ASHA: Blast From The Past

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

The reconstruction of medieval Indian society has long rested upon chronicles, inscriptions, administrative documents, travellers’ accounts and archaeological evidence. Together, these sources have enabled historians to craft sophisticated narratives of political institutions, dynastic change, economic structures and religious movements. Yet they remain largely the products of courts, bureaucracies and learned elites. They illuminate the actions of kings and nobles far more readily than they reveal the assumptions, aspirations and moral universe of ordinary men and women. Questions concerning how society imagined kingship, understood justice, negotiated religious diversity or viewed the supernatural often find only partial answers in official sources. It is here that popular narratives assume particular significance.

Folktales, romances and wonder tales cannot be approached as literal historical records. Their chronology is fluid, their characters often larger than life, and the supernatural is accepted as an integral part of reality. Yet, as modern social historians increasingly recognise, such narratives preserve something that formal chronicles rarely capture: collective memory, social values and the mental world of the communities that produced and transmitted them. They tell us less about what happened than about what people believed ought to happen—what they admired, what they feared and what they considered just.

Simon Digby’s Wonder-Tales of South Asia represents one of the most important contributions towards understanding this neglected dimension of medieval Indian history. Bringing together translations from Hindi, Urdu, Persian and Nepali traditions, Digby does far more than present an anthology of entertaining stories. Through his learned introduction and, more importantly, his detailed historical commentary in “The Background of the Tales,” he demonstrates how these narratives may be read alongside chronicles and inscriptions as valuable historical evidence. The tales preserve memories of courts, villages, shrines, forests, pilgrimage centres and social relationships that illuminate the cultural landscape of medieval India from an entirely different perspective.

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One of the dominant themes emerging from Digby’s collection is the medieval conception of kingship. Unlike modern political narratives that emphasise military conquest, the tales consistently portray the ruler primarily as the guardian of justice. The opening description of Raja Niladhwaj in Madhumalati and Madhukar immediately establishes this ideal:

“He was adept in distinguishing between justice and injustice, like Brihaspati in wisdom… He was stalwart, brave, warlike and glorious, and also merciful towards the poor and the unfortunate… So he was replete with all good qualities… but he had a single great fault; and that was whenever he found time to get away from his royal task he always used to go off to hunt in the jungle.”1

The passage is striking for what it chooses to celebrate. The king’s legitimacy rests neither upon conquest nor wealth but upon justice, wisdom and compassion. Yet the narrator immediately introduces the weakness that eventually destroys both ruler and kingdom. Niladhwaj’s fondness for hunting – a pastime enjoyed by medieval rulers across South Asia – becomes the narrative device through which he abandons the discipline expected of a sovereign and falls prey to deception. The moral is unmistakable: political authority is inseparable from ethical responsibility. A kingdom declines not merely because of external enemies but because its ruler allows personal passions to override sound judgement. In this respect the tale stands comfortably alongside the political ethics of Barani, the Persian Akhlaq tradition and even the Sanskrit Arthashastra, all of which regarded self-control as one of the essential virtues of rulership.

Closely connected with this conception of kingship is the equally important role assigned to the minister. Medieval political literature throughout South Asia repeatedly emphasised that kings required wise counsellors capable of speaking uncomfortable truths. Digby’s translation preserves this ideal with remarkable clarity. Shar Sen is described as a minister accomplished in finance, diplomacy, war, secrecy and administration. More importantly, he possesses the courage to oppose injustice. When Niladhwaj orders the execution of his innocent queens and sons, the minister responds:

“Maharaja! This will be a great injustice. It is not right to bring down such a thunderbolt on those who are blameless.”2

The king refuses to listen, but the minister quietly substitutes the hearts of deer for those of the princes and secretly saves their lives. The episode demonstrates a sophisticated conception of political morality. Loyalty is directed not merely towards the person of the sovereign but towards justice itself. Such an understanding closely resembles the ideals articulated in Persian advice literature, where the wazīr functions as the conscience of the monarchy. The story suggests that popular political imagination valued ethical government no less than official political theory.

The narratives also contain revealing observations concerning education and the formation of the ruling elite. Niladhwaj does not merely prepare his sons for warfare. Instead, he “sent for learned men from many countries and appointed them to instruct his sons in the six branches of knowledge.”3 This apparently incidental remark reflects several assumptions about medieval education. Learning is presented as cosmopolitan, depending upon scholars who travel across regions, while the education of princes extends beyond martial accomplishment to embrace intellectual cultivation. Such details correspond closely with evidence from the Delhi Sultanate and Mughal courts, where princes were instructed by distinguished scholars in literature, ethics, languages, theology and statecraft.

Equally informative are the stories’ representations of family life and gender. The seven queens are described as “faithful to their husband,” accomplished in household management and “skilled in the secrets of love.”4

Such descriptions undoubtedly idealise queenship, but therein lies their historical significance. They reveal the qualities medieval society associated with female virtue: loyalty, domestic competence, beauty and maternal responsibility. Against these ideals stands the witch queen, whose beauty conceals deception and whose ambition destroys the moral order of the court. She persuades the king to exile his own family and finally demands the execution of his children. Rather than reading these figures literally, historians should recognise them as symbolic expressions of social anxieties concerning kingship, succession, sexuality and the stability of the household.

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One of the greatest strengths of Digby’s anthology lies in its portrayal of the religious landscape of medieval India. The stories move effortlessly between Hindu, Islamic and yogic traditions without suggesting rigid cultural boundaries. Krishna, Gorakh Nath, Muslim saints, Persian heroes and Sufi masters inhabit the same imaginative universe. Digby’s discussion of the tales concerning Gorakh Nath and the medieval Sufis demonstrates that interaction between yogic and Sufi traditions formed an accepted part of popular memory. The traditions surrounding Kamal Jogi and Sayyid Ashraf Jahangir Simnani, for example, reveal a world characterised by dialogue, adaptation and shared spiritual vocabulary rather than simple confrontation.

This cultural fluidity reaches its clearest expression in Digby’s discussion of The Flower of Bakawali. Although surviving in Urdu versions heavily influenced by Persian literary conventions, the story preserves older Indian traditions while continuing to evolve through successive retellings. Digby perceptively observes that the tale illustrates “…the cultural complexities of late Mughal and pre-modern India” which “defy simplistic politico-religious classification.”5

This observation extends beyond literary criticism to become an important historiographical statement. The medieval literary world was characterised not by isolated religious traditions but by continuous borrowing, adaptation and translation. Stories crossed linguistic boundaries with ease, acquiring new meanings while retaining older cultural associations. The collection therefore provides compelling evidence for the composite literary culture that flourished across much of South Asia.

The stories also illuminate aspects of everyday social organisation that rarely appear in court chronicles. Digby’s discussion of the tale of Ganga Ram the Headman and Bulakhi Ram the Barber demonstrates how popular narratives preserve memories of the traditional north Indian village before the transformations brought about by colonial rule.6

The relationship between the headman and the barber reflects neither complete equality nor simple domination. Rather, it reveals a society organised through reciprocal obligations in which occupational groups depended upon one another for the functioning of village life. Humour softens hierarchy, while mutual dependence tempers authority. Such narratives remind historians that medieval society cannot be understood solely through the perspectives of kings and nobles.

Hospitality likewise emerges as a recurring social virtue. When Raja Niladhwaj arrives at the mysterious palace deep within the forest, he pleads with its occupant:

“Do not leave the guest who has arrived in the middle of the night without hope! It will be a great merit if you light the fire and make arrangements for our eating and sleeping.”7

The appeal assumes that receiving travellers constituted a recognised moral obligation, even under extraordinary circumstances. Such moments reveal ethical expectations embedded within everyday life that official documents seldom record. Hospitality appears not merely as social etiquette but as a religious and moral duty recognised across cultural traditions.

