IDEOLOGICAL INFLUENCES ON ABUL KALAM AZAD

Author(s): Qazi Mohd. Jamshed

Source: Proceedings of the Indian History Congress , 2010-2011, Vol. 71 (2010-2011), pp.
662-676
Published by: Indian History Congress

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44147535

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 IDEOLOGICAL INFLUENCES ON ABUL
KALAM AZAD
Qazi Mohd. Jamshed

Maulana Azad was essentially an erudite scholar, enjoying pageants of

thought, ego-centric, seclusion loving and retiring in nature.1 He was
an unusual type of politician. He was, therefore, essentially the scholar
whom circumstances had forced into a life of action. He used to say, "I
do not go after the tumult of political life, political commotions
themselves searched me out.2" We find much contradiction between a
poet, scholar, artist and an erudite politician of which Azad was a fine
exhibition. He was a complex and often contradictory figure. He fully
realized this contradiction and admitted in his Magnum opus Tarjuman-
ul-Quran.3 He represented a fine blending of intellectual exercises and
a liberal political ideology. While doing so, he traversed an arduous
path of evolution. His religious thought co-existed with his political
philosophy. In the realm of religion, Azad symbolized theological
creativity, where he laid emphasis on his own understanding of the
Quran and its basic philosophy4. In politics too, he evolved his own
thoughts. But his political thought, more than the religious, went through
an evolutionary process before they acquired an enduring shape during
the course of political maturity. However, in the process of the evolution
of his ideas, religious as well as political, Azad maintained a remarkable
continuity. In the process cf a continuous evolutionary journey, Azad
was able to resolve many contradictions which were as much the result
of his own efforts as that of the political process he had become an
integral part of.

During the course of his formal education, Azad's study of literary

journals and books on subjects had raised doubts in his mind, led him
to think independently and question some of the basic premises behind
the beliefs and practices he had been brought up with. He wanted to
solve them through his studies of different religions and modern
Philosophy and of some branches of science available in Urdu and
Arabic translations. But, instead of providing any remedy to his
spiritual-intellectual agony, they further increased his doubts and
dissatisfaction in regard to religion and religious beliefs.5 It was at this
stage of mental crisis and almost disbelief that Azad suddenly found a
new world before him and that was the writings of Sir Sayyid Ahmad
Khan which had greatly influenced his religious and intellectual life.6
Sir Sayyid showed him that the reality of Islam was different from
what his ancestors had believed it to be. This freed Azad from the

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 Modem India 663

fetters of his parental religious

describe the extent of his int
worshipped him like an idol.
Mujtahid-i-mutlaq (the absolute
debt that he owed to him. He d
religious development as mujtah
juristic School).8 He believed tha
moral and spiritual developmen
taqlid.9 He felt that the notion
shaken by the new way opened
interpretation of Islam.10 But
mind. Being extremely curious a
be something beyond Sayyid'
escaped to another. The irony o
that men can never forsake taq
taqlid, he began in fact, to adop
He started questioning those as
not challenge. Thus Azad's intell
of insatiable curiosity where
experience the spiritual agony
faith.12 Azad says that these eight
of great mental tension for h
existence of God were expresse
Azad's death. Azad at last achieved the deliverance from darkness and
the hangover was over13. When Azad was tired of his quest for truth
and courage failed him, suddenly the curtain of darkness was parted
and he saw the face of the lost truth unveiled before him. This event of
unveiling of the truth before Azad took place sometimes at the end of
1909 or early in 1910, the year when he wrote the famous essay, Sarmad,
the Martyr.14
This essay depicted the non-conformist Sufi mainly as a symbol of
revolt against the established authority of traditional religious, juristic
and political institutions, which was one of the main features of Azad's
intellectual and moral development. Sarmad provided him with an
opportunity to condemn the narrow minded worldly Ulema who were
a class by themselves and whom Azad never spared and lost no
opportunity to criticize with bitter sarcasm. It reflected Maulana Azad's
liberal and bold outlook. His choice to deliberate and write on a poet
who did not succumb to unreasonable pressure from Mullahs reflected
a lot of Maulana's personality. Azad was influenced by Sarmad's
pluralistic approach to humanity and his spirit of toleration and co-
existence-15. Azad seemed to have not been reconciled to Aurangzeb's
inflexible and inassimilable orthodoxy. These aspects of Sarmad

