maulānā Mahmud ul-Ḥasan Asīr Mālṭā, known as Shaikh ul-Hind. After completing his education at Deoband, Mazh̤ ar ud- Dīn returned to Shairkot, where he worked on the newspaper Dastūr under the management of Ḥakīm Asrār ul-Nabī and on the newspaper Nagīnah.
Maulānā Majīd Ḥasan saw Maz̤har ud-Dīn’s affiliation with the newspaper as the beginning of a new period of commitment to the Muslim community and wrote an illustrious introduction for his new editor. Majīd Ḥasan’s message in his introduction was clear: he had brought in a power player to man the ship of Madīnah, a man who indubitably linked the paper to a network of powerful publications and individuals. The new editor transformed Madīnah into a more explicitly political entity. Maz̤har ud-Dīn associated with prominent political Muslims of the period, including Syed Ḥasan Imām, who presided over the Indian National Congress’s consideration of the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms in Bombay in 1918. His other associates included Nawab Muḥammad Ismā’il Khān. He was, along with Khalīquzzamān, a key organizer of the UP Muslim League, and a prominent member until 1947; he remained in India after independence.
After the end of World War I in November 1918, discussions of independence and postwar reality in India began in earnest. The state of Islam, and the progress of both national and local branches of organizations such as the Muslim League and Congress, became matters of intense concern. Mohandas Karamchand “Mahātmā” Gāndhī (1869–1948) featured in several articles musing on the way forward for political Muslims. In addition, discussions of the fall out of World War I in Turkey and the caliphate took center stage. Under Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn’s leadership, the newspaper emphasized the connection between the fate of Indian Muslims and of those in Turkey and other nations with significant ties to Islam.
Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn presided over Madīnah’s publication of an article critical of the government’s role in the Jallianwallabagh massacre, which led to a dramatic conflict with the British Raj. In April 1919 Madīnah published an article criticizing Lieutenant Governor Sir Michael O’Dwyer’s (1864–1940) endorsement. Putting Madīnah on the Muslim Map of the actions of Colonel Reginald Dyer, who had overseen the disproportionate response at Jallianwallabagh. The article minced no words:
His honour O’Dwyer’s government of Panjab, from the very beginning, kept as the foundation of its policy a despotic course of action [ . . . ] This was his honor O’Dwyer’s last period of government; therefore it was necessary that he make amends for his past course of actions. This was the time when, instead of extinguishing the fire with the water Of gentleness and kindness, he inflamed the hearts of the ahl-i Punjab. Perhaps it could be said that he did not put out the fire with water, but instead doused it with oil. If that were not the case, then why would he at the conclusion of his reign, give orders that were so repellent, so far from resembling affection that they approximated hate?
It was actually illegal at this point in time to question the motives of the colonial government; thus, the final statement of the quotation accusing O’Dwyer of “hate” fell afoul of censorship laws. The government banned Madīnah from circulating in Punjab as a result of this piece. Mazh̤ arud-Dīn and Majīd Ḥasan’s response was defiant: in August 1919 they renamed the newspaper Yasrab, an Arabic synonym of Madīnah, as a bid to evade censorship.64 On the cover of each issue of Yasrab an Iqbal couplet appeared, a knowing wink to its readership base:
The dust of Madinah is better than both worlds. How wonderful is the city where the beloved is.
Khāk-i yas̱rab az do ‘ālam khūshtar ast Ā’e khunak shahre ke ānjā dilbar ast.
The couplet hinted at the paper Yasrab’s true identity, offered praise for the paper’s unpretentious popularity, and emphasized the link between the newspaper and the city Madīnah. Madīnah’s proprietor and editors were men who wore their few educational laurels lightly. More important than formal education was the ability to use that knowledge in the service of Indians generally and Muslims particularly. Unsurprisingly, the attempt at flouting the circulation ban was quickly detected. The paper reverted back to the title Madīnah after a few weeks, and the ban on circulation was lifted eventually.66 Madīnah was a space offering a figurative point of access to the community of Islam, the qaum, and it was a space increasingly under siege of colonial censorship laws.
Madīnah had been only one of many significant voices in the press commenting on the Jallianwallabagh fiasco. As the UP fortnightly report complained, “[The] occurrences in the Punjab [ . . . ] practically absorbed the entire attention of the press.” Along with Madīnah/Yasrab, the British excluded from Punjab al- Khalīl of Bijnor, The Independent of Allahabad (a Nehru paper), Hamdam and Akhuwat of Lucknow (Farangi Mahalli papers), Swadesh of Gorakhpur, and Amrita bazar patrika of Calcutta. The government demanded securities, or large sums of money as surety against future crimes of sedition, from papers in Bengal, Nagpur, Lucknow, and Madras. Madīnah’s inclusion in this censorship was a testament to its growing influence; its subterfuge demonstrated a growing sense of urgency in its mandate to reach readers and an emerging resolve to flout British restrictions.
In the 1920s, Madīnah focused on coverage of the Muslim League and the Indian National Congress, showing a preference for Congress.
It was per- haps Maz̤har ud-Dīn’s affection for the League that motivated him ultimately to resign from Madīnah in 1921. It is also possible that Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn’s taste for politics pulled him closer to Delhi and toward the League after the political awakening accompanying the Khilafat Movement.
It was common for editors to move around among different qasbah-based newspapers, and after leaving Madīnah, Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn joined Munshī Safīr Aḥmed’s Naginah-based paper Almān as its first editor; he was instrumental in relocating that paper to Delhi. He later became close to the leadership of the All-India Muslim League, including Muḥammad ‘Alī Jinnāh. In the 1930s he founded a paper entitled Vaḥdat (Unity) in order to assist the propagation of Muslim League ideals. When Maulānā Shabbīr Aḥmed ‘Usmānī, a Deobandi who supported the creation of Pakistan, resigned from the pro-Congress Jam‘īat ‘Ulamā and declared his allegiance to the Muslim League and Jinnah, he did so from Mazh̤ ar ud-Dīn’s office. This demonstrated Madīnah was one node in an important network of political power and publishing prestige in this period and had to make considered choices when it came to balancing shifting political alliances.
This excerpt from Print and the Urdu Public: Muslims, Newspapers, and Urban Life in Colonial India has been published with special permission from Oxford Univerity Press.
source: http://www.theprint.in / The Print / Home> Page Turner> Book Excerpts / by Megan Eaton Robb /May 15th, 2021