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Finally, historians should resist the temptation to dismiss the supernatural elements of these narratives as irrelevant fantasy. Demons, enchanted flowers, miraculous journeys, shape-shifting beings and saintly miracles were not peripheral embellishments but formed part of the medieval understanding of reality. For historians, their importance lies not in determining whether such events actually occurred but in recognising what they reveal about contemporary mentalities. These stories illuminate the boundaries of the imaginable, demonstrating how the visible and invisible worlds coexisted within the medieval imagination. They preserve beliefs, fears and hopes that no administrative record could ever capture.

In the Preface to the volume, Digby modestly remarks that “the translator claims no moral rights over the tales that he has translated, and he will be glad if they are retold and give pleasure.”8

Yet their value extends well beyond literary pleasure. Through centuries of retelling, these narratives accumulated the experiences, ideals and collective memories of the societies that preserved them. They constitute a different kind of historical archive, one shaped not by state institutions but by popular transmission.

Wonder-Tales of South Asia therefore demonstrates that historians need not confine themselves to chronicles, inscriptions and official documents. Popular narratives, read critically and comparatively, recover dimensions of medieval Indian society that formal historical writing often leaves in shadow. They reveal ideals of kingship founded upon justice rather than conquest, ministers who embodied ethical governance, villages sustained by reciprocal obligations, educational values rooted in cosmopolitan learning and a religious world characterised by interaction rather than isolation. Above all, they remind us that history survives not only in monuments and manuscripts but also in stories. When approached with historical sensitivity, these tales cease to be merely tales of wonder. They become indispensable reflections on the social, moral and cultural world of medieval India.

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Notes

1. Simon Digby and Leonard Harrow, trans., Wonder-Tales of South Asia (New Delhi: Oxford India Paperbacks, 2006), 14.
2. Ibid., 15.
3. Ibid., 14.
4. Ibid., 14.
5. Ibid., xxxiii.
6. Ibid., xxix.
7. Ibid., 18.
8. Ibid., viii.

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

After having so far dealt with how I chose the subject, what type of teachers I was privileged with and how I evolved in life, I will here deal with another type of training and education altogether. It is about the education that no curriculum prescribed, no examination tested and no degree formally recognised. Yet, in retrospect, it was perhaps the most important education I ever received. The University did not merely teach me history. It taught me how to live with history.

Beyond the classrooms lay another world: the MA Seminar Room where afternoons effortlessly merged into evenings; the endless shelves of the Maulana Azad Library where one entered searching for a single reference and emerged having discovered an entirely different subject; hostel debates that continued well past midnight; endless cups of tea consumed while quarrelling over historiography; friendships forged in moments of intellectual excitement as well as financial hardship; and the exhilarating discovery that history was not merely a subject to be studied but a way of thinking and living. My life at the University bore little resemblance to the life I had known at school.

Academically, school had never been particularly kind to me. History and literature came naturally enough, but arithmetic and physics seemed determined never to reveal their secrets. Numbers stubbornly refused to obey me, and scientific formulae appeared to inhabit a universe to which I was never fully admitted. Yet outside the classroom my life had been remarkably comfortable. I was the only son of a highly respected scholar, surrounded by the affection of two doting sisters and protected by a family that ensured I seldom worried about the practical difficulties of life. Looking back, I sometimes think I lived like a young prince without ever realising it. That comfortable world disappeared almost overnight.

Within the first few months of my entering the University, my father passed away. The emotional loss was devastating enough, but it was accompanied by a crisis that only later did I fully comprehend. Suddenly there was no earning member in the family. The security that had always seemed permanent vanished in an instant. For the first time I understood the uncertainties that accompany financial hardship. Curiously, while my personal life entered one of its darkest periods, my academic life entered one of its brightest. Every morning I walked into classrooms where some of the finest historians in the country unfolded before us worlds that fascinated me. Unlike my school years, I understood what was being taught. More importantly, I enjoyed understanding it. History was no longer a subject that required memorisation. It became an intellectual adventure.

There was another reason why I found the Department so welcoming. Many of my teachers had known my father personally. Some had been his close friends. Others had been frequent visitors to our home. They were towering names in Indian historiography, yet I never found them intimidating. They had watched me grow up long before they became my professors. That familiarity gave me a confidence that many of my classmates understandably lacked. Something else also happened almost imperceptibly. The diffidence that had characterised my school days began slowly to disappear. At school I had remained reserved, almost painfully shy. At the University I gradually found myself becoming increasingly outgoing. Perhaps it was the stimulating intellectual atmosphere, perhaps the encouragement of inspiring teachers, or perhaps the simple joy of finally discovering a subject that genuinely excited me. Whatever the reason, I found myself making friends with remarkable ease.

Some sought my friendship because of the elaborate notes I prepared after every lecture. I had acquired the habit of recording almost everything my teachers said, supplementing their lectures with additional reading and arranging the material systematically. Before long, my notebooks acquired a circulation of their own. Others appreciated that, having studied in a convent school, I was reasonably comfortable expressing myself in English, a skill that many students educated in Urdu or Hindi medium institutions wished to cultivate. Amongst my earliest friends was Amjad Afridi from Jammu. Like me, he had received a convent education and possessed an easy command over English. He was also closely related to Professor Haqqi, the distinguished Head of the Department of Political Science. We shared similar backgrounds and quickly became close companions.

Quite different was my friendship with Jawaid Akhtar from Purnea. Jawaid came from an Urdu medium background and had set his heart upon joining the Civil Services. During our earliest encounters he regarded Amjad and me with considerable suspicion. Whenever we approached him, he would greet us with a barrage of sarcastic remarks, accusing us of belonging to an unduly privileged class of students. According to him, we had every conceivable advantage. Perhaps he was not entirely wrong. Friendship, however, has a remarkable ability to dissolve such distinctions. Gradually the sarcasm disappeared, conversations became longer, and before very long we had become inseparable companions. When Amjad later left for Jawaharlal Nehru University to pursue his postgraduate studies, Jawaid naturally filled the void. For several years we were almost constantly together.

There was one difficulty that both of us shared. Neither of us possessed much money. Necessity, however, often stimulates ingenuity. Those were the days when even BA (Hons) students remained in the Department until late in the evening. Hunger therefore became an almost daily companion. Unfortunately, our pockets rarely cooperated. So Jawaid and I devised what we considered a brilliant strategy. We would quietly occupy a table at one of the dhābas outside the campus and patiently wait until some senior student, or preferably someone known to possess a reasonably healthy wallet, appeared. The moment our unsuspecting benefactor arrived, we would begin a loud and entirely fabricated argument. Within moments voices would rise, accusations would fly, and both of us would display dramatic talents that neither of us had exhibited elsewhere. As expected, the kindly senior would intervene. “Arrey bhai, why are you fighting? Sit down, both of you.” Then, in accordance with the finest traditions of Aligarh hospitality, he would immediately order tea, pakoras and generous helpings of fried dālmoth in the hope of restoring peace. The miracle invariably occurred. Our quarrel would instantly subside. We would consume the refreshments with appropriate seriousness, thank our peacemaker for his wisdom and generosity, and leave in perfect harmony. Looking back now, I cannot decide whether we deserved Oscars or disciplinary action. Perhaps both.

The episode that taught me perhaps the greatest lesson of my student life came quite unexpectedly. One afternoon a few friends informed me that Aftab Hall was organising its annual debate competition. One of them requested that I write a speech for him opposing the motion. I readily agreed. Writing had never frightened me. I spent the next few hours preparing what I thought was a reasonably convincing speech. Just before the competition was about to begin, an idea suddenly struck me. If I could write a speech for someone else, why could I not deliver one myself? With all the confidence that only youth can possess, I walked to the organisers’ table and entered my own name as a speaker. Since my friend was speaking against the motion, I decided to speak for it.

