Has the Radiance Viewsweekly, brought out in July 1963, left an impact on the thinking of Indian citizenry or at least its intellectuals? Has the Viewsweekly exerted influence upon the political thinking of plural Bharat? Has it fulfilled its mission of making bridges between the majority and the minority, and the minority and the government? How is it that the Viewsweekly is being brought out with clock-like regularity since its birth? Has the Weekly any vision of future? Does it envisage any leadership role for the Muslims in this grand parliamentary democracy?
These and similar questions must be agitating the minds of the concerned on the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary.
COMPREHENSIVE REPLY
For a comprehensive reply, let us have a cursory glance at the circumstances in which the Viewsweekly had been launched under the stewardship of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind.
It was a series of communal rather anti-Muslim disturbances in the late 1950s and early 1960s that compelled the feeling sections of the major segment of heterogeneous Bharat to seriously think in terms of having a mouthpiece in the English language, read and understood through the length and breadth of the country. Dr. Kailash Nath Katju, the then Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, after a visit to the city, described the riot-torn Jabalpur as a shamshan bhoomi. Any stick, during those days, was good enough to beat the Muslims and Islam with. Muslims’ sound case went by default since it had no powerful advocate and communication with the level-headed sections of the majority community and the government. After long discussions it was decided to bring out a paper dedicated to the moral, legal and constitutional defence of Muslims and presentation of Islam in the sweetest possible language before the nation.
Initially the proposal was for an English Daily. But it was resolved that let Indian Muslims have a potent Viewsweekly to do the arduous job. A sustained campaign was launched to collect the initial amount. As a result, Rs. 10 lakh, was collected from the cities, townships and villages of India. Sale of coupons was the medium of collection. A poor Muslim widow donated her necklace made of bronze that triggers tears in the eyes.
It was under the guidance of the late Mr. Yousuf Siddiqui and Mr. Mohammad Muslim of the Dawat Urdu daily that the campaign was pushed to its logical conclusion. Maulana Muslim regularly wrote powerful editorials on the subject; his colleagues wrote telling posters that carried the message of a Muslim paper in the English language. The first issue hit the stands on 28 July 1963.
The first Managing Director was Mr. Yousuf Siddiqui, who used to look after Home of the erstwhile Tonk State in Rajasthan (Honorarium Rs. 500). The first Editor was Mr. A.A. Ravoof, who had the experience of editing a weekly, the Deccan Times from Madras for 25 years (Salary Rs. 500). The first Manager was Mr. Alyassa (Salary Rs. 500). The first Accountant was Mr. Ameerullah Khan Shaheen. The first Proof Reader was this scribe (Salary Rs. 100). The first print order was 18,000 out of which 8,000 copies were meant for Assam alone. The popular enthusiasm knew no bounds.
NOT A RAG, SOBER READING
In the beginning, the Radiance Viewsweekly was a 12-page periodical. Later on, it transformed itself into a 28-page, and yet later a 36-page, publication in demy size. It was not, in the words of then AMU Vice Chancellor, Mr. Ali Yawar Jung, a ‘rag’, as our other critics also relished to call us. It was, and of course is, a sober reading on multifarious problems, particularly confronted by the Muslim minority. We deliberately avoided sharp superlatives and harsh language. Our reasonableness, coupled with the sweet alchemy of persuasion, was our strongest weapon.
Our motivated antagonists and the government would read Radiance with the help of microscope but found no excuse to gag our voice. Radiance’s popular cliché was “our brethren belonging to the majority community”. No case in the court – and those were not many – succeeded in any court of law against us. The one which was successful punished the then Editor, Mr. Yousuf Siddiqui, who was punished with jail “till the rising of the court” which means hardly a minute or so.
DEATHLY UPHEAVALS
The Radiance Viewsweekly dealt with each and every irritant in right earnest. We always quoted facts and figures and positive ideas of our contemporaries also. Be it the genocidal attacks on the defenceless minority, be it the usurpation of the minority character of Aligarh Muslim University and fiddling with the character of Jamia Millia Islamia, be it the ever-threatening posture of the uniform civil code so that the Islamic Shari’ah could be de-Islamised, be it the selective arrests of Muslim youth and their fabricated prosecution, be it the deathly upheavals at Nellie in Assam, Moradabad in UP, or Gujarat as a whole etc. etc. be it Urdu or Muslim culture and religion or wilful destruction of the places of worship here and there and be it the fiction of Islamic or Muslim terrorism etc. etc., Radiance always stood like a solid rock by substantiating its claims through tale-tell statistics and pictures.
