“Revisiting Sir Syed in the Contemporary World”

The person who proved that privileges or hardships do not matter if one is determined to bring reform in

the society which is of revolutionary nature; the life of that person is relevant to be taught in the

contemporary world, especially when the nation is facing the thorns of communalism and disunity.

Born in a respectable family, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was a privileged child who spent his childhood in

the mansion of his maternal grandfather Khwaja Farid, and whose family had a favorable relation with the

Mughals. Never faced with any social or financial hardship, one may expect the person to be carefree and

devoid of any concern towards the outside world, but that what makes Sir Syed Ahmed Khan an eminent

personality who despite of having a fulfilling juvenility felt the obligation of reducing the hardships from

the life of his community people who were decaying with each passing day with the fall of Mughal

Empire and the rise of Colonialism. The sense of duty and commitment did not arose in a day but was just

the fruit of what was reaped by his parentage, in which the role of his mother Aziz-Un-Nisa was of utmost

importance, who was more inclined towards the upbringing of Sir Syed than his father. There are

numerous instances which throws light on how the mother disciplined Sir Syed and how fundamental her

role was, in making Sir Syed a benevolent, liberal minded and reformist personality.

Once when Sir Syed slapped his servant, his mother turned him out of the house until he apologized to the

servant, such instances made Sir Syed what he was in the later years and paying tribute to his mother, Sir

Syed said –

“A good mother is better than thousands of teachers”

Thus the first thing that makes revisiting Sir Syed relevant in the contemporary world is nonetheless the

fact that no matter what our lineage is, no matter how much riches shower on the family, a good
upbringing is the fundamental root of what the person becomes in his adulthood and the thorny lessons of

childhood will ultimately bloom in the later years.

Polished in various subjects like mathematics and Persian, Sir Syed in his youth found an inclination

towards famous poets like Ghalib and Azurda and the knowledge derived out of the same incorporated

the qualities of both literature and science within him that he continued studying and pursuing by himself

even after his formal education got completed but the sudden demise of his father left the family in utter

grief and at the young age of twenty one, Sir Syed joined East India Company to support his family as the

pension from the ruins of Mughal Empire wasn’t suffice for them but none of the sudden hardship

lowered the commitment of Sir Syed to study and learn along with the Government Service as Munsif and

in 1840 he wrote a booklet Jam-i-Jum tracing the history of the Mughal Emperors from Timur to

Bahadur Shah Zafar. When Government made it mandatory to qualify exam for being competent for all

government appointments, Sir Syed thereafter published a book- Intikhab-al- Akhawain (‘Selected by

Two Brothers’) which proved profitable for aspirants. His capability as a Munsif was now well known

and in 1842 he was honored with the title of Jawwad-ud-Daula Arif-e-Jung by Emperor Bahadur Shah

Zafar.

It is pertinent to mention that where even today pursuing the love of literature and science together is

considered as taboo, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan not only continued to study both but enlightened the world by

publishing books on totally different genres which proves that learning is not bound by any specific field

rather it is a love to gain knowledge, a craving to know more and an act of scholar to share the same with

the world.

The turning point that levelled the reformist personality within Sir Syed Ahmed Khan came in 1847

where he witnessed the mayhem of Muslims who were innocent and not involved in the mutiny, the vivid

distrust and accusation on Muslims whose conservative ideas left them far behind the other communities

were reduced to the lowest ebb of deterioration.

As reported by Durbin, a Persian daily, the condition of Muslims after 1857 was nothing but defenseless

“All sorts of employment, great and small, are being gradually snatched away from the Mohammadans,

and bestowed on men of other races…The Government is bound to look upon all classes of its subjects

with an equal eye, yet the time has now come when it publicly singles out the Mohammadans in the

Gazette for exclusion from official posts. Recently, when several vacancies occurred in the office of the

Sunderbans Commissioner, that official in advertising them in the Government Gazette stated that the

appointments would be given to none but Hindus. In short, the Mohammadans have now sunk so low that

even when qualified for Government notifications, nobody takes any notice of their helpless condition,

and the higher authorities do not deign to acknowledge their existence.’’

