Maulana Azad chair created at IIT-Gandhinagar to "promote" Urdu

By A Representative
A Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Chair at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Gandhinagar, has been created in order to encourage Urdu in Gujarat, where not even a single Urdu daily is published. This has been made possible, says Firoz Bakht Ahmed, Chancellor, Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU) because of efforts by Prof Hamida Banu Chopra of the Berkeley University, California, and Prof Sudhir K Jain, director, IIT Gandhinagar.
Ahmed, speaking on the occasion, said that, even today, Urdu happens to be the language of the heart firmly cementing the bonds of culture among people from all cultures and backgrounds. He added, Azad was the symbol of interfaith bonding between all the communities fighting for freedom from the clutches of the British.
Prof Akhtar-ul-Wasey, an Urdu celebrity, said, ironically, the language has been kept alive by Hindi cinema, FM radio, madrassas and the occasional recitation of couplets from Ghalib, Iqbal and Faiz in the Parliament. A language does not prosper through such methods alone but through people who love it with sincerity that's rather more important. He added, all languages are beautiful and have their own charm and distinct persona. Urdu, in particular, is sweet and poetic and at the same time, very adaptable.
Saeeda Hameed, former Planning Commission member and a scholar on Maulana Azad opined that languages become worst, suffer most and die mercilessly when they are politicized. This is because politics create hurdles and problems and destroy the shape, tone and taste of the languages. She cherished the efforts of Prof Jain that he had left no stone unturned to give Urdu a kiss of life at the IIT.
Prof Chopra too recites a ghazal that truly touched the inner chords of the people in the auditorium. Prof Jain lauded the efforts of students and professors who created an ambience of mushaira, where students came up to the stage and recited Urdu poems and ghazals.

Xi Jinping’s visit to USA: Recognition that China can't be contained?

By Vijay Prashad President Xi Jinping’s forthcoming visit to the United States must be understood as more than an encounter between two heads of state, but it must be seen as an encounter between two possible futures. In one future, the United States imposes a spiral of confrontation against China. Trade disputes harden into economic warfare, then economic warfare intensifies into technological blockades, technological blockades produce military encirclement, and finally military encirclement creates incidents, and incidents the danger of becoming an unimaginable war.

Swaminarayan, untouchability and the 'we are not Hindu' argument

By Rajiv Shah Following my blog on why the Eiffel Tower authorities should take all the blame for giving in to the Swaminarayan sadhus ’ bizarre demand to “invisibilise” women, including its female staff, during their visit to the internationally renowned Paris tourist centre on September 5, an interesting comment by one of the top academics drew my attention to something I vaguely knew about one of India’s most powerful and richest religious sects.

From margins to microphones: The rise of Dalit hip-hop in India

By Tersina Maria Toppo* A protest does not always arrive as a slogan shouted from a street corner. Sometimes, it arrives on a beat. A microphone replaces the megaphone, a music video becomes a public square, and the smartphone becomes the space where a history once pushed to the margins is narrated, debated, and shared.

Counterview

Search This Blog