Areeba Anwar, an undergraduate student of the Department of Biosciences, Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI), has won the prestigious Damodarashri National Award for Academic Excellence 2024.
Her essay on the topic “Victory Will Be of Human Spirit” emerged as the best among participants from across the country. The Prayagraj-based SS Khanna Girls Degree College, affiliated with Allahabad University, has been giving away this award for 15 years.
This year, more t2,000 participants submitted their essays in the competition, out of which only 10 essays were selected for the final round.
Areeba Anwar’s essay not only featured in the top 10, but was also declared the winner for the best undergraduate essay across the country.
The award comprises a cash prize of Rs 30,000, a memento, and books worth Rs 5,000.
The award is given every year in a function on October 2. Areeba Anwar represented the university in the competition organized under the aegis of Literature, Fine Arts, Quiz and Debate Club under the DSW (Dean Students Welfare) office of Jamia Millia Islamia.
Before leaving for Prayagraj for the final defense of the essay, she presented her essay and discussed her ideas with Dr. Rumi Naqvi, a member of the Sahitya Club. Dr. Naqvi gave her important suggestions to make the essay stronger.
This 5,000-word essay by Areeba Anwar underlined the resilience of the human spirit. She explained how this spirit is important not only for our survival but also for the development of the nation.
Her essay was adjudged the best among 2,003 essays received from central universities, making her eligible for this prestigious award. This achievement is a proud moment for both Ariba Anwar and Jamia Millia Islamia, a testimony to the academic quality of the institution and the creativity of the students.
source: http://www.awazthevoice.in / Awaz, The Voice / Home> Story / by posted by Aasha Khosa, ATV / October 09th, 2024
The development of Urdu prose and journalism and the parallel agenda of social reform in 19th-century Hyderabad played a vital role in setting the ground for the emergence of the Progressive Writers’ Movement a few decades later. The aims and objectives of the Progressive Writers’ Movement (PWM), which began in the 1930s in North India, resonated with students, poets, writers and scholars in Hyderabad. The PWM urged writers and poets to organise and break away from the hackneyed tropes, themes and genres of classical, romantic poetry that had dominated the literary milieu of Hyderabad and were associated with great cultural capital. Instead, the PWM wanted to create a new, more meaningful aesthetic that would represent changing political and social conditions and confront the material realities and experiences of everyday life. Apart from class struggle and class injustice, which was a major concern for the PWM, progressive writers also stressed the need to fight for political freedoms, resist political repression, and forge grassroots connections with the people 1.
The Hyderabad chapter of the Progressive Writers’ Association (PWA) was established by Makhdoom Mohiuddin along with Akhtar Hussain Raipuri and Sibt-e-Hasan in 1936. Sarojini Naidu offered her home, The Golden Threshold, as a venue for PWA gatherings and, later, for meetings of the banned Communist Party of India (CPI) 2. Among the women writers, journalists, intellectuals and activists associated with the PWA in the 1940s and 1950s were Jahanbano Naqvi, Zeenath Sajida, Rafia Sultana, Azeezunnisa Habibi, Brij Rani, Jamalunnisa Baji, her sisters Razia Begum and Zakia Begum, and Najma Nikhat. Amena Tahseen emphasises that the period after 1936 was critical for the history of women’s writing in Hyderabad because although women had been publishing their work, forming associations, and leading and participating in social, educational and literary initiatives for decades before the formation of the PWA, these endeavours were limited largely to women’s gatherings alone 3. The PWA changed this forever, and women began to attend and participate in literary and intellectual gatherings which had previously been restricted to men only.
Sarojini Naidu’s first collection of poems, named The Golden Threshold was published in 1905. (Photo: Getty Images)
The most vivid example and description of this shift comes from Jamalunnisa Baji’s autobiography, Bikhri Yaadein (Scattered Memories; 2008), which not only documents and assesses the political and literary events that took place in Hyderabad over the span of almost a century, but also furnishes information and reflection on what these events meant to women like Baji. Pardah is an important preoccupation in this account. Baji had long considered it her bane but had been unable to give it up. She describes how her younger sisters—who had had more freedom than her, were better educated, and were allowed greater choice in choosing their partners—had discarded the pardah at a young age. Literary gatherings with the leading Progressive figures of the day began to take place in Baji’s house in the 1940s on her and her brother Akhtar’s initiative. She had always been interested in literature and politics and was supported by parents and siblings who had an apparently insatiable appetite for education and literature. This drew her all the more to discussions that were happening beyond the curtain that separated her from gatherings where her sisters and other women who did not observe pardah, listened and spoke 4. Such gatherings offered her the opportunity to gradually emerge out of pardah.
The Telangana people’s armed struggle. (Photo: People’s Democracy)
The Progressive writers and the Telangana People’s Struggle
Between 1946 and 1951, the rural districts of Telangana had risen against the feudal structure of the Hyderabad state and the oppression it had wreaked on peasants and agricultural labourers for generations. The struggle began organically, with a tenant cultivator named Chityala Ailamma refusing to hand over her harvest to the landlord’s men. Within a few months, however, the Communist Party entered the fray and began to operate under the aegis of the Andhra Mahasabha, which had been formed in 1930 to champion the cultural and social rights of Telugu-speaking people. At its height, the Telangana People’s Struggle involved three million people from 3,000 villages 5. The struggle also made its way to the cities, as factory workers and students protested and went on strike. Many Progressive writers also identified as communists and were active members of the CPI. As the people’s struggle intensified in Telangana, the CPI was banned in Hyderabad and many PWA members had to go underground. So,
PWA meetings began to take place at Baji’s house at night, which was less conspicuous than the Golden Threshold, Sarojini Naidu’s house, and offered better cover to the likes of Makhdoom, who was well-known and easily recognised.
