Professor of Modern and Contemporary Indian History at the Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University, India Address: Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, India
The essay argues –based on a close study of the past century --for doses of rationality and soul-... more The essay argues –based on a close study of the past century --for doses of rationality and soul-searching in the ongoing battle for minority rights and dignity. It urges India's Muslim communities to make their own contribution to invest in secularising India, and underlines that minority communalism is no antidote to majoirtarianism.
On the eve of Sir Syed Day, I was invited to deliver a talk on "how do we, or, should we, look ba... more On the eve of Sir Syed Day, I was invited to deliver a talk on "how do we, or, should we, look back at the history of the Aligarh Movement of the 19th century?" by the Jamshedpur's Karim City College and Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) Alumni of Jamshedpur (Jharkhand). The talk (October 16, 2023) is broadly divided into three parts. In the first part, inter alia, I provide a brief overview of the effective disparity that one witnesses in terms of quality education imparted by Muslim minority education institutions in North and South India, and attempts to shed light on the possible reasons behind it. In the second part, I argue, in light of Sir Syed's 19 th century project of modern education, how the present state of education at AMU in particular and other Muslim minority educational institutions in North India in general, woefully falls short of the vision stipulated by Sir Syed. In this section, I even try to put forth how traits such as critical thinking and temperament of self-effacement played an enabling role in Sir Syed's life and the project he espoused, and how it is in a significant state of wanting today. In the last part, which is the conclusion, I make a case that in order to further the objective of Sir Syed, or for that matter Aligarh Movement, one has to rise above petty politics of regionalism, clout-based regressivism, and to work towards furthering the diversity and representation, and, devise a mechanism to deepen principles such as secularism, democracy and, above all, rationalist, the values which informed the 19th century reformism in India.
Invited Talk [Abridged version published in a periodical], 2023
In all the biographical accounts of Maulana Azad, following four issues still remain largely un-a... more In all the biographical accounts of Maulana Azad, following four issues still remain largely un-addressed: 1. In the 1930s, when the Shariat Act was being drafted and legislated, what roles did Azad play? Why Jinnah was seen in the driver’s seat on this count? Why did the League become more successful politically, under Jinnah, rather than the nationalists under Azad? 2. In the Constituent Assembly Debates, what did Azad do? He remained mostly silent, and/or, got out of the debate when voting took place on some of the crucial issues. This aspect has been brought out in detail by Pratinav Anil, in his latest book, Another India: Making of the World’s Largest Muslim Minority, 1947-1977. Anil is rather very harsh against Azad. In fact, his provocative rhetoric and polemics are not sparing anyone. 3. Post-independence, why couldn’t the interventions of nationalist Muslims against the Two Nation Theory be popularised? More so, when India’s Muslims, as a collective, were made to suffer from guilt and circumspection! The critiques were from Husain Ahmad Madani (1887-1957), Abul Mohasin Sajjad (1880-1940), Hifzur Rahman Seohaarvi (1901-1962), Tufail Ahmad Manglori (1868-1946), Abdul Qaiyum Ansari (1905-1974), etc. Their Urdu language critique of the two-nation theory is elaborated in my 2014 book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours; Venkat Dhulipala’s 2015 book, Creating New Medina deals with these in greater detail. 4. Did Maulana Azad engage with the likes of Qaiyum Ansari and B R Ambedkar on the question of caste and social justice for the historically subordinated Muslim communities? What did Azad do on the question of gender justice among the Muslims, when Nehru was pushing the reforms in Hindu Personal Law in the 1950s?
This paper attempts at looking into the role an Urdu daily of Patna played in pluralizing the dem... more This paper attempts at looking into the role an Urdu daily of Patna played in pluralizing the democracy of India during the 1960s and 1980s. This was a phase when the hegemony of the ruling Congress was sought to be challenged by many segments of society. The Urdu speaking Muslim communities were one of those segments contributing towards participative democracy. The Urdu weekly Sangam, launched in October 1953 turned itself into a daily in 1963, and went on to make a significant impact upon Bihar’s Urdu literati as much as on the journey of democratic republic. These decades were prognosticated pessimistically by some of the American journalists such as Selig H. Harrison (1960), as ‘the most dangerous decades’. From the 1960s onwards, India witnessed ‘turbulence’ in terms of what Atul Kohli (1990) said, “revolution of rising expectations”, when new rural elites had begun to ask for their share in structures and processes of power . There were food riots, droughts, economic crises, law and order issues, mass protests, at times violent, rise of agrarian violence, atrocities against Dalits and their resistance through what became known as Naxalism, besides the communal strife between the Hindus and Muslims, which are quite recurrent in many parts of India. A number of scholars have chronicled these developments about contemporary Bihar . The English daily from Patna, The Searchlight, was particularly dedicated to this. So was the Hindi daily, Aryavart. Many scholars have studied these aspects, but, in these significant tomes, what remains neglected is scholarly engagement with the Urdu newspaper Sangam.
My first encounter with patriarchy perpetuated through motivated interpretation of religious text... more My first encounter with patriarchy perpetuated through motivated interpretation of religious texts came through someone who was close friend of my late father as well as his co-villager. He also happened to have been Secretary of the management board of the school I passed my High School. He eventually wrote a wonderful book on the subject, Woman in Hindu Literature, 1995. His name was Prof. Ram Padarth Sharma (d. 2019), he taught English literature in the universities such as the Bihar Univ, Muzaffarpur the NEHU, Shillong, and also at Yemen. Some aspects of the origin of patriarchy is articulated best in Engel’s 1884 book, Origin of Family, Private Property and the State, and a fictional articulation of some of these aspects of the Engel’s book have been done in Tolstoy’s 1878 novel, Anna Karenina. For the medieval period of Indian history, scholars such as Emma Kalb (2021) and many more have been writing on the issue, not necessarily confining the explorations merely to aristocratic domains. Pakistani historian Mubarak Ali has written historically informed popular essays critiquing the patriarchic perpetuations made through the texts such as Ashraf Ali Thanwi’s Behishti Zewar (1905). For instance, see his Urdu blog, “Mua’ashrah, Aurat aur Beheshti Zewar”, Sept. 5, 2014. https://thelalajie.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/beheshti-zewar/ The Pakistani creative writer, scholar and columnist, Zahida Hena (b. 1946, Sasaram, Bihar) has compiled her essays with the title (2006), Aurat, Zindagi Ka Zindan. This powerful write-up has torn apart the patriarchic world-view in most lucid and candid prose. During the freedom struggle, Kamladevi Chattopadhyaya (1903-1988) stands out as someone who persuaded Gandhiji to bring women outside their homes and to claim their public space. She, arguably the greatest of women in 20th century India, wrote many books, essays as well as her own memoir to document and to interpret such pursuits of gender-justice.
This is a talk, on, the Indian National Movement and Its Legacy, delivered at the AMU, on the occ... more This is a talk, on, the Indian National Movement and Its Legacy, delivered at the AMU, on the occasion of Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav, August 11, 2022.
The government sponsored lectures and talks in commemoration of our heroes in the nationalist str... more The government sponsored lectures and talks in commemoration of our heroes in the nationalist struggle and in the struggles to resist the marginalization of weaker sections, there has to be a sincerity of the purpose, rather than making it a cosmetic exercise geared towards narrow politics of electoral gains. The stories of Birsa Munda and his struggles therefore need telling, re-telling and the regimes need to pay serious and sincere attention to what such heroes stood for.
This essay attempts at exploring the phenomenon of gangsterism and “entrepreneur criminal” in a s... more This essay attempts at exploring the phenomenon of gangsterism and “entrepreneur criminal” in a small industrial town, Jamshedpur. In recent decades, phenomena of organised crime in rural areas and in small towns have mushroomed like menace. Yet, this remains largely neglected in academic explorations. Caste factor is looked into the composition of institutional politics. We often hear of crime-politics nexus, yet, it is hardly articulated as to why we don’t find as many gangsters from the lower castes as we do from the politically powerful and dominant castes. Also, compared to those from powerful castes, the ones from the lower castes have lesser longevity in the ‘profession’ of crime. It tentatively suggests that before a petty-criminal grows into a gangster and overpowers the criminal justice system, he can possibly be contained through the institution of local thana.
Presidential Address, 10th Bihar History Congress, Contemporary Section, September 15, 2022, 2022
Though, archival sources could be limited and not well kept, which throws up challenges to the hi... more Though, archival sources could be limited and not well kept, which throws up challenges to the historians working on contemporary Bihar, the supplementary sources such as life-writings, fiction, rumours, oral accounts, inquiry commission reports, newspapers, little magazines of activists and political organizations and NGOs, and most important of all, radio, television and film documentaries, are some of the sources for the historians.
Bihar is also wiating for 'hydraulic historians' to write on its rivers.
If sessions of the Bihar History Congress could be organised punctually every year and the proceedings could be published and also made available online, then a beginning towards writing contemporary histories of Bihar would be made. I would urge the Bihar History Congress to make a sincere move in this direction. Besides fulfilling the conventional professional responsibilities, this would also be one of the steps towards minimising the academy-society disjunction, and thereby making the case for public funding on higher education and research stronger than it has ever been.
Last but not the least, our conversations and writings, researches and talks need also to be rendered into Hindi, Urdu and other local languages of the region. The historians need to come out of their ivory towers into public and social space, keeping themselves fortified with scientifically verifiable evidence rather than pandering to the wishful comfort of the hegemons and oppressors . Bihar, lagging behind most other federal units of the Union of India, particularly needs such academic initiatives and pursuits, more than the other provinces.
Indian Journal of Secularism, vol. 25, Nos. 1-3, April-Dec pp. 39-71, 2021
This essay deals with Muslim communities in the electoral politics of India's most populous provi... more This essay deals with Muslim communities in the electoral politics of India's most populous province and 'heartland', Uttar Pradesh, . Constituting almost 20% of the electorates. The essay explores how and why did Muslims increasingly became electorally irrelevant in the era of electoral dominance of Hindutva. It also studies this issue through political profiles of some of the prominent Muslim politicians, viz, Dr Abdul Jalil Faridi (1913-1974) and Azam Khan, besides few other leaders and political outfits.
This essay centres around treatment meted out to the Muslim citizens by the Indian state and soci... more This essay centres around treatment meted out to the Muslim citizens by the Indian state and society during the COVID-19 pandemic in India in & after April 2020. This had followed the protests against India’s new citizenship laws, and communal violence in eastern parts of the capital city of Delhi, in February. By late March 2020, the COVID-19 spread came to be blamed mainly by the media, generally pro-establishment ones, upon a sub-sect of Sunni Muslims called Tablighi Jama’at with its headquarters (Markaz) in Delhi.The blame put on the Tablighi Jama’at should be contrasted with the state’s facilitative efforts towards the hindu pilgrimage Kumbh in Haridwar in 2021, which resulted in massive COVID infections, as reported by many national and international newspapers. Though the judiciary subsequently exonerated the Tablighi people, the prejudice of the Indian state, in sections of its popular media, and society is evident. In this series of events, the states’s approach towards a section of its own citizens has come under serious scrutiny. The issue of justice has a new, growing religious dimension along with old caste, class, gender, and others dimensions. This goes against the constitutional values of equal treatment to all citizens irrespective of faith, caste, creed, gender and ethnicity. This has its own short-term and long-term implications; hence, worth discussing.
Muzaffarpur-Vaishali parts in north Bihar, has historically been largely free from communal viole... more Muzaffarpur-Vaishali parts in north Bihar, has historically been largely free from communal violence. In recent years, however, there have been many incidents of communal violence. In most of the cases in recent years, Bajrang Dal activists were allegedly in the forefront. This report from the ground looks into the phenomenon of rapid competitive communalization of a locality, which saw two different but similar incidents of such clashes as recently as on January 23, 2018.
While concern to aspire and ensure proportionate representation in the structures and processes o... more While concern to aspire and ensure proportionate representation in the structures and processes of power is quite desirable in a democracy, another significant point of concern is the quality of leadership/legislators and ensuring its accountability through perpetual vigilance by the citizens. Only informed citizens can guarantee better democracy. As an old adage goes, “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty”. Merely electing someone from the community cannot ensure protection of legitimate interests. Are Bihar’s and India’s Muslims really prepared to do that?
This essay is on growing disjunction between the universities and social needs and realities in I... more This essay is on growing disjunction between the universities and social needs and realities in India.
"Reforms in higher education cannot be bargained away-they form the bedrock for a vibrant economy, the place from where we can, given the chance, build powerful and sustainable new ideas for future". [Nilekani 2008, 352)
At any given moment, stocktaking of institutions is a necessary exercise. In recent times, universities have started facing more difficult challenges than ever before. At least in certain cases, both the state and some segments of our society have appeared to articulate discomfitures particularly against the best of our universities. We should not and cannot be dismissive about such discomfitures, alienations, hostilities, and grievances. It would be too simplistic and fraught with implications, if we push it aside merely by saying that these are all because of misinformed and motivated propaganda. As a student of history, I somehow feel that in our part of world, comprehensive studies on social histories of the academies of higher learning are woefully inadequate. It is therefore important to deal with the predicaments facing our universities. Have they really remained alive to the social and economic challenges facing Indian societies? With what objectives were they set up? Have they really remained true to those objectives? What kind of researches and pedagogy did they churn out? Did they remain confined as a preserve of a miniscule minority of the select middle classes? Did the campuses explore and address the problems of the immediate surroundings of their physical location? Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), in his essay, "Patriotism and Education", indicted the teachers for being "fairly content with the status quo". Do we really have enough instances when the teachers' movements went beyond their own pay, perks, and working conditions, and agitated for larger....
Sir Sayyid's educational projects for elite males metamorphosed to involve various paradigms – fr... more Sir Sayyid's educational projects for elite males metamorphosed to involve various paradigms – from using Persian as a dominant medium for attaining knowledge to including learning useful sciences (kaar aamad or mufeed uloom), such as agriculture, soil sciences, and allied disciplines, suitable for upgrading the overwhelmingly agrarian economy and establishing conventional universities, with the elusive vernacular as the medium of instruction. Thus, Sir Sayyid Ahmad initiated the translation of Western knowledge from various disciplines, such as philosophy, political economy, logic, and history; however, after making some progress, the pragmatic entrepreneur realized that the time available for translation was very short, and hence, he stopped the translation work. This transition signifies the change in Sir Sayyid Ahmad’s mindset: his intellectual aspirations and pursuit of excellence were tampered by the needs of his time and realization that his qaum (community) has to maintain a presence closer to the levers of powers by staying closer to the relatively higher echelons of public services, which had now been opened to native Indians. However, to be eligible, the aspirant was required to have Western education, which was in favour of the then-prevalent college education model: The colonial powers had resolved to recruit native Indian youths in somewhat ‘superior’ tiers of executive and judicial administration if the aspirants had obtained Western/collegiate education. As the 1870s advanced, this policy of exposure to Western learning became less of a preference and more of a mandatory requirement. Sir Sayyid’s compromise of establishing the MAO College in Aligarh (1877), however, was not an act of tame surrender to the routine: if he had to conform to the ‘routine’ in imparting higher education (primarily) to the Muslim youth, it had to be under the best possible the circumstances. The MAO College adopted the Oxbridge model of residential colleges both in form and substance, to the extent that the local circumstances in the nineteenth-century north India permitted. Sir Sayyid Ahmad’s story of this evolving and metamorphosing project gleans from his writings and utterances, primarily documented in his journals (Aligarh Institute Gazette and Tahzib-ul-Akhlaq), along with his speeches, correspondences, and other sources from which the rest of the narrative is drawn. The current essay seeks to outline the course of these evolving, self-correcting paradigms in the mind of this founder of the Aligarh Movement, as he understood the realities of the time imposed on his qaum.