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664 ///CV Proceedings , 71st Session, 2010-11

continued to guide Azad in his quest for supreme Reality and kindled
his faith in tolerance and co-existence. Azad expressed his preference
for Dara Shikoh's conviction that, in the search for the ultimate truth,
both mosque and temple can validly mediate the light which is one,
even if there are many candles16. It later guided him in his quest to
make a realistic and courageous call to share with people of different
religious background in the construction of a pluralistic- national as
well as worldwide- community. The importance lays not so much in
what it has to say about Sarmad but rather in what it reveals about
Azad's deeper convictions and ultimate preferences at a time when he
had just found his way back to religious faith after his period of search
and even of darkness and despair.
It has been observed by some writers that Azad's commentary on
Sarmad reveals his commitment to the Sufi approach to Islamic faith
and practice and that it was a continuous process17. But it was not so. It
is true that there was always a mystic element in his search for truth
and thereafter in his spiritual growth. But Sarmad, it should be kept in
mind, could not be the true representative of that element in him.
Moreover in Azad's letter of June 1910 to one Mulla Wahidi, the then
assistant editor of Nizam-ul- Mashaikh, and his response to a query
from Maulana Abdur Rehman Kashmiri in 1 945 and again in September
1957, one finds him unequivocally true to his Salafi and not Sufi
approach to Islamic belief and practice. Azad's letter to Mulla Wahidi
shows how casually the essay on Sarmad was written. It was only on
the insistent persuasion of Khawaja Hasan Nizami, the chief editor of
the Nizam-ul- Mashaikh that Azad wrote a review of the Sarmad. His
utterances that "he neither has time nor consider it so important as to
spare some more time for Sarmad" and that "there are hundreds of
people of 'Ijtihad and Tajdiď why waste time on Sarmad and others
like him"18 are ample indications that whatever views he had expressed
on Sarmad were nothing but the reflections of the transitory stages in
the evolution of his political and religious views. Azad had just passed
through the pangs of some tragic event when he was asked to write on
Sarmad. He, therefore, symbolized the love story of Sarmad with his
own recent experience of madness of love and self forgetfulness and
depicted the love story of Sarmad as a symbol of a journey from the
unreal to the real19. It led him to emotionally identify his agony with
that of Sarmad. This might have been one of the stimulants to write on
Sarmad. Written before the political and journalistic commitment of
al-Hilal, Sarmad, therefore, could not be the true representative of
Azad's religious world view20. In the very first issue of al-Hilal21 we
find clear indications of Azad's Salafi approach to Islamic faith and
practice. His Salafi approach is much pronounced and stronger in his

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 Modem India 665

reference to the Quranic injunc

munkar and the theme of Jihad
passionate terms in the forcefu
Azad during the al-Hilal days. H
ma'ruf were alternatively the s
violent, in the way of God woul
Moreover, much before his adumberance on 'Sarmaď Azad was a
completely changed person in respect of his being under the influence
of the Salafiyah, i.e., the group of reformers in the Arab world who
drew inspiration from the Salaf, mainly through the writings of Ibn
Taimiyya, in their zeal to bring about a truly Islamic renaissance in the
contemporary world of Islam. The accounts of Louis Massignon further
confirm that Azad had met and developed contact with the Alusi family
of Baghdad, which was the defender of Ibn Taimiyya and "took part in
the Salafl movements for the reform of the Muslim community as a
whole."23 This is corroborated by Azad himself in his letter to Nawab
Sadr Yar Jang, dated September 29, 1940, in Karwan-i-Khiyal. In
Kahani also Azad mentions Allama Alusi Shahabuddin and his
commentary on the Quran, Ruh al- Ma'ani which, to a certain extent,
reflects his inclination towards the Salafi viewpoint24. In his Tazkirah
Azad is all praise for Ibn Taimiyya wherein he emerges as his greatest
hero. The other, Mahaddithin like Ahmad Ibn Hanbal, Ibn Jauzi,
including Taimiyya and others found prominent place and their life
and achievement were depicted as models of life long vocation, with
strong determination, sacrifice and sufferings, to uphold the cause of
Islamic faith and practice as adumbrated in the Quran and Hadith25.
Thus one can safely conclude that whatever Sufi strand reflected in
Sarmad, it was nothing but a transitory period in the evolution of his
religious and political thinking and was not a continuous process.
In the evolution of his political and religious ideas, the teaching of
Ibn Taimiyyah had a profound influence. In both Tazkira and Kahani
Azad is all praise for Ibn Taimiyya where he emerged as his greatest
hero26. Taimiyya stood for jehad in political and ittehad in intellectual
life. Maulan azad propagated both of them. He believed that without
infusing a new spirit of Ijtihad as propagated by the Imam, and giving
up rigid adherence to school of law, the Muslims' social and intellectual
life could not be revitalized. He believed that Islamic society declined
when the door of Ijtihad was closed. Of course he did not go to the
extent that ahl-hadith or other groups went in their denunciation of
taqlid of the schools of Islamic law, but he clearly and categorically
emphasized recourse to the original sources of Muslim law - the Quran
and the Sunnah27. Unlike the Arab and Indian Muslim reformers of the
19th century28. Azad's interest has not confined only to the religious