Baji formally discarded the pardah during the All-India Progressive Writers’ Conference in 1945, which was held in Hyderabad. She, her sisters, and one other woman were the only women to sit in the open with the men 6. What enabled the participation of a large number of Hyderabadis, especially women, in the Progressive movement was the PWA’s approach right from the start to not limit their membership to committed socialists 7. To be sure, there was always a core group of socialist writers at its centre, but the only expectation from all member writers—irrespective of ideological persuasions—consisted of them sharing the basic agenda of the manifesto, i.e. to build a sturdy organisation of writers who opposed reactionary social tendencies and stood for a literature rooted in reality. Indeed, so successful was this broadly defined manifesto that there were many writers who would not fall easily into this category if it had been ideologically restricted, but who nonetheless identified as Progressive and were closely connected with the PWM.
Dr. Zeenath Sajida on the cover of Poonam, Urdu monthly magazine in Hyderabad. (Photo: archive.org)
Zeenath Sajida (1924-2009) and a thriving culture of women writers
Zeenath Sajida was one such figure who dominated the literary and cultural circles of Hyderabad. She is a good example of a Progressive writer who not only wrote works criticising social injustices and exposing the hollowness of middle-class values, but also those that were less political and consisted of humorous essays as well as classic, romantic short stories. Sajida was most prolific in the decades spanning the 1940s to the 1960s, publishing an anthology of short stories in 1947 and several academic manuscripts on literatures of the Deccan. But the most fascinating literary writings she produced consisted of her essays in the genres of tanz-o-mizah (humour and satire) and khaake (pen-portraits), which were published in different newspapers and literary magazines and compiled only after her death in 2009. They cover subjects as varied as the gendered perspectives and lived experiences of women from different walks of life, critiques of social manners and everyday human folly, and nuanced documentation of the history and heritage of her beloved Hyderabad.
In the most political and radical of these texts, Sajida artfully and rigorously debates provocative social questions and taboos while disguising them in the genre of inshaiye or light sketches.
In these, she shows herself to be far ahead of her time, writing about things that we know today as gender fluidity, gender privilege, the mental load of women in relation to household management, the invisibility of domestic labour, and the unfair and unrealistic demands made of middle-class women professionals.
These essays also reveal the narrator’s most disarmingly vulnerable thoughts, feelings, and frailties; in the process, Sajida emerges as a writer who knows how to use emotion to extract both empathy as well as laughs from her readers.
There was a thriving culture of women writers of humour, satire and pen-portraits in Hyderabad right from the 1940s, which both received individual and institutional support from male writers and scholars and was also subjected to ridicule by them 8. Sajida’s work marks the best of this tradition of women’s non-fiction and is important to read and know also because non-fiction is generally neglected in favour of fiction and poetry, which have greater cultural capital; have come to form well-defined and durable stereotypes of Urdu literature; and, thus, capture the attention of translators, scholars and publishers alike.
Among Sajida’s younger contemporaries were Jeelani Bano (b. 1936), Najma Nikhat (1936–1997), and Wajida Tabassum (1935–2011). Nikhat was a writer of short stories whose loyalty and commitment to the PWM exceeded the heyday of this organisation. Like Sajida, although Nikhat produced a relatively modest number of short stories, her oeuvre demonstrates skill and is important for its sustained engagement with her lifelong preoccupations and concerns. Her stories about life in the feudal deodis of Hyderabad are insightful and instructive in establishing how women of both working as well as upper classes lived and negotiated feudal patriarchy and the conservative social world of princely Hyderabad. She also wrote hopeful stories about the revolution and depicted the lives of the poor in the rural districts of Telangana and Andhra, where she lived for many years.
A rare picture of R-L Qurratulain Hyder, Ismat Chughtai and Wajida Tabassum – known names in Urdu Literature. Twitter- FaseehBariKhan
Wajida Tabassum is understood today to be more of a feminist than an avowed Progressive. This is because she writes defiantly and unselfconsciously about female sexuality, caste patriarchy and sexual violence against women in feudal homes.
Although her many novels and short stories were successful and popular and the latter, in particular, are enjoying a resurgence of interest among youth after the Me Too movement, many Hyderabadis, including scholars, look down on her work as “obscene” and “unjust” towards the feudal aristocracy 9.
The “shock value” of Tabassum’s approach often belies her profound and nuanced understanding of the precise workings of culture and society towards concentrating and maintaining power in a few hands. Until recently, only a couple of Tabassum’s stories were available in English translation.
Other continuities
Over time, the PWM—its ideology and aesthetic—acquired a hegemony that ensured the marginalisation of writers who did not consider themselves Progressives. This became a big problem when in the tension between the “creative section” and the “political section” of the PWA (Progressive Writers’ Association), the latter prevailed, and this often resulted in didactic writing dominated by socialist themes and motivations 10. The ambivalence and even disenchantment of writers in other places towards the PWA, which increasingly adopted a rigid, even conservative stance towards the choice and treatment of themes employed by its members, is well known 11. But given that it had such a compelling social message, an influential platform, and an overarching visibility and influence, it is understandable that many women writers would continue to operate under the aegis of the PWA and utilise its many resources.
Other writers who did not subscribe to Progressive writing often represented literary and cultural continuities that were desirable and significant in other ways. After 1948, Urdu had been relegated to a secondary place in Hyderabad, and its resources and institutions were severely undermined by the minoritisation imposed by the new regime. Despite this, nuha, marsiya, azadari and salaam, traditional poetic genres that belong to the Shia practice of Muharram, continued to be regularly published in magazines and newspapers and also performed in ashurkhanas. Other religious or mystical genres, such as hamd and naat, and ghazals, nazms, and qasidas that did not represent Progressive thought or aesthetics persisted too. Many women poets wrote and published in these genres. Additionally, nazms for children were very popular in Hyderabad, and women were enthusiastic proponents of this genre as well 12. Often, these engagements revealed completely different ways of engaging with social and political discourses from Progressive writing, as can be seen in the way the poet Syeda Bano “Hijab”/Hijab Bilgrami juxtaposed the battle of Karbala with the struggle for freedom from colonial rule 13.