In most of the narratives of the communal (Hindu-Muslim) violence in India, four issues remain co... more In most of the narratives of the communal (Hindu-Muslim) violence in India, four issues remain comparatively less attended, viz., (a) the Pasmanda identity of the Muslim victims, (b) communalization of the Muslim communities, (c) wilful failure even of supposedly secular regimes in penalizing the culprits, and (d) details about the hoodlums patronized by the politicians. This essay looks into the first of the four issues in the anti-Muslim violence which took place in a village, Pedda, of Bijnor, in the western part of Uttar Pradesh, the most populous province of India. This happened when the elections for the provincial legislative assembly of Uttar Pradesh were just few months away. This part of India has seen a resurgence of spurt in the communal violence in recent times. The majoritarian communal organizations have registered a big rise manifested by unprecedented victory of such political formation and occupying power at the Union government in May 2014. Unlike some of the recent communal violence, in the present case of the village Pedda (Bijnor) however, no evidence of communalization (or Intra-Muslim sub-sectarian— maslaki-assertions in public domain, more particularly the Barelwi-Deobandi conflicts) of the Muslims, could be found out. In this specific case, even though initially the police action remained in question, the provincial government however, did initiate actions against the accused. Both the resurgence of such violence, and the administrative action or inaction, is guided more by the immediate and long term electoral motives of the major political parties.
This essay primarily concerns itself with attempting to retrieve contributions of some of the loc... more This essay primarily concerns itself with attempting to retrieve contributions of some of the local and regional leaders of the Champaran Satyagraha Movement who have largely been left out by the existing literature. Further, it draws upon some of the unexplored archival sources as well as some vernacular literatures, mainly Hindi besides memoirs as well as newspaper reports have been used for the study. Yet, one faces huge constraints of evidences to find answers to many pertinent questions, which emerge after delving into the subject. This essay has been able to cull out significant information about the contributions of Pir Munis, mostly through the memoirs of the Hindi literatures and Hindi newspaper, Pratap. There is still a need to trace out many other sources to find out details about many other local leaders, who have been mentioned in this essay. Besides retrieving the roles played out by the local leaders and vernacular intelligentsia at great personal risks of state repression, this essay brings out that the agrarian problems of Champaran still suffers from something which has been inherited as a legacy during the colonial era, and even after seven decades post-independence many issues remains unresolved.
This is Hindi translation of an essay, "Caste, Community and crime: Explaining the Violence in Mu... more This is Hindi translation of an essay, "Caste, Community and crime: Explaining the Violence in Muzaffarpur", Bihar, published in the Economic & Political Weekly (EPW), January 31, 2015
Social mobility, growing prosperity and rising aspirations, combined with the upcoming state assembly elections explain the sudden violence in Muzaffarpur (Bihar).
The violence against Pasmanda Muslims in Azizpur-Bahilwara in Muzaffarpur, Bihar cannot be understood as an instance of conventional communal strife between Hindus and Muslims.
This report from the ground indicates that different layers of caste, community, administrative and patronage networks have played a role in fostering the violence but also in containing it.
While the Dalit upsurge in Una in Gujarat received widespread attention, an atrocity against Dali... more While the Dalit upsurge in Una in Gujarat received widespread attention, an atrocity against Dalit youths being thrashed in Muzaffarpur, Bihar at the same time did not. It remained merely a Paswan versus Bhumihar confrontation. Dalits remain a differentiated group in Bihar, and have a long way to go before the community can rise above the imperatives of the here and now and assert as a conglomeration.
The essay argues –based on a close study of the past century --for doses of rationality and soul-... more The essay argues –based on a close study of the past century --for doses of rationality and soul-searching in the ongoing battle for minority rights and dignity. It urges India's Muslim communities to make their own contribution to invest in secularising India, and underlines that minority communalism is no antidote to majoirtarianism.
On the eve of Sir Syed Day, I was invited to deliver a talk on "how do we, or, should we, look ba... more On the eve of Sir Syed Day, I was invited to deliver a talk on "how do we, or, should we, look back at the history of the Aligarh Movement of the 19th century?" by the Jamshedpur's Karim City College and Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) Alumni of Jamshedpur (Jharkhand). The talk (October 16, 2023) is broadly divided into three parts. In the first part, inter alia, I provide a brief overview of the effective disparity that one witnesses in terms of quality education imparted by Muslim minority education institutions in North and South India, and attempts to shed light on the possible reasons behind it. In the second part, I argue, in light of Sir Syed's 19 th century project of modern education, how the present state of education at AMU in particular and other Muslim minority educational institutions in North India in general, woefully falls short of the vision stipulated by Sir Syed. In this section, I even try to put forth how traits such as critical thinking and temperament of self-effacement played an enabling role in Sir Syed's life and the project he espoused, and how it is in a significant state of wanting today. In the last part, which is the conclusion, I make a case that in order to further the objective of Sir Syed, or for that matter Aligarh Movement, one has to rise above petty politics of regionalism, clout-based regressivism, and to work towards furthering the diversity and representation, and, devise a mechanism to deepen principles such as secularism, democracy and, above all, rationalist, the values which informed the 19th century reformism in India.
Invited Talk [Abridged version published in a periodical], 2023
In all the biographical accounts of Maulana Azad, following four issues still remain largely un-a... more In all the biographical accounts of Maulana Azad, following four issues still remain largely un-addressed: 1. In the 1930s, when the Shariat Act was being drafted and legislated, what roles did Azad play? Why Jinnah was seen in the driver’s seat on this count? Why did the League become more successful politically, under Jinnah, rather than the nationalists under Azad? 2. In the Constituent Assembly Debates, what did Azad do? He remained mostly silent, and/or, got out of the debate when voting took place on some of the crucial issues. This aspect has been brought out in detail by Pratinav Anil, in his latest book, Another India: Making of the World’s Largest Muslim Minority, 1947-1977. Anil is rather very harsh against Azad. In fact, his provocative rhetoric and polemics are not sparing anyone. 3. Post-independence, why couldn’t the interventions of nationalist Muslims against the Two Nation Theory be popularised? More so, when India’s Muslims, as a collective, were made to suffer from guilt and circumspection! The critiques were from Husain Ahmad Madani (1887-1957), Abul Mohasin Sajjad (1880-1940), Hifzur Rahman Seohaarvi (1901-1962), Tufail Ahmad Manglori (1868-1946), Abdul Qaiyum Ansari (1905-1974), etc. Their Urdu language critique of the two-nation theory is elaborated in my 2014 book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours; Venkat Dhulipala’s 2015 book, Creating New Medina deals with these in greater detail. 4. Did Maulana Azad engage with the likes of Qaiyum Ansari and B R Ambedkar on the question of caste and social justice for the historically subordinated Muslim communities? What did Azad do on the question of gender justice among the Muslims, when Nehru was pushing the reforms in Hindu Personal Law in the 1950s?
This paper attempts at looking into the role an Urdu daily of Patna played in pluralizing the dem... more This paper attempts at looking into the role an Urdu daily of Patna played in pluralizing the democracy of India during the 1960s and 1980s. This was a phase when the hegemony of the ruling Congress was sought to be challenged by many segments of society. The Urdu speaking Muslim communities were one of those segments contributing towards participative democracy. The Urdu weekly Sangam, launched in October 1953 turned itself into a daily in 1963, and went on to make a significant impact upon Bihar’s Urdu literati as much as on the journey of democratic republic. These decades were prognosticated pessimistically by some of the American journalists such as Selig H. Harrison (1960), as ‘the most dangerous decades’. From the 1960s onwards, India witnessed ‘turbulence’ in terms of what Atul Kohli (1990) said, “revolution of rising expectations”, when new rural elites had begun to ask for their share in structures and processes of power . There were food riots, droughts, economic crises, law and order issues, mass protests, at times violent, rise of agrarian violence, atrocities against Dalits and their resistance through what became known as Naxalism, besides the communal strife between the Hindus and Muslims, which are quite recurrent in many parts of India. A number of scholars have chronicled these developments about contemporary Bihar . The English daily from Patna, The Searchlight, was particularly dedicated to this. So was the Hindi daily, Aryavart. Many scholars have studied these aspects, but, in these significant tomes, what remains neglected is scholarly engagement with the Urdu newspaper Sangam.
My first encounter with patriarchy perpetuated through motivated interpretation of religious text... more My first encounter with patriarchy perpetuated through motivated interpretation of religious texts came through someone who was close friend of my late father as well as his co-villager. He also happened to have been Secretary of the management board of the school I passed my High School. He eventually wrote a wonderful book on the subject, Woman in Hindu Literature, 1995. His name was Prof. Ram Padarth Sharma (d. 2019), he taught English literature in the universities such as the Bihar Univ, Muzaffarpur the NEHU, Shillong, and also at Yemen. Some aspects of the origin of patriarchy is articulated best in Engel’s 1884 book, Origin of Family, Private Property and the State, and a fictional articulation of some of these aspects of the Engel’s book have been done in Tolstoy’s 1878 novel, Anna Karenina. For the medieval period of Indian history, scholars such as Emma Kalb (2021) and many more have been writing on the issue, not necessarily confining the explorations merely to aristocratic domains. Pakistani historian Mubarak Ali has written historically informed popular essays critiquing the patriarchic perpetuations made through the texts such as Ashraf Ali Thanwi’s Behishti Zewar (1905). For instance, see his Urdu blog, “Mua’ashrah, Aurat aur Beheshti Zewar”, Sept. 5, 2014. https://thelalajie.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/beheshti-zewar/ The Pakistani creative writer, scholar and columnist, Zahida Hena (b. 1946, Sasaram, Bihar) has compiled her essays with the title (2006), Aurat, Zindagi Ka Zindan. This powerful write-up has torn apart the patriarchic world-view in most lucid and candid prose. During the freedom struggle, Kamladevi Chattopadhyaya (1903-1988) stands out as someone who persuaded Gandhiji to bring women outside their homes and to claim their public space. She, arguably the greatest of women in 20th century India, wrote many books, essays as well as her own memoir to document and to interpret such pursuits of gender-justice.
This is a talk, on, the Indian National Movement and Its Legacy, delivered at the AMU, on the occ... more This is a talk, on, the Indian National Movement and Its Legacy, delivered at the AMU, on the occasion of Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav, August 11, 2022.
The government sponsored lectures and talks in commemoration of our heroes in the nationalist str... more The government sponsored lectures and talks in commemoration of our heroes in the nationalist struggle and in the struggles to resist the marginalization of weaker sections, there has to be a sincerity of the purpose, rather than making it a cosmetic exercise geared towards narrow politics of electoral gains. The stories of Birsa Munda and his struggles therefore need telling, re-telling and the regimes need to pay serious and sincere attention to what such heroes stood for.
This essay attempts at exploring the phenomenon of gangsterism and “entrepreneur criminal” in a s... more This essay attempts at exploring the phenomenon of gangsterism and “entrepreneur criminal” in a small industrial town, Jamshedpur. In recent decades, phenomena of organised crime in rural areas and in small towns have mushroomed like menace. Yet, this remains largely neglected in academic explorations. Caste factor is looked into the composition of institutional politics. We often hear of crime-politics nexus, yet, it is hardly articulated as to why we don’t find as many gangsters from the lower castes as we do from the politically powerful and dominant castes. Also, compared to those from powerful castes, the ones from the lower castes have lesser longevity in the ‘profession’ of crime. It tentatively suggests that before a petty-criminal grows into a gangster and overpowers the criminal justice system, he can possibly be contained through the institution of local thana.
Presidential Address, 10th Bihar History Congress, Contemporary Section, September 15, 2022, 2022
Though, archival sources could be limited and not well kept, which throws up challenges to the hi... more Though, archival sources could be limited and not well kept, which throws up challenges to the historians working on contemporary Bihar, the supplementary sources such as life-writings, fiction, rumours, oral accounts, inquiry commission reports, newspapers, little magazines of activists and political organizations and NGOs, and most important of all, radio, television and film documentaries, are some of the sources for the historians.
Bihar is also wiating for 'hydraulic historians' to write on its rivers.
If sessions of the Bihar History Congress could be organised punctually every year and the proceedings could be published and also made available online, then a beginning towards writing contemporary histories of Bihar would be made. I would urge the Bihar History Congress to make a sincere move in this direction. Besides fulfilling the conventional professional responsibilities, this would also be one of the steps towards minimising the academy-society disjunction, and thereby making the case for public funding on higher education and research stronger than it has ever been.
Last but not the least, our conversations and writings, researches and talks need also to be rendered into Hindi, Urdu and other local languages of the region. The historians need to come out of their ivory towers into public and social space, keeping themselves fortified with scientifically verifiable evidence rather than pandering to the wishful comfort of the hegemons and oppressors . Bihar, lagging behind most other federal units of the Union of India, particularly needs such academic initiatives and pursuits, more than the other provinces.
Indian Journal of Secularism, vol. 25, Nos. 1-3, April-Dec pp. 39-71, 2021
This essay deals with Muslim communities in the electoral politics of India's most populous provi... more This essay deals with Muslim communities in the electoral politics of India's most populous province and 'heartland', Uttar Pradesh, . Constituting almost 20% of the electorates. The essay explores how and why did Muslims increasingly became electorally irrelevant in the era of electoral dominance of Hindutva. It also studies this issue through political profiles of some of the prominent Muslim politicians, viz, Dr Abdul Jalil Faridi (1913-1974) and Azam Khan, besides few other leaders and political outfits.
