It was a horrible period for the Urdu language in North India after independence. Those who gave vent to their ire against the British Empire with the slogan Inquilab Zindabad, now started to impeach Urdu as a foreign language. A section of communal elements of Indian population started to blame Urdu for Partition, calling it a language which created Pakistan.
In Uttar Pradesh, the birthplace of Urdu, a learned chief minister Dr. Sampurnanand refused to recognise Urdu as a separate language but declared that Urdu was nothing but a style (shaili) of the Hindi language and the promotion of Hindi is nothing but the promotion of Urdu. Govind Ballabh Pant and Sampurananand issued orders to terminate the teaching of Urdu in government schools and a number of Urdu teachers were ordered to stop teaching of Urdu and try to learn Hindi. I still remember my teacher Molvi Shamshad Husain, who had expressed his disability to teach Hindi instead of Urdu at the age of 58 tendered his resignation with tearful eyes in 1949. There was a chaos in the educational system in Uttar Pradesh and Hindi was being thrust upon the children of Urdu-speaking people. After great hue and cry it was allowed to create a separate class for a few boys who refused to learn Sanskrit instead of Urdu.
At that troublesome period of linguistic fascism when Hindi was ravaging Urdu, a big group of brave hearts came forward and at that critical juncture the English weekly Radiance stepped forward and championed the cause of Urdu. This weekly was launched in July 1963 from Delhi with Mr. Yousuf Siddiqui as its publisher and Mr. A.A. Ravoof, a famous senior English journalist of South, as its editor. Radiance took up the cause of Urdu and started publishing articles relating to the plight of Urdu and obstacles created on the path of its progress.
The Government of Uttar Pradesh under the chief ministership of Chandra Bhan Gupta introduced the three-language formula. Radiance in its issue of 18 August, 1963 published an eye-opening article “Steps to Oust Urdu” by Qazi Adeel Abbasi. This formula actually proved a death knell for Urdu as along with Hindi and English primary class pupils were required to study a third language and that was any modern language of India including Hindi and excluding Urdu. Mr. Abbasi protested this formula which placed Sanskrit, an ancient language, instead of Urdu and the curriculum of basic education had no place for Urdu as it was banished from all schools of U.P.
In August 1963 Radiance published an article by famous Urdu writer and poet, Justice Anand Narain Mulla who had stepped forward to defend Urdu. He wrote, “The treatment accorded by the Government of U.P. under the three-language formula patently betrays the evil intent of the government inasmuch as the linguistic repression in rearing its ugly head again and nothing fruitful seems to come out of this formula for the good of Urdu.”
The friends and admirers of Urdu have sadly noted the deliberate political motive behind the U.P. Government to seek to create such uncongenial atmosphere in the schools of Uttar Pradesh which would rather choke Urdu to death. Radiance projected statements of Mr. Anand Narain Mulla and Qazi Adeel Abbasi to defend Urdu from the onslaughts of mischievous state government of U.P. which was even trampling on the good advice of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and the Central Government. Mr. Mulla was very realistic when he declared, “Strictly speaking, the mother tongue of people is not simply a mother tongue. It is fusion of the history, the civilization, the social structure and the mode of thinking of the people who speak it.”
In the September 1963 issue of Radiance an article “Language Tangle in India” was published. The writer expressed astonishment over Hindi being made Rashtra Bhasha or supreme national language of the country while it was not the language of the masses of the country. He claimed that Hindi is an artificial language in the process of manufacture in order to revive and promote a culture thousands of years old. The common language of people in northern India is Hindustani. The pages of Radiance spotlight the famous words of Mahatma Gandhi, “Hindi athwa Hindustani written in Nagri and Urdu scripts is fit for the national language of the country.”
In its October 1963 issue Radiance published the demands of the Convention on three-language formula held under the chairmanship of Mr. Anand Narain Mulla which condemned the anti-Urdu policy. Radiance again in November 1963 devoted three pages to show the state of discriminatory attitude of U.P. government and published an article of Qazi Adeel Abbasi, General Secretary Deeni Talimi Council of U.P. and a great Muslim leader who was working day and night to revive Islamic education and establish maktab and madrasa in every village of U.P. to provide educational facility for Urdu-speaking boys and girls to keep them akin to their faith. He wrote, ‘’It is the general feeling of Urdu population of U.P. that the attitude of the Government and its educational authorities is full of extreme hostility against Urdu.”