Soon after the revolt, the Government relied on false rumors which mostly attacked Muslims loyalty and

the long standing resistance of Muslims of not coming out of their conservative shells to adopt Western

education or avail facilities provided by the Government did nothing good rather added butter oil to

burning flame, therefore to persuade the Government, Sir Syed in 1860 wrote The Loyal Mohammadans

of India whose main objective was to reject the rumors and accusations of disloyalty against the Muslims

which invited a lot of criticism and reformers like Raja Jai Krishan Das suspected him to be communal

but in later years he became one of the closest friend of Sir Syed and after about twenty years he said-

“When Sir Sayyid started his journal The Loyal Mohammadans of India, some of its sentences gave the

impression that Sayyid Ahmad Khan was a fanatic who had no sympathy for Hindus….I went to the relief

centre and met Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan whom I had not seen before. I referred to sentences which had

given me the impression of his being a fanatic. He apologized and confessed that it was due to slip of pen.

This was, however, a polite reply. But the affection and sympathy with which he was behaving with men

of all religions and all castes made my heart absolutely clean towards him. I was in fact struck with

wonder when I found what a noble soul he was. It was on that day I established friendship with him,

which went on increasing every day.’’

Sir Syed Ahmed Khan soon thereafter wrote Asbab-i-Bhagwat-i-Hind (Causes of the Indian Revolt)

which highlighted the ignorance and misapprehension on the part of the people about the intention of the

Government besides other reasons, was a thought provoking brochure which consequently led to the Act

of 1861 but due to the deep rooted prejudice against Muslims, no Muslim was called up in the Legislative

Council, thus to reduce the misunderstanding between Muslims and Christians, Sir Syed wrote Ta’bin-ul-

kalam (The Mohammedan Commentary on Bible) which showed the striking similarities between both

the religion.

One more instance from the life of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan is of vital importance when it comes to

expressing dissent to someone’s idea or belief. When Sir William Muir, an Orientalist scholar published

his work “The Life of Mahomet”, Sir Syed was deeply hurt by Muir’s interpretation of the Prophet

(PBUH). There was no demand on Sir Syed’s part for burning or banning the book, no incitement to

violence. Instead he responded Muir with his own book titled “Life of Mohammed”, in which he

answered each claim of Muir with reasoning and in a civilized manner.

In contemporary world when blasphemy is an offence and freedom of speech and expression is a

fundamental right, a thin line is hard to draw between them and people often get violent or indulge in mob

activities or unlawful assembly to express their dissent, Sir Syed amidst the environment of hatred and

prejudice opted for a civilized manner to express his dissent which is necessary to be inhibited in the

contemporary world, especially by the youth.

This second phase in the life of Sir Syed which started after the mutiny of 1857 challenged him to analyze

the causes of the mutiny and the diplomatic mind of his proved of a great help in the coming years where

on one hand he did not want revolution but reform in the conditions of Muslims under the British

Government and on the other he used religion to rationalize the minds of Muslims to take up Western

Education for their own upliftment, therefore, as alleged by many that Sir Syed was a staunch supporter
of British did not have the foresightedness to imagine a nation where Muslims shared the same status as

Hindus.

The third and final phase which is commonly called as The Aligarh Movement is the bedrock of the

modern education, a movement of renaissance and as American author Barbara D. Metcalf rightly

described Sir Syed Ahmed Khan - Father of Muslim Intellectual Renaissance.

Though the foundation of Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College (Now known as Aligarh Muslim

University) was laid in 1875, but the seeds of the educational renaissance were sown years ago, when on

July 9, 1864 Sir Syed established the Scientific Society with the object to translate leading English works

of science and philosophy into vernacular languages to acquaint Indians with scientific knowledge.

Colonel Graham who attended the inaugural ceremony of the society said-

“For the first time in the annals of Hindustan has a Mohammedan gentleman, alone and unaided, thought

over and commenced a Society in order to bring the knowledge and literature of the nations of the

Western World within the reach of the immense masses of the people of the Eastern.”

After staying for 17 months in England, the person who returned to India was not just a reformist,

philanthropist but a revolutionist who now not only wanted to impart Western Education to his religion

but also to fight the social evils that were the cause of Muslim degeneration. As Altaf Hussain Ali in his

biography aptly stated about Sir Syed Ahmed Khan that, he saw everything; he ignored the defects of

Western Civilization and picked up its good features. He was acting on Prophets Saying i.e. Take what is

pure and leave what is impure.

To fight the conservatism and obsolete rules in the name of culture, Sir Syed started a paper Tahzib-ul-

Akhlaq (Refinement in Manners) which attacked on social practices which had no place in Islam and

since he went against the very notion of his religion, he provoked a major section of society who called
him apostate and heretic but none of this lowered the zeal of revolution which had just begun and in 1870

he formed a Committee Khwastgar Taraqi-e-Musalmanan-e-Hindustan (The Committee for the Better

Diffusion and Advancement of Learning Amongst the Muslims of India) which invited entries to study

the cause which prevented the Muslims from learning Western Education and as speculated the prime

reasons included the fear of inhibiting immorality and distance from Islam, thus keeping in views the

suggestion, The Mohammadan College Fund Committee was founded to collect funds and the object

proposed was to impart education in English as well as Oriental subjects separately.