This essay centres around treatment meted out to the Muslim citizens by the Indian state and soci... more This essay centres around treatment meted out to the Muslim citizens by the Indian state and society during the COVID-19 pandemic in India in & after April 2020. This had followed the protests against India’s new citizenship laws, and communal violence in eastern parts of the capital city of Delhi, in February. By late March 2020, the COVID-19 spread came to be blamed mainly by the media, generally pro-establishment ones, upon a sub-sect of Sunni Muslims called Tablighi Jama’at with its headquarters (Markaz) in Delhi.The blame put on the Tablighi Jama’at should be contrasted with the state’s facilitative efforts towards the hindu pilgrimage Kumbh in Haridwar in 2021, which resulted in massive COVID infections, as reported by many national and international newspapers. Though the judiciary subsequently exonerated the Tablighi people, the prejudice of the Indian state, in sections of its popular media, and society is evident. In this series of events, the states’s approach towards a section of its own citizens has come under serious scrutiny. The issue of justice has a new, growing religious dimension along with old caste, class, gender, and others dimensions. This goes against the constitutional values of equal treatment to all citizens irrespective of faith, caste, creed, gender and ethnicity. This has its own short-term and long-term implications; hence, worth discussing.
Muzaffarpur-Vaishali parts in north Bihar, has historically been largely free from communal viole... more Muzaffarpur-Vaishali parts in north Bihar, has historically been largely free from communal violence. In recent years, however, there have been many incidents of communal violence. In most of the cases in recent years, Bajrang Dal activists were allegedly in the forefront. This report from the ground looks into the phenomenon of rapid competitive communalization of a locality, which saw two different but similar incidents of such clashes as recently as on January 23, 2018.
While concern to aspire and ensure proportionate representation in the structures and processes o... more While concern to aspire and ensure proportionate representation in the structures and processes of power is quite desirable in a democracy, another significant point of concern is the quality of leadership/legislators and ensuring its accountability through perpetual vigilance by the citizens. Only informed citizens can guarantee better democracy. As an old adage goes, “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty”. Merely electing someone from the community cannot ensure protection of legitimate interests. Are Bihar’s and India’s Muslims really prepared to do that?
This essay is on growing disjunction between the universities and social needs and realities in I... more This essay is on growing disjunction between the universities and social needs and realities in India.
"Reforms in higher education cannot be bargained away-they form the bedrock for a vibrant economy, the place from where we can, given the chance, build powerful and sustainable new ideas for future". [Nilekani 2008, 352)
At any given moment, stocktaking of institutions is a necessary exercise. In recent times, universities have started facing more difficult challenges than ever before. At least in certain cases, both the state and some segments of our society have appeared to articulate discomfitures particularly against the best of our universities. We should not and cannot be dismissive about such discomfitures, alienations, hostilities, and grievances. It would be too simplistic and fraught with implications, if we push it aside merely by saying that these are all because of misinformed and motivated propaganda. As a student of history, I somehow feel that in our part of world, comprehensive studies on social histories of the academies of higher learning are woefully inadequate. It is therefore important to deal with the predicaments facing our universities. Have they really remained alive to the social and economic challenges facing Indian societies? With what objectives were they set up? Have they really remained true to those objectives? What kind of researches and pedagogy did they churn out? Did they remain confined as a preserve of a miniscule minority of the select middle classes? Did the campuses explore and address the problems of the immediate surroundings of their physical location? Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), in his essay, "Patriotism and Education", indicted the teachers for being "fairly content with the status quo". Do we really have enough instances when the teachers' movements went beyond their own pay, perks, and working conditions, and agitated for larger....
Sir Sayyid's educational projects for elite males metamorphosed to involve various paradigms – fr... more Sir Sayyid's educational projects for elite males metamorphosed to involve various paradigms – from using Persian as a dominant medium for attaining knowledge to including learning useful sciences (kaar aamad or mufeed uloom), such as agriculture, soil sciences, and allied disciplines, suitable for upgrading the overwhelmingly agrarian economy and establishing conventional universities, with the elusive vernacular as the medium of instruction. Thus, Sir Sayyid Ahmad initiated the translation of Western knowledge from various disciplines, such as philosophy, political economy, logic, and history; however, after making some progress, the pragmatic entrepreneur realized that the time available for translation was very short, and hence, he stopped the translation work. This transition signifies the change in Sir Sayyid Ahmad’s mindset: his intellectual aspirations and pursuit of excellence were tampered by the needs of his time and realization that his qaum (community) has to maintain a presence closer to the levers of powers by staying closer to the relatively higher echelons of public services, which had now been opened to native Indians. However, to be eligible, the aspirant was required to have Western education, which was in favour of the then-prevalent college education model: The colonial powers had resolved to recruit native Indian youths in somewhat ‘superior’ tiers of executive and judicial administration if the aspirants had obtained Western/collegiate education. As the 1870s advanced, this policy of exposure to Western learning became less of a preference and more of a mandatory requirement. Sir Sayyid’s compromise of establishing the MAO College in Aligarh (1877), however, was not an act of tame surrender to the routine: if he had to conform to the ‘routine’ in imparting higher education (primarily) to the Muslim youth, it had to be under the best possible the circumstances. The MAO College adopted the Oxbridge model of residential colleges both in form and substance, to the extent that the local circumstances in the nineteenth-century north India permitted. Sir Sayyid Ahmad’s story of this evolving and metamorphosing project gleans from his writings and utterances, primarily documented in his journals (Aligarh Institute Gazette and Tahzib-ul-Akhlaq), along with his speeches, correspondences, and other sources from which the rest of the narrative is drawn. The current essay seeks to outline the course of these evolving, self-correcting paradigms in the mind of this founder of the Aligarh Movement, as he understood the realities of the time imposed on his qaum.
In most of the narratives of the communal (Hindu-Muslim) violence in India, four issues remain co... more In most of the narratives of the communal (Hindu-Muslim) violence in India, four issues remain comparatively less attended, viz., (a) the Pasmanda identity of the Muslim victims, (b) communalization of the Muslim communities, (c) wilful failure even of supposedly secular regimes in penalizing the culprits, and (d) details about the hoodlums patronized by the politicians. This essay looks into the first of the four issues in the anti-Muslim violence which took place in a village, Pedda, of Bijnor, in the western part of Uttar Pradesh, the most populous province of India. This happened when the elections for the provincial legislative assembly of Uttar Pradesh were just few months away. This part of India has seen a resurgence of spurt in the communal violence in recent times. The majoritarian communal organizations have registered a big rise manifested by unprecedented victory of such political formation and occupying power at the Union government in May 2014. Unlike some of the recent communal violence, in the present case of the village Pedda (Bijnor) however, no evidence of communalization (or Intra-Muslim sub-sectarian— maslaki-assertions in public domain, more particularly the Barelwi-Deobandi conflicts) of the Muslims, could be found out. In this specific case, even though initially the police action remained in question, the provincial government however, did initiate actions against the accused. Both the resurgence of such violence, and the administrative action or inaction, is guided more by the immediate and long term electoral motives of the major political parties.
This essay primarily concerns itself with attempting to retrieve contributions of some of the loc... more This essay primarily concerns itself with attempting to retrieve contributions of some of the local and regional leaders of the Champaran Satyagraha Movement who have largely been left out by the existing literature. Further, it draws upon some of the unexplored archival sources as well as some vernacular literatures, mainly Hindi besides memoirs as well as newspaper reports have been used for the study. Yet, one faces huge constraints of evidences to find answers to many pertinent questions, which emerge after delving into the subject. This essay has been able to cull out significant information about the contributions of Pir Munis, mostly through the memoirs of the Hindi literatures and Hindi newspaper, Pratap. There is still a need to trace out many other sources to find out details about many other local leaders, who have been mentioned in this essay. Besides retrieving the roles played out by the local leaders and vernacular intelligentsia at great personal risks of state repression, this essay brings out that the agrarian problems of Champaran still suffers from something which has been inherited as a legacy during the colonial era, and even after seven decades post-independence many issues remains unresolved.
This is Hindi translation of an essay, "Caste, Community and crime: Explaining the Violence in Mu... more This is Hindi translation of an essay, "Caste, Community and crime: Explaining the Violence in Muzaffarpur", Bihar, published in the Economic & Political Weekly (EPW), January 31, 2015
Social mobility, growing prosperity and rising aspirations, combined with the upcoming state assembly elections explain the sudden violence in Muzaffarpur (Bihar).
The violence against Pasmanda Muslims in Azizpur-Bahilwara in Muzaffarpur, Bihar cannot be understood as an instance of conventional communal strife between Hindus and Muslims.
This report from the ground indicates that different layers of caste, community, administrative and patronage networks have played a role in fostering the violence but also in containing it.
While the Dalit upsurge in Una in Gujarat received widespread attention, an atrocity against Dali... more While the Dalit upsurge in Una in Gujarat received widespread attention, an atrocity against Dalit youths being thrashed in Muzaffarpur, Bihar at the same time did not. It remained merely a Paswan versus Bhumihar confrontation. Dalits remain a differentiated group in Bihar, and have a long way to go before the community can rise above the imperatives of the here and now and assert as a conglomeration.
Mohammad Sajjad scrutinises Hyder's fictions in the light of its neo-historical approach and its ... more Mohammad Sajjad scrutinises Hyder's fictions in the light of its neo-historical approach and its treatment of history, particularly the event of 1857 and its aftermath on the Indian-Muslim psyche. He takes on Shamim Hanafi who views events represented in Hyder's fictions as imaginative though treated with such truthfulness that their veracity can be tested. Apart from digging into the reasons for apparent silence in Urdu literature on the great Uprising of 1857, he also takes an overview of Urdu critics' response to Hyder's treatment of history.
A valuable and fine-grained study by Mohammad Sajjad (“Muslim Communities and the Politics of Soc... more A valuable and fine-grained study by Mohammad Sajjad (“Muslim Communities and the Politics of Social Justice: Bihar, 1990–2010”) examines the intricacies of Muslim politics in Bihar during its pre-Mandal and post-Mandal phases. While Urdu provided an umbrella identity for the Muslims during the decades after independence, the caste/community hierarchy within the Muslims soon found a political expression in the Pasmanda movement and dynamics which are yet to unfold fully. In Sajjad’s piece we see a keen observer and an analyst with a fine ability to register varied voices and to give them their due.
One of the most notable recent contributions to the understanding of Muslim histories in India is Mohammad Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours. It moves away from the former centres of Mughal power which have generally been the focus of studies on Indian Muslims. Sajjad’s carefully researched work outlines the rich history of political mobilisation among Muslims in Bihar, the third-most populous state in India and one with a significant Muslim population, from the colonial period to the present. The author highlights the resistance amongst Bihari Muslims to the two-nation theory. This has largely been overlooked in studies of the pre-independence period which generally focus on Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Bengal.
Sajjad, however, points out that Muslim political groups in Bihar were both anti-colonial and anti-separatist in orientation and regularly allied with Hindu groups in their political struggles. In the postcolonial period, he describes the movement for the promotion of Urdu – which began in the 1950s and continued through the 1980s – as a mass-based campaign, not carried out in religious and communal terms, but instead, on the basis of the rights guaranteed to linguistic minorities in the Indian constitution.
Sajjad points to another subject hitherto untouched by other scholars: the question of caste among Muslims. Though Muslim elites in India would have us believe that there is no caste system among Indian Muslims, the 1990s witnessed the emergence of two significant movements: the All-India Backward Muslim Morcha and the All India Pasmanda Muslim Mahaz. These two movements campaigned for the rights of lower-caste Muslims in Bihar.
Sajjad’s contribution is important in two ways. First, it focusses on a part of India that is under-researched when it comes to the study of Indian Muslims. Second, it not only highlights the issue of caste amongst Muslims but also focusses on mobilisation among – and also led by – non-elite groups. For this reason, his is a welcome addition to the existing literature on Indian Muslims.
Review of my book, Contesting Colonialisma nd Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857. Prim... more Review of my book, Contesting Colonialisma nd Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857. Primus, 2014.
In Muslim Politics in Bihar, Mohammad Sajjad, an assistant professor of history at Aligarh Muslim... more In Muslim Politics in Bihar, Mohammad Sajjad, an assistant professor of history at Aligarh Muslim University, breaks new ground in a number of ways. First, addressing Bihar Muslim politics during the colonial period leading up to Partition, he shows that unlike U.P. and Bengal, its two neighbours (which, together with Punjab, have received most of the attention by historians of Partition), Bihar Muslims did not embrace the separatist message of the Muslim League until 1946, when in the wake of massive riots in Bihar the Muslim League made major electoral gains on the strength of the slogan ‘Islam in danger’. While support for separate electorates was weak among leading Bihar Muslim politicians, that for Congress and for composite nationalism—conceptualized as political unity with non-Muslim Indians combined with non-interference by the State in Muslim religio-cultural affairs—aimed at ending British rule in India was stronger through much of the early twentieth century. Second, Sajjad explores not only Bihar Muslim engagement with the Congress and the Muslim League, but also with the less well-known Muslim Independent Party (MIP), Imarat-e Shariah, and the All-India Momin Conference, whose politics were allied with the Congress. This background in turn explains the post-Independence politics of Bihari Muslims. In both the campaigns which they have waged between 1947 and the present—that for the recognition of Urdu as a second State language until the late 1980s, and the struggle for social justice and political power since the 1990s through the creation of new reservation policies which would benefit the most deprived among them—Bihar Muslims have participated fully in the democratic process in Independent India by mobilizing the masses for the attainment of their constitutionally guaranteed rights. The study thus seeks to challenge the idea that Indian Muslims bear ‘responsibility for the partition of India’ (p. xvi) by showing that in Bihar, Muslims had an antipathy to the Muslim League’s Two-Nation Theory and a strong preference for a united, pluralist anti-colonial struggle. Furthermore it argues that contrary to the perception of Indian Muslims as ‘isolationist’, they have been fully engaged with the language of Indian ‘constitutionalist, secular, pluralist democracy’ (p. xvi) after Independence. The book uses a number of Urdu sources which have not been explored before, including biographies, histories, the Urdu press, and works of fiction. The first four chapters of the ...
The book, Contesting Colonialism and Serparatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857 (Primus, Delh... more The book, Contesting Colonialism and Serparatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857 (Primus, Delhi, 2014) probes the nationalist trajectory of what Mohammad Sajjad calls ‘the lesser-known nation-makers of Muzaffarpur’ of north Bihar. Muslims of Muzaffarpur acquiring centre stage, within undivided and divided Bihar, in colonial and Independent India, places regional and community history objectively within the larger narrative of nation making that has remained a neglected area of study. The micro-study is essentially based on a vivid description of Muslim responses to nationalist developments and Muslim League politics in the region that Mohammad Sajjad argues as remaining just a marginal force (p. 11). It further delineates on the post-Partition challenges faced by the Muslims with the region ushering into conundrum of local, identity and caste politics in its conclusive chapters. What makes this work interesting is that it stretches its research phase chronologically from the emergence of the region till contemporary times. It offers a cohesive understanding of major historical and political developments in Muzaffarpur to showcase the region’s uniqueness in responding to developments taking place in colonial India up to changes in recent times. Such narrative is important to link the vista of regional politics with the larger nationalist turf, thereby creating enough space to understand the connections and departures between the two. The author contests some major arguments of history, particularly built around Muslims’ monolithic response in favour of demand for a separate Muslim homeland along with shedding fresh light on engagements and predicaments of the Muslims. He weaves the region’s responses with a broader Muslim articulation in the province against operative colonial and communalist forces to further substantiate his arguments culled in favour of the community’s nationalist visions and endeavours. In several ways, Muslim responses were in tune with nationalist expositions, not only of support but also in initiatives. The language issue (Urdu being replaced by Nagri) did create tensions between communities but this was not to cause a sordid rift between Hindus and Muslims. The struggle for separation of Bihar from Bengal (eventually realized in 1912) was ranged more against Bengali bhadralok class, who gained most from dominance of Bihar in education and jobs. This tussle dominated early politics and emerges as an important example of Bihar’s uniqueness in forging Hindu-Muslim collaboration on matters of regional preference, with enthusiastic initiatives and collaboration coming from the Muslims. Even the idea of a separate state of Bihar was mooted for the first ...