There was only one small problem. I had completely forgotten who I was. Throughout my school life I had remained painfully shy. Public speaking was something I had carefully avoided. Standing before an audience had never been one of my strengths. Yet, buoyed by the confidence that the University had slowly instilled in me, I convinced myself that speaking would be no more difficult than writing. Confidence, however, is not always accompanied by experience. When my name was announced, I walked confidently towards the podium. The confidence lasted exactly as long as it took me to look at the audience. My mind went completely blank. Not a single sentence remained. Not a single argument survived. Everything that I had thought I knew vanished in an instant. I stood there staring at the audience while the audience stared back at me. Then came the inevitable hooting. The louder the hooting became, the more paralysed I felt. It was as though someone had suddenly switched off my brain. I do not know how long I stood there. It could not have been more than a minute or two, but to me it felt like an eternity. Eventually, defeated and utterly embarrassed, I lowered my head and quietly stepped down from the podium.

For a young man who had only recently begun to discover confidence, it was a crushing humiliation. There remained, however, another problem. The debate was to be followed by dinner. Anyone who studied at Aligarh in those days will understand that one simply did not miss a hostel dinner after a hall function, especially when qorma and freshly baked rotis, kabābs and biryāni followed by a sweet dish, mostly shāhi tukda were on the menu. But how could I possibly return after making such a spectacular fool of myself? Providence, or perhaps desperation, suggested an ingenious solution. I walked straight to Shamshad Market and entered a barber’s shop. “Shave it off,” I said, pointing to my beard. The barber looked mildly surprised but asked no questions. Within minutes the beard that I had carefully nurtured had disappeared. I looked into the mirror. The young man staring back at me appeared sufficiently different to convince even me that he was someone else. Feeling reassured, I returned to the lawns of Aftab Hall where dinner was being served. I quietly joined the table, accepted my plate of qorma and rotis, found a comfortable corner and enjoyed my meal with complete satisfaction. As far as I could judge, nobody recognised that the clean-shaven fellow enjoying his dinner was the very same unfortunate individual who, less than an hour earlier, had stood speechless before the audience while they mercilessly hooted him down.

Even today, whenever I remember that evening, I cannot help smiling. What seemed at the time an unbearable humiliation became one of the most valuable lessons of my life. That evening taught me that possessing knowledge and communicating knowledge are two entirely different accomplishments. It is not enough to understand a subject. One must also learn to express one’s thoughts clearly, confidently and persuasively. Scholarship locked away within one’s own mind serves little purpose. Knowledge fulfils its true purpose only when it is communicated to others. Ironically, the greatest lesson I ever learnt about public speaking came not from delivering a memorable speech but from being completely unable to utter a single word. Far from discouraging me, that failure transformed me. I resolved that never again would I allow fear to silence me. From then onwards I deliberately sought every opportunity to speak before an audience, however small. Every discussion, every seminar, every informal gathering became an exercise in overcoming the paralysis that I had experienced that evening at Aftab Hall. Looking back today, I often tell my own students that failure is sometimes the finest teacher one can ever have. Success may give confidence, but failure gives determination.

Around the same time another transformation was quietly taking place. I came from a deeply religious Shi’i family. My father had been a distinguished theologian, and religion naturally formed an integral part of my upbringing. Yet almost as soon as I entered the University I found myself exposed to an intellectual atmosphere very different from the one in which I had grown up. Many of the brightest students in the Department were associated with the Students’ Federation of India, the student wing of the Left. Before long I too found myself attending their meetings. The experience introduced me to Marxist literature, political activism and ways of looking at society that were entirely new to me. I learnt much from those associations. At the same time, I remained deeply rooted in my own religious traditions. There were aspects of Left politics that appealed to me greatly, particularly its emphasis on social justice and equality. There were others with which I felt less comfortable.

Perhaps it was an unconscious attempt to reconcile these different worlds that led me to one of the more amusing episodes of my undergraduate years. If there could be an SFI representing the Students’ Federation of India, why could there not also be another SFI? And so, with all the idealism and confidence of youth, I floated an organisation bearing exactly the same initials. Mine stood for the Shia Federation of India. The similarity of names was entirely intentional. It never possessed the organisational machinery or political ambitions of the other SFI. Nor was it intended to. It simply reflected the world from which I had come and the identity that continued to shape me. Through this organisation I began arranging programmes entirely at my own expense. Looking back, I often wonder where the money came from, given the financial circumstances through which my family was then passing. Somehow, however, one always managed. I do remember one benefactor however: an Engineering teacher at ZH Engineering College, Dr Aliul Hasan of Banaras, who would keep on funding my programme materially and intellectually. During my undergraduate years we organised three substantial functions. One was held in the Arts Faculty Lounge, another at Bait-us-Salaat, the University’s principal centre of Shi’i religious and cultural activity, and a third in the Kennedy Auditorium. Those programmes gave me an education that no classroom ever could. They taught me how to organise an event from beginning to end, how to persuade people to participate, how to coordinate speakers, arrange logistics and assume responsibility for success as well as failure. Only much later did I realise that these experiences were preparing me for a lifetime spent organising seminars, conferences and academic gatherings. The training had begun long before I knew that I would spend my professional life in a university.

By the time I entered the MA programme, however, another transformation had quietly begun to take place. The rather exclusive outlook that had characterised my undergraduate years slowly gave way to something much broader. It was not that I had become any less attached to my own religious identity. My upbringing, my family and my father’s influence remained inseparable parts of who I was. Rather, I had begun to appreciate that history, by its very nature, refuses to remain confined within narrow boundaries. The more one reads, the more one realises that societies, cultures and religions are intertwined in ways that simple labels fail to explain. The historian’s first loyalty must ultimately be to evidence and understanding rather than to inherited assumptions. Without consciously deciding to do so, I found myself moving away from specifically Shi’i student activities towards a much more inclusive academic engagement. The change was so gradual that I scarcely noticed it myself. Instead of organising religious gatherings, I began organising student seminars on Medieval Indian History. They were modest affairs by the standards of later years, but for us they represented an entirely different kind of intellectual exercise. Students were encouraged to read original texts, prepare papers and defend their arguments before their peers. We learnt not merely to collect information but to formulate questions, construct arguments and, perhaps most importantly, accept criticism.

Not every initiative, however, received enthusiastic encouragement. There were occasions when the then Chairman of the Department (I won’t name him as I still respect him a lot) would take a rather dim view of our activities. Sometimes we were told that the Seminar Room could not be occupied indefinitely. On other occasions we were gently reminded that students were expected to attend classes rather than organise them. Being young and thoroughly convinced of the importance of what we were doing, we accepted these interruptions with remarkable good humour. If we were turned out of the Seminar Room, we simply shifted the seminar to the lawns. Someone would spread a newspaper on the grass, another would produce a notebook, and within minutes the discussion resumed exactly where it had been interrupted. Looking back today, I often feel that those informal baithaks beneath the trees were among the finest seminars I have ever attended. There were no microphones. No inaugural ceremonies. No chief guests. No interminable votes of thanks. Only students, and occasionally a visiting Professor, arguing passionately about history.

One afternoon the discussion might revolve around the nature of the iqta system under the Delhi Sultans. On another occasion we debated whether Akbar’s theory of sovereignty represented a genuine ideological departure or merely a political necessity. Sometimes the arguments became so animated that passers-by would stop and look at us with curiosity. They probably wondered why a group of young men seemed prepared to quarrel so passionately over emperors who had been dead for centuries. For us, however, those emperors were very much alive. They represented ideas. They represented problems. Above all, they represented different ways of understanding the past.

It was during those years that another important academic tradition began within the Department. Professor Irfan Habib initiated what were then known as the Thursday Seminars of the Aligarh Historians Group, an enterprise that would, in later years, evolve into the Aligarh Historians Society. Few of us realised at the time that we were witnessing the birth of an institution that would eventually become one of the most respected historical forums in the country. To us it was simply Thursday. Those seminars became an event around which our week revolved. There was much to be done before each meeting. Chairs had to be arranged, notices circulated, visiting scholars received, papers duplicated and countless small details attended to. A seminar that appears effortless to an audience invariably rests upon the unseen labour of volunteers. I was fortunate to be one of them. Along with a few fellow students, I became actively involved in organising these meetings. There was no financial reward, no certificate of appreciation and no expectation of recognition. We participated simply because we enjoyed being part of an intellectual community that was visibly growing before our eyes.