AL-MAQDIS QUESTION
We did not touch the subjects concerned to Muslim minority alone; we dealt with issues like Sati, burning brides for not bringing sufficient dowry, sodomy and lesbianism, economic recession, environment, alcoholism, disrespect to Prophets and caricature of religious personages and blasphemy. Our special issue on Sati has been referred to by the Supreme Court also.
We attacked right and left the country’s foreign policy in the context of the recognition of Israel by a few Arab States. We severely criticised the so-called Arab nationalism and pleaded for Islamisation of the Bait al-Maqdis question, which we still feel, is not being solved simply because it is considered an issue of land belonging to the Palestinians. It is our concerted view that we have had been projecting single-mindedly that Al-Maqdis is the real Islamic issue and the entire Ummah is, and must be, involved in its peaceful resolution.
More often than not, our constructive plain speaking was not taken kindly by the powers-that-be. Once I did an editorial on Kashmir. Soon I received a call from the Secretary of Information Mr. Jamal Ahmad Kidwai to have a cup of tea with him in his office. When I reached there, my heart was pounding. The tea did come but also came: You can certainly do as powerful an editorial on the subject as you have already done recently. But do you think your editorials would alter the policy of the Government of India? In the meantime I had finished the tea and the official message was received by me in its proper perspective.
Once I was taken to task by the misinformed Mr. SK Singh, who after his remarkable stint with the Ministry of External Affairs, became Governor of Rajasthan. While sympathetically dealing with my request for passport, Mr. Shailendra Kumar Singh said, “The information is that you receive money from the embassy of Saudi Arabia and it is this money that is given as salary to the staff of Radiance Viewsweekly”. “Mr. Singh,” I quipped, “Did your clever-by-half source also inform you that our meagre salaries are not distributed in time. Had that been the case, we would have been the richest of the rich! We are people of integrity; we sell neither the nation nor our dignity.”
DESAI KNEW RADIANCE
At least Mr. Moraji Desai had the correct idea of the weight of Radiance Viewsweekly. After spotting me at a press conference and crosschecking my credentials, he invited me at tea at his residence. Can you help me in conveying my message to the Ameer Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, asked the Prime Minister? Gladly, I submitted. Here it should be remembered that it was not an election time. I conveyed the Prime Minister’s request to the late Maulana Muhammad Yusuf and within a week we were with Mr. Desai, who gave his views on the communal situation in the country for 55 minutes. Maulana Yusuf accompanied by Mr. Muslim gave him a patient hearing. Then it was the turn of the Jamaat-e-Islami chief, but Mr. Desai postponed it for the next session as time for another appointment was fast approaching and he had perhaps taken too much time in apprising the Maulana with his views. But circumstances compelled him to relinquish his office and the Jamaat chief could never put his point of view before him.
SECRET OF SURVIVAL
The chief secret – notwithstanding the aforementioned faux pas – of our survival is: we refused to be sold out to the lobbyists as well as individual politicians. The second reason behind the phenomenon was our sincere dedication and commitment to the ideology. We did not repose trust in our labour or talent; we reposed trust in Allah. Most of us considered it our good fortune that we were attached with Radiance Viewsweekly. Our staffers did not reach office according to the hands of the watch. Nor did they leave office according to the hands of their watches. There was an inexplicable zeal, passion rather madness.
We have to record our deep appreciation for the late Mr. Anwar Ali Khan Soze and Mr. Rahm Ali Al Hashmi for their editorial services during the periodic crises, which never came to public knowledge.
The Radiance Viewsweekly never compromised on certain values like objectivity or honesty of purpose. We never allowed our image to be sullied even in book reviews. The late Mr. A.A. Ravoof, in the very beginning, gave me a book for review. I glanced through it and ultimately decided to ignore. The Editor, who had photographic memory, reminded me but I could not persuade myself to review the book. After a week or two he once again reminded me of the assignment. At last I decided to put before him the “why and what” of my reluctance. Therein was a sentence telling in so many words that the author had seen Allah. Mr. Ravoof could not resist his laughter.