Kashif-ul-Huda, The Milli Gazette, 16-31 March 2015
History should not be merely recounting of exploits of famous people or important conflicts. It should also be about changes happening at the grassroots level and how these local changes shape the course of communities and nations. Mohammad Sajjad’s “Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur Since 1857” falls into the latter category of history narration. Muzaffarpur in Bihar “is neither a seat of power nor a place arguably having nationally known history-makers” admits Sajjad in his preface to the book. Mohammad Sajjad who is Assistant Professor at the Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University, digs deep to find the “largely untold” stories of “lesser-known nation-makers of Muzaffarpur.” Beginning with a brief history of Muzaffarpur region, the book, divided in 11 chapters, explores the socio-political history of Muzaffarpur and the neighbouring areas since 1857. The failure of 1857 resulted in a new thinking among Muslims. Muzaffarpur Muslims were ahead of Syed Ahmed Khan in starting a movement for modern education. Syed Imdad Ali and Syed Mohammad Taqi were successful in getting non-Muslims also to join their cause. Muslims joined hands with Hindus to set up schools and colleges that benefitted all, not exclusively any one community. The Hindu-Muslim cooperation extended to politics as well. The movement for separation of Bihar from the Bengal presidency was the first such movement where both Hindus and Muslims participated. British administrators devised a rift between Hindus and Muslims by removing Urdu from school instructions and official business and restricting teaching of Urdu to only Muslims. As the movement for Hindi turned communal, Muslims responded by establishing Urdu Sahitiyik Sabha to bridge the gap between the two languages. But the movement for Hindi was not for the development of Hindi as much as an attempt to shrink public space for Urdu. The 1937 Madras session of Hindi Sahitya Sammelan (HSS) was presided over by Jamnalal Bajaj rather than the Hindi poet Maithili Sharan Gupt, making it clear that HSS was a political group rather than a literary body. By 1920s, parts of India were reeling under communal violence. Muslims feared that the Congress was being converted into a Hindu organization and Muslim leaders were pushed to the margins. In 1923, Hindu Sabha’s Gaya session was presided over by Dr. Rajendra Prasad which gave credence to Muslim views that Hindu leaders of Congress are encouraging the communal elements. The electoral defeat of Muslim leaders like Shafi Daudi and Mazharul Haque, who considered themselves as Indian leaders and not just leaders for Muslims, came as a shock. Muslims believed that communal elements in the Congress conspired to ensure their defeat. In spite of the rising anti-Muslim feeling which had engulfed even the Congress, Muslims continued to actively participate in the freedom struggle. They also vehemently opposed the Muslim League and its two-nation theory. 'Sajjad writes “Muslim political leadership (of Muzaffarpur) has displayed progressive outlook… Yet, it is quite intriguing that their share in political power has undergone a noticeable decline.” Muslims of Muzaffarpur didn’t fare well in independent India either. The situation turned so bad that even such a big Congress leader like Maghfur Aijazi quit the party to contest the 1962 parliamentary elections on Swantatra Party ticket. Read this book carefully and you will see that Muslims of Muzaffarpur despite putting emphasis on modern education and not only being part of political movements but leading it for most part still end up being marginalized in the political processes and governance institutions. Even their history is on the verge of being wiped out if not for historians like Sajjad who are ready to invest their time in researching and writing about people who are largely forgotten. Mohammad Sajjad shines through as a modern historian in the last chapter which is 100-year long history of the village Turkauliya (population 6,500). It’s a wonderful reading of how outside political and economic forces affected the lives in this predominately Muslim village. It is a fascinating read and highlight of this brilliantly-researched book. (twocircles.net)
This article appeared in The Milli Gazette print issue of 16-31 March 2015 on page no. 21
A Book-Review by Arshad Alam, JNU, Indian Historical Review (Sage), 2015, pp. 159-161
Mohammad ... more A Book-Review by Arshad Alam, JNU, Indian Historical Review (Sage), 2015, pp. 159-161
Mohammad Sajjad, Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857, New Delhi: Primus, 2014, xviii + 265 pp. (Hardback), Price INR 1,195, ISBN 978-93-84082-04-8. DOI: 10.1177/0376983615569878
In writing the macro history of India, the specificity of the local gets lost. The birds-eye view of the grand historical narrative of India therefore needs to be rectified by the worms-eye view of the local and contextualised narrative. In the book under review, Mohammad Sajjad seeks out to do precisely this. In the process, he demolishes many of the certitudes of the mainstream nationalist narrative which have sought to understand Indian Muslims’ response to the national struggle as an after-effect, pointing to their lackadaisical response to movements like Non-cooperation and Quit India. What is more, the Muslim response has been understood through the lens of separatism, rather than on their own terms. Sajjad seems to correct this mainstream view through his historical study of the city of Muzaffarpur in Bihar. Although there is a growing genre of literature on Indian cities, most happen to be confined to the so-called metropolises like Delhi and Mumbai. Sajjad’s local and localised history also seeks to correct this anomaly. Moreover, by investing into Muslims of Muzaffarpur, Sajjad throws light on the politics of a people which have been much understudied in the Indian context.
The plea to take local history more seriously is underwritten in almost all the chapters of this book.
Mohammad Sajjad’s book, however, makes a courageous attempt to go beyond this conventional unders... more Mohammad Sajjad’s book, however, makes a courageous attempt to go beyond this conventional understanding of Muslim politics. He endeavours to look at those unexplored areas that have not been given any serious intellectual attention so far. More precisely, the study adopts a threefold research strategy to get rid of the conventional historiography of Muslim politics. Instead of offering a grand narrative of South Asian Islam, the book concentrates on a geopolitical entity called Bihar. This regional focus (in a conceptual as well as geographic sense) turns out to be a productive ‘vantage point’ to revisit some of the given explanations of Muslim political responses especially in colonial India. Second, the book discusses the Muslim resistance to the two-nation theory to produce a complex and diversified picture of Muslim politics in the post-1930s Bihar. In fact, the study makes a serious claim that the Muslim political attitudes in colonial India should not be seen merely in relation to the rather known story of Muslim separatism. Finally, the book attempts to establish an analytically useful relationship between the colonial past and the post colonial realities. In fact, the contemporary Muslim politics is not looked at as a residue of the past; rather the complexities of the contemporary are analysed in its own entirety.
As for Sajjad’s landmark academic tome Muslim Politics in Bihar, there are two ways to read it. Y... more As for Sajjad’s landmark academic tome Muslim Politics in Bihar, there are two ways to read it. You can take it as valuable work based on fresh archival material demonstrating how the Muslim politics in Bihar followed pathways very different from Punjab and Uttar Pradesh and how the Muslim League did not find a firm foothold in Bihar right till the Partition and leave things at that. …. Mohammad Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar, is an academic study focusing on the shifting political alignments of the Muslim communities in Bihar since the 1920s right through the Independence movement, although the last chapters of the book cover matters as far as the mid-1990s….
Book Review by Abhay Kumar (JNU), SEMINAR, no. 678, February 2016
http://ww.w.india-seminar.com/2... more Book Review by Abhay Kumar (JNU), SEMINAR, no. 678, February 2016 http://ww.w.india-seminar.com/2016/678/678_books.htm MUSLIM POLITICS IN BIHAR: Changing Contours, by Mohammad Sajjad. Routledge, New Delhi, 2014.
Sajjad's focus is on Bihar, where he comes up with a very different picture of Muslim politics in... more Sajjad's focus is on Bihar, where he comes up with a very different picture of Muslim politics in the late colonial period. To begin with, Bihar as a political entity has hardly been the focus of serious scholarship in the context of Muslim politics.
pertaining to the historiography of India's Partition in 1947, most of the works concentrated on ... more pertaining to the historiography of India's Partition in 1947, most of the works concentrated on Punjab, Bengal, and UP. On the issue of Partition, the Muslim League's communal territorial separatism has been explored whereas Muslim resistance to the politics of Partition remains a largely untold story. Bihari Muslims displayed a fierce anti-colonial struggle through the Wahabbi movement during the better part of the 19th century. Subsequently, the sub-regional nationalism of Biharis emerged against the hegemony of the Bengalis on Bihar, in the forefront of which were the urban educated elites of Muslims and Kayastha Hindus. 'Communalism and communal riots happened in India only during and due to colonialism. Pre-colonial India didn't have this problem of communal conflicts and religious strife.' 'So far as the destruction of Nalanda University by Bakhtiyar Khilji is concerned, there is no direct evidence of it. We don't have even archaeological evidence testifying Khilji's destruction,' Mohammad Sajjad tells Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com. http://www.rediff.com/news/interview/communal-riots-never-happen-in-a-political-vacuum/20150422.htm
It's been a week since a 50-year-old Muslim man was lynched in Dadri after rumours did the round... more It's been a week since a 50-year-old Muslim man was lynched in Dadri after rumours did the rounds that he consumed beef. While the small Uttar Pradesh town continues to simmer after his death, its aftershocks are being felt in poll-bound Bihar. From Sushil Modi to Lalu Prasad Yadav, every 'important person' in the state commented on the issue and now even Chief Minister Nitish Kumar feels that the beef issue is being imported to Bihar that goes to poll in less than a week. We spoke to Dr. Mohammad Sajjad, Associate Professor at Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University, to understand the impact of these developments on Bihar politics. He has written extensively on the communal fabric of Bihar in his essays and books. He is best known for his book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours (Routledge, 2014).
The economic reforms and privatisation during 1990s opened some avenues for the youth in the comm... more The economic reforms and privatisation during 1990s opened some avenues for the youth in the community, as opposed to the previous decades during which government jobs were hard to come by.
Gradually, a small but significant middle class is emerging as new professionals join the fields of media, IT and management.
The recently published book - India's Muslim Spring: Why is Nobody Talking about It? by Hasan Suroor, a London-based veteran Indian journalist, focuses on the positive trends within the community.
Another soon to be published book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours by Mohammed Sajjad, an assistant professor at Aligarh Muslim University's history department, highlights the community's response to challenges in the historical past, particularly during the partition.
Al Jazeera's Saif Khalid in an email interview with Suroor and Sajjad tries to get a sense of the changes happening in India’s Muslim community.
An expert in colonial Indian history, Dr Mohammad Sajjad teaches at the Aligarh Muslim University... more An expert in colonial Indian history, Dr Mohammad Sajjad teaches at the Aligarh Muslim University. Armed with a PhD on Muslim politics in Bihar in the last decade of colonialism, he keeps his eye on Uttar Pradesh and Bihar politics. He has submitted a research monograph on 'Post-Colonial Bihar Muslims: Their Socio-Economic Diversities and Political Behaviour, 1947-2007.
Sheela Bhatt met Dr Sajjad at AMU, where his life revolves around 32,000 students -- of whom 18,000 students live on the campus itself. Besides, AMU has over 2,500 teachers.
The conversation delved around Muslims's voting patterns and their state of mind in the two northern states on the eve of the general election.
Asked about the mood in Uttar Pradesh, Dr Sajjad feels, "Muslims are shocked after the Samajwadi Party took (former Bharatiya Janata Party chief minister) Kalyan Singh's support. Many Muslims are angry with the SP -- that one factor will shift many Muslim votes to the BSP."
For a student of history, the most abiding memory of Bihar is of Mahatma Gandhi’s Champaran satya... more For a student of history, the most abiding memory of Bihar is of Mahatma Gandhi’s Champaran satyagraha. Of course, much before that, we had read about Nalanda and all the Buddhist shrines. Yet, somehow, in the mind of the common man, the role of Bihar in the independence movement has never been as well analysed. Even less so the role of Muslims of the State. Noted historian Mohammad Sajjad, assistant professor, AMU, has sought to fill this gap with a meticulously researched and insightfully analysed work, “Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857”. Primus, Delhi, 2014
This book therefore calls into question many assumptions about Partition historiography, and elab... more This book therefore calls into question many assumptions about Partition historiography, and elaborates upon the fact that Muslims resisted communal separatist politics quite vociferously. After independence, Muslim representation, even in politics and legislature, started becoming less and less visible, despite their socially inclusive mass politics. This was contrary to general assumption about Muslims confining their political concerns to emotive religious issues. In 20th century, the Muslims took lead in all kinds of anti-colonial struggle. Shafi Daudi (1875-1949), Maghfur Aijazi (1900-66), and Manzur Aijazi (1898-1969), among many other Muslims, mostly advocates, took lead in founding the local units of the Congress. In 1920s-30s, there were instances of Muslim disenchantment with the Congress on the question of share in the structures of power, yet their firm opposition to colonial exploitation as well as to the separatist politics of the Muslim League attracted my attention more decisively. They remained vociferous against the Muslim League besides enthusiastic participation and sacrifices in the Civil Disobedience (193-34) and Quit India Movements (1942). Even though from mid 1920s onwards, within the structure of the Congress, the Bhumihars and Rajputs started gaining ascendance and Muslims started feeling marginalized, elections after elections, be it in the legislatures or in the local bodies.
The AMU Teachers' Association (AMUTA) and the Waqf Worries: Common Members of the Qaum Caught between their own Self-Serving Elites and the Majoritarian Regime, 2024
This essay explores the entrenched hegemony of select clouts of teachers in the governance struc... more This essay explores the entrenched hegemony of select clouts of teachers in the governance structures of India's highest funded Aligarh Muslim University-AMU, that are preventing the historic, renowned University from exploring its full potential, including commandeering a leading opposition to the recently introduced controversial Waqf Bill 2024.