The rewards were immeasurable. For the first time I found myself listening not only to my own teachers but also to distinguished scholars from universities across the country. I watched eminent historians disagree with one another, sometimes quite vigorously, yet without any trace of personal bitterness. Arguments were supported by evidence, challenged by evidence and refined through evidence. That experience fundamentally altered my understanding of scholarship. Until then I had imagined that history consisted of established facts waiting to be learnt. The seminars taught me something very different. History is, in reality, an unending conversation. Every generation returns to the same evidence with new questions. Every historian contributes one interpretation amongst many others. Scholarship advances not because everyone agrees, but because informed disagreement compels us to think more carefully. It was a lesson that remained with me throughout my own academic career.

The MA Seminar Room itself gradually acquired an almost sacred significance. It was no longer merely a room where students sat between classes. It became the intellectual heart of our lives. Hours disappeared there unnoticed. One discussion naturally gave birth to another. Someone would introduce a newly published article. Another would disagree with its conclusions. A third would rush to the library to fetch a relevant book. Before long what had begun as a casual conversation had become a miniature research seminar. Equally important was the Maulana Azad Library. To visitors it was one of the University’s most magnificent buildings. To us it was home. I often think that no historian is ever truly educated until he has learnt to lose himself in a great library. One entered intending to consult a single volume and emerged several hours later carrying references to half a dozen books that one had never originally intended to read. A footnote led to another book; that book suggested another article; the article referred to an obscure Persian source; and before one realised it, the entire afternoon had disappeared. Long before electronic databases transformed research into a matter of computer searches, scholarship depended upon serendipity. One learnt to browse. One learnt to wander. Above all, one learnt patience.

The friendships forged during those years have remained amongst the greatest blessings of my life. Some began in classrooms, others in the Seminar Room, still others over countless cups of tea in the canteens and dhabas that surrounded the campus. We borrowed one another’s books, criticised each other’s papers with ruthless honesty, argued over historiography with youthful certainty and reconciled ourselves over yet another cup of tea. Looking back now, I realise that the University was educating us in ways that no curriculum could ever prescribe. The lectures gave us knowledge. The library taught us discipline. The seminars taught us to think. Friendships taught us generosity. Failure taught us resilience. Organisation taught us leadership. And life itself taught us humility.

When I first entered Aligarh, I imagined that education took place inside classrooms. By the time I completed my MA course, I knew better. The classrooms had given me teachers. Life beyond them had made me a historian. The story, however, was far from over. The years that followed would take me from the Seminar Room to research, from student life to teaching, and eventually to the very Department that had nurtured me. Looking back now, I often feel that everything that came later had its origins in those unforgettable years when the University quietly taught me lessons that no textbook could ever contain. That, however, is a story yet to be told.

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

Professor Hitendra Patel’s two-part essay published in The Statesman on July 12 and July 13, 2026 is a thoughtful reminder that constitutional history deserves sustained attention in any account of late colonial Bengal. His emphasis on the Morley-Minto reforms, the Government of India Act of 1935, provincial autonomy, coalition politics, the Bengal Pact, and the constitutional debates of the 1940s serves as a useful corrective to historical narratives that concentrate exclusively on nationalism, communalism or Partition. Political institutions undoubtedly mattered. Constitutional debates shaped the language through which Bengal’s political elite articulated competing visions of representation, democracy and provincial autonomy.

Yet the essays also invite a number of questions. They claim to “rethink” Bengal’s history by placing constitutional politics at its centre. The issue is whether this constitutes a genuinely new historiographical direction or simply shifts emphasis within an already well-developed body of scholarship.

The first difficulty lies in the suggestion that constitutional history has been relatively neglected. This is not entirely convincing. Much of the finest scholarship on Bengal over the past four decades has consistently explored the relationship between constitutional reforms, representative institutions, communal politics and provincial autonomy. The works of Joya Chatterji, Sugata Bose, Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Ayesha Jalal, Gordon Johnson, Judith Brown and others have never treated constitutional developments as peripheral. Rather, they have integrated them into broader analyses of Bengal’s political transformation. Constitutional politics is therefore hardly a neglected subject awaiting rediscovery.

More importantly, the essays tend to present constitutional politics as an almost autonomous sphere of historical explanation. Constitutions, however, do not operate independently of society. Institutions derive their significance from the social, economic and cultural contexts within which they function.

The elections of 1937 provide a good illustration. They certainly marked a constitutional watershed. Yet their outcome cannot be explained merely by electoral arrangements or representative institutions. They reflected agrarian discontent, the mobilisation of Muslim peasantry, the rise of the Krishak Praja Party, urban Hindu politics, educational expansion, changing social aspirations and the cumulative consequences of colonial land revenue policies. Constitutional reforms created the arena within which politics unfolded, but they did not determine the political forces that occupied it.

Similarly, the Bengal Pact of 1923 was far more than a constitutional compromise. It represented an attempt to address longstanding anxieties over education, employment, representation and access to public institutions. Those concerns had emerged through wider social and economic developments. Constitutional negotiation was therefore one expression of deeper historical processes rather than their origin.

The role of colonial power also receives less attention than it deserves. British constitutional reforms were not neutral experiments in democratic development. Every constitutional measure, from the Morley-Minto reforms onwards, sought to reconcile limited political participation with the preservation of imperial authority. Separate electorates, reserved representation and provincial autonomy were carefully calibrated mechanisms of colonial governance. To analyse constitutional evolution without placing imperial objectives at the centre risks overlooking the very framework within which these institutions operated.

The essays also establish an unnecessary opposition between constitutional reasoning and ideology. Professor Patel argues that constitutional considerations rather than ideological differences explain many of the choices made by Bengal’s political leadership. Yet constitutional preferences themselves emerged from ideological commitments. Fazlul Huq, Sarat Chandra Bose, H. S. Suhrawardy, Syama Prasad Mookerjee, Muhammad Ali Jinnah and others differed not merely over constitutional arrangements but over fundamentally different conceptions of community, democracy, federalism and the future of India. Constitutional arguments were themselves expressions of political ideology.

Nor can constitutional history be separated from popular politics. The legislative debates of the period unfolded alongside the Swadeshi movement, peasant mobilisation, labour unrest, revolutionary nationalism, communal mobilisation and, ultimately, the Bengal Famine. Public opinion, organised protest and mass political participation shaped constitutional developments as much as constitutional institutions influenced society. The relationship was reciprocal rather than one directional.

The second essay rightly emphasises that the constitutional alternatives discussed during the 1940s remind us that Partition was not inevitable. This is an important point. Yet it is also one that modern historiography has long recognised. Historians have repeatedly demonstrated that multiple constitutional futures remained possible until remarkably late in the transfer of power. The existence of unrealised alternatives enriches our understanding of contingency, but it does not fundamentally revise the existing historiography.

There is another omission that deserves attention. Throughout both essays, constitutional debates are largely viewed from the perspective of political leaders and legislative institutions. Missing are the experiences of ordinary Bengalis. Constitutional ideas were interpreted, contested and reshaped through newspapers, voluntary associations, student movements, district politics, caste organisations, religious institutions, municipal bodies and peasant organisations. The constitutional history of Bengal was not written only in Calcutta or in legislative chambers. It was equally fashioned in villages, towns and local public spheres.

Ultimately, the greatest strength of Professor Patel’s essays lies in reminding readers that constitutional history deserves serious consideration. Their weakness lies in presenting constitutional politics as the principal explanatory framework for understanding Bengal’s modern past. Constitutional institutions mattered enormously, but they functioned within larger processes of social change, economic transformation, ideological contestation and imperial governance. None can adequately be understood in isolation from the others.

History rarely advances by replacing one dominant narrative with another. Rather, it progresses through synthesis, by recognising the interaction of institutions, ideas, social forces and historical contingency. Bengal’s history is no exception. Its richness lay precisely in the complex interplay between constitutional innovation, political ideology, agrarian change, communal negotiation, intellectual life and popular mobilisation.

