Ayoob Qadri’s contribution to biographical research
The knowledge of Hadith consists of two branches: rivayat, or narration of Hadith, and dirayat, or assessing the narration and the narrator. Assessing the authenticity of Hadith includes the names of narrators, their personal character, their intelligence, their aptitude and every minute detail of their entire life so as to ensure that every single person in the chain of narrators of Hadith who is quoted in the wordings of a particular Hadith was an honest, pious and reliable person. Scholars make it sure that a Hadith is free from logical flaws and the narrator’s personal opinion or lack of knowledge has not affected the actual tradition. They also ensure that an unusual event or tradition is supported by more contemporary and stronger evidence and the vagaries of time have not changed the actual tradition.
These rules demanded of the researchers that the biographical details of each and every person, by whom a chain of narrators is formed in quoting a Hadith, shall be thoroughly investigated and recorded carefully, preparing a kind of database of about 500,000 persons. This gigantic task was accomplished by the scholars of Islamic sciences, some of whom spent their entire lives researching the subject. The monumental database, prepared in an era without electricity or even basic amenities, let alone computers, is known as Ilm-i-asma-ur-rijaal, or the science of names of persons. Shibli Naumani has described some of these principles in the introduction to his books Seert-un-Nabi and Al-Farooq. For lack of space I cannot go into the details of these principles, but in a nutshell we can say that the basic rules applied in authenticating Hadith were adopted by the west and even today the methodology of educational research applies many of them to academic research, especially in PhD programmes.
The idea of recording the biographical details of important persons drew the scholars of later eras too and the practice continued.
Dr Qadri was an eminent scholar, historian, compiler and translator. But basically, he was a researcher. All his works are stamped with a high standard of research peculiar to him. Aside from biographical research, he was an authority on the subcontinent’s Islamic history and religious and Islamic movements. Spending almost his entire life on research, he not only specialised in editing, annotating and translating rare and abstruse books, but he also chose such topics for research that were generally obscure and beyond the reach of other scholars.
Born in Aanwla, a small town in Bareli district, on July 28, 1926, Ayoob Qadri learnt Persian from his father, Moulvi Mashiyatullah Qadri, and Arabic from Hakeem Abdul Ghafoor, a well-known scholar and saint of his native town. Before migrating to Pakistan with his father in 1950, Qadri Sahib had passed his intermediate from Badayoon, where his maternal grandparents lived. In Pakistan, he initially stayed in Dadu, Sindh, before coming to Karachi and joining a government department. In 1956, he graduated from Karachi’s Urdu College and joined the Pakistan Historical Society as a research officer and the following year he was introduced to the scholastic world through his first book Maulana Faiz Ahmed Badayooni. Then his other books that made the scholars take notice of him were brought out which included Ilm-o-amal, or Waqae Abdul Qadir Khani, published in two volumes with valuable annotations and the other was a translation of Moulvi Abdur Rahman Ali’s famous Tazkira-i-Ulama-i-Hind with a detailed introduction and invaluable annotations. Dr Qadri, says Dr Moinuddin Aqeel, made these important books more valuable and more useful with his meticulous notes.
In 1962, Qadri Sahib did his master’s in Urdu from the University of Karachi and joined Urdu College as a lecturer. Joining the Urdu College increased his sphere of academic and research works all the more and he wrote some extremely valuable books, including ‘Makhdoom Jahaniyan Jahan Gasht’, ‘Maulana Muhammad Ahsan Nanautvi’, ‘Arbab-i-Fazl-o-kamal’ (lives of luminaries of Bareli), ‘Tableeghi jamaat ka tareekhi jaeza’ and some works on the 1857 war of independence.
He translated Shah Waliullah’s ‘Majmooa-e-wasaya-e-arba’, Shahnawaz Khan’s ‘Maasar-ul-Umara’, Pasroori’s ‘Farhat-un-Nazreen’ and Jamali’s ‘Sair-ul-Aarifeen’. In addition, he edited and annotated ‘Tawareekh-i-Ajeeb’ (known as ‘Kala paani’), ‘Ahd-i-Bangash ki siyasi, ilmi aur saqafati tareekh’, ‘Maqalat-i-Yaum-i-Alamgeer,’ ‘Tazkira-i-Noori’ and ‘Jang nama-i-Asif-ud-daula aur nawab Rampur’. As if these were not enough, he co-authored, in his brief lifespan of 57 years, ‘Kahtt-o-khattati’, ‘Aligarh tehreek aur qaumi nazmen’ and ‘Nuqoosh-e-seerat’, not to mention scores of scholarly articles and research papers which were important contributions to literary and research journals. It is of vital importance to collect all his articles in book form, though one such collection titled ‘Ghalib aur asr-i-Ghalib’ had appeared in 1982.