New woman, new writing
The next major shift in Urdu literature came with jadeediyat or modernism in the 1960s, which turned the subject of literature inwards and focused on the psyche of the individual, allowing for much experimentation in genre, mode and language. Some of the short stories and novels of Jeelani Bano and Rafia Manzoor ul-Ameen are good examples of jadeediyat from Hyderabad. Both wrote short stories and novels about contemporary protagonists struggling with the human condition as well as a variety of issues associated with the modern state and society. They also produced scripts and screenplays for successful TV serials, documentaries and films.
Jeelani Bano
Rafia Manzoor ul-Ameen
Rafia Manzoor ul-Ameen is best known today for her novels, especially Alam Panaah (Refuge of the World; 1983) and Yeh Raaste (These Paths; 1995), and the immensely popular TV series that was based on the former text and whose screenplay she wrote too. Both novels fall in the genre of romantic fiction and testify to her craft with language, narration, plot, and pace. The most attractive feature of this writer’s work is her psychologically and emotionally complex heroines, who represent a new world after the transfer of power in Hyderabad, in which young women were stepping out of the ostensible “protection” of the zenana, seeking education, professional employment and financial independence, and negotiating a society that did not appear to be prepared for their entry and often openly expressed its disapproval. These novels also offer multifaceted commentary on the social culture and ethnography of groups associated with Hyderabad and the Nilgiris respectively.
The significance of Jeelani Bano’s modernist writing can be appreciated from PWA co-founder Sajjad Zaheer’s comment in a letter to Sulaiman Areeb, editor of Saba (Hyderabad), that as long as Jeelani Bano is in Hyderabad, they need not worry about the Naya Afsana (New Short Story), a genre that had picked up pace in Urdu-Hindi literature in the 1950s and focused more on the inner state of the individual subject than on the external world or its ideological preoccupations 14. Over more than 50 years of writing, Bano’s nationally and internationally acclaimed short stories span three identifiable schools of Urdu literature: taraqqi-pasand adab (Progressive writing), jadeediyat (modernism), and tajreediyat (abstractism), although she has consistently refused to declare her affiliation or identification with any of these schools, explaining that there are many influences in her work and that she seeks only to represent the world around her and does not adhere to any particular ideological position.
Although some of Bano’s work has been admirably translated into English by Zakia Mashhadi, her two novels have not been given their due by English-language readers and scholars. Aiwan-e-Ghazal and Baarish-e-Sang represent the most serious and rigorous engagement with the history of princely and post-princely Hyderabad in creative writing. While the former narrates the lives of four generations of an aristocratic family against the backdrop of transformative change during and after the transfer of power, the latter represents the lives of landless tillers and labourers tottering under the weight of crushing debts in the rural districts of Telangana. Both texts offer rich and sombre insight into urgent questions of class and gender and offer a remarkable degree of depth where class, in particular, is concerned.
Radio continued to be an important medium for women’s voices in Hyderabad after the transfer of power, and the work of most Progressive writers in Hyderabad (and elsewhere) as well as those who did not subscribe to this category remained in demand. Among the many women who wrote for All India Radio (AIR) and read out their stories and essays were Zeenath Sajida, Najma Nikhat, Fatima Alam Ali and Badrunnisa Begum. Another vital development for women’s literary culture was the establishment of the Mehfil-e-Khawateen (Women’s Gathering) in 1971 at Urdu Hall (f. 1955), which became a flourishing platform for Hyderabadi women writers. Women poets of Progressive and other persuasions, such as Azmat Abdul Qayyum, Azizunnisa Saba, Ashraf Rafi and Muzaffarunnisa Naz, were instrumental in founding and running the Mehfil over the years. Monthly meetings and annual events are conducted and are well attended. The association also publishes an annual magazine.
Life-writing and auto/biography
Another important feature of Hyderabadi women’s writing in Urdu is an enduring affinity for different forms of life-writing. While Jamalunnisa Baji’s autobiography is the richest example, meaningful deployments of auto/biography emerge also in other genres that demonstrate a strong element of self-construction and self-performance, usually through first-person narration. The travelogues of Sughra Humayun Mirza and the humorous essays and pen-portraits of Fatima Alam Ali (1923-2020) are a good example of this trend. Fatima Begum grew up in an environment suffused with literary, political and intellectual discussions in the 1930s and 1940s, for her father was Qazi Abdul Ghaffar (1889-1956), the immensely popular and admired Progressive editor of Payaam. Her humorous essays were published in Siasat from the 1960s to the 2000s and also read on AIR. Some of them were compiled into a book called Yaadash Bakhaer (May God Preserve Them; 1989), which also furnishes a selection of her pen-portraits of the poets and scholars she knew. These portraits animate in words the rich and potent milieu of the mid-20th century and vividly perform and re-create the development of Fatima Begum’s own subjectivity.
Fatima Alam Ali (Photo: Scroll.in)
Finally, scholar and translator Oudesh Rani Bawa (b. 1941) writes a weekly column, titled Mujhe Yaad Hai Sab Zara Zara Sa (My Blurred Memories of Yesteryear), in the Urdu daily Munsif, where she engages with popular and historiographical narratives of the past, filtered usually through her memories and research on the material and linguistic heritage of Hyderabad. She also uses this column as a platform for her political and social critique, and has, most recently, begun to actively criticise local and national events, with respect to government policies, heritage and development, and growing right-wing intolerance and violence.
Hyderabad continues to have a thriving culture of humorous writing among women in both prose and poetry, besides other modes of writing, such as the short story, novel, novelette, plays and ghazals.
Stree Shakti Sanghatana, We Were Making History: Life Stories of Women in the Telangana People’s Struggle, New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1989, 3.
Jamalunnisa 2008: 103. Op. cit.
Ordinary Hyderabadis were suspicious of communists because they were all thought to be atheists. Ibid. 121).
Habeeb Ziya, who is a humourist herself and has compiled and edited a collection of Hyderabadi women’s humorous writings, reveals that Mujtaba Hussain, the most prominent and celebrated humourist from Hyderabad, had criticised her article on Hyderabadi women’s humour in the Siasat newspaper. He had wondered if men are supposed to sweep and mop, while women write humour in large numbers. Ziya Hyderabad ki Tanz-o-Mizah Nigar Khawateen. Hyderabad: Shagoofa Publications, 2005, 7.