WAHBI, NOT KASBI
Again, after years a non-Muslim friend wrote a book on Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be to him). The central point of the book, carrying a Foreword of the Rector of Cairo University was, Prophet Muhammad was so pious, so religious, so true a Muslim and he said so much prayer, recited so much Qur’ān and observed so much fasts that ultimately Allah promoted him as the Prophet. Col BK Narain reminded me many a time about the review and he was somewhat angry also with my “laziness”. Tired, I respectfully submitted to the Colonel: “Prophethood has nothing to do with piety, prayers, readings of the Qur’ān and fasting. The Prophets are the chosen few, and the choser is Allah. It is the Divine choice which makes one a Prophet, not the Prophet’s piety etc. etc. Do you know it”? I told him in Urdu also that Prophethood is not ‘Kasbi’ but ‘Wahbi’. I further explained to him, it is the Divine will and Divine judgement and choice that makes one a Prophet. My hunch is that the Rector of the Cairo University had written the Foreword without reading the book.
We had a good number of non-Muslim writers who were sympathetic to Muslims and Islam as ideology. The most prominent among them was Mr. SP Sinha, a senior advocate of the Supreme Court. He attacked the saffron forces and always with legal finesse. The very first issue of the Radiance Viewsweekly carried his article. To me it was education to take dictation of his article every week.
The second benefactor of Radiance was Mr. Kuldip Nayar. His writings adored the pages of Radiance for years. Another gentleman was Mr. Gopal Mittal while yet another was Mr. DR Goyal. Both highly educated and erudite writers and pamphleteers; both lovers of Urdu and admirers of Muslim culture and the Urdu language.
As we had, and have, no money, the printing charges as well as the cost of paper shrunk our limited resources and soon we were on the rocks. The modus vivendi we adopted to float was bringing out Special Issues on Eid al-Fitr, Eid al-Adha, Independence Day and Republic Day. In fact, we were always in search of occasions. The advertisers of south were remarkably sympathetic towards us. This kept us afloat.
Then we had, and have, our limitations also for we did not, and would not, publish advertisements promoting family planning or interest-oriented schemes or anything compromising morality. Picture of women was a taboo for us. The late Maulana Shams Peerzada was so touchy that he resigned from the membership of the Board of Islamic Publications simply because we had published a full page advertisement containing a lady giving an interview to a press person regarding the efficiency of Kuwait Airlines. Knowing fully well the consequence of non-payment by the advertisement agent, we had to disfigure the lady’s face. The then Kuwaiti ambassador Mr. Yacoubur Rushaid did not show his annoyance but the agent discontinued publication forever.
OPERATIVE PARTS
If we ever published operative parts of the speech of any gulf dignitary, we never published his photograph. Many a time we refused to publish such material to the utter chagrin of the local ambassador of that country in New Delhi. But times did change.
When Syed Qutb was awarded death penalty by the Nasser regime, the caption given by Mr. Javid Hassan, then on our staff, was, “He smiled his way to death”. This was the first picture given of a male figure in Radiance Viewsweekly. Now we publish pictures but with caution.
Radiance has been through a severe grind. The trials and tribulations never abandoned us. Till the early 1990s, the staff salary was rarely disbursed in the first week. But what is remarkable is that there was no complaint on any face. Normalcy prevailed even in penury amongst us.
CLUMSY CURVE
Radiance was also cheated by a few. We have, and had a training scheme for young men in journalism. The understanding would be that after the completion of training they would serve the Radiance at least for three years. Almost as a whole, we have a sad experience in this regard. One gentleman, after doing the course, joined the Benaras Hindu University as a Lecturer in advertisement; another one adored the ranks of IPS officers. The third person adorns the chair of editor of a saffron mouthpiece on Islam.
The curve of progress of the Viewsweekly is clumsy. It is not stout and dynamic. Our basic problem has been paucity of advertisement, which constitutes the backbone of any media organisation. This fact, at the end of the day, casts its shadow on circulation and quality of paper. Because of poor resources, at least in the given situation, we do not pay, and cannot pay our staff appropriately. Several adventurous souls joined us during the last 50 years. But after having experience, they left us in lurch without any compunction at all. Thus unwittingly, Radiance turned out to be a good jumping board for the zealots.
GROUND REALITY
Our admirers, critics and antagonists understandably expect a lot from us. But they do not know the ground reality. They compare us, or want to compare us, with the TIME news magazine or at least India Today. But they forget to realise the world of difference between the staff as well as the infrastructure of Radiance and that of other magazines.
The problem with our Honorary Editors has been that because of their other-than-editorial engagements, they could not, and of course cannot, give their best. All of them were erudite and enlightened. But an editor is supposed to be a man of imagination, innovation and vision. This is not a part-time job. He must be on-the-spot, inspiring, leading and able to guide. Stopgap arrangements do not and cannot deliver. Some of them, for personal reasons, stayed at their far off places. It created insurmountable difficulties. Now Alhamdulillah we have a competent, whole time Editor.