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666 IHC: Proceedings, 71st Session , 2010-11

aspects of Ibn Taimiyyah teachings. He presented Ibn Taimiyyah in

the totality of his wholesome personality and intellectual and political
efforts to regenerate the Muslim society of the day. He was also
influenced by his ideas of reform of the Ulema of his time and his
stand for continued resistance to the Mongol domination of Muslim
lands. Azad took inspiration from him in his struggle against the British
domination of the country. He prompted Ulema to reform themselves
and offer resistance to alien rule in India and to all such elements in
the Muslim society as represented the pro-British Aligarh school of
thought in politics and the pro-west orientation in matters of culture
and social and intellectual behavior29. Ibn Taimiyya had advised
Muslims of the day to organize their life round the authority of an
Imam, who should lead them in their struggle for liberation. The Darul
Irshad and the Hizbullah enunciated by Azad were practical expression
of this spirit of jihad imbibed from Ibn Taimiyya30. During the editorship
of the Vakil he came into contact with the Amritsar group of hadith
ulema of the time, who took great pains to popularize Ibn Taimiyya's
teachings in favour of ijtihad, and against blind taqlid31. This might
have certainly contributed to his growing appreciation of Ibn Taimiyya's
teachings with which he had already become familiar through his studies
of the learned works of the Ulema, and the writings of al-Manar group
of the salafis in Egypt and Syria. Thus it was not Shibli's essay on
"Allama IbnTaimiyya Harrani"32 which inspired Azad to think and act
in the similar fashion but his acquaintance with the writings of the al-
Manar group of the salafis in Egypt and Syria. However, in eulogizing
the political aspect of his message, impact of the enduring intellectual
relationship with Shibli cannot be ruled out.
Perhaps, the thing that was uppermost in his mind was the future
of Islam and ways and means of ameliorating the conditions of his co-
religionists. The first effect of Sir Sayyid Ahmad's writings was to
stimulate this desire to serve the community. Sir Sayyid's writings had
aroused Azad 's interest in social reforms and convinced him that no
social and intellectual development of the Muslim community could
be possible without acquiring western learning and knowledge of the
science. Azad also owed to Sayyid Ahmad Khan his quest for modern
knowledge as a key for emancipating Muslim society from the fetters
of bigotry, superstition and obsolete customs.16 With these objectives
in mind Azad started his33 own literary journal, Lisan-ul-Sidq. It
reflected his deep commitment to Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan's ideas of
social and educational reforms. In many ways Azad's Lisan-ul-Sidq
carried Sayyid Ahmad Khan's echoes. The articles in Lisan-ul-Sidq
reflected Azad's progressive and modern views on the subject of
education which he believed was the key to social reforms. He was

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 Modem India 667

concerned about disseminating

and in this he wanted Urdu to
was on translation in Urdu th
Bacon, Newton and Darwin. He
among the readers.34 A careful st
issue and the material published
that Azad was fully conscious of
play in the social and education
Sayyid Ahmad Khan and others
century. In the first and the la
detail lauded the ideas of refor
Abduh and Jamaluddin Afghan
progressive views about religi
however, that it was only Sir
vanguard of the nineteenth centu
Douglas is wrong in his commen
and Afghani in Lisan-ul-Sidq w
had met Abduh during his Egy
his enlightened thought which he
Douglas contradicts himself by
regularly and had also read Abd
does refer to Shibli in his note on
Sidq but this in no way proves
Afghani for the first time from
Azad knew and was already infl
of modern Egypt. In Kahani, he
influence that his reading of a
youth which, as he candidly acc
him.39