See e.g. Ashraf Rafi, “Hyderabad ki Afsana-Nigar Khawateen,” in Tahseen 2017: 173.
Mir and Mir 2006: 28. Op. cit.
See Ayesha Jalal, The Pity of Partition: Manto’s Life, Times and Work across the India-Pakistan Divide, Noida: Harper Collins, 2013, 162–72; Jalil 2014: chapter 7; Mir and Mir 2006: 33.
Tahseen 2017: 136. Op. cit.
Riyaz Fatima Tashhir, “Hyderabad mein Khawateen ki Rasaai Shayari,” in Tahseen 2017: 219.
Mosharraf Ali, Jeelani Bano ki Novel Nigari ka Tanqeedi Mutala, Delhi: Educational Publishing House, 2003, 21.
Nazia Akhtar is an Assistant Professor (Human Sciences Research Group) at the International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT), Hyderabad (India). In 2017, she was awarded a New India Foundation fellowship to write a book on Urdu prose by Hyderabadi women. Bibi’s Room: Hyderabadi Women and Twentieth-Century Urdu Prose went into print in July 2022.
source: http://www.thethirdeyeportal.in / The Third Eye / Home> Praxis / by Nazia Akhtar / January 19th, 2023
The fifth in an exclusive series of essays to mark the 75th anniversary of India’s independence, by winners of the New India Foundation Fellowship for writers.
Fatima Alam Ali.
As India completes 75 years of Independence, it is important to ask: what is the place of women in its historical imagination? Where in the corridors of memory – official, scholarly, and popular – are the women of this country to be found? The lives of women, whose voices have at best been indifferently preserved, necessitate that we think differently to locate and retrieve these marginalised histories. This also applies to the way literary historiography treats women writers.
Let us examine these questions through the archive of Fatima Alam Ali (1923-2020), an Urdu writer who lived in Hyderabad and wrote non-fiction essays in the genres of khaaka (pen-portrait) and tanzo-mizah (humour and satire). These essays were published in newspapers or read out over All India Radio, and later compiled into a book.
When Fatima passed away two years ago, her literary drafts, scholarly research, and college notes were found preserved in diaries and re-used school notebooks. She was also a fastidious record-keeper and left behind several hisaab ki kitaabein – books of expenses.
The way Fatima organised and conducted her writing offers us glimpses into not only her writing process but the realities of her life – as a busy homemaker with a husband and three children, and as a respected and active member of social and literary organisations.
She wrote on every available paper surface, demonstrating middle-class thrift in the way she used the blank pages of school notebooks discarded by her children and nieces at the end of every school year. She re-used institutional diaries – a common practice in the subcontinent – disregarding the outdated calendar year printed in them and putting them to any purpose she wished.
She produced entire drafts of essays, speeches, and letters on the backs of calendars, wedding invitations, and grocery receipts. She wrote with regular pencil, colour pencil, fountain pen, and ball-point pen, in inks of different colour. She did not follow any particular system of filling one notebook or diary before moving on to another, but moved back and forth between different ones with no apparent pattern that I have been able to discern thus far.
She wrote draft upon draft of some essays across notebooks and diaries. Sometimes she used the same notebook or diary from both ends for the same or different purposes. What we learn about her from this flexible approach to pen and paper is how versatile she was with these possessions and their applications in her full and hectic days, both because of the weight of the mental load she carried and because it was cheaper and more responsible to re-use things.
Among her papers are the many hisaab ki kitaabein Fatima maintained conscientiously over a number of years in re-used school notebooks. These contain details of her homemaking and domestic activity as well as documentation of important personal and family events, alongside drafts of her essays.
In fact, it is clear from the way these expense books were used that they were meant to serve as multipurpose sites for documenting and recording meaningful things in relation to her professional as well as her personal and family life.
The varied contents of these expense books give us insights into the social culture and domestic economy of the period; the contemporary history of her family; and Fatima’s writing process and the circumstances in which she produced her work.
Even in its most basic definition, a hisaab ki kitaab is of great importance to a historian or a sociologist for a time when people relied on writing to keep domestic records, something the advent of digital technology has changed forever for many of us. No longer do we maintain the kind of meticulous handwritten accounts that we may once have done. After all, online statements and instant text messages from the bank tell us when and what we have spent on groceries or school fees.
Itemised invoices sent by retailers and organisations give us a breakdown of what we have bought or how much we have paid for any service. Note-taking apps and other digital organisers help us to make sense of our everyday transactions and track our needs and wants.
But much before the arrival of digital technology, in the decades after Independence – that golden period in the history of this country when women finally had broad access to education and writing – these written accounts of domestic economy give us indispensable insights into middle-class households, lifestyles, and aspirations.
How did women manage homes? Can we tell from these accounts and lists how much time they spent in homemaking, ie, planning, management, and execution? What does that tell us about the quality of their lives?
What were the items – food and other necessities, such as fuel or paper – that were regularly consumed in a home, and what can that tell us about social position, class, and caste affiliations? Can we learn something about the aspirations of a particular family and, perhaps, by extrapolation, a certain society at a specific period of time, by looking at these weekly, monthly, or annual accounts and lists?
What commodities were sparingly purchased? What were the occasions for which special items were ordered, and what can we tell about the age from the things that were considered grand or fashionable? Can we learn something broader about the state of the economy and its impact on individual households by comparing prices, quantities, and substitutions that may have been made over months or years? What kind of wages were paid to domestic help and other service staff? How many such domestic helpers were there, and what role did they play in the family? Again, what can we learn about a family’s social or economic status from these things?
In short, there is a world of information and insight waiting for the willing in these unassuming accounts. These records of expenses are metaphor and synecdoche for aspirations, anxieties, and lived realities. They embody and document the everyday realities, banalities, and priorities of women’s lives.
