EVER since Dr Fatema Hasan has taken over as secretary of the Anjuman Taraqqi-i-Urdu Pakistan (ATUP) the spirit of commitment permeates in its all activities.
She, with Zulqernain Jameel and Sahar Ansari, has charted new plans for the ATUP to take it to new heights. One of their plans is to have ATUP’s new, modern and spacious premises which will hold not only the thousands of rare tomes that are part of Anjuman’s precious library but will also have an auditorium, bookshop and other modern facilities. The new building, being constructed with a generous help from the federal government and situated in Karachi’s Gulistan-i-Jauhar neighbourhood, is in its final stages. Established in 1903 and re-established in Pakistan by Moulvi Abdul Haq in 1947, the ATUP has been working for the promotion of Urdu language and literature.
Of late, the ATUP has been pursuing its publication programme more zealously and new titles have been pouring in during the last couple of years. Anjuman’s monthly literary magazine Qaumi zaban has been published regularly since 1948. Its research journal Urdu has recently resumed the publication after a gap of a few years.
ATUP’s recent publications include some works by new researchers as well as reprints of some works that the ATUP had published previously and that are still very much in demand, for instance books by Moulvi Abdul Haq. This shows ATUP’s priorities: reviving the old masterpieces as well as encouraging the new, budding researchers and scholars to come up.
Some of the golden old works recently reprinted by the ATUP include: Qavaaid-i-Urdu, Punjab ke paanch qadeem shaer, Tanqeedi usool-o-nazariye, Mauj mauj Mehran , Muraqqa-i-aqwaal-o-amsaal, Khutbaat-i-Abdul Haq and many more.
ATUP’s new publications include works by some veterans as well as the new generation’s researchers. Some of them are:
Urdu shaeri ka difa: Published 48 years after the death of its writer, Urdu shaeri ka difa is a defence of Urdu poetry. It was written by Ali Abbas Hussaini (1897-1969), a well-known short story writer and novelist of Urdu, but only a chapter from it could get published from Lucknow in 1972. In those days some critics, notably Kaleemuddin Ahmed, were trying to convince the readers that Urdu poetry was nothing but a pack of rubbishes. Kaleemuddin Ahmed in his books Urdu shaeri par aik nazar and Sukhan haae guftani had maligned every Urdu poet, except for his father whom he profusely admired though his father was hardly known as a poet and did not merit that praise.
Hussaini had already penned some critical works and decided to defend Urdu poetry. The result was this book that has now been published because of Dr Anwaar Ahmed’s efforts who assigned Shakeel Hussain Syed, one of his students, the job of editing and annotating it. Completed as an MPhil dissertation under the supervision of Dr Rubeena Tareen, the annotated version has put up a remarkable defence for Urdu poetry keeping in mind the objections raised not only by Kaleemuddin Ahmed but other critics as well.
Urdu mein taraqqi pasand tanqeed: Ambreen Haseeb Amber is among those young women poets of Urdu who are destined to leave their mark. But she is a serious scholar too. Her research dissertation titled Urdu mein taraqqi pasand tanqeed ka tehqeeqi mutal’a on which the University of Karachi conferred a PhD has now been published by the ATUP. The book is a comprehensive study of the progressive critics of Urdu right from beginning to the present day. Divided into six chapters, the book critically evaluates the critical works and critical views of Urdu’s progressive critics along with the historical and literary background. With the publication of the book, now Amber has joined the ranks of Urdu’s rising researchers as well.
Ada Jafri bahaisiyet-i-shaer-o-nasr nigar: Ada Jafri (1924-2015), often dubbed as the first lady of the modern Urdu literature, was a woman poet of Urdu rightly credited with not only setting new trends in Urdu poetry but showing the way to the young female poets of her times and the generations of female poets that followed. She was a prose writer too and her autobiography Jo rahi so be khabari rahi was received with much enthusiasm and awe in the literary circles. Her life and works were made the topic of research by Nargis Bano and she was awarded a PhD for this work. The dissertation, now published by the ATUP, has five chapters and discusses the life and works of Ada Jafri.
Navaadir-i-Anjuman: ATUP’s library is a virtual treasure-trove for scholars as it has thousands of rare books. Prof Dr Aslam Farrukhi (1923-2016) loved to browse this library and regularly wrote research articles on the rare tomes he found there. These articles introducing the rare works, their authors and the importance of the works along with the background were published in Qaumi zaban. Dr Yasmeen Sultana Farooqi, another young female scholar, has edited and annotated these invaluable articles in book form now. The articles discuss some classical works as well as some rare tomes preserved at the ATUP, such as, a rare copy of Divan-i-Vali, the first edition of Kulliyaat-i-Mir Taqi Mir published in 1811 and Divan of Alexander Heatherly Azad, a European poet of Urdu and a disciple of Ghalib. The book is packed with pieces of some rare literary information.
Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2017
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