Although Lisan-ul-Sidq did not publish anything political in it, yet

being a political man Azad could not resist him from discussing some
political issues - national as well as international political. In the
January issue of 1904, commenting on the nature and character of the
Indian National Congress Azad 's perception was that the Congress was
a Hindu organization instead of a national one as it falsely claimed to
be.40 This view of Azad was in perfect accord with Sir Sayyid's stand
but a few months later he wrote a piece, titled as 'Indian National
Congress', announcing that its session 1904 would be held in Bombay
and commenting favourably and with best wishes on the fact that the
said Congress session would be presided over by Ferozshah Mehta,
who was a Parsi.41 In the April-May 1904 issue of the journal he was
seen propagating Ittihad (unity) and forging bonds of unity amongst
the communities (Qaum) of the country as the aims and objectives of

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668 ÍHC: Proceedings, 71st Session, 2010-11

the journal, "To weaken this bond of unity would be against the law of
nature and would ultimately result, as in the case of other nations, in
the total retrogression of the country."42 This had undoubtedly some
political implications, and reminds one of his later utterances and
writings on the subject of Hindu-Muslim unity. Then, Azad could not
remain unaffected by the general jubilant excitement over Japan's
victory in the Russo-Japanese war43 and the uproarious Swadeshi
agitations against the Partition of Bengal in 1905 in Calcutta and other
places in Bengal. These entire new trends in Azad's politics show that
though still under the influence of Sir Sayyid's intellectualism, Azad
was gradually getting disillusioned with his mentor's policy of loyalty
towards British imperialism and could not remain contented any more
with a purely academic journal. It was, therefore, actually not the
paucity of funds that led to the closure of Lisan-ul-Sidq, but it could be
the awakened political consciousness of his that chilled his interest in
the journal.44 By that time a radical change were taking place in the
political view of Azad. His extra-textual reading of history and
philosophy as well as his knowledge, through Arabic newspapers, like
al-Manar and Risalah-al-Tawhid, of the political activities of the
nationalist groups of the Muslim world convinced him that no political
struggle would be successful in India unless it was launched jointly by
the Hindus and the Muslims.45 However, Azad's claim of his contact
with the revolutionaries has met with some skepticism from modern
writers. Rajat Ray, in his well-researched paper suggests that Azad did
become involved with the fringe of the extremist revolutionary
movement. But he doubts if he ever penetrated beyond the fringe.46
Ray also questions Shyam Sunder Chakravarthy's status as a
revolutionary. Douglas closely follow Ray.30Before discussing these
revolutionary connections of Azad, it would be better to start with
Shyam Sunder Chakravarthy, the main claimed contact of Azad among
the revolutionaries. Shyam Sunder Chakravarthy was very active in
the anti-Partition Movement in Bengal. He was a member of the
revolutionary Terrorist organization, the Anushilan Samiti. He was
arrested in 1908 and deported to Burma. On return from there in 1910,
he took to nationalist journalism. It is significant that two years later,
Azad pursued the same course through the establishment of al-Hilal.
Chakravarthy was arrested again in 1914 and released in 1919. His
arrest in 1914 may be attributed to his extremist activities which the
British Government in India was not willing to allow during the First
World War. On being released in 1919, Chakravarthy came under the
spell of Gandhi.31 Chakravarthy and Azad seem to have become friends
and passed their days in jail together during the Khilafat- Non-
Cooperation Movement.32 Here, the biographical account of

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 Modem India 669

Chakravarthy may appear disjoin

that Azad and Chakravarthy sha
anti-Partition Movement.

Evidence of Azad 's involvement in revolutionary activities outside

Bengal has now come to light. Intelligence Branch records of the
National Archives, Calcutta, 1913 (Newspaper, al-Hilal) largely
supports Azad 's revolutionary activities in Punjab during 1907-08 where
he was in close contact with the extremists including Amba Prasad and
Sufi Ajit Singh. The Intelligence reports state that "Azad had been
active in the Punjab during 1907-08 (He) was an active helper of the
extremist Party in Lahore and had contact with Amba Prasad, Sufi Ajit
Singh and other Punjab extremists".33 An upcountry informer reported
to the Criminal Intelligence office in Simla; "He (Azad) is a staunch
advocate of Swaraj, and says that the Muhammadans should undergo
every possible trouble and sacrifice in order to cultivate friendly
relations with the Hindus".34 This also proves that right from the very
beginning Hindu-Muslim unity was one of the essentials of his political
creed.

