National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language (NCPUL), with the support of the Department of Higher Education of the National Human Resource Development Ministry, organised an Urdu Mela at the Srimanta Sankaradeva Kalasetra Campus, Panjabari, Gawahati from January 12 to 18to popularise the Urdu language and encourage youngsters to learn the language. The Mela was inaugurated by Tarun Gogoi, the Chief Minister of Assam.
NPUCL’s director Ali Javed said that Urdu is a language of the masses, and it also played an important role in the freedom struggle. However in the recent years, the love for the language, especially among the youths, is dipping. The main aim of organising the Mela, he further said, is to push the language move beyond madrasas and make it popular among the masses.
Urdu plays and other local cultural shows form the main items of the Urdu Mela. The plays were staged every evening. Some of the big names of Indian theatre took part in the Mela. Habib Tanvir’s popular plays Agra Bazaar and Raj Rakt, Hanif Patni and Nadira Babbar’s Begum Jaan, Salim Amir’s Aapki Sonia, Lokendra Trivedi’s Qaid-e-Hayat, Anis Azmi’s Ghalib Ke Kahutoot were staged in the Mela. These plays provided a vast and diverse picture of Urdu culture and language. The plays were all well-received by the audience and helped them to know more about the language. Local artists also added flavour to the Mela. Bihu, the traditional dance form of Assam and Thang–ta, the traditional martial art form of the Manipuris along with other cultural shows by Guwahati branch of Indian Progressive Theatre Artist (IPTA) were also showcased. IPTA, Guwahati, staged a children play Beli Uthar Sadhu. One of the unique presentations of the Mela was the performance of Zikir by a local cultural troupe Sargam Sanskriti Gosthi, led by Hafeeza Begum. Zikiri songs are the Islamic devotional songs sung in Assamese. It is sung in group without any musical instrument, but the tune is set to the sound of the clapping of hands. This tradition is mainly associated with the 17th century Muslim saint Shah Fakir Syed Moinuddin, popularly known as Azan Pir.
Salim Amir’s play Aapki Sonia was a big hit as film actors Sonali Bendre and Farooq Sheikh play their roles. Farooq Sheikh, who has made frequent trips to the region earlier for theatre related works, expressed that the people of North-East are wonderful and loving, and the region has a lot of good things in store, both in terms of nature and culture. But he feels that the political scenario is awful and hopes that the situation becomes normal and the political scenario improves. The Urdu Mela, according to Farooq Sheikh, was a big success. He says that it is a good way of developing cultural affinity, and the government and the organisers should organise such events in other parts of the North-East as well.
The Mela is a part of NCPUL’s ongoing programme to promote the Urdu language in North-eastern part of India. Under this programme NCPUL has established Urdu Study Centres in North-eastern states to teach 1-year course of Urdu Diploma through Distance Education. It has also opened 1 year Diploma in Computer Application and Multilingual DTP to give technical education to Urdu speaking boys and girls for getting employment in IT field. And to promote classical languages Arabic and Persian and to preserve cultural heritage of India, 10 Arabic Study Centres were also established in North-east to impart 2-year Diploma and 1-year Certificate course in functional Arabic. NCPUL has also been giving financial assistance to voluntary organisations to hold seminar and lecture series. A national seminar on the theme ‘Impact of Mir on Urdu Poetry’ was held from October 26 to 28, 2007 at Imphal, Manipur.