A hisaab ki kitaab also often contains other kinds of lists and information about dates, events, people, and places. Fatima’s expense books contain lists of wedding and travel expenses as well as lists of books to buy or consider buying, which help us to re-create both everyday moments and unique experiences in her life as well as those of others around her.
But the most extraordinary and poignant documentation in her expense books consists of a single date on an otherwise blank page, bookmarked by an open blue Reynold’s pen: 8.6.2002. The eighth of June in the year 2002. Written at the top right corner of the right page, the date is the only writing on those two facing pages. Several pages – perhaps fifty on either side – are left blank. The date is significant, although no outsider could possibly know what it may have meant or why it is there. Fatima’s daughter Asma Burney, however, recognised it immediately: it was the day Alam Ali – Fatima’s husband and Asma’s father – had died.
Fatima and Alam Ali had been married for 53 years, and she had privately recorded the date of their earthly separation. The significance of this moment is marked in the brevity of what is written on the page. No words are needed to describe what had happened.
Fatima writes the date and places an open (still functioning) pen to mark the page, in recognition of its import and the magnitude of her loss. The blank pages before and after the recorded date appear to gesture towards the nature of bereavement. With grown-up children and grandchildren living elsewhere, Fatima was unarguably the one most affected by Alam Ali’s death, and so in some ways her grief stands alone.
One is reminded of Helen Macdonald’s words in H is for Hawk (2014), her deeply moving account of losing her father and trying to come to terms with her grief. “It happens to everyone,” she explains. “But you feel it alone. Shocking loss isn’t to be shared, no matter how hard you try.”
That Fatima allowed this date to vanish among the blank pages around it – separated from her accounts and lists – suggests that her loss was so profound that it isolated her from the bustle and activity of everyday life. She lived through it alone, despite the presence of family and friends who rallied around. Life was not the same again, and perhaps such an inscription was part of acknowledging that reality and coming to terms with it on her own.
And yet, the ink still flows from the pen that marks the page. Fatima continued to write and was an active member of various literary and social organizations, writing letters, giving interviews, and attending literary gatherings almost up to the year of her passing.
For women writers like Fatima, a hisaab ki kitaab can go even further than documenting domestic economy and important events in the life cycle. It may start out with the intent of being used for one purpose alone. But soon, the overburdened mind of the busy homemaker gives in to the demands of the writer, who begins to intrude quite aggressively on the business of the day.
In fact, Hyderabadi writer Zeenath Sajida (1924-2009), whose life and work are explored in my new book, once wrote that women’s expense books represent the daily struggle they undergo to find time and space for themselves and their craft.
Zeenath was one of Fatima’s dearest friends. She writes that every homemaking woman has a diary, in which household accounts, laundry lists, and knitting patterns jostle for space with nazms and ghazals. This, she stresses, is the reality of not only women who write, squeezing their compositions between lists and expenses, but also women who may not write but still indulge their creativity by copying a sher or nazm that has caught their fancy.
What she refers to, of course, is what we today call the mental load of women, ie. the constant pressure on the homemaker’s mind of the all-consuming labour and management involved in making a home and caring for a family, while also trying to juggle a writing career from home and even perhaps keeping a full-time job. Women write in the margins of time and space – at “the edges of the day,” as a weary Toni Morrison once explained.
And indeed, amid the pages of Fatima’s own expense books, sandwiched between the relentless and hectic paraphernalia of everyday life, are welcome drafts of her essays, worked and re-worked, again and again, with faithful and constant rigour. These drafts tell us how much labour and planning went into essays which seem so spontaneous and natural in published form, belying the workings of the craft that went into their making.
They demonstrate to us also what a normal day for her would have been like: full of the work that goes into making a home, her mind would still be preoccupied with her essays, so that she would stubbornly write and re-write until she deemed them ready to see the light of print.
Fatima’s expense books are also excellent illustrations of the workings of mind and memory. After all, neither thought nor memory is linear: it rambles and is frequently fragmented, disjointed, and interrupted, organising thought, feelings, and sensibility in shifting and fluid ways.
There are quick shifts in content and register in Fatima’s expense books as she goes from recording expenses to documenting an experience of intense loss to contemplating the title of an essay. These multiple registers of language, thought, and sensibility illuminate different aspects of women’s experiences and subjectivities.
They perform as well as demonstrate the gendered making, maintenance, and transmission of personal and family memory among women. There is so much more, then, to these multipurpose diaries, which encapsulate a way of life when seen in their entirety.
It is rare to come across such records in official or public archives, betraying our collective lack of understanding of not only the importance of hisaab in itself as a source, but also the multipurpose nature of the hisaab ki kitaab.
Furthermore, archives are not only sites of memory, but also sites of power, representing forms of national, public, and collective remembering. They embody official and institutional positions about what is believed to constitute knowledge deserving of transmission, who can thus be validated as a legitimate agent of such deserving knowledge, and what textual materials, therefore, are considered worthy of preservation. The inclusion of women in these archives is limited and conditional upon these constraints.
The circumstances of women’s lives and the conditions in which they work call for a redefinition of the archive. The dense, multipurpose notebooks and diaries that Fatima and no doubt many other women of her generation owned demand other ways of looking at women’s histories and also women’s writing, ie, the process and conditions in which texts are produced by women.
What Fatima’s hisaab ki kitaabein bring to us is a world gone by, where educated middle-class women used writing to document and capture their everyday lives, experiences, and aspirations. With the advent of digital technology, this world is rapidly changing for many women of this demographic.
It remains to be seen how digital records of home-making will fare in the choppy tides of history. Whether these will even take the same shape is debatable. What would a digital archive of homemaking by a woman writer today look like? It has never been easier to keep accounts and lists using apps with increasing degrees of sophistication and convenience, but it has also never been easier to delete data or lose it forever to the vagaries of short-lived technology.
In an age where there is so much information saturation and quick shifts in digital technology, data and the vessels in which we put them are, by definition, ephemeral. They become rapidly obsolete, moving along and beyond the conveyor belt of our days. With the ease of classification and separation into folders and labels, will digital records demonstrate the overlaps and variety of registers that Fatima’s work demonstrates and which Zeenath reveals to us as the reality of home-making women who write? Or are our records going to be equally chaotic, as we move from one app or device to another, depending on where we are and what we are doing? The mental load of women, after all, remains the same.