There is, however, one final point that deserves reflection. Every generation rewrites history, but the timing of such rewritings is itself historically significant. The current enthusiasm for “rethinking” Bengal’s past has emerged not in an intellectual vacuum but in the aftermath of a major political realignment within the state. That fact neither invalidates nor validates the arguments advanced. It does, however, remind us that historiography, like politics, is often shaped by the questions the present chooses to ask of the past. Historians should therefore examine not only the new interpretations being proposed but also the intellectual and political moment that has made these particular reinterpretations appear especially urgent.

The challenge, then, is not simply to rethink Bengal’s history. It is equally to remain attentive to the contexts in which history itself is being rethought. Only by doing so can historiography remain both intellectually rigorous and historically self-aware.

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

For a long time, the history of medieval and early modern India has been written largely from the perspective of kings and emperors. Dynastic chronicles, imperial memoirs and colonial settlement reports have justly dominated the field, but they have also tended to crowd out a quieter, equally rich tradition of historical writing that flourished in provincial North India during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This is the tradition of the Urdu local history, or tārīkh-i maqāmī. These works were not produced in royal courts but in small towns (qasbas) by scholars who were deeply embedded in their communities. They preserve a remarkable wealth of detail about genealogy, patterns of settlement, education, religious institutions and collective memory. Among them, Tārīkh-i Haswa by Maulvi Haji Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali Sahib ‘Akhlaṣ‘ deserves special attention. Though it focuses on a single qasba in what is now Fatehpur district in Uttar Pradesh, its insights reach far beyond the boundaries of that one locality.

The qasba as a social and cultural formation has drawn renewed interest from historians in recent decades. The late Mushirul Hasan, in his influential study From Pluralism to Separatism: Qasbas in Colonial Awadh, described these settlements as historic ‘rurban’ spaces – smaller than cities but larger than villages – that were once vibrant centres of Sufism, Urdu literature, refined conversation (tehzib) and cross-cultural encounter. In the Awadh region, with its epicentre in Lucknow, these towns nurtured a remarkable composite culture, where Hindus and Muslims participated freely in each other’s festivals, contributed together to literary traditions, and shaped a shared social world. Haswa, lying within this cultural orbit, exemplifies precisely such a milieu. Its history, as recorded by Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali, is not merely a local chronicle but a testament to the pluralistic and intellectually rich life of the Awadhi qasba that Hasan so eloquently evoked.

Published in Banaras in 1330 AH (1912–13 CE), the book runs to seventy-two pages and is introduced by a preface from Mufti Sayyid ‘Abd al-Qawi, the author of Rashīd al-Mu’allifīn. The title page tells us that Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali was a retired tehsildar, and this detail is more significant than it might first appear. Unlike many local chroniclers who relied almost exclusively on oral tradition, he brought to his task both the sensibilities of a local scholar and the practical training of a revenue official. That dual perspective shows throughout the work, in his careful attention to genealogy, landholding patterns, institutional history and documentary exactness.

The volume belongs to a distinguished but understudied group of Urdu local histories, alongside works on Bilgram, Sandila, Kakori, Amroha and Dewa Sharif. Together, these texts form one of the richest archives we have for reconstructing the social history of provincial Muslim society in northern India. Yet they have received only sporadic scholarly attention, overshadowed by the better-known Persian chronicles of the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empire, or by the district gazetteers compiled by British officials. Tārīkh-i Haswa shows precisely why this neglect ought to be remedied.

Unlike the Persian chronicles of the Delhi Sultans or the Mughal emperors, Tārīkh-i Haswa does not seek to narrate the rise and fall of empires. Instead, it asks a different set of historical questions. Who first settled here? Which families established the town’s scholarly reputation? Which mosques and shrines shaped its religious life? How did successive generations preserve their lineage and identity? Who were the teachers, judges, physicians and poets who made Haswa an intellectual centre? These questions reflect a conception of history rooted not in kingship but in community. The author’s understanding of what constitutes history is fundamentally different from that of a court chronicler. Political events are given only a secondary place. Instead, the narrative centres on the origins of Haswa, the settlement of its Sayyid families, the founding of mosques and imambaras, the careers of local scholars and jurists, and the preservation of communal memory. History here is not the story of rulers succeeding one another but the story of a community enduring over time.

One of the striking features of the work is the author’s concern with place. The opening pages describe the physical setting of Haswa, its surrounding villages and the natural environment in which the settlement evolved. The qasba is presented as an organic part of the countryside rather than an isolated urban enclave. Agricultural prosperity, access to communications and proximity to neighbouring settlements all contributed to its emergence as a regional centre. Such observations correspond closely with what historians now understand about the growth of qasbas under the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughals. These settlements typically developed where agrarian expansion created a surplus capable of supporting religious scholars, administrators and artisans.

The Sayyids and Scholars of Haswa

The genealogical tables reproduced in Tārīkh-i Haswa are among the most remarkable features of the work. They demonstrate the author’s determination to preserve precise relationships between successive generations rather than relying upon vague family traditions. The author carefully traces the descent of the main Sayyid families, recording relationships, migrations and family lore. Modern historians are rightly cautious about genealogical evidence, aware that lineage is often shaped as much by memory as by documentation. From the standpoint of historical methodology, such material deserves careful evaluation. Genealogies often preserve accurate information over remarkably long periods because inheritance, marriage and religious succession depended upon them. At the same time, they occasionally incorporate omissions, simplifications or retrospective adjustments intended to strengthen claims of prestige. The historian must therefore compare local genealogies with contemporary documents wherever possible.

Nevertheless, even when minor inaccuracies occur, genealogies remain invaluable historical evidence. They reveal patterns of migration, demographic growth, educational succession and the distribution of landed property. They also illuminate the remarkable stability of certain scholarly families whose influence extended across several centuries. The genealogical portions of Tārīkh-i Haswa deserve to be treated as primary historical evidence, not merely as curious relics of antiquarian interest.

The Sayyids of Haswa constituted what may appropriately be described as a scholarly aristocracy. Their authority rested upon learning rather than military power. Their prestige derived from scholarship as much as descent. They taught in madrasas, delivered legal opinions, supervised religious endowments, led prayers, composed literary works and trained successive generations of students. Their homes often functioned as informal academies where instruction continued outside the formal classroom. In doing so, they bore out Hasan’s observation that these towns were much more culturally refined than either large cities or ordinary villages, and that their residents often took immense pride in their heritage, comparing their homes to illustrious centres like Baghdad or Córdoba.

Mosques, Imambaras and Sacred Geography

Every historic qasba possesses two histories. One may be reconstructed through chronicles, administrative records and genealogies. The other is inscribed upon the landscape itself. Mosques, imambaras, shrines, cemeteries, madrasas and family residences collectively form what historians increasingly describe as a town’s sacred geography. These buildings are more than architectural monuments. They embody memory, patronage, scholarship and communal identity. In Tārīkh-i Haswa, Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali devotes considerable attention to these institutions, recognising that they constituted the very heart of the town’s historical existence.

The emergence of sacred landscapes formed one of the defining characteristics of Muslim settlement in medieval India. Wherever scholars, Sayyids or Sufis established themselves permanently, they founded mosques, schools and cemeteries. These institutions gradually attracted students, pilgrims and patrons, creating a network of religious activity that transformed an ordinary settlement into a recognised centre of learning.

Haswa appears to have developed in precisely this manner. As successive generations of learned families settled there, each contributed to the religious topography of the town. New mosques were erected, educational circles expanded, imambaras were established for the observance of Muharram, while cemeteries became places where family memory and communal identity converged. The resulting landscape reflected centuries of continuous religious patronage rather than the vision of any single founder. These descriptions preserve information that may no longer be recoverable from surviving buildings or inscriptions. In this sense, the chronicle complements archaeological and epigraphic evidence by recording the social meanings that these institutions held for the local community.