This essay is on the AIMPLB's obfuscation around the latest (10 July 2024) Supreme Court verdict ... more This essay is on the AIMPLB's obfuscation around the latest (10 July 2024) Supreme Court verdict for maintenance to the divorced Muslim women... ...Crucial reforms in Muslim personal law, especially laws related to inheritance and adoption, need to be initiated forthwith; historically speaking, without the State's backing, hardly has any reform taken place or allowed to prevail... ...It is distressing that even the modern institutions funded by the secular State of India, such as the AMU, Jamia Millia Islamia (New Delhi), MANU University (Hyderabad), and their departments of studies such as gender and women studies, Islamic studies, theology, law, social sciences, etc, have not been able to pursue a reformist agenda with any degree of sincerity and conviction. Quite a lot of them have either maintained a dishonest silence or have endorsed the regressive positions. Both ways, they are on the regressive side. This is extremely disgusting, to say the least...
"How An Indian’s Visit To Turkey Turned Into Search Of Answers For Population Transfer, Majoritarianisms, And Much More", The Outlook, August 26, 2023, 2023
This travelogue is about the many questions that a trip to Istanbul (Turkey) in June 2023, raised... more This travelogue is about the many questions that a trip to Istanbul (Turkey) in June 2023, raised, which led to write this piece in which he addresses the majoritarianism, Islamization, and the systemic population transfers over the years among other themes.
Sabraangindia/Communalism Combat, March 8, 2024, 2024
The essay makes an argument –based on a close study of the past century and of recent times --for... more The essay makes an argument –based on a close study of the past century and of recent times --for doses of rationality and soul-searching in the ongoing battle for minority rights and dignity. It urges India's Muslim communities to make their own contribution to invest in secularizing India, and asserts that minority communalism is no antidote to majoirtarianism
during the discussion on the book, one somehow felt that Muzaffar Ali was in Aligarh to feel the ... more during the discussion on the book, one somehow felt that Muzaffar Ali was in Aligarh to feel the pulse of the Muslim youth, especially in the darker and harsher times that India is passing through.
Urdu fiction writer Zakiya Mashhadi's short story Diya Baati Ki Bela might help us in finding sol... more Urdu fiction writer Zakiya Mashhadi's short story Diya Baati Ki Bela might help us in finding solutions to the current problem of Hindu-Muslim divisiveness that is politically manufactured and exacerbated. The opening story of Zakiya Mashhadi's, (born 1944) latest publication, Diya Baati ki Bela (िदया बाती की बे ला), a collection of short Urdu stories, is a must-read to comprehend and diagnose the current problems of Hindu-Muslim fratricide and the divisiveness that is largely politically manufactured and exacerbated. The almost 50-page long short story might help in finding workable solutions to the problems faced by the two communities in present times. My wife insisted that I read the story, leaving aside any other important assignments that I might be preoccupied with. Having read it, I realised that a Nagri rendition of the story is urgently needed. After all, the pluralist coexistence between the two major religious communities of the country is receiving heavy blows. It is on the verge of death; similar to how dawn gradually gives way to dusk. Just like how lighting of lamps is required to fight the evil of darkness, the title of the story-Diya Baati Ki Bela-suggests something profound.
This Hindi novel, Zeherkhurani (2023) by Nirmala Bhuradia, underlines that even decades after unp... more This Hindi novel, Zeherkhurani (2023) by Nirmala Bhuradia, underlines that even decades after unprecedented brutalities and violence in the wake of India’s partition, humanity seems to have refused to learn any lesson.
As a seven-judge Supreme Court's Constitution bench hears a plea regarding the minority status of... more As a seven-judge Supreme Court's Constitution bench hears a plea regarding the minority status of Aligarh Muslim University, a history professor charts the pre-independence roots of the varsity and why it has been administered by Muslims. According to the historical records, the Mohammedan Anglo Oriental (MAO) College, Aligarh, was established by the Muslims, in 1877. In the 19th century, be it either because of socio-religious reform movements or the birthing of many educational institutions, religious particularism or sectionalism became a universal feature. This is not only why across India, we came to have institutions like 'Hindu College', 'Khalsa College', 'Mohammedan College', 'Christian College', etc, but also denominational colleges and universities in the late colonial as well as post-independence period of our history. From the very beginning, since the 1870s, the objective was to upgrade MAO, the residential college, to a university, in honour of the struggle of and for the betterment of Muslims. The idea gained momentum from 1898 when its founder and the leading light, Sir Syed Ahmad, died, and by 1920, the college was incorporated into (or upgraded to) the Muslim University [under section 23 (2) of the Act].
No, Mughals didn’t rename Aligarh, it was the Maratha controlled local authority. for the Times o... more No, Mughals didn’t rename Aligarh, it was the Maratha controlled local authority. for the Times of India, a history professor at Aligarh Muslim University, Mohammad Sajjad, looks at how the idea of renaming Aligarh as Harigarh took root, and busts the many myths surrounding the origins of the city”
Urdu fiction writer Zakiya Mashhadi's short story, Diya Baati Ki Bela, might help us in finding s... more Urdu fiction writer Zakiya Mashhadi's short story, Diya Baati Ki Bela, might help us in finding solutions to the current problem of Hindu-Muslim divisiveness that is politically manufactured and exacerbated. The opening story of Zakiya Mashhadi's, (born 1944) latest publication, Diya Baati ki Bela, a collection of short Urdu stories, is a must-read to comprehend and diagnose the current problems of Hindu-Muslim fratricide and the divisiveness that is largely politically manufactured and exacerbated. The almost 50-page long short story might help in finding workable solutions to the problems faced by the two communities in present times.
This Hindi novel underlines that even decades after unprecedented brutalities and violence in the... more This Hindi novel underlines that even decades after unprecedented brutalities and violence in the wake of India's partition, humanity seems to have refused to learn any lesson.
This write-up looks at how the idea of renaming Aligarh as Harigarh took root, in the 1960s-1970... more This write-up looks at how the idea of renaming Aligarh as Harigarh took root, in the 1960s-1970s, and busts the many myths surrounding the origins of the city (the town called Kol till early 19th century), and the fort area north-west of the railways. Only the latter part has been getting various names from time time in 18th and 19th centuries. It didn't ever get its name after a religious figure. The fortress area, from time to time, was named after the local authorities (subadars or qiladars), e.g., Muhammadgarh, Sabitgarh (after Sabit Khan), Ramgarh, Aligarh (after the name of Najaf Ali Khan, when the weak later Mughals were under effective control of Mahadji Sindhia, the "Great" Maratha). Finally, the British, in 19th century, named the whole town of Kol, as well as the fort area, as Aligarh. the Civil Lines (came to be developed north west of the railway junction) which connects the old town Kol with the fort area.
Hindustan Times, English Daily, Delhi, Nov. 10, 2019, 2019
For India’s Muslims, it is the closure of a festering issue. This has now got an institutional st... more For India’s Muslims, it is the closure of a festering issue. This has now got an institutional stamp of as high an institution as the highest court of the land. With this verdict, if I have understood it correctly, the criminality of the demolition (December 6, 1992) vanishes, and if there is no crime, where is the issue of confession, and reconciliation with the aggrieved? If that is the case, then things should/would become even clearer to the petitioners and their co-religionists. India's apex judiciary determines the place of Muslims; the 5 acre land, if allocated, then its precise location from the city will further define Muslims's place in New, Saffronised, India.
Sadly, some of the better known Muslim law commentators of the day are also not helping the judic... more Sadly, some of the better known Muslim law commentators of the day are also not helping the judiciary in removing such misconceptions; rather, they are encouraging the Muslim Law Board to continue to perpetuate a regressive law .
A scholar reminisces his growing up in rural north Bihar and how its secular fabric changed after... more A scholar reminisces his growing up in rural north Bihar and how its secular fabric changed after loud-mouthed Hindu fanatic leaders landed there. The Outlook, weekly, Delhi, October 3, 2022
Given this kind of socio-political scenario, it is naturally inevitable that there is a perceptib... more Given this kind of socio-political scenario, it is naturally inevitable that there is a perceptible rise of communitarians, and many of them are slipping into communal reactionaries, who talk of Muslims should vote only for Muslim candidates. One is able to witness the rise of these fissiparous and self-defeating tendencies in many WhatsApp groups operating at village and mohalla levels. These Muslims fail (or refuse) to realise that antidote of majoritarianism is pluralism; howsoever, difficult that might appear to be made workable, in the present circumstances of unprecedented majoritarian consolidation. These hard-headed nuts also fail to realise that even if, just for argument sake, for once, you discard this conviction, in sheer practical terms also, a minority cannot afford to pursue this politics. Moreover, they also fail to realise that, if majoritarian hatred and consolidation persists, then even an enhanced Muslim representation inside the legislature will not help them, as it happened post-1938 in UP and elsewhere. (Mukul Kesavan, “Partition’s Hinge: How Muslim Separatist Politics Took Roots between 1937-1942” The Telegraph, August 7, 2005) They will be there as helpless opposition, and nothing more than that. These Muslims also need to realise in sheer pragmatic terms of electoral politics that in these harsher times, they are left in an either-or-quandary. What is their precise priority at these moments of unprecedented vulnerabilities? Enhancing Muslim representation or choosing lesser evil? At this moment, sad reality is: the Muslim minorities cannot ensure both of the above, concurrently, for themselves.
Karpoori Thakur (1924-1988) must be remembered by people today who are tired of witnessing fracti... more Karpoori Thakur (1924-1988) must be remembered by people today who are tired of witnessing fractious politics where corruption, bigotry, hatred and violence seems to have become distressingly recurrent
Ever since the Jawaharlal Nehru led government legislated the Hindu Marriage Act 1956, a section ... more Ever since the Jawaharlal Nehru led government legislated the Hindu Marriage Act 1956, a section of society has been harbouring a grievance regarding why Muslims were ‘spared’ from a similar reform. This legislation is a saffron vengeance, hence, afflicted with many flaws. It also exposes the patriarchy of the clergy.
'A fierce crusader against communalism, George joined hands with majoritarian forces, never to re... more 'A fierce crusader against communalism, George joined hands with majoritarian forces, never to revisit or re-assess his saffron association.' 'He was a Union minister in 1998-2004, a time when people like Graham Staines were lynched in Orissa.' 'On the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, George went on to kind of justify the slashing of pregnant women, by saying in the Lok Sabha that this was nothing new for India.' 'Thus, he was in sharp contrast to what he had himself stood for in the heyday of his political career in the 1970s and 1980s.
This essay attempts at looking into certain Urdu writings, mostly prose, to explore about the way... more This essay attempts at looking into certain Urdu writings, mostly prose, to explore about the ways Gandhi was looked upon by Muslims of different ideological orientations and persuasions. There were at least three Gandhi Namas written in Urdu, out of which, only one, by Akbar Allahabadi, is better known, whereas the other two are lesser-known. In some Urdu lifewritings, Gandhi has been seen by Muslims of different socio-political persuasions and locations, in different ways. Going by these, there has also been rise, fall and rise again, in the popularity of Gandhi among Muslims (as also among Hindus). A look into all such literature, may possibly add something important to the existing knowledge on Gandhian studies.
Foreword on the Scindias (to be rendered into Urdu), 2021
[Foreword for a book by Rasheed Kidwai on the Scindias; to be rendered into Urdu]
...Mahadji Sci... more [Foreword for a book by Rasheed Kidwai on the Scindias; to be rendered into Urdu]
...Mahadji Scindia (1730-1794), the ‘Great Maratha’ couldn’t get the Delhi throne despite having reached a striking distance. Just as the chief minster’s chair was within Vijayraje Scindia’s reach, in 1967, but she admittedly chose not to be, for which, her memoir does not offer any explanation. Though, she provides all details about her roles pertaining to toppling the D. P. Mishra-led Congress government and thereby teaching a lesson to the ‘arrogant’ Congress. Just as Jyotiraditya, in March 2020 played his roles in toppling the Kamalnath-led Congress government but could not replace him in the office of the chief minister....
This is raising few queries about the historical basis of Dalit Muslim Unity: dominant backward c... more This is raising few queries about the historical basis of Dalit Muslim Unity: dominant backward castes against the rest; are Dalits embracing Arzals?
The question is: how did we reach such a grim situation? How did the society get alienated agains... more The question is: how did we reach such a grim situation? How did the society get alienated against our respectable institutions and the regressive political and cultural forces have begun to prevail over the society? How did these politicians succeed in persuading the society rather than the knowledge producers and disseminators? This calls us all the more for much deeper introspection. To my little understanding, part of the reason is: with the expanding social base of the campuses, the pre-existing upper caste elites got threatened about their pre-eminence in the sphere of knowledge. Our practices of knowledge-production and dissemination have remained woefully inadequate on challenging the status quo.
Shaibal's piece made some sweeping statements, and it was quite incredible of him to say the eme... more Shaibal's piece made some sweeping statements, and it was quite incredible of him to say the emerging capitalistic system in Bihar will solve all the problems of the people.
Adulation of goons by their deprived community is in a way a manifestation of despondency as the ... more Adulation of goons by their deprived community is in a way a manifestation of despondency as the fans have nothing more to look forward to as symbols of their pride. The moot point is whether the common Muslim of Siwan has started identifying himself with the goon as this would make them vulnerable not only to crime but possibly also to violent religious extremism.
The incident of communal violence in Agarpur (Lalganj) Vaishali, Bihar in November 2015, clearly ... more The incident of communal violence in Agarpur (Lalganj) Vaishali, Bihar in November 2015, clearly points to the widespread nexus among hoodlums, politicians with criminal records, and the police in the state. Dismantling this criminal patronage network, which perpetuates communalism and casteism and exacerbates lawlessness, is one of the biggest challenges that confronts the Nitish Kumar regime.
In July 2016, when the national media was gazing into the Dalit upsurge in Gujarat's Una, another... more In July 2016, when the national media was gazing into the Dalit upsurge in Gujarat's Una, another relatively under-reported episode of Dalit assertion was there in a north Bihar village, Babu tola-Matthiya, Paroo, Muzaffarpur. Two Dalit youths, Rajiv Paswan and Munna Paswan, were alleged to have attempted to steal motorbike of a local Bhumihar. The two Paswans were thrashed and it was alleged that a member of the mob urinated into the mouth of one of the Paswans. Rajiv Paswan's mother, Sunita Devi lodged an FIR with the Paroo police, against 11 persons including Mukesh Thakur, the husband of the local Panchayat head. The police arrested two of the 11 named accused, and on enquiry the thrashing of the two Dalits was confirmed while the allegation of urination was said to have not been substantiated. Meanwhile, the opposition in Bihar made it a big issue using it as a stick to beat the Nitish regime with. The Union minister and LJP president Ram Vilas Paswan visited the family of the two Dalit youths, and demanded a CBI inquiry into the incident. Though the BJP's leader of opposition in the State Assembly, Sushil Modi lashed out at Nitish administration, a Bhumihar leader from Bihar and the Union Minister, Griraj Singh, however, steered clear of the issue. Griraj had courted controversies during the 2014 elections with a statement that those who didn't vote for the BJP should be banished to Pakistan.