They make only a show of justice and fair play before the Central Government but they have not accepted the latter’s clear order that Sanskrit should not be included in the three-language formula. The state government has refused to appoint Urdu teachers and remain dumb on the demand of parents of the students who want to study Urdu. The schools are saturated with Hindi medium teachers and only Urdu teacher is missing in every institution. Mr. Abbasi created awakening among Urdu-speaking parents and advised them to send their wards to such schools which provide Urdu education.
In February 1964 Radiance published an article by famous Urdu poet and writer Prof. Raghupat Sahai Firaq Gorakhpuri. He asked the veterans of Hindu Rashtra that their slogan – Hindi, Hindu, Hindustani – is not derived from any Indian language but is purely Arabo-Persian. He warned the makers of modern Hindi that their attitude towards Urdu diction is unfortunate and has resulted in a violently enforced dichotomy between Urdu and Hindi. He pointed out that more than two thousand Arabo-Persian words were in constant use by children, women, villagers, city people, the least educated and the most highly educated whom we include among Hindi-speaking people. They have naturally and willingly assimilated thousands of Arabic and Persian words which rival the number of Tatsam Sanskrit words in different Indian languages.
In 19 July 1964 issue of Radiance, Sri Chand Gore traced a link between Hindi and Urdu in the light of the novels of the famous Urdu writer Munshi Premchand who wrote a number of novels in Urdu as well as Hindi and both the languages claim him to be their own writer. According to Mr. Gore, Mr. Premchand had perfect command over two literary forms – fiction and short stories as well as Urdu and Hindi. He wrote for humanity and not for any particular community or sect. His characters look like a portrait gallery of Indian people. Thus Radiance paid a tribute to this great writer of the Urdu language.
Mr Mustafeezul Hasan asks the readers of Radiance whether Urdu is going to be exiled to Karachi or Lahore. His article in 9 August,1964 issue covers the report of the convention held on 12 April 1964, at Lucknow which was attended by the delegates from Urdu-speaking states of U.P, Bihar, Punjab, Delhi, M.P and Rajasthan. The convention expressed its disappointment and concern over the systematic anti-Urdu policy of the concerned governments and demanded that Urdu be made second official language.
Radiance in its 11 October 1964 issue presents a report of All India Urdu Conference at Jaipur on 2 October 1964, under the auspices of Anjuman Taraqqui Urdu. Pandit Anand Narain Mulla presided over it. He revealed to the audience that more than one crore people speak Urdu and it is their mother tongue. Its literary contribution is more than any other language of India except perhaps Bengali. But the sentimentalism, prejudices as well as politics has blind-folded a section of our people. Radiance covered the big Jaipur Convention in its many issues. Justice Mulla’s whole presidential address was covered in five issues of the weekly.
Justice Mulla narrated the callous behaviour of some state governments that had been side-tracking all the steps of Central Government for the well-being of Urdu. The educational departments very cunningly killed all the plans for development of Urdu. The school authorities very brazenly filled in the mother tongue column of all the students with Hindi. So was the hate campaign against Urdu that almost all the teachers were busy in rubbing out Urdu from their schools and even Muslim boys and girls were counted among students with Hindi mother tongue. Mr. Mulla exhorted his audience to be sincere and alert against such mischiefs.
Mr. A. Majid, an advocate, explains why and whats of anti-Urdu campaign in the November 1964 issue of Radiance. In his opinion the Partition of India on the basis of two-nation theory and the utmost bitterness heading to devastation and carnage, the memory of which is still celebrated with impunity, are guiding factors for majority decisions in matters concerning Muslims. Unfortunately, after independence a section of Indians developed hatred for all the aspects of our civilization which reflected major contributions of Muslim civilization and its clear impact on India. Some diehard Hindutvawadis started a campaign to condemn all the aspects of Indian civilization and culture which marked impact of Islamic trends. Some of them started to prove that the Qutub Minar and the Taj Mahal were built by some Hindu rulers of the past. This vicious trend continued to tarnish the image of all the aspects of Muslim culture. Some Hindu parties led a section of population to develop hatred with all the things that bear the Muslim mark and it is a blot on the immaculate culture of Akhand Bharat. Mr. Majid is shocked to hear the claim of the Hindus that Urdu has no place in India as it is not a regional language of any province of India. It is totally wrong as Urdu was born in the Punjab, U.P, Bihar and it is the mother tongue of a multitude of people of these provinces.