The presence of imambaras within Tārīkh-i Haswa immediately indicates the importance of Shi’i devotional culture within the town. These buildings served as centres for the observance of Muharram, the recitation of marsiyas, majālis and the commemoration of the martyrdom of Imam Husain. The prominence accorded to these institutions suggests that the culture of Azadāri had become firmly rooted within Haswa by the nineteenth century, contributing significantly to the town’s distinctive identity.

Echoes in Stone

Today, one of the most tangible remnants of Haswa’s historical character is not a grand palace or mosque, but a pond. The Rani ka Talab, a historic pond in Haswa, is famous for its artistic and unique architecture. It was built in 1871 by Rani Gomati Kunwar, a daughter of a local landlord named Lala Ram Ghulam. The pond stands as a reminder of a time when local patronage shaped the landscape and when a single monument could serve the entire community. It is a quiet, physical link to Haswa’s past, one that embodies the composite culture of which Hasan wrote – a Hindu queen’s gift that became an enduring landmark for the entire town, regardless of faith.

Scholarship and Intellectual Culture

Perhaps the most significant contribution of Tārīkh-i Haswa, however, lies in its biographical material. The author commemorates scholars, jurists, teachers and other notable inhabitants whose names rarely appear in larger historical narratives. Together, these biographies illuminate the intellectual culture of the North Indian qasba. They remind us that the vitality of Indo-Muslim learning did not depend only on celebrated centres such as Delhi, Lucknow or Jaunpur, but also on smaller provincial towns that sustained traditions of scholarship across generations.

Linguistically, the work is an excellent example of mature Urdu historical prose. Though deeply indebted to Persian historiographical conventions in both style and vocabulary, it reflects the gradual replacement of Persian by Urdu as the principal language of Muslim historical writing during the nineteenth century. This shift itself forms an important chapter in the intellectual history of colonial India, and Tārīkh-i Haswa occupies a significant place within that story.

From the perspective of modern historical scholarship, the work is not without its limitations. The author seldom distinguishes explicitly between documentary evidence and oral tradition, and miraculous narratives occasionally sit alongside historically verifiable information without any critical comment. Ordinary cultivators, artisans and women receive relatively little attention, and explicit references to documentary sources are sparse. But these characteristics are largely features of the genre itself rather than shortcomings unique to this particular work. To judge Tārīkh-i Haswa solely by the standards of contemporary academic history would be to misunderstand both its purpose and its historical context.

Indeed, the book’s greatest strength lies precisely in its preservation of material that official records neglect. Colonial gazetteers give us statistics but rarely convey the inner life of a community. Persian chronicles illuminate imperial politics but seldom notice provincial scholars or neighbourhood institutions. Local histories such as this fill that gap by documenting the lived texture of society. When read alongside Persian chronicles, Mughal administrative manuals, district gazetteers, inscriptions and archival records, they become indispensable sources for reconstructing the social and cultural history of the Gangetic plain.

In recent decades, historians have increasingly turned to microhistory as a way of exploring broader historical processes through the detailed study of particular communities. Although the term itself emerged in twentieth-century European historiography, works such as Tārīkh-i Haswa show that Indian scholars had long recognised the historical value of the local. By documenting a single qasba in extraordinary detail, Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali reveals patterns of migration, education, religious patronage and communal identity that illuminate much wider developments in North Indian history. Yet one cannot help but feel, as Hasan poignantly remarked, that ‘a carefully swept imambara, a functional old kothi, periodic assemblage of aspiring local poets, even an occasional production of local lore, legends and histories are poor substitute for the lost world of the qasbas‘. Works like this one are invaluable precisely because they offer us a glimpse of that vanished world, even as they remind us of all that has been irretrievably lost.

One cannot conclude without expressing the hope that Tārīkh-i Haswa will one day receive the critical edition it deserves. A scholarly English translation, accompanied by a substantial introduction, explanatory notes, genealogical charts, maps, indices and a comparison with Persian and colonial sources, would greatly enhance its accessibility and historical value. Such an edition would constitute a major contribution not only to the history of Haswa but also to the broader historiography of Mughal and colonial India.

Despite its modest size, this is a work of considerable historical importance. It reminds us that the making of Indian history took place not only in imperial capitals but equally in provincial qasbas, where scholars taught, families preserved their genealogies, religious institutions shaped communal life, and local historians consciously recorded the memories of their communities for future generations. More than a century after its publication, Sayyid Wāhid ‘Ali’s work remains an indispensable source for anyone interested in the social, intellectual and cultural history of North India.

Note: A copy of the book was in the library of my father, but is now not traceable. I am thankful to my cousin Mr Masoodul Hasan, former Bureau Chief of Hindustan Times at Lucknow, for sending me a pdf of the same. I also thank my student Ms Shireen Khan in getting it printed and bound for me.

A detailed study of this work will be undertaken later, hopefully.

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

Some scholars are measured by the volumes they produce or the positions they hold. Others leave their truest legacy in the hearts and minds of their students, friends, and all who were fortunate enough to share their company. Professor Syed Badrul Hasan Abdi (1924–2009) belonged unmistakably to the latter. To introduce him merely as Professor of Arabic and Persian at Banaras Hindu University would be to capture only a fragment of a remarkably rich personality. He was scholar, teacher, poet, reciter of majalis, and above all a gentle soul whose profound learning was matched only by his profound humility.

Professor Abdi embodied a generation of scholars now steadily receding from our intellectual landscape. They moved with effortless grace between the lecture hall, the library, the shrine, and the mimbar. They saw no contradiction between academic rigour and religious devotion, between critical inquiry and literary sensibility. For them, learning was not a profession but a way of being.

For decades, Professor Abdi served in the Department of Arabic and Persian at Banaras Hindu University, where he became one of the most revered teachers of his time. His command of Arabic, Persian, and Urdu was the product of years of disciplined scholarship. He belonged to the classical Indo-Persian tradition in which languages were not merely studied but inhabited. Every text was read with care, every expression situated in its historical context, every interpretation tested against evidence. Students who passed through his classroom invariably remembered not simply what he taught but how he taught. He possessed that rare gift of making difficult texts feel accessible without ever diminishing their complexity.

His published writings reflected the same intellectual integrity. They ranged across Arabic and Persian literature, Islamic thought, Qur’anic studies, and the literary traditions of South Asia. Yet, like so many scholars of his generation, he never measured success by the number of books to his name. His greatest contribution lay in the students he shaped and the standards of scholarship he quietly upheld throughout his career.

For me, however, Professor Syed Badrul Hasan Abdi – Badrul Chacha – was never merely a distinguished academic. He was one of the closest friends of my late father, Saiyid Sibtul Hasan. As a child, I grew up seeing him as an honoured guest in our home in Aligarh. Whenever he visited, the conversations between the two friends would stretch for hours. Literature, history, theology, politics, and shared memories flowed together with effortless ease. Looking back now, I recognise that I was privileged to witness a culture of friendship rooted in scholarship, where intellectual companionship formed the strongest of bonds.

Yet, curiously, my most vivid memories of Professor Abdi belong not to Aligarh but to the Mazar of Shahid-e-Salis, Qazi Nurullah Shustari, in Agra. Every year, during the commemorations held there, he would arrive to recite the majalis. Those gatherings remain among the most cherished memories of my youth.

The shrine itself possessed a unique atmosphere. It was not merely a place of pilgrimage; it functioned almost as an academy, where scholars, students, poets, and devotees gathered in remembrance and discourse. Conversations would continue long after the majlis had concluded. Persian poetry, Mughal history, Qur’anic exegesis, Arabic philology, and Shi’i theology were all discussed with remarkable freedom. Professor Abdi was invariably at the centre of these exchanges, not because he sought attention but because knowledge naturally gravitated towards him.