Book-Review of Laurence Gautier's, Between Nation and 'Community': Muslim Universities and Indian Politics after Partition, Cambrdige Univ Press 2024 (Review published in the Sabrangindia, Sept 03, 2024), 2024
The dominance of an elite Muslim upper caste and class has hindered healthy research and introspe... more The dominance of an elite Muslim upper caste and class has hindered healthy research and introspection among these two dominant universities Universities, viz., the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) and its "rebel sister", the Delhi's Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI).
This otherwise well-researched book on UP Muslims after 1947, doesn’t help much in figuring out w... more This otherwise well-researched book on UP Muslims after 1947, doesn’t help much in figuring out why didn’t UP Muslims throw up the kind of ‘Pasmanda Movement’ [and Left-inspired Tehreek-e-Niswan, the gender movement, howsoever short-lived and inconsequential] that emerged in the adjacent province of Bihar in the 1990s. Overall, why did Muslims, on their part, fail to strengthen the movements for citizenship rights after independence, and confined themselves to emotive religio-cultural-identitarian issues, is a vital question that remains un-answered in this book. Overall, Pandit (and William Gould’s 2005 book on late colonial UP) provides lot of ammunition for the narrative of Muslim victimhood. It talks of state (and Hindu) discrimination against Muslims but maintains silence on reform from within Muslims. What Muslims ought to have done towards strengthening secularism and towards marginalizing the communal forces within the two communities, remains beyond the scope of Pandit’s book. Thus, this book ignores this pertinent question: in order to claim citizenship, and for secularization of the state and society, how to strike a balance with rights for religious communities? This approach of the author doesn’t let her ask (and deal with) another question, (particularly in her chapters four and five wherein Muslim assets are discussed): why didn’t UP Muslims employ their wealth and assets into capacity building of their community, the way south Indian Muslims did and are still doing, in the spheres of education, and health? Why did the UP Muslims remain much dependent upon the state?
A New Book on Muslims in India’s Politics, 1947-1977, wherein Pratinav Anil is able to foresee so... more A New Book on Muslims in India’s Politics, 1947-1977, wherein Pratinav Anil is able to foresee some agency and assertion on the part of India's Muslims. His hope emanates from the citizenship rights movement of Muslims in 2019-2020. On the Muslim question in the Indian Republic, Anil is harshly critical against Nehruvian policies and programmes. He characterises this era of Nehru-Congress hegemony as Islamophobic. One of the targets of his polemics is Mushirul Hasan's 1997 book, Legacy of a Divided Nation: India's Muslims since Independence, which, according to Anil, is 'an inventory of elite political maneuverings in which Muslims are little more than spectators'. He puts other scholars such as Rafiq Zakaria, Moin Shakir and Omar Khalidi, in almost the same league. In his own words, Anil's 'primary aim is to recover Muslim agency'. Admittedly, he is 'repurposing the minority question to reflect on the majoritarian character of Indian democracy'.
The Champaran Satyagraha (1917) occupies significance in the history of India’s anti-colonial str... more The Champaran Satyagraha (1917) occupies significance in the history of India’s anti-colonial struggle because of many reasons. One, it was Gandhi’s most spectacular and first experiment of non-violent Satyagraha in India; two, Bihar’s prioritized engagement with “regional patriotism” to become a separate province from the Bengal kept the reach of the Congress very limited in Bihar till Gandhi visited Champaran to intervene into the inhuman oppression to which the peasantry was subjected by the European planters. The indomitable peasant resistance however started manifesting more visibly since 1860s. The scholars like Jacques Pouchepadass (1974), Girish Mishra (1978), Razi Ahmad (1987) and few others have paid adequate academic attention to the issue. Still, the name of Peer Md. Ansari ‘Munis’ (1882-1949) remained much less known (except for the passing mention in such works).
...While the Muslim League’s communal separatism has been explored in greater details, the roles ... more ...While the Muslim League’s communal separatism has been explored in greater details, the roles of Hindu Communalism and anti-Muslim proclivities of the lower organizations of the Congress, which went a long way in alienating the Muslims (upon which the Muslim League played its politics, particularly after 1937) have largely been ignored... Papiya Ghosh (1953-2006), has succeeded tremendously in filling that gap in the historiography of India’s Partition in 1947, making use of all kinds of sources including Urdu newspapers, memoirs/ autobiographies (even though she did not know Urdu, her friends and acquaintances read the sources for her) and oral accounts of various sections/ sub-regions. Through her essays, she explored the subject with amazing precision.
The premise of this book is both interesting, and, to an extent, perhaps, disconcerting, too. Int... more The premise of this book is both interesting, and, to an extent, perhaps, disconcerting, too. Interesting, because it examines how a group of elites replaced another, and disconcerting, because it looks into the socio-political history of Punjab almost exclusively with a single prism of religious divides—Muslims and non-Muslims. It examines the emergence of Ranjit Singh who erected a confident regional power in the wake of the disintegration of the Mughal power.
India has, over time, cultivated a culture of exerting no effort towards justice for the survivor... more India has, over time, cultivated a culture of exerting no effort towards justice for the survivors of communal violence, finds Warisha Farasat and Prita Jha’s in their book, Splintered Justice: Living the Horror of Mass Communal Violence in Bhagalpur and Gujarat.
The anthology under review should be read and evaluated in this backdrop, even though neither the... more The anthology under review should be read and evaluated in this backdrop, even though neither the Foreword, by Farhan Nizami (Oxford), nor any other essay in the volume, really makes any such purported attempt. Though it does make a strong point about Syed Ahmad: “… his principal achievement is his understanding of the need to build intellectual spaces and frameworks of enquiry …”.
This anthology of 18 essays along with a Foreword has been brought out to commemorate the bicentenary of Syed Ahmad (1817-98). Among others, the contributors also include better-known scholars on Indian Islam and on Syed Ahmad such as Barbara Metcalf, David Lelyveld, Hafeez Malik.
Discussing Post-Truth is like asking, has truth been killed? If yes, then when and how did it die... more Discussing Post-Truth is like asking, has truth been killed? If yes, then when and how did it die? Declining levels of trust in the institutions of society (family, state, judiciary, media) to the extent that it is now assumed everyone is lying, is behind the prevalence of the politics of post-truth. This also means that somewhere objective truth does exist. For, if there is no objective truth, then no one can be speaking truth to power. Truth-seeking has been replaced by truth-production. We were always ace practitioners and eminent victims of Post-Truth, regardless of when did we coin this term. We should however make a clear distinction between/among the words such as: rumour, falsehood, lying, alternative facts, and post-truth. Suppression of dissent is post-truth. It emerges more from the state institutions, the houses of the government and universities, from the powerful. It can be fought out only with the knowledge-producing institutions.
The following is the text of a talk that Professor Sajjad was supposed to deliver at a college of... more The following is the text of a talk that Professor Sajjad was supposed to deliver at a college of B N Mandal University, Madhepura, in Bihar, but was unable to do so due to a very tight schedule, prior commitments elsewhere, and preoccupations of completing courses of semesters and conducting mid-semester examinations of the undergraduate and postgraduate courses here in Aligarh Muslim University.
" Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very heaven ". [William Wordsworth] In the entire human history, youth have always been a crucial demographic segment and changeagents for progress and development. Their contribution in nationbuilding, therefore, is indispensable. They are not only the leaders of tomorrow but also shapers of the present. At the moment, India is said to have got highest proportion of youth in its total population. This demographic reality makes it all the more necessary to assess their role in the society. Nandan Nilekani, the cofounder of the Infosys, India's biggest IT firm, in his wonderful book, Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century (2010), called it " demographic dividend " for new India. The foundation of a nation, its economy, its ethical and cultural aspects, all depend upon how well the youth is educated, in real sense of the term, and not only in terms of obtaining the piece of paper called degrees and certificates. Moreover, regardless of the disciplines of studies a young mind prefers to specialise in, he or she must also develop a taste for reading and appreciating creative literature in prose and poetry as well as philosophy. Without such readings, it is difficult to protect and promote culture and heritage, constructive values and emotional assets. Thus, merely obtaining degrees in medicine, technology, higher sciences, etc., won't do. A passion for reading literature is as much necessary for the science graduates as for those studying humanities and liberal arts. The writer, Tabish Khair says that primary reason for the growth of hatefilled fundamentalisms is due to the fact that there is a total refusal to engage with texts and stories in a contemplative, critical and historical manner. Once this conception of education is accepted, the youth would automatically turn into greatest asset of the nation building process. Such inquisitive minds would be passionate, strongwilled and motivated, besides being motivator. They have to understand and comprehend the politics, the government, its policy priorities and failures, etc. The local cultures, traditions, the need for social harmony, environmental protection, equitable economic development, reaching all segments of the society, and all these issues need a probing and critical look by the youth. Allama Iqbal, in his famous poem, " Khitaab Ba JawaanaaneIslam " (Address to the Muslim Youth), in his BaangeDara, said it more clearly. The poet did not mean it for Muslims only. The universality of the appeal is certainly there, which is quite relevant for all, across religions and regions. Kabhi ae naujawaan Muslim tadabbur bhi kiya tu ne Woh kya gardoon ttha tu jis ka hai ek toota hua tara GaNwaa di ham ne jo aslaaf se meeraas payee tthi Suraiya se zamiN par aasmaaN ne ham ko de maara Hukumat ka to kya rona ke woh ek aarzi shay tthi NahiN duniya ke aainemusallam se koyee chaarah Magar woh ilm ke moti, kitaabein apney aaba ki Jo dekhein un ko Europe meiN to dil hota hai Seepara In the abovecited poem, the key word is tadabbur (ponder). The youth have to ponder over the issues of pressing concerns today. The youth need to speak out against the evils of poverty, unemployment, proper health care, equality of opportunities, special protections to those segments who have been left out because of historically ingrained systems and practices of discriminations and subjugations. The history of the anticolonial struggle in India suggests that the movement gained strength and momentum after the 1920s only when the youth joined in. From the Swadeshi Movement of 190508, the students jumped into it and by the 1920s30s, the likes of Bhagat Singh, Ashfaqullah, Rajguru, and Sukhdev not only made the supreme sacrifice of their lives but also envisioned a free India which will be socialist, secular and democratic republic. They studied, struggled, spoke out, and wrote. They wrote against the ideologies which discriminated and subjugated the people on the basis of caste, religion, region, language, and every such marks of identity. They celebrated plurality and harmonious coexistence of humanity. They abhorred exploitative and iniquitous socioeconomic order. This is how they built the foundations of new India. At the moment, global capitalist imperialism is deepening the economic divide. This growing inequality is creating social tensions, hatred and violence. Sadly, a very large proportion of the youth are increasingly becoming less critical and less informed in their understanding about the issues of the day. They consume the plethora of information without subjecting
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Selected Research Papers by Mohammad Sajjad
1. In the 1930s, when the Shariat Act was being drafted and legislated, what roles did Azad play? Why Jinnah was seen in the driver’s seat on this count? Why did the League become more successful politically, under Jinnah, rather than the nationalists under Azad?
2. In the Constituent Assembly Debates, what did Azad do? He remained mostly silent, and/or, got out of the debate when voting took place on some of the crucial issues. This aspect has been brought out in detail by Pratinav Anil, in his latest book, Another India: Making of the World’s Largest Muslim Minority, 1947-1977. Anil is rather very harsh against Azad. In fact, his provocative rhetoric and polemics are not sparing anyone.
3. Post-independence, why couldn’t the interventions of nationalist Muslims against the Two Nation Theory be popularised? More so, when India’s Muslims, as a collective, were made to suffer from guilt and circumspection! The critiques were from Husain Ahmad Madani (1887-1957), Abul Mohasin Sajjad (1880-1940), Hifzur Rahman Seohaarvi (1901-1962), Tufail Ahmad Manglori (1868-1946), Abdul Qaiyum Ansari (1905-1974), etc. Their Urdu language critique of the two-nation theory is elaborated in my 2014 book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours; Venkat Dhulipala’s 2015 book, Creating New Medina deals with these in greater detail.
4. Did Maulana Azad engage with the likes of Qaiyum Ansari and B R Ambedkar on the question of caste and social justice for the historically subordinated Muslim communities? What did Azad do on the question of gender justice among the Muslims, when Nehru was pushing the reforms in Hindu Personal Law in the 1950s?
These decades were prognosticated pessimistically by some of the American journalists such as Selig H. Harrison (1960), as ‘the most dangerous decades’. From the 1960s onwards, India witnessed ‘turbulence’ in terms of what Atul Kohli (1990) said, “revolution of rising expectations”, when new rural elites had begun to ask for their share in structures and processes of power .
There were food riots, droughts, economic crises, law and order issues, mass protests, at times violent, rise of agrarian violence, atrocities against Dalits and their resistance through what became known as Naxalism, besides the communal strife between the Hindus and Muslims, which are quite recurrent in many parts of India. A number of scholars have chronicled these developments about contemporary Bihar . The English daily from Patna, The Searchlight, was particularly dedicated to this. So was the Hindi daily, Aryavart.
Many scholars have studied these aspects, but, in these significant tomes, what remains neglected is scholarly engagement with the Urdu newspaper Sangam.
Some aspects of the origin of patriarchy is articulated best in Engel’s 1884 book, Origin of Family, Private Property and the State, and a fictional articulation of some of these aspects of the Engel’s book have been done in Tolstoy’s 1878 novel, Anna Karenina.
For the medieval period of Indian history, scholars such as Emma Kalb (2021) and many more have been writing on the issue, not necessarily confining the explorations merely to aristocratic domains. Pakistani historian Mubarak Ali has written historically informed popular essays critiquing the patriarchic perpetuations made through the texts such as Ashraf Ali Thanwi’s Behishti Zewar (1905).
For instance, see his Urdu blog, “Mua’ashrah, Aurat aur Beheshti Zewar”, Sept. 5, 2014.
https://thelalajie.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/beheshti-zewar/
The Pakistani creative writer, scholar and columnist, Zahida Hena (b. 1946, Sasaram, Bihar) has compiled her essays with the title (2006), Aurat, Zindagi Ka Zindan. This powerful write-up has torn apart the patriarchic world-view in most lucid and candid prose.
During the freedom struggle, Kamladevi Chattopadhyaya (1903-1988) stands out as someone who persuaded Gandhiji to bring women outside their homes and to claim their public space. She, arguably the greatest of women in 20th century India, wrote many books, essays as well as her own memoir to document and to interpret such pursuits of gender-justice.
Bihar is also wiating for 'hydraulic historians' to write on its rivers.
If sessions of the Bihar History Congress could be organised punctually every year and the proceedings could be published and also made available online, then a beginning towards writing contemporary histories of Bihar would be made. I would urge the Bihar History Congress to make a sincere move in this direction. Besides fulfilling the conventional professional responsibilities, this would also be one of the steps towards minimising the academy-society disjunction, and thereby making the case for public funding on higher education and research stronger than it has ever been.