Though getting a piece of paper known as ‘doctoral degree’ is nothing more than a formality for a scholar of Qadri Sahib’s stature, he did get one in 1980 and his dissertation ‘Urdu nasr ke irteqa mein ulama ka hissa’ was published posthumously. An incurable collector of books since early childhood, Ayoob Qadri’s personal collection boasted thousands of rare books and hundreds of manuscripts.
Qadri sahib epitomised the golden principle of ‘simple living and high thinking’. He reminded one of the scholars of olden times who selflessly spent their lives in pursuit of knowledge.
On November 25, 1983, this irreplaceable scholar died in a road accident in Karachi.
drraufparekh@yahoo.com
Gearing up, again, for self-rule
Responding to a writ petition last week, the Islamabad High Court ordered the relevant ministries to come up with legislation for local government in the federal capital territory within 15 days.
Will the latest efforts to introduce self-rule in federal bureaucracy-controlled Islamabad succeed this time when previous attempts have not?
Six years ago in November 2002 - after the first local government elections held nationally in phases between 2000-2001 - the then President of Pakistan had promulgated the Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government Ordinance.
The ordinance even contained a provision (Section 158) stipulating a transitional timeframe for the setting up of the local government system, i.e., by June 30, 2003, but the ordinance soon lapsed into oblivion.
In 2005, the year that the second local government elections were held nationally, another move was made towards introducing local government in Islamabad when the latter was divided into 40 union councils - 20 urban and 20 rural.
But the union council system was never implemented. The jurisdiction of the 20 union councils in the rural areas was apparently delineated and named from number 1 to 20 after a main place in the respective localities, but in the urban areas, the jurisdiction of the UCs was apparently never finalised nor named.
The delay in introducing self-government in Islamabad is due in large part to differences among the key stakeholders over the evolvement of what the National Reconstruction Bureau in 2001 called a “suitable framework” because of the unique “constitutional and legal” situation of the capital territory.
Any “suitable framework” would necessarily have to take into account the fact that capital cities in general, being administrative centres, have very different functions and role in the historical development of any nation.
Even the local government systems of national capital cities in many developed countries with established political systems face challenges and the need of transformation. The past few decades have seen considerable changes in the functions of many national capital cities and these changes are continuing.
In many instances, the self-government systems in national capital cities are not only usually the last to develop in the respective countries, they are also usually different - less independent - than the local or state government systems in the rest of the country. Many though are gradually moving towards fully-fledged self-government or state- or province-hood.
For example, Washington, America’s national capital, is located within a special federal territory known as the District of Columbia (DC), which unlike the rest of the 50 sovereign US states, is under the direct authority of the US Congress.
Self-government to the district was delegated under the District of Columbia Home Rule Act 1973 to a 13-member elected city council - headed by a chairman - which effectively also has the powers given to county or state governments in the US. The District’s Home Rule Act also provided for an elected mayor.
But under the Act, Congress reviews all legislation passed by the council before it can become law and retains authority over the district’s budget. Also, the president appoints the district’s judges. Because of these and other limitations on local government, many citizens of the district continue to lobby for the authority held by all 50 states.
The Australian capital territory, which contains Australia’s national capital, Canberra, also does not have the full legislative independence of the other Australian states despite becoming self-governing in the late 1980s.
The ACT is governed by a 17-member unicameral parliament or legislative assembly and headed by a chief minister, but in accordance with the Australian Capital Territory (Self-government) Act 1988, the Australian national government can overrule decisions by ACT’s legislative assembly.
Similarly, India’s national capital territory of Delhi, established as a federally-administered union territory in 1956, was given a legislative assembly headed by an elected chief minister with a council of elected ministers in 1991.
However, while municipal control in the NCT and services like transport are handled by the locally-elected government, major portfolios like police and administration are still directly under the control of the central government.
It has taken Delhi over three decades to transition to this current stage of self-government, although the transition timeframe was supposed to be only ten years under the Delhi Administration Act 1964. Under this Act, Delhi had a directly elected legislative branch but the president of India under the advice of the prime minister nominated all members of Delhi’s executive council, which was headed by a chief minister.
Delhi is supposed to become a fully-fledged state eventually - which major Indian political parties have been advocating - but the process to establish this has not moved as quickly as some want it to. The Delhi example was reportedly considered as a model for Islamabad in 2001.
Whether or not Islamabad’s residents will be able to join the rest of the country in electing their own local government next year remains to be seen. What they have seen so far is their city losing out to Karachi whose city nazim was recently chosen as the second-best mayor in the world in 2008 by a notable foreign magazine.