'Urdu is linguistic Taj Mahal of India'

Mohammed Wajihuddin, May 1, 2011, 03.05am IST

Meri is baat se sab log hum aahang bhi honge...

Jahan payenge Urdu ko wahan Narang bhi honge...

(Everybody will concur with me/Wherever they will find Urdu, there will be a Narang too)

— Urdu poet Chandrabhan Khayal

Though many of his peers have grudgingly come to accept that Urdu is essentially spoken by Muslims today, Professor Gopi Chand Narang still fights the good fight. Language, he tirelessly intones, has no religion, Urdu belongs neither to Muslim nor Hindu and it will survive so long as India remains multicultural.

Narang's steadfast belief is partly based on Urdu's role in India's freedom struggle. For a start, it gave us the slogan "Inquilab Zindabad" and contributed to our famed Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb or composite culture. Unsurprisingly, the Delhi Urdu Academy acknowledges Narang's role in giving Urdu a broad contextual placement, rather than a religious one.

Just weeks ago, it gave him the Bahadur Shah Zafar Award. Akhtarul Wasey, vice-chairman of the Academy, says it was well deserved because the Award is named after the last Mughal emperor, who symbolized India's secular, syncretic ethos.

Fortunately, Narang does not share yet another of the deposed poet-emperor's traits – melancholy. Instead, he is optimistic about the future of Urdu and is so well known as an ambassador for it that Hindi writer Kamleshwar once said every language needed a Narang.

"There are three hallmarks of the Mughal era — the Taj Mahal, Ghalib's poetry, and Urdu. A common spirit of aesthetic excellence and elegance runs through all three. Although every language is beautiful, Urdu's sophistication and charm captivate everyone. That's why I call Urdu India's linguistic Taj Mahal," explains the 82-year-old scholar-critic.

To those who call Urdu a videshi language, he retorts: "It is a hybrid, but Urdu's base is indigenous and its essence lies in Indian soil." He warns against continuing to deny Urdu its rightful place in the secular education system. It might then be pushed into the madrassas and will lose its secular character, he laments.

Narang is severe when asked about the great language paradox — Urdu couplets are quoted by everyone, including politicians, but almost no one is prepared to champion it otherwise. Is Urdu being punished for its apparent association with the Muslim community? Narang says, "If Urdu is the language of the Muslims, then how come non-Muslim writer-poets like Gulzar, Pavan K Varma, Sheen Kaaf Nizam (Shiv Kumar), Chandrabhan Khayal and Jayant Parmar are thriving?"

Born in Baluchistan, Narang is a partition refugee who insisted on studying Urdu rather than agricultural science, as his father wanted him to. Later in life, Delhi's Jamia Millia proved to be the perfect lab for Narang and he even served as acting vice-chancellor for a year.

Source: Times of India , May 01st, 2011

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com
picture courtesy: http://www.gopichandnarang.com