Last but not the least, our conversations and writings, researches and talks need also to be rendered into Hindi, Urdu and other local languages of the region. The historians need to come out of their ivory towers into public and social space, keeping themselves fortified with scientifically verifiable evidence rather than pandering to the wishful comfort of the hegemons and oppressors . Bihar, lagging behind most other federal units of the Union of India, particularly needs such academic initiatives and pursuits, more than the other provinces.
"Reforms in higher education cannot be bargained away-they form the bedrock for a vibrant economy, the place from where we can, given the chance, build powerful and sustainable new ideas for future". [Nilekani 2008, 352)
At any given moment, stocktaking of institutions is a necessary exercise. In recent times, universities have started facing more difficult challenges than ever before. At least in certain cases, both the state and some segments of our society have appeared to articulate discomfitures particularly against the best of our universities. We should not and cannot be dismissive about such discomfitures, alienations, hostilities, and grievances. It would be too simplistic and fraught with implications, if we push it aside merely by saying that these are all because of misinformed and motivated propaganda. As a student of history, I somehow feel that in our part of world, comprehensive studies on social histories of the academies of higher learning are woefully inadequate. It is therefore important to deal with the predicaments facing our universities. Have they really remained alive to the social and economic challenges facing Indian societies? With what objectives were they set up? Have they really remained true to those objectives? What kind of researches and pedagogy did they churn out? Did they remain confined as a preserve of a miniscule minority of the select middle classes? Did the campuses explore and address the problems of the immediate surroundings of their physical location? Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), in his essay, "Patriotism and Education", indicted the teachers for being "fairly content with the status quo". Do we really have enough instances when the teachers' movements went beyond their own pay, perks, and working conditions, and agitated for larger....
Social mobility, growing prosperity and rising aspirations, combined with the upcoming state assembly elections explain the sudden violence in Muzaffarpur (Bihar).
The violence against Pasmanda Muslims in Azizpur-Bahilwara in Muzaffarpur, Bihar cannot be understood as an instance of conventional communal strife between Hindus and Muslims.
This report from the ground indicates that different layers of caste, community, administrative and patronage networks have played a role in fostering the violence but also in containing it.
http://www.epw.in/…/comm…/atrocity-against-dalits-bihar.html
EPW, Vol. 51, Issue No. 51, 17 Dec, 2016, pp. 20-24
1. In the 1930s, when the Shariat Act was being drafted and legislated, what roles did Azad play? Why Jinnah was seen in the driver’s seat on this count? Why did the League become more successful politically, under Jinnah, rather than the nationalists under Azad?
2. In the Constituent Assembly Debates, what did Azad do? He remained mostly silent, and/or, got out of the debate when voting took place on some of the crucial issues. This aspect has been brought out in detail by Pratinav Anil, in his latest book, Another India: Making of the World’s Largest Muslim Minority, 1947-1977. Anil is rather very harsh against Azad. In fact, his provocative rhetoric and polemics are not sparing anyone.
3. Post-independence, why couldn’t the interventions of nationalist Muslims against the Two Nation Theory be popularised? More so, when India’s Muslims, as a collective, were made to suffer from guilt and circumspection! The critiques were from Husain Ahmad Madani (1887-1957), Abul Mohasin Sajjad (1880-1940), Hifzur Rahman Seohaarvi (1901-1962), Tufail Ahmad Manglori (1868-1946), Abdul Qaiyum Ansari (1905-1974), etc. Their Urdu language critique of the two-nation theory is elaborated in my 2014 book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours; Venkat Dhulipala’s 2015 book, Creating New Medina deals with these in greater detail.
4. Did Maulana Azad engage with the likes of Qaiyum Ansari and B R Ambedkar on the question of caste and social justice for the historically subordinated Muslim communities? What did Azad do on the question of gender justice among the Muslims, when Nehru was pushing the reforms in Hindu Personal Law in the 1950s?
These decades were prognosticated pessimistically by some of the American journalists such as Selig H. Harrison (1960), as ‘the most dangerous decades’. From the 1960s onwards, India witnessed ‘turbulence’ in terms of what Atul Kohli (1990) said, “revolution of rising expectations”, when new rural elites had begun to ask for their share in structures and processes of power .
There were food riots, droughts, economic crises, law and order issues, mass protests, at times violent, rise of agrarian violence, atrocities against Dalits and their resistance through what became known as Naxalism, besides the communal strife between the Hindus and Muslims, which are quite recurrent in many parts of India. A number of scholars have chronicled these developments about contemporary Bihar . The English daily from Patna, The Searchlight, was particularly dedicated to this. So was the Hindi daily, Aryavart.
Many scholars have studied these aspects, but, in these significant tomes, what remains neglected is scholarly engagement with the Urdu newspaper Sangam.
Some aspects of the origin of patriarchy is articulated best in Engel’s 1884 book, Origin of Family, Private Property and the State, and a fictional articulation of some of these aspects of the Engel’s book have been done in Tolstoy’s 1878 novel, Anna Karenina.
For the medieval period of Indian history, scholars such as Emma Kalb (2021) and many more have been writing on the issue, not necessarily confining the explorations merely to aristocratic domains. Pakistani historian Mubarak Ali has written historically informed popular essays critiquing the patriarchic perpetuations made through the texts such as Ashraf Ali Thanwi’s Behishti Zewar (1905).
For instance, see his Urdu blog, “Mua’ashrah, Aurat aur Beheshti Zewar”, Sept. 5, 2014.
https://thelalajie.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/beheshti-zewar/
The Pakistani creative writer, scholar and columnist, Zahida Hena (b. 1946, Sasaram, Bihar) has compiled her essays with the title (2006), Aurat, Zindagi Ka Zindan. This powerful write-up has torn apart the patriarchic world-view in most lucid and candid prose.
During the freedom struggle, Kamladevi Chattopadhyaya (1903-1988) stands out as someone who persuaded Gandhiji to bring women outside their homes and to claim their public space. She, arguably the greatest of women in 20th century India, wrote many books, essays as well as her own memoir to document and to interpret such pursuits of gender-justice.
Bihar is also wiating for 'hydraulic historians' to write on its rivers.
If sessions of the Bihar History Congress could be organised punctually every year and the proceedings could be published and also made available online, then a beginning towards writing contemporary histories of Bihar would be made. I would urge the Bihar History Congress to make a sincere move in this direction. Besides fulfilling the conventional professional responsibilities, this would also be one of the steps towards minimising the academy-society disjunction, and thereby making the case for public funding on higher education and research stronger than it has ever been.
Last but not the least, our conversations and writings, researches and talks need also to be rendered into Hindi, Urdu and other local languages of the region. The historians need to come out of their ivory towers into public and social space, keeping themselves fortified with scientifically verifiable evidence rather than pandering to the wishful comfort of the hegemons and oppressors . Bihar, lagging behind most other federal units of the Union of India, particularly needs such academic initiatives and pursuits, more than the other provinces.
"Reforms in higher education cannot be bargained away-they form the bedrock for a vibrant economy, the place from where we can, given the chance, build powerful and sustainable new ideas for future". [Nilekani 2008, 352)
At any given moment, stocktaking of institutions is a necessary exercise. In recent times, universities have started facing more difficult challenges than ever before. At least in certain cases, both the state and some segments of our society have appeared to articulate discomfitures particularly against the best of our universities. We should not and cannot be dismissive about such discomfitures, alienations, hostilities, and grievances. It would be too simplistic and fraught with implications, if we push it aside merely by saying that these are all because of misinformed and motivated propaganda. As a student of history, I somehow feel that in our part of world, comprehensive studies on social histories of the academies of higher learning are woefully inadequate. It is therefore important to deal with the predicaments facing our universities. Have they really remained alive to the social and economic challenges facing Indian societies? With what objectives were they set up? Have they really remained true to those objectives? What kind of researches and pedagogy did they churn out? Did they remain confined as a preserve of a miniscule minority of the select middle classes? Did the campuses explore and address the problems of the immediate surroundings of their physical location? Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), in his essay, "Patriotism and Education", indicted the teachers for being "fairly content with the status quo". Do we really have enough instances when the teachers' movements went beyond their own pay, perks, and working conditions, and agitated for larger....
Social mobility, growing prosperity and rising aspirations, combined with the upcoming state assembly elections explain the sudden violence in Muzaffarpur (Bihar).
The violence against Pasmanda Muslims in Azizpur-Bahilwara in Muzaffarpur, Bihar cannot be understood as an instance of conventional communal strife between Hindus and Muslims.
This report from the ground indicates that different layers of caste, community, administrative and patronage networks have played a role in fostering the violence but also in containing it.
http://www.epw.in/…/comm…/atrocity-against-dalits-bihar.html
EPW, Vol. 51, Issue No. 51, 17 Dec, 2016, pp. 20-24
imaginative though treated with such truthfulness that their veracity can be tested. Apart from digging into the reasons for apparent silence in Urdu literature on the great Uprising of 1857, he also takes an overview of Urdu critics' response to Hyder's treatment of history.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/23341986
One of the most notable recent contributions to the understanding of Muslim histories in India is Mohammad Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours. It moves away from the former centres of Mughal power which have generally been the focus of studies on Indian Muslims. Sajjad’s carefully researched work outlines the rich history of political mobilisation among Muslims in Bihar, the third-most populous state in India and one with a significant Muslim population, from the colonial period to the present. The author highlights the resistance amongst Bihari Muslims to the two-nation theory. This has largely been overlooked in studies of the pre-independence period which generally focus on Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Bengal.
Sajjad, however, points out that Muslim political groups in Bihar were both anti-colonial and anti-separatist in orientation and regularly allied with Hindu groups in their political struggles. In the postcolonial period, he describes the movement for the promotion of Urdu – which began in the 1950s and continued through the 1980s – as a mass-based campaign, not carried out in religious and communal terms, but instead, on the basis of the rights guaranteed to linguistic minorities in the Indian constitution.
Sajjad points to another subject hitherto untouched by other scholars: the question of caste among Muslims. Though Muslim elites in India would have us believe that there is no caste system among Indian Muslims, the 1990s witnessed the emergence of two significant movements: the All-India Backward Muslim Morcha and the All India Pasmanda Muslim Mahaz. These two movements campaigned for the rights of lower-caste Muslims in Bihar.
Sajjad’s contribution is important in two ways. First, it focusses on a part of India that is under-researched when it comes to the study of Indian Muslims. Second, it not only highlights the issue of caste amongst Muslims but also focusses on mobilisation among – and also led by – non-elite groups. For this reason, his is a welcome addition to the existing literature on Indian Muslims.
Kashif-ul-Huda, The Milli Gazette, 16-31 March 2015
History should not be merely recounting of exploits of famous people or important conflicts. It should also be about changes happening at the grassroots level and how these local changes shape the course of communities and nations. Mohammad Sajjad’s “Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur Since 1857” falls into the latter category of history narration.
Muzaffarpur in Bihar “is neither a seat of power nor a place arguably having nationally known history-makers” admits Sajjad in his preface to the book. Mohammad Sajjad who is Assistant Professor at the Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University, digs deep to find the “largely untold” stories of “lesser-known nation-makers of Muzaffarpur.”
Beginning with a brief history of Muzaffarpur region, the book, divided in 11 chapters, explores the socio-political history of Muzaffarpur and the neighbouring areas since 1857.
The failure of 1857 resulted in a new thinking among Muslims. Muzaffarpur Muslims were ahead of Syed Ahmed Khan in starting a movement for modern education. Syed Imdad Ali and Syed Mohammad Taqi were successful in getting non-Muslims also to join their cause. Muslims joined hands with Hindus to set up schools and colleges that benefitted all, not exclusively any one community. The Hindu-Muslim cooperation extended to politics as well. The movement for separation of Bihar from the Bengal presidency was the first such movement where both Hindus and Muslims participated.
British administrators devised a rift between Hindus and Muslims by removing Urdu from school instructions and official business and restricting teaching of Urdu to only Muslims.
As the movement for Hindi turned communal, Muslims responded by establishing Urdu Sahitiyik Sabha to bridge the gap between the two languages. But the movement for Hindi was not for the development of Hindi as much as an attempt to shrink public space for Urdu. The
1937 Madras session of Hindi Sahitya Sammelan (HSS) was presided over by Jamnalal Bajaj rather than the Hindi poet Maithili Sharan Gupt, making it clear that HSS was a political group rather than a literary body.
By 1920s, parts of India were reeling under communal violence. Muslims feared that the Congress was being converted into a Hindu organization and Muslim leaders were pushed to the margins. In 1923, Hindu Sabha’s Gaya session was presided over by Dr. Rajendra Prasad which gave credence to Muslim views that Hindu leaders of Congress are encouraging the communal elements.
The electoral defeat of Muslim leaders like Shafi Daudi and Mazharul Haque, who considered themselves as Indian leaders and not just leaders for Muslims, came as a shock. Muslims believed that communal elements in the Congress conspired to ensure their defeat.
In spite of the rising anti-Muslim feeling which had engulfed even the Congress, Muslims continued to actively participate in the freedom struggle. They also vehemently opposed the Muslim League and its two-nation theory.
'Sajjad writes “Muslim political leadership (of Muzaffarpur) has displayed progressive outlook… Yet, it is quite intriguing that their share in political power has undergone a noticeable decline.”
Muslims of Muzaffarpur didn’t fare well in independent India either. The situation turned so bad that even such a big Congress leader like Maghfur Aijazi quit the party to contest the
1962 parliamentary elections on Swantatra Party ticket.
Read this book carefully and you will see that Muslims of Muzaffarpur despite putting emphasis on modern education and not only being part of political movements but leading it for most part still end up being marginalized in the political processes and governance institutions. Even their history is on the verge of being wiped out if not for historians like Sajjad who are ready to invest their time in researching and writing about people who are largely forgotten.
Mohammad Sajjad shines through as a modern historian in the last chapter which is 100-year long history of the village Turkauliya (population 6,500). It’s a wonderful reading of how outside political and economic forces affected the lives in this predominately Muslim village. It is a fascinating read and highlight of this brilliantly-researched book. (twocircles.net)
This article appeared in The Milli Gazette print issue of 16-31 March 2015 on page no. 21
Mohammad Sajjad, Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857, New Delhi: Primus, 2014, xviii + 265 pp. (Hardback), Price INR 1,195, ISBN 978-93-84082-04-8. DOI: 10.1177/0376983615569878
In writing the macro history of India, the specificity of the local gets lost. The birds-eye view of the grand historical narrative of India therefore needs to be rectified by the worms-eye view of the local and contextualised narrative. In the book under review, Mohammad Sajjad seeks out to do precisely this. In the process, he demolishes many of the certitudes of the mainstream nationalist narrative which have sought to understand Indian Muslims’ response to the national struggle as an after-effect, pointing to their lackadaisical response to movements like Non-cooperation and Quit India. What is more, the Muslim response has been understood through the lens of separatism, rather than on their own terms. Sajjad seems to correct this mainstream view through his historical study of the city of Muzaffarpur in Bihar. Although there is a growing genre of literature on Indian cities, most happen to be confined to the so-called metropolises like Delhi and Mumbai. Sajjad’s local and localised history also seeks to correct this anomaly. Moreover, by investing into Muslims of Muzaffarpur, Sajjad throws light on the politics of a people which have been much understudied in the Indian context.