It was upon the mimbar that his extraordinary gifts became fully apparent. Those who attended his majalis quickly realised that they differed profoundly from the style commonly associated with Muharram gatherings. For the greater part of the discourse, Professor Abdi spoke exactly as a university teacher would conduct a class. Listening to him, one often felt that one was attending a postgraduate seminar rather than a religious sermon. Every majlis followed a carefully planned intellectual progression. He would begin with a verse of the Qur’an or a tradition of the Prophet, explain its language and historical setting, and then gradually construct the background necessary for understanding the events of Karbala. Political developments within the early Muslim community, theological debates, the personalities involved, and the historical sources were all examined with the precision of an experienced historian.

Arabic and Persian texts appeared naturally throughout his discourse. They were never quoted merely to display learning; each citation served as historical evidence supporting the argument he was developing. Every assertion rested upon a source. Every narrative was placed within its proper context. For most of the majlis, the atmosphere resembled that of a university classroom. The audience was invited to understand before being invited to mourn. History became the foundation upon which devotion rested.

Then came the moment that everyone awaited. As Professor Abdi entered the masaib, the narration of the sufferings endured by Imam Husain, his family, and companions at Karbala, something remarkable occurred. Almost imperceptibly, the professor disappeared and the traditional zākir emerged. The measured prose of the lecturer gave way to a lyrical cadence that recalled the great majlis tradition of Awadh, a style that has now become increasingly rare. His voice acquired a rhythm of extraordinary beauty. His language became poetic without ever becoming theatrical. The emotional restraint that characterised the old Lucknow school of recitation revealed itself with quiet dignity. He never attempted to force emotion. He never relied upon exaggerated gestures or dramatic effects. Instead, grief unfolded naturally through the elegance of language and the cumulative weight of historical memory. The audience found itself moved because it had first been educated. Understanding prepared the heart, and the masāib completed what scholarship had begun. Even today, when I think of Professor Abdi, it is this transition that remains most vivid in my memory. Few speakers have ever combined historical analysis with devotional narration so seamlessly. He demonstrated that scholarship and emotion need not exist in opposition. Indeed, each gained strength from the other.

There was another dimension to Professor Abdi that many outside literary circles perhaps knew less well. He was an accomplished Urdu poet who wrote under the takhallus ‘Badr Faizabadi’. His poetry reflected the same refinement that marked his scholarship. Much of it celebrated the Ahl al-Bayt, the blessed Household of the Prophet, and commemorated the eternal tragedy of Karbala. His verses belonged to the great tradition of Urdu devotional poetry, in which literary elegance, historical consciousness, and profound faith existed together in perfect harmony. Like his Majālis, his poetry was distinguished by dignity rather than ornamentation. Classical in language yet immediate in feeling, his verses drew upon the immense heritage of Persian and Urdu literature while speaking with an authentic personal voice. Those who knew Badr Faizabadi the poet, recognised immediately the same gentle scholar they encountered in the classroom and upon the mimbar.

His literary and scholarly legacy continues through his family. His son, Professor Syed Ainul Hasan Abdi, is himself an eminent scholar of Persian who served for many years at the Centre of Persian and Central Asian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He has since held several important academic and cultural positions and currently serves as Vice Chancellor of Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad. Like his father, Professor Ainul Hasan is much more than an academic administrator. He is an accomplished Urdu poet and an admired reciter of marsiya. In him, one finds the continuation of a remarkable family tradition in which scholarship, literature, and devotion continue to reinforce one another across generations. Professor Abdi’s family was itself connected with other distinguished scholarly lineages. His daughter Noor is married to Professor Aliul Hasan, son of the revered Maulana Syed Zafrul Hasan of Banaras, who for a period taught at the Engineering College of Aligarh Muslim University. Thus, through scholarship, friendship, and family, Professor Abdi remained part of a larger intellectual world that linked Banaras, Aligarh, Agra, and Lucknow through a shared commitment to learning and culture.

Looking back today, I realise that Professor Syed Badrul Hasan Abdi belonged to one of the last generations of what may truly be called scholar-orators. There was once a time when the majlis served simultaneously as a lesson in history, an exercise in literary appreciation, and an act of devotion. The finest zākirs prepared themselves as carefully as university lecturers. Accuracy mattered. Language mattered. Literary refinement mattered. Above all, respect for history mattered. Professor Abdi embodied that ideal completely. He explained before he exhorted. He educated before he moved. His authority rested not upon dramatic oratory but upon learning. Even when narrating the sufferings of Karbala, he never abandoned historical discipline or literary elegance.

Sadly, this culture has become increasingly uncommon. Modern academic life often leaves little room for the broad humanistic learning that once characterised scholars like Professor Abdi. At the same time, the majlis has in many places become separated from the rich historical and literary traditions that once nourished it. Professor Abdi stood firmly against such divisions. In his life, there existed no separation between the university and the mimbar, between scholarship and remembrance, between history and faith.

When I remember him today, I do not first recall the distinguished Professor of Banaras Hindu University or even the respected poet Badr Faizabadi. I remember instead the quiet figure seated upon the mimbar at the shrine of Shahid-e-Salis in Agra, patiently unfolding the historical background of Karbala before allowing the discourse to blossom into the haunting beauty of the masaib in the old Awadhi style. I remember the evenings that followed, when discussions continued deep into the night among scholars and friends. I remember, too, the warmth of his friendship with my father, a friendship that reflected the finest traditions of civility and intellectual companionship. In remembering Professor Syed Badrul Hasan Abdi, one remembers much more than an individual. One remembers an entire intellectual world that valued learning above recognition, humility above acclaim, and service above ambition. It was a world in which a professor could also be a poet, a poet could also be a zākir, and a zākir could remain, above all else, a teacher.

Such men become rarer with every passing generation. It is therefore both a privilege and a duty to remember Professor Syed Badrul Hasan Abdi ‘Badr Faizabadi’, not simply for what he accomplished, but for what he represented. He was among the last great custodians of a civilisational tradition in which scholarship, literature, piety, and humanity existed in perfect harmony. His voice has fallen silent, but the culture he embodied continues to inspire all those who had the good fortune to hear him teach, to hear him recite, and above all, to know him.

Syed Ali Nadeem Rezavi

The city of Ayodhya, revered in Hindu tradition as the birthplace of Lord Rama, possesses a rich and complex history that extends far beyond its religious significance. While contemporary discourse often frames Ayodhya exclusively through the lens of Hindu-Muslim tensions, historical evidence reveals a far more nuanced narrative of coexistence, cultural exchange, and shared urban life. The scholarly work of historian Irfan Habib provides invaluable insight into the deep and multifaceted Muslim connection to Ayodhya, demonstrating that the city was not merely a site of conflict but a vibrant centre of Islamic learning, commerce, and community for centuries (Irfan Habib, “Medieval Ayodhya (Awadh), Down to the Mughal Occupation”, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, Vol. 67 (2006-2007), pp. 378-81).

The Establishment of Muslim Settlement

The Muslim presence in Ayodhya can be traced to the early thirteenth century, following the Ghorian occupation around 1200 CE. While the historian Minhaj Siraj’s claim that a figure named Batua killed “one hundred and twenty-odd thousand Muslims” in the vicinity of Awadh is undoubtedly an exaggeration, the rhetoric itself reveals an important truth: a substantial civilian Muslim population had emerged in the region. As Habib notes, the city of Awadh (as Ayodhya was then known) served as the headquarters of this community and must have contained a sizeable portion of this population. This early settlement pattern established Ayodhya as a significant Muslim centre from the very beginning of the Delhi Sultanate period.

Religious and Scholarly Institutions

The institutional framework of Muslim religious life in Ayodhya developed rapidly alongside its population. Contemporary texts attest to the presence of theologians, mosques, and graveyards. The appointment of Qazi Jalaluddin Kashani as “the Qazi of Awadh” in 1243, and his subsequent elevation to the position of Imperial Qazi in Delhi in 1249, demonstrates the city’s growing religious importance. Even more significant is the presence of a “Shaikhu’l Islam” or “Leader of Islam” in Ayodhya during the fourteenth century. This title, conferred by the Sultan and typically reserved for scholars in Delhi or Multan, indicates that the royal court viewed Ayodhya as a centre of Islamic learning on par with the empire’s most important cities.