Also, how would the absence of tactility and materiality affect what we can learn from this digital archive? The smell, texture, and sound of paper; the conditions and locations in which records are preserved; and the uniqueness of an individual’s handwriting – shifting and changing with age, health, mood, and other circumstances – are particular to the written page and document the circumstances in which texts are produced and preserved. The ease of digital reproduction smoothens an individual’s handwriting down to the uniformity and anonymity of a font on a screen, so that critical dimensions of the human experience are lost from the archive.
Accounts such as the hisaab ki kitaabein of Fatima Alam Ali are vital for the historian of modern India. Such sources unravel and unmoor standardized notions of both history and archive, demanding greater creativity and, therefore, more effort to interpret and understand.
They attest to an age when writing became an important and accessible technology for educated women to harness in the management of their lives as well as in the channelling of their creative expression and aspirations.
While magisterial didactic tomes of domestic economy, such as those of Sultan Jahan Begum of princely Bhopal or Isabella Beeton of Victorian England, are known and celebrated and have been used by historians and scholars to make sense of domestic economy, the more modest everyday offerings – often interspersed with literary writings – have been neglected and deserve the attention and regard of both the social historian and the literary historian. Only then can we write more inclusive histories that represent the experiences of women in this country.
Nazia Akhtar is a Fellow of the New India Foundation whose book Bibi’s Room: Hyderabadi Women and Twentieth-Century Urdu Prose has just been published by Orient Black Swan.
source: http://www.scroll.in / Scroll.in / Home> Literature & History> Hyderabad> / by Nazia Akhtar / August 16th, 2022
Yousuf Tekri is a bungalow built by Syed Yousufuddin Mohammed who was a Subedar during Nizam rule. This building was a farm house built during 1850’s which later served as a residence for his progeny.
Tolichowki:
This building is now in the list of heritage structures in Hyderabad and is being restored by the hereditary family Syed Mohammed Aliuddin grandson of Yousufuddin, and his great grandsons Syed Mohammed Najmuddin and Syed Mohammed Mawaheduddin are financing and restoring the building independently.
This building is beautifully constructed uphill, which gives a scenic view of the city which was all farm and isolated landscape, which is now a concrete jungle. Syed Aliuddin said “Yousufuddin was born in the city of Hyderabad and was appointed as an officer in the revenue services working for Asaf Jah VI, Mahbub Ali Khan. Yousufuddin was later entitled as a Subedar for Gulbarga District”.
The bungalow was built by Yousufuddin as a farmhouse as it was away from city back in those days, surrounding the area of about 290 acres. During land acquisition most of it was acquired by Indian Army and colonies were build, Yousuf Tekri colony is where our family lives. Now we are renovating the structure with plaster and cement, because preparation of lime takes much effort and time.
Syed Mohammed Najmuddin said “We are restoring the building independently there as is no financial aid from the government. In spite of being in the list of the heritage structure, government is taking no initiative”.
source: http://www.thehansindia.com / The Hans India / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by Mayank Tiwari / Abhyudaya Ya Karamchetu / March 05th, 2015
Hyderabad, TELANGANA / SAUDI ARABIA / California, U.S.A :
Hyderabad:
Syed Burhan Badshah Quadri alias Salik, a well-known media person in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, lost a five-year long and painful battle with cancer in Santa Clara, California, the USA, on Thursday (December 22).
Burhan, as he was known among most of his friends, came from a traditional and elite family of Hyderabad. He was 74 years old.
His father Syed Kaleemullah Qadri was the last Subedar of Hyderabad of the Nizam era. After the Police Action of 1948 he was arrested and released after some time. After he was reinstated he worked as head of several departments before his superannuation.
Burhan is survived by his wife Shahnaz and four children–two daughters and two sons.
Burhan after completing his bachelor’s degree with the Nizam College had joined Nizams Sugar Factor as a management trainee and moved over to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia somewhere in the mid-seventies.
Within few years of him arriving in the Kingdom, he became one of the topnotch executives from India. He worked with several companies and finally began his own advertising agency Zee Ads which counted many major companies among its clients. He was one of the few Indian executives in the Kingdom at that time who owned a BMW and lived comfortable, if not luxurious, life. The company had to be closed down owing to some managerial issues. From there started the next phase Burhan’s life.
Among a host of his close friends who are deeply bereaving his loss are Mohammad Majid Ali, Nadir Yar Khan, Zahyr Siddiqi and Syed Inamur Rahman Ghayur.
Burhan a photographer by passion took keen interest in the political developments taking place in India and expressed his opinion without any hesitation. His talk which he considered free and frank was painful for many of his friends. Among his favourite personalities was Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan, the last Nizam of Hyderabad. He would never keep quiet if he heard any negative comment about the Nizam. In his eyes the Nizam was a symbol of tolerance, development and Hindu-Muslim unity.
It is not yet known when and where he would laid to rest.
source: http://www.siasat.com / The Siasat Daily / Home> Obituaries / by Mir Ayoob Ali Khan / December 23rd, 2022
Mohammad Hanief Bhat at his workstation. Photo: Aatif Ammad
Srinagar:
In the early morning, as the streets of downtown Srinagar — known for its artisans and art forms — begin to buzz with activity, shopkeepers display their goods and autowalas wait for customers. Mohammad Hanief Bhat, 62, starts his day by opening a window in his workstation, located on the first floor of a 100-year-old building. As sunlight streams into his room, he begins assembling small pebbles, which he will set into a brass shell to create a necklace. This craft, known as Ferozi in Kashmiri and Turquoise in English, involves making jewellery with stones fixed in brass, and Hanief is its last guardian.
“This is a challenging art, but it is my identity. My father practiced it, and back then, this craft was well-recognized and loved by foreigners. They would come here and purchase items from us. In the 1970s, my father employed more than 30 artisans who worked under him,” he said.