The plea to take local history more seriously is underwritten in almost all the chapters of this book.
…. Mohammad Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar, is an academic study focusing on the shifting political alignments of the Muslim communities in Bihar since the 1920s right through the Independence movement, although the last chapters of the book cover matters as far as the mid-1990s….
http://ww.w.india-seminar.com/2016/678/678_books.htm
MUSLIM POLITICS IN BIHAR: Changing Contours, by Mohammad Sajjad. Routledge, New Delhi, 2014.
Bihari Muslims displayed a fierce anti-colonial struggle through the Wahabbi movement during the better part of the 19th century. Subsequently, the sub-regional nationalism of Biharis emerged against the hegemony of the Bengalis on Bihar, in the forefront of which were the urban educated elites of Muslims and Kayastha Hindus.
'Communalism and communal riots happened in India only during and due to colonialism. Pre-colonial India didn't have this problem of communal conflicts and religious strife.'
'So far as the destruction of Nalanda University by Bakhtiyar Khilji is concerned, there is no direct evidence of it. We don't have even archaeological evidence testifying Khilji's destruction,' Mohammad Sajjad tells Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com.
http://www.rediff.com/news/interview/communal-riots-never-happen-in-a-political-vacuum/20150422.htm
While the small Uttar Pradesh town continues to simmer after his death, its aftershocks are being felt in poll-bound Bihar. From Sushil Modi to Lalu Prasad Yadav, every 'important person' in the state commented on the issue and now even Chief Minister Nitish Kumar feels that the beef issue is being imported to Bihar that goes to poll in less than a week.
We spoke to Dr. Mohammad Sajjad, Associate Professor at Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University, to understand the impact of these developments on Bihar politics. He has written extensively on the communal fabric of Bihar in his essays and books. He is best known for his book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours (Routledge, 2014).
http://www.catchnews.com/national-news/bihar-elections-muslims-in-bihar-scared-1444222630.html
Gradually, a small but significant middle class is emerging as new professionals join the fields of media, IT and management.
The recently published book - India's Muslim Spring: Why is Nobody Talking about It? by Hasan Suroor, a London-based veteran Indian journalist, focuses on the positive trends within the community.
Another soon to be published book, Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours by Mohammed Sajjad, an assistant professor at Aligarh Muslim University's history department, highlights the community's response to challenges in the historical past, particularly during the partition.
Al Jazeera's Saif Khalid in an email interview with Suroor and Sajjad tries to get a sense of the changes happening in India’s Muslim community.
He has submitted a research monograph on 'Post-Colonial Bihar Muslims: Their Socio-Economic Diversities and Political Behaviour, 1947-2007.
Sheela Bhatt met Dr Sajjad at AMU, where his life revolves around 32,000 students -- of whom 18,000 students live on the campus itself. Besides, AMU has over 2,500 teachers.
The conversation delved around Muslims's voting patterns and their state of mind in the two northern states on the eve of the general election.
Asked about the mood in Uttar Pradesh, Dr Sajjad feels, "Muslims are shocked after the Samajwadi Party took (former Bharatiya Janata Party chief minister) Kalyan Singh's support. Many Muslims are angry with the SP -- that one factor will shift many Muslim votes to the BSP."
never been as well analysed. Even less so the role of Muslims of the State. Noted historian Mohammad Sajjad, assistant professor, AMU, has sought to fill this gap with a
meticulously researched and insightfully analysed work, “Contesting Colonialism and Separatism: Muslims of Muzaffarpur since 1857”. Primus, Delhi, 2014
Excerpts from an interview:
After independence, Muslim representation, even in politics and legislature, started becoming less and less visible, despite their socially inclusive mass politics. This was contrary to general assumption about Muslims confining their political concerns to emotive religious issues.
In 20th century, the Muslims took lead in all kinds of anti-colonial struggle. Shafi Daudi (1875-1949), Maghfur Aijazi (1900-66), and Manzur Aijazi (1898-1969), among many other Muslims, mostly advocates, took lead in founding the local units of the Congress. In 1920s-30s, there were instances of Muslim disenchantment with the Congress on the question of share in the structures of power, yet their firm opposition to colonial exploitation as well as to the separatist politics of the Muslim League attracted my attention more decisively. They remained vociferous against the Muslim League besides enthusiastic participation and sacrifices in the Civil Disobedience (193-34) and Quit India Movements (1942). Even though from mid 1920s onwards, within the structure of the Congress, the Bhumihars and Rajputs started gaining ascendance and Muslims started feeling marginalized, elections after elections, be it in the legislatures or in the local bodies.
...Crucial reforms in Muslim personal law, especially laws related to inheritance and adoption, need to be initiated forthwith; historically speaking, without the State's backing, hardly has any reform taken place or allowed to prevail...
...It is distressing that even the modern institutions funded by the secular State of India, such as the AMU, Jamia Millia Islamia (New Delhi), MANU University (Hyderabad), and their departments of studies such as gender and women studies, Islamic studies, theology, law, social sciences, etc, have not been able to pursue a reformist agenda with any degree of sincerity and conviction. Quite a lot of them have either maintained a dishonest silence or have endorsed the regressive positions. Both ways, they are on the regressive side. This is extremely disgusting, to say the least...
India’s partition, humanity seems to have refused to learn any lesson.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/it-s-time-to-move-on-muslim-side-should-not-take-5-acre-plot/story- MT1wdv2jwQNJ7N720iv4dM.html
https://www.outlookindia.com/national/muslim-personal-law-who-says-the-ascendant-hindutva-is-slaying-muslim-identity-priorities-news-253501?utm_source=article_sharing&fbclid=IwAR1go-WAza08uGqXdv9YjV6ChY6P6EIjswJ6UdN3bUN6pk32OnYZ-z0XK9o
The Outlook, weekly, Delhi, October 3, 2022
These Muslims fail (or refuse) to realise that antidote of majoritarianism is pluralism; howsoever, difficult that might appear to be made workable, in the present circumstances of unprecedented majoritarian consolidation. These hard-headed nuts also fail to realise that even if, just for argument sake, for once, you discard this conviction, in sheer practical terms also, a minority cannot afford to pursue this politics. Moreover, they also fail to realise that, if majoritarian hatred and consolidation persists, then even an enhanced Muslim representation inside the legislature will not help them, as it happened post-1938 in UP and elsewhere. (Mukul Kesavan, “Partition’s Hinge: How Muslim Separatist Politics Took Roots between 1937-1942” The Telegraph, August 7, 2005) They will be there as helpless opposition, and nothing more than that. These Muslims also need to realise in sheer pragmatic terms of electoral politics that in these harsher times, they are left in an either-or-quandary. What is their precise priority at these moments of unprecedented vulnerabilities? Enhancing Muslim representation or choosing lesser evil? At this moment, sad reality is: the Muslim minorities cannot ensure both of the above, concurrently, for themselves.
...Incomplete and inaccurate information follow cases of lynching. Questions are not asked. Details are not provided. But the initial outrage is invariably followed by a narrative blaming the victim...
https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/opinion/response-of-the-media-liberals-and-civil-society-to-lynching-leaves-questions-unanswered
'He was a Union minister in 1998-2004, a time when people like Graham Staines were lynched in Orissa.'
'On the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, George went on to kind of justify the slashing of pregnant women, by saying in the Lok Sabha that this was nothing new for India.'
'Thus, he was in sharp contrast to what he had himself stood for in the heyday of his political career in the 1970s and 1980s.
...Mahadji Scindia (1730-1794), the ‘Great Maratha’ couldn’t get the Delhi throne despite having reached a striking distance. Just as the chief minster’s chair was within Vijayraje Scindia’s reach, in 1967, but she admittedly chose not to be, for which, her memoir does not offer any explanation. Though, she provides all details about her roles pertaining to toppling the D. P. Mishra-led Congress government and thereby teaching a lesson to the ‘arrogant’ Congress. Just as Jyotiraditya, in March 2020 played his roles in toppling the Kamalnath-led Congress government but could not replace him in the office of the chief minister....
To my little understanding, part of the reason is: with the expanding social base of the campuses, the pre-existing upper caste elites got threatened about their pre-eminence in the sphere of knowledge. Our practices of knowledge-production and dissemination have remained woefully inadequate on challenging the status quo.
Overall, why did Muslims, on their part, fail to strengthen the movements for citizenship rights after independence, and confined themselves to emotive religio-cultural-identitarian issues, is a vital question that remains un-answered in this book.
Overall, Pandit (and William Gould’s 2005 book on late colonial UP) provides lot of ammunition for the narrative of Muslim victimhood. It talks of state (and Hindu) discrimination against Muslims but maintains silence on reform from within Muslims. What Muslims ought to have done towards strengthening secularism and towards marginalizing the communal forces within the two communities, remains beyond the scope of Pandit’s book. Thus, this book ignores this pertinent question: in order to claim citizenship, and for secularization of the state and society, how to strike a balance with rights for religious communities? This approach of the author doesn’t let her ask (and deal with) another question, (particularly in her chapters four and five wherein Muslim assets are discussed): why didn’t UP Muslims employ their wealth and assets into capacity building of their community, the way south Indian Muslims did and are still doing, in the spheres of education, and health? Why did the UP Muslims remain much dependent upon the state?
On the Muslim question in the Indian Republic, Anil is harshly critical against Nehruvian policies and programmes.
He characterises this era of Nehru-Congress hegemony as Islamophobic.
One of the targets of his polemics is Mushirul Hasan's 1997 book, Legacy of a Divided Nation: India's Muslims since Independence, which, according to Anil, is 'an inventory of elite political maneuverings in which Muslims are little more than spectators'.
He puts other scholars such as Rafiq Zakaria, Moin Shakir and Omar Khalidi, in almost the same league.
In his own words, Anil's 'primary aim is to recover Muslim agency'. Admittedly, he is 'repurposing the minority question to reflect on the majoritarian character of Indian democracy'.
The scholars like Jacques Pouchepadass (1974), Girish Mishra (1978), Razi Ahmad (1987) and few others have paid adequate academic attention to the issue. Still, the name of Peer Md. Ansari ‘Munis’ (1882-1949) remained much less known (except for the passing mention in such works).
Papiya Ghosh (1953-2006), has succeeded tremendously in filling that gap in the historiography of India’s Partition in 1947, making use of all kinds of sources including Urdu newspapers, memoirs/ autobiographies (even though she did not know Urdu, her friends and acquaintances read the sources for her) and oral accounts of various sections/ sub-regions. Through her essays, she explored the subject with amazing precision.
This anthology of 18 essays along with a Foreword has been brought out to commemorate the bicentenary of Syed Ahmad (1817-98). Among others, the contributors also include better-known scholars on Indian Islam and on Syed Ahmad such as Barbara Metcalf, David Lelyveld, Hafeez Malik.
" Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very heaven ". [William Wordsworth] In the entire human history, youth have always been a crucial demographic segment and changeagents for progress and development. Their contribution in nationbuilding, therefore, is indispensable. They are not only the leaders of tomorrow but also shapers of the present. At the moment, India is said to have got highest proportion of youth in its total population. This demographic reality makes it all the more necessary to assess their role in the society. Nandan Nilekani, the cofounder of the Infosys, India's biggest IT firm, in his wonderful book, Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century (2010), called it " demographic dividend " for new India. The foundation of a nation, its economy, its ethical and cultural aspects, all depend upon how well the youth is educated, in real sense of the term, and not only in terms of obtaining the piece of paper called degrees and certificates. Moreover, regardless of the disciplines of studies a young mind prefers to specialise in, he or she must also develop a taste for reading and appreciating creative literature in prose and poetry as well as philosophy. Without such readings, it is difficult to protect and promote culture and heritage, constructive values and emotional assets. Thus, merely obtaining degrees in medicine, technology, higher sciences, etc., won't do. A passion for reading literature is as much necessary for the science graduates as for those studying humanities and liberal arts. The writer, Tabish Khair says that primary reason for the growth of hatefilled fundamentalisms is due to the fact that there is a total refusal to engage with texts and stories in a contemplative, critical and historical manner. Once this conception of education is accepted, the youth would automatically turn into greatest asset of the nation building process. Such inquisitive minds would be passionate, strongwilled and motivated, besides being motivator. They have to understand and comprehend the politics, the government, its policy priorities and failures, etc. The local cultures, traditions, the need for social harmony, environmental protection, equitable economic development, reaching all segments of the society, and all these issues need a probing and critical look by the youth. Allama Iqbal, in his famous poem, " Khitaab Ba JawaanaaneIslam " (Address to the Muslim Youth), in his BaangeDara, said it more clearly. The poet did not mean it for Muslims only. The universality of the appeal is certainly there, which is quite relevant for all, across religions and regions. Kabhi ae naujawaan Muslim tadabbur bhi kiya tu ne Woh kya gardoon ttha tu jis ka hai ek toota hua tara GaNwaa di ham ne jo aslaaf se meeraas payee tthi Suraiya se zamiN par aasmaaN ne ham ko de maara Hukumat ka to kya rona ke woh ek aarzi shay tthi NahiN duniya ke aainemusallam se koyee chaarah Magar woh ilm ke moti, kitaabein apney aaba ki Jo dekhein un ko Europe meiN to dil hota hai Seepara In the abovecited poem, the key word is tadabbur (ponder). The youth have to ponder over the issues of pressing concerns today. The youth need to speak out against the evils of poverty, unemployment, proper health care, equality of opportunities, special protections to those segments who have been left out because of historically ingrained systems and practices of discriminations and subjugations. The history of the anticolonial struggle in India suggests that the movement gained strength and momentum after the 1920s only when the youth joined in. From the Swadeshi Movement of 190508, the students jumped into it and by the 1920s30s, the likes of Bhagat Singh, Ashfaqullah, Rajguru, and Sukhdev not only made the supreme sacrifice of their lives but also envisioned a free India which will be socialist, secular and democratic republic. They studied, struggled, spoke out, and wrote. They wrote against the ideologies which discriminated and subjugated the people on the basis of caste, religion, region, language, and every such marks of identity. They celebrated plurality and harmonious coexistence of humanity. They abhorred exploitative and iniquitous socioeconomic order. This is how they built the foundations of new India. At the moment, global capitalist imperialism is deepening the economic divide. This growing inequality is creating social tensions, hatred and violence. Sadly, a very large proportion of the youth are increasingly becoming less critical and less informed in their understanding about the issues of the day. They consume the plethora of information without subjecting