The scholarly traditions of Ayodhya are further evidenced by the recollections of Shaikh Nasiru’ddin, a major disciple of the famous Sufi saint Nizamuddin Auliya. Born and raised in Awadh, Nasiru’ddin’s memoirs provide vivid glimpses into the religious and ethical life of the city. His accounts describe gatherings at the Congregation Mosque (Masjid-i Juma’-i Awadh), where worshippers would assemble for Friday prayers and engage in spiritual discussions. The mosque served not merely as a place of worship but as the heart of community life, where merchants, scholars, and ordinary citizens intersected in shared religious practice.

The Life of a Great Sufi Saint

A powerful personal testament to Ayodhya’s deep-rooted Muslim heritage comes from the life of Nasiruddin Mahmud, who lived from approximately 1274 to 1356 CE. He would later become the renowned Sufi saint known as “Roshan Chirag-e-Delhi“, meaning “The Illuminating Lamp of Delhi”. Born and raised in Ayodhya, he was a disciple of the great Nizamuddin Auliya and eventually became his successor. His spiritual lineage and early life in Ayodhya are well documented in historical sources. Remarkably, the shrine of his elder sister, called Badi Bua, still exists in Ayodhya today, serving as a living link to this fourteenth-century figure. His presence, together with the story of his sister’s shrine, offers concrete and humanising evidence of a flourishing Muslim community in the city centuries before the construction of the Babri Masjid.

Sufi Traditions and Religious Syncretism

The Sufi tradition, with its emphasis on spiritual devotion and often its openness to non-Muslims, played a particularly important role in Ayodhya’s Muslim community. The city was home to numerous saints and mystics, including Maulana Daud Pahili, a disciple of the renowned Shaikh Farid of Ajodhan. By the early fourteenth century, there was evidently a market for mystical works in Ayodhya, indicating a sophisticated lay interest in Sufi teachings.

Perhaps most revealing of the city’s spiritual character are the traditions surrounding the tombs of prophets Seth and Job. These impressive graves, measuring six and seven yards in length, were already identified as the resting places of biblical prophets by the sixteenth century, when Abu’l Fazl recorded the popular belief in his Ain-i Akbari. The development of such legends requires considerable time, suggesting that these graves held significance for the local Muslim community long before the Mughal period. The presence of such traditions within a predominantly Hindu city speaks to the complex religious landscape of medieval Ayodhya, where shared sacred spaces and overlapping traditions were likely more common than modern narratives of conflict suggest.

Economic Life and Commerce

Beyond its religious significance, Ayodhya functioned as an important economic centre. The city’s size in the late sixteenth century, estimated at nearly half that of Lahore and Delhi, suggests a prosperous urban community. The merchant Khwajagi Khujandi, a contemporary of Shaikh Nizamuddin Auliya, exemplifies the commercial vitality of Ayodhya. His trade in coarse cloth (pat) from Ayodhya to Delhi reveals the city’s role in regional commerce. Significantly, Khujandi deliberately chose to trade in pat rather than finer cloth, explaining that fine cloth was worn only by “Turks and soldiers” in Delhi, while the poor and dervishes wore pat. This observation reveals a merchant who understood his market and perhaps also embodied the ethical values of Sufi piety.

The presence of a cloth dealer with a capital of over 2000 tankas further testifies to the economic importance of Ayodhya’s textile trade. The city’s markets, including sellers of cooked meat and various commodities, sustained a diverse urban population. This economic vibrancy, combined with Ayodhya’s administrative significance as a provincial capital and later as the seat of a Mughal province, ensured that Muslims and Hindus intermingled in the marketplace as well as in religious spaces.

The Babri Masjid and the Evolving Dispute

The most prominent symbol of Muslim presence in Ayodhya was the Babri Masjid, a mosque completed in 1529 CE under the orders of Mir Baqi, a commander under the first Mughal emperor, Babur. For centuries, the site was a contested space. In the 1850s, during the British colonial era, local disputes were noted, and the administration, in an attempt to maintain order, allowed Muslims to pray inside the mosque while Hindus worshipped outside.

This local conflict was profoundly altered in 1949, when Hindu activists placed idols of Lord Ram inside the mosque. The government ordered the gates locked, and the site became dormant for decades, but the seeds of national conflict were sown. In 1992, the demolition of the mosque by a Hindu mob marked a catastrophic turning point. The event escalated a local dispute into a national flashpoint, unleashing communal violence that killed over 2,000 people. This destruction irrevocably changed the character of the city and its communities.

Shared Urban Space and Collective Memory

Habib’s research reveals that Muslims and Hindus shared the urban landscape of medieval Ayodhya in complex ways. Graves and mango-groves that existed during Shaikh Nasiru’ddin’s youth were later engulfed by the expanding city, suggesting continuous habitation and urban development that accommodated both communities. The presence of Muslim tombs surrounding the mounds of Maniparbat and Kuberparbat further indicates that Muslim burial practices were integrated into the city’s sacred geography.

The coexistence was not without tensions, as evidenced by the occasional conflicts recorded in historical sources. However, the overall picture that emerges from the medieval period is one of a city with substantial populations of both religious communities, engaged in shared economic, administrative, and social life. Ayodhya was simultaneously a Hindu pilgrimage centre and an important Muslim administrative and religious centre, a duality that characterised many Indian cities before the communal divisions of the modern era.

This modern reality of fear and displacement stands in stark opposition to the lived experience of previous generations. Long-time residents of both faiths consistently describe Ayodhya as having a culture of inter-faith harmony that was shattered by outsiders. As one priest of a local Muslim shrine put it, there was “never an iota of communal hatred” among the locals, who historically “were busy saving each other” during times of trouble. This narrative of a shared city, where a Muslim tailor could stitch clothes for the idol of Ram and a Hindu priest might help renovate an old mosque, is a powerful counterpoint to the politics of division that has come to define the city in the national imagination.

The Twenty-First Century: A Community in Transition

In the present day, Ayodhya stands transformed. The Ram Temple has been built on the site, and the city is being reimagined on a grand scale. This has created a stark reality for the local Muslim community, which constitutes a small minority within the old city.

Reports reveal an atmosphere of palpable anxiety and fear among these residents. Many recall the violence of 1992 and worry about their future in the changing city. In the run-up to the temple’s consecration, some Muslim families have seen their properties acquired or demolished, leading to feelings of intimidation and insecurity despite official assurances of safety. The heavy presence of police in Muslim-dominated neighbourhoods reflects the fragile situation.

The lives of individuals such as Iqbal Ansari, the son of a long-time Muslim litigant in the Babri case, illustrate the complex pressures of the era. He has publicly praised the government for the temple, but his stance is seen by many as a symbol of Muslim voices being co-opted in the new Ayodhya, a stark contrast to the fear expressed by others like Meraj, a craftsman who lives in fear of losing his home and workshop.

To conclude, the historical records present Ayodhya not as a site of eternal Hindu-Muslim antipathy but as a city where Muslim communities established deep roots over centuries, contributing to its religious, intellectual, and economic life. From the establishment of Islamic institutions in the thirteenth century through the development of rich Sufi traditions and the growth of a vibrant commercial economy, Ayodhya’s Muslim connection was integral to its urban identity. The life of Nasiruddin Mahmud, the presence of the Babri Masjid for over four centuries, and the memories of shared coexistence all testify to this enduring heritage.

Understanding this complex history is essential for moving beyond the polarised narratives that have come to define contemporary discourse about Ayodhya. The city’s heritage belongs not to one community alone but reflects the layered and intertwined histories of India’s diverse populations. As Habib’s scholarship demonstrates, the Muslim connection to Ayodhya is not a recent imposition but a centuries-old relationship that shaped the city’s development and character. Recognising this shared history offers the possibility of reimagining Ayodhya as a symbol not of division but of the rich cultural synthesis that has characterised Indian civilisation, even as the present reality for the city’s remaining Muslim residents remains fraught with uncertainty and fear.