Mohammad Hanief displays a variety of necklaces he has crafted over the past few years. Photo: Aatif Ammad
Hanief was young but the eldest in his family when he lost his father. Since this art form was their only source of income, he eventually had to take matters into his own hands and manage the small workstation where 30 artisans who had worked under his father taught him the craft.
He was just a child, a grade five student, when he lost his father. Being the eldest among his siblings, he had to take on the responsibility of managing the family’s turquoise art workshop, their sole source of income. Fortunately, the artisans working in their workshop were kind and taught him the craft very well.
Over time, Hanief mastered the art, but the demand for it mysteriously declined. Consequently, many artisans abandoned the craft as it no longer provided a sufficient income for survival. The number of artisans dwindled from 30 to just 5.
Hanief adding the finishing touch to a pendant. Photo: Aatif Ammad
Hanief’s father crafted hundreds of pieces of jewellery each week, which he would take in a large basket every Friday to a family with a showroom in Zainakadal, just 2 kilometers from Hanief’s home. This family would then sell the jewellery in their showroom. According to Hanief, they always managed to sell everything they made, despite never having any pre-orders, as everything they produced was sold to that business family.
The same trend persisted when Hanief took over; the demand remained steady, and he was able to sell everything he made. However, over time, the demand declined for reasons Hanief couldn’t understand. Consequently, many artisans abandoned the craft, leaving Hanief as the only one who continued it.
Aside from Hanief’s father, more than 60 families were involved in the craft of turquoise. However, over time, everyone abandoned the craft, leaving Hanief as its last guardian. As the artisans departed, Hanief also quit for a few months, leaving no artisans remaining, and he began selling carpets instead.
“In the 1990s, nearly everyone abandoned the art, and I also thought it was not worth continuing since there were no buyers. I eventually left it and started selling carpets. Although I earned more from selling carpets, I was never satisfied with that profession. I felt it would be a great injustice to the art that my father devoted his life to. So, I left everything else and returned to practicing the art of Ferozi,” Hanief explained.
When Hanief resumed making turquoise jewellery, he found that there were no longer any major buyers to sell it to customers, as the previous showroom owners had lost interest due to decreased demand.
However, his sister, whose family runs businesses in Bangalore, suggested he come to Bangalore for art exhibitions to sell his jewellery. There, he discovered that people were attracted to his art, with many NRIs and foreigners purchasing from him. This allowed him to sell a significant amount of jewellery, but the exhibitions only lasted a few days.
Hanief visited Bangalore every year and set up a stall at the exhibition, managing to sell a good quantity of jewellery. However, it wasn’t enough for him to sustain a livelihood solely from the craft.
“Bangalore exhibitions gave me a lot of hope and motivation to continue the craft,” said Hanief, adding, “People used to come and praise me there. It gave me a lot of confidence and recognition”.
New Innovations in the Craft
Traditionally, turquoise jewellery was exclusively blue and featured very simple designs. However, Mohammad Hanief introduced innovations after several buyers in Bangalore expressed a desire for more colours and designs. Upon returning to Kashmir, he thoughtfully incorporated new colourful stones and created different designs. He even added unique elements, such as breaking thin wires into small pieces to use in necklaces for a distinctive look.
Colourful necklaces from Hanief’s collection. Photo: Aatif Ammad
Hanief remarked, “I used to get bored making the same designs and colours every time, but I never thought of doing something new. It was only when some foreign buyers at an exhibition in Bangalore suggested that I introduce more varieties and colours. I then started creating jewellery in different colours that people would love and adore. I felt happy and satisfied making these new types of jewellery.”
He currently makes turquoise jewellery in almost every colour.
No Government Support
Despite the widespread appreciation for Hanief’s art of crafting turquoise jewellery, the local government has never recognized his efforts, even though he received accolades from states like Kerala.
Hanief remarked, “Although I have carried this art on my shoulders for years and I am the only one left practicing it, our government has never appreciated or recognized me. However, officials from Kerala and Karnataka have always praised me and assisted in setting up stalls in Bangalore.”
Mohammad Hanief’s artisan card, issued to artisans of various crafts, expired in 2022. Despite submitting it to officials for renewal, the process is still pending. Hanief believes that the officials do not take his art seriously, which is why they show little interest in his official matters.
Concern for the Art’s Survival
Mohammad Hanief, now in his sixties, is deeply concerned that his craft will perish with him, as he has no children to carry on his legacy as he did after his father’s passing.
source: http://www.twocircles.net / TwoCircles.net / Home> Art>Culture / by Muhammad Aatif Ammad Kanth, TwoCirlces.net / August 18th, 2024
Wajid Khan Artist with the portrait of Mahatma Gandhi he made with nails.
Few artists are as passionately obsessed with Mahatma Gandhi as Wajid Khan, whose love and reverence for Gandhi manifest in extraordinary ways through his art. Wajid’s devotion to the Father of the Nation is evident not only in the subjects of his artwork but also in the innovative techniques he uses to create them. Whether by assembling nails, arranging goggles, or using other unconventional materials, Wajid Khan’s portrayal of Gandhi is a testament to his deep admiration.
Wajid Khan a multifaceted artist—a portraitist, sculptor, inventor, and patent holder—known for pushing the boundaries of traditional art. He specializes in creating intricate works of art using unconventional materials such as iron nails, bullets, metal, stones, automobile parts, medical equipment, iron rods, and more. His passion for creativity is boundless, and his art often reflects his deep emotions and thoughts about the world and the figures who have shaped it.
Among his many talents, Wajid’s ability to carve canvases using iron nails has garnered international acclaim. His work has earned him places in prestigious records such as the Guinness Book of World Records, Limca Book of Records, and Asia Book of Records. His artistic prowess is admired from Mumbai to Dubai, captivating both art connoisseurs and the general public with his exceptional nail art.
Although Wajid has made portraits of numerous iconic personalities, including Indira Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Dhirubhai Ambani, and Nelson Mandela, his fascination with Mahatma Gandhi stands out. His first portrait, fittingly, was of Gandhi—a powerful expression of his love and passion for the man who led India to independence. Wajid meticulously used thousands of iron nails to craft this portrait, each nail symbolizing the unwavering dedication and perseverance Gandhi embodied throughout his life.