Mr. M. M. Zamzam, in the 20 November 1964 issue of Radiance, raises alarm and calls Urdu lovers to commit themselves to the cause of existence of Urdu which is at stake. Actually at this critical juncture Urdu had been banished from all the government schools and colleges and students were being compelled to adopt Sanskrit along with Hindi and English. Urdu textbooks were nearly out of market and Urdu teachers were compelled to teach other subjects.
Mr. Mohammad Yusuf rightly says in the February 25, 1965 issue of Radiance that Urdu-speaking people should solve themselves the problem themselves and open their own schools and keep their mother tongue alive. In the February 28, 1965 issue Radiance is shocked to report that the President of India refused to grant Urdu the state of regional language as demanded by more than two million people of U.P. It was a great setback to Urdu loving people. Radiance advised Urdu-loving people not to lose patience, and that apathy of the government should make them work even more enthusiastically to continue their efforts and achieve their goal. During the chief ministership of Mrs. Sucheta Kripalani demand for the status of second language for Urdu gained momentum but it failed due to opposition of Hindu lobby of U.P. Radiance advised the Urdu lovers that they should try to convince the common people of what Mr. Raghupati Sahai has said on the issue is truth. He claimed that no one can hope to learn khari boli Hindi well unless he is also conversant with the literature and poetry of Urdu. But this is very old conviction. Now Hindi-speaking people have brushed aside all Urdu words from their language and now it is packed with Sanskrit words from top to bottom and even Muslim ministers avoid words of Urdu origin while addressing people and use Sanskrit words to give impression that they are great patriots. Radiance gives a clear picture of the efforts of Urdu lovers during the ’70s and ’80s of the 19th century. Its 25 April 1965 issue covers the memorandum of 104 MPs of Indian Parliament who requested the Prime Minister to declare Urdu as a regional language and second official language of U.P, Bihar, MP, Delhi, Rajasthan and Punjab. In its 4 July 1965 issue Radiance again published a memorandum of 35 dignified persons belonging to different walks of life who expressed concern over the plight of linguistic minorities of M.P. It condemned the anti-Urdu campaign of a section of society.
The 2 October 1966 issue of Radiance narrates the details of Bihar Urdu Conference held on 10 and 11 September, 1966 which was attended by 40,000 people. Delegates from all districts of Bihar attended it. They demanded statutory guarantee for Urdu. Again in 27 November 1966 issue, Radiance published the manifesto presented by 38 eminent protagonists of Urdu who hailed from different parts of the country. They complained that the government is showing lukewarm attitude towards Urdu. In January 1967 issue Radiance spotlights the role of Urdu in our democratic and secular pattern of society. All India Solidarity Council headed by Mrs. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit expressed its shock that there is no Higher Secondary school with Urdu medium in whole Uttar Pradesh.
In 8 January 1967 issue a factual report by Mr. Gopal Mittal, Editor Tehrik, Delhi regarding pitiable condition of Urdu appears; it narrates the efforts of Maulana Hifzur Rahman regarding rehabilitation of Urdu. There is a factual and realistic analysis by Mr. A. G. Noorani of the report of the linguistic minorities in 22 January 1967 issue of Radiance.
Thus Radiance goes on with its efforts to project on its pages the cause of Urdu continuously right from July 1963 when its first issue was published till this day. This famous weekly has completed 50 years of its publication and its voluminous files are teeming with articles and reports relating to Urdu. In 7 April 1968 issue Radiance publishes extracts from the famous book on history of the Urdu literature by Mr. Ram Babu Saxena. It reflects how Urdu served the cause of national integration and unity between Hindus and Muslims.
Thus Radiance preserves a voluminous treasure relating to the problems and issues of Urdu after independence and also memorable articles on the role of Urdu in promoting human values and moral stature of Indian people.
[The writer, Ex Sub-Editor of Radiance Viewsweekly (1963-64), breathed his last on 1 September 2013 only days after submitting this article. His obituary appeared in 8-14 Sep issue of Radiance.]