The educational scheme was perceived as a grave threat on the religion by many ulemas and orthodox

Muslims that they obtained Fatwa from Mecca declaring Sir Syed Ahmed Khan kafir but Sir Syed knew

how to express dissent and confront dissent in a civilized manner thus he started writing Tafseer-e-Quran

(Commentary of the Quran) which gave rational and liberal interpretation of Quran and slowly and

gradually convinced Ulemas that it will be in the interest of the Muslim community if they leave their

prejudice against the Western Education behind and avail the benefits of the Government schemes.

The allegations of being communal by Hindus and a non-believer by Muslims were proved baseless not

by any action but by every action of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan. In Gurdaspur in 1884, Sir Syed delivered one

of his very famous speech

“O Hindus and Muslims! Do you belong to a country other than India. Don’t you live on this soil and

are you not buried under it or cremated on its ghats. If you live and die on this land, then, bear in mind,

that ‘Hindu’ and ‘Muslim’ is but a religious word; all the Hindus, Muslims and Christians who live in

this country are one nation.”

Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was not deviated from his Islamic teachings as accused by many narrow minded

people, rather his aim was to make his students an epitome of science and theology and to change the

perception that Islam is inconsistent with modernism and he repeatedly said

“Philosophy will be in our right hand and Natural Science in our left; And the crown of ‘There is no God

but Allahand Mohammad is His Prophet’ will adorn our heads.”

The more contemporary accusation on Sir Syed Ahmed Khan is that he supported ‘two-nation theory’, but

this is nothing but one more frivolous allegation, on the contrary Sir Syed Ahmed Khan kept himself and

his ambition of Intellectual Renaissance away from the politics of both Congress and Muslim League. On

the inaugural session of Mohommedan Educational Conference 1886, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan remarked

“I donot agree with those who think that we can make progress by discussing political problems. On the

contaray I believe that education alone can be the source of our progress”

Thus, when one revisits the teachings of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, he will be magnetized by the very nature

and revolution bought by him which witnessed no bloodshed, no violence and one of the very few

revolution done in a civilized manner without deviating from the religious teachings yet at the same time

inculcating the worthy lessons from Western Culture, he proved that change comes from change in

mentality executed in form of action neither by conservatism nor hyper nationalism; dissent if made in a

right way is suffice to bear fruits and fruits take time to grow but one should not stop watering and

become impatient rather he should be ready to face the adverse and worst whenever he goes against the

notion of the society for the better interest of the society.

Though no one can describe the personality of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan in mere words but C.F. Andrews

did justice to shone the light summarily on him

"In Sir Syed Ahmad I saw the

grandeur, the lion like strength, the high ideals the passionate enthusiasm of a

great mind. No Musalman, whom 1 ever met impressed me more by the force

and dignit) of his character, and his commanding intellectual greatness that Sir
 Syed Ahmad. Whenever he went, he naturally took the lead. His personality

demanded it and men instinctively followed him. His very presence and

appearance were commanding. He was a born leader of man"

Today, Aligarh Muslim University is labeled as the laboratory of Indian Pluralism and the first Modernist

Organisation of Islam with Sir Syed Ahmed Khan as its pioneer and to revisit Sir Syed Ahmed Khan in

the contemporary world has become more important when institutions are vulnerable target of different

ideological groups and the very Idea of University is under threat, to revisit Sir Syed Ahmed Khan is not

confined to his educational schemes or teachings but also includes the learning he got in his life at

different phases and how he dealt it like a Reformist, Revolutionist and Renaissance Man.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. https://www.thehindu.com/society/man-of-reason-and-compassion/article19869862.ece

2. https://www.thehindu.com/books/books-authors/sir-syed-ahmad-khan-man-who-knew-

tomorrow/article7770311.ece

3. https://www.dailypioneer.com/2017/columnists/pioneering-hindu-muslim-unity.html

4. http://dspace.wbpublibnet.gov.in:8080/jspui/bitstream/10689/12935/5/Vol%202_Chapter%20

18-20_451-532p.pdf

5. Shan Muhammad, The Aligarh Movement (A Concise Study), Educational Book House,

Aligarh(1999)