Wajid’s connection to Gandhi goes beyond artistic inspiration. His admiration for Gandhi stems from the values of patience and truth that Gandhi represented. “There are many qualities in Gandhiji that impressed me deeply,” Wajid shared in an interview. “His power of patience and his commitment to truth are what stand out the most. For me, those who hold onto patience and never lie are truly great individuals.”
One of the moments that left an indelible mark on Wajid was when he visited a museum and saw letters written by Gandhi in which the leader openly admitted his mistakes. “It takes a big heart to admit one’s mistakes in public,” Wajid reflected. “I greatly admire Gandhi’s patience and steadfastness.”
Wajid’s connection to Gandhi also has personal roots. He fondly recalls stories from his grandfather, who would attend Gandhi’s meetings during the freedom movement in India. “My grandfather used to tell us about the time when he was very young and would participate in Gandhi’s meetings. Enthusiastic crowds would gather to listen to Gandhi, and when they returned, they were always calm and composed,” Wajid recounted. The calm demeanor Gandhi inspired in his followers left a profound impact on Wajid, influencing both his life and his art.
In one of his most ambitious projects, Wajid demonstrated the extent of his dedication to honoring Gandhi. He organized an event where 6,000 people were gathered in a stadium, carefully arranged in a formation that created a massive portrait of Gandhi. This live depiction showcased not only Wajid’s artistic genius but also his ability to bring people together to celebrate Gandhi’s legacy.
Wajid Khan’s artistic journey is a remarkable blend of creativity, innovation, and an unyielding devotion to Gandhi’s principles. Through his portraits, sculptures, and inventive techniques, he continues to keep the spirit of Gandhi alive, inspiring others with the same values of patience, truth, and perseverance that Gandhi embodied.
source: http://www.muslimmirror.com / Muslim Mirror / Home> Indian Muslim> Positive Story / by Syed Zubair Ahmad / October 02nd, 2024
Veteran photojournalist Nisar Ahmed, who spent over three decades documenting the diverse and critical events in Kashmir, passed away on Wednesday. His legacy in capturing the region’s essence lives on through his work.
Survived by his wife, two sons, and a daughter, Ahmed was admitted to the SMHS hospital in Srinagar after his health worsened on Tuesday.
Ahmed, associated with the national daily The Hindu for the last thirty years, had been unwell for the last couple of years. His demise has prompted condolences from various journalists’ organizations and political parties.
“Nissar was a thorough photojournalist, capturing the turmoil and beauty of Kashmir through his lens until his last breath. His work has left an indelible mark on our hearts and in the annals of photojournalism. His legacy lives on through the countless images that tell the stories of heartbreaks, joy and beauty of the Valley,” The Hindu posted on X.
Before joining The Hindu as a Photojournalist, Ahmad spent most part of his life working for Kashmir’s local media.
Hundreds of people, including journalists, took part in the funeral of the deceased. Ahmad was buried amid sobs and tears at his ancestral graveyard in Natipora Srinagar. The mourning will be held for three days, with congregational Feteha Khawani on Friday.
Meanwhile, the Kashmir Press Photographers Association (KPPA) has expressed grief over the death of senior photojournalist Nasir Ahmad.
In a statement, the KPPA said that Nisar’s passing away has left a vacuum in the photojournalistic circles of Kashmir.
source: http://www.kashmirobserver.net / Kashmir Observer / Home> News> Media / by KO Web Desk / June 19th, 2024
Iqbal Manna, a committed social worker from Brahmagiri, Udupi, has been selected for the prestigious Swami Vivekananda State Award, recognising his tireless efforts to promote Kannada and Tulu languages in Gulf countries. The award is presented by the People’s Council for Human Rights.
Manna has gained recognition for his social and philanthropic activities in Qatar, where he is a founding member of the Qatar Tulu Koota and KMCA Qatar. After returning to India, he continued his involvement with various social organisations.
He has held leadership positions in numerous prominent associations, including the Udupi Giants Group, Haji Abdullah Charitable Trust, Saheban Welfare Trust, Udupi District Muslim Union, Muslim Welfare Association, and the Brahmagiri Hashimi Mosque. His active role in the Udupi District Minorities Forum further highlights his dedication to community welfare.
The award ceremony will be held on September 28 at 5:30 pm at the Lions Bhavan in Brahmagiri, Udupi
source: http://www.daijiworld.com / DaijiWorld.com / Home> Karnataka / by Media Release / September 26th, 2024
Prof Zia ur Rehman Siddiqui (R) receives the National Urdu Award from Mr Dharmendra Singh Lodhi at Bhopal
Prof Zia ur Rehman Siddiqui, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of Urdu, Aligarh Muslim University has been conferred with the National Urdu Award by the Madhya Pradesh Urdu Academy, for his contributions to Urdu literature and research.
The award was conferred upon him by Mr Dharmendra Singh Lodhi, Minister of Culture and Dr Nusrat Mehdi, Director of Madhya Pradesh Urdu Academy in a function held at Bhopal.
Prof Siddiqui has authored several books, including “Tehreek-e-Azadi aur Urdu Nasr”, “Urdu Adab Ki Tareekh”, “Urdu-Hindi Dictionary”, “Armughan-e-Tehqeeq”, “Asaleeb-e-Fikr”, “Bengali Kahaniyan”, “Doon ka Sabza” (Urdu translation of Ruskin Bond’s writings), “Hsuan Tsang ka Safar-e-Hindustan”, “Asan Urdu Grammar,” etc.
He has also contributed over 200 research papers to various journals of repute in India and abroad.
Prof Q.H. Faridi, Chairman, Department of Urdu, Prof S. Siraj Ajmali and other faculty members congratulated him for getting this prestigious award.
source: http://www.radiancenews.com / Radiance News / Home> Pride of the Nation> Awards / by Radiance News Bureau / September 11th, 2024