We have not so far, we admit with pain and regret, become a “popular” magazine. We are absent from newsstands. Many describe us as an “elite” magazine whose readership is confined to intellectuals, opinion makers and critics. But the desire to transform Radiance Viewsweekly into the voice of thinking sections of society has not till date died down in us.
RADIANCE IMPACT
For a bird’s eye view on the impact of Radiance, the then External Affairs Ministry saw to it that I, as a representative of Radiance, was included in the Press entourage, accompanying Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee during his official visit to Islamabad. During his Prime Ministership also, they say, he did not leave his habit of apprising himself of the Muslim public opinion.
During the Rabat Summit my name, as the Radiance Correspondent, was also officially included in the list of media persons bound for Morocco, where everybody knows New Delhi received a severe drubbing.
If the posting of the weekly was delayed by a day, for this or that reason, Prime Minister I.K. Gujaral’s office would ring up to ask why the paper was late.
Years ago I did a lead in which the expression “mercantile mentality” was used in the bold headline on the weekly’s front page. Mr. Mani Shankar Aiyar put the weekly before then Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi. The caption had compelled Mrs. G to read the whole analysis projecting Muslim point of view of the then prevailing political scenario.
Before the Bangladesh liberation, I did a cover story containing a snide remark: “Foreign policy should not be entrusted to fickle minds.” My accreditation facility was silently withdrawn as a punishment for transgression. But Mr. Mani Shanker Aiyar and Mr. Kuldip Nayar saw to it that it was restored ultimately. By recalling these trifle incidents, I want to underscore that Radiance was read, is read and shall be read in the corridors of power.
READ IN HIGHER ECHELONS
Our editorial material as well as reportages is read by higher echelons simply because we project the real ground reality. The truth is that we have no constituency. Our constituency is Islam and Muslims. You will be surprised to know – it is a tall claim indeed – that since its inception, the Viewsweekly has not missed a single issue because of “our” reasons. During the long nightmare called Emergency, we were behind bars and of course there was no Radiance in market. Why were we incarcerated? Because we had opposed the Emergency tooth and nail.
To Indian diplomats, they say, a copy of Radiance is dispatched every week officially.
Almost all the High Commissioners and Ambassadors of Arab Islamic world regularly receive a copy of Radiance from us, and it is no more a secret that their weekly and fortnightly reports carry paragraphs from the Viewsweekly.
NOT AN END IN ITSELF
We are of the concerted view that the Viewsweekly is just a means to an end. It is not an end in itself. We are not for lengthening the shadows. We are for cohesion.
At the national level we are for mutual-respect, mutual-understanding, mutual-trust, mutual-confidence and mutual-solidarity at the apex, the highest level. We are for dialogue for the removal of irritants.
The Viewsweekly is today considered mouthpiece of Muslim segment of India’s plural polity. A glance at the files of the last five decades would reveal that we, like a rock, have defended the multiple causes of various minorities. We have faithfully represented various Muslim schools of thought. For the sake of Our pages were always open for our honest dissenters. Sensational or yellow journalism is unprintable words in our office. We have paid, and are prepared to continue paying, a heavy price for our adherence to morality, principles and higher standards of journalism.
The constitution of the Board of Islamic Publications reflects its large-heartedness. Maulana Ali Mian remained on the Board till his death, although for reasons best known to him, the luminary did not attend a single meeting of the Board.
MUSLIM FUTURE
Much water has flown down the Ganges since 1963. Today a confident Muslim can talk with his chin up. Today he knows more about his rights and others’ obligations. Definitely bridges have been made between the Muslims and the majority, and the Muslims and the government. Its tardy implementation apart, how do you look at the Sachar Committee Report? Muslim future is more promising today than it was 50 years ago. If they hold the string of Allah firmly and succeed in projecting Islam as a comprehensive alternative, their future is brighter.
Need I reiterate that Islam has come to lead, not to be led?
What goes without reiterating is that yes, Radiance has impact; it is considered Muslim minority’s representative voice; it has made the ever-continuing essays in removing the thick cobwebs of bias and prejudice; it has built bridges and mutual understanding and trust. And it has yet miles to go.
[Now 76, the writer is the first Proof Reader of the Viewsweekly. After 34 years’ service, he retired as Deputy-Editor 13 years ago. But he continues to write for us almost regularly. He is also on the Board of Islamic Publications.]