It was in the context of this indigenous revolutionary background

on which Azad first drew on the Wahhabis and the Bengal militants.
His later contacts with Egyptian and Turkish revolutionaries, when he
visited the West Asia, confirmed, they did not ignite his nationalist
flavour. This is what Azad himself says: "Contact with these Arab and
Turk revolutionaries confirmed my pol The official records of the
Intelligence Branch of the Bengal Police suggest that after his return
from Ranchi, Azad vigorously started reactivating his revolutionary
plan. He gradually made this secret society broad based and inter-
communal. Two revolutionary leaders of the Jugantar party, Santosh
Mitra and Bipin Ganguly are reported to have joined his party.41 During
this period he also appears to have used terrorist methods for achieving
the desired end. One of his close associates, Qutbuddin Ahmad, who
had worked with him as the manager of al-Hilal, was reported to have
. founded in 1 92 1 , Anjuman-i-Khansaman, a Union of Cooks and Butlers
working in English households. With their connivance he had hatched
up a more deadly plan of assassinating the English by smuggling
revolutionaries in European clubs and hotels. The police suspected that
Azad was behind the plan, but could not prove it.42This phase of Azad's
life, however, is shrouded in mystery. We do not have any other
independent evidence to connect Azad with what the police was
reporting about him. Assuming that he was conspiring with
revolutionary terrorists, he does not seem to have remained there for
long either. He soon diverted his energies to organizing the Muslims
for the liberation.

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670 IHC: Proceedings, 71st Session, 2010-11

There has been a tendency amongst Pakistani historians and some

non-Muslim historians to dub him Pan-Islamist during 1912 and 1922.
It is this fundamental question, which Ziya-ul-Hasan Faruqi addressed
in his biography of Azad.43 He provided a brilliant exposition to the
problem of continuity versus change in Azad's outlook on Islam and
his views on the participation of Muslims in the struggle for India's
political freedom. He made a successful attempt to set right the common
error in the tendency to study Azad by dividing his public life into two
parts, pre 1920 and post 1920 in so far as his political and to some
extent even his religious ideas were concerned. He maintained that the
political ideals cherished and advocated by him in al-Hilal impeccably
remained close to his heart till the last moment of his life. Ziya-ul-
Hasan Faruqi is critical of the historians like I.H. Qureshi and Peter
Hardy for stressing the radical change in Azad from advocating Muslim
nationalism to Indian nationalism or from changing Pan-Islamism to
composite Indian nationhood.44 If we read Azad's writings in the very
first issue of al-Hilal, elaborating his objectives and political message
along with the written statement that he submitted to the magistrate in
January 1922 at the end of the proceedings of his trial, we will find a
continuity in the theme that he propagated as al-Hilal's policies almost
with no deviation in its approach.45 The historians' attempt to dub him
as Pan-Islamist is misleading. This is perhaps because of the publication
in the very first issue of al-Hilal of the photograph of Afghani with
high sounding titles like the Pan-Islamist par excellence. But the Pan-
Islamism which Azad had been advocating in form of common bond
among Muslims was based on the idea of Islamic brotherhood which
is entirely different from the political Pan-Islamism of Afghani.46
Equally, it is wrong to say that Azad had changed from Pan-Islamist to
a nationalist Muslim when he first met Mahatma Gandhi in the
beginning of 1922. Those who say this fail to see that Hindu-Muslim
unity had been one of the basic tenets of Azad's political thinking since
the very beginning. He never believed in separatism rather he opposed
it with all his keen intellect. Azad's involvement and participation in
the Khilafat Movement was less Pan-Islamism and he invariably made
it a point to assert that the Khilafat represented a political struggle that
would ultimately weaken the British empire and its success would not
only provide strength to the freedom loving Turks and Arabs abroad
but also to the political movement at home.47 The observation of Douglas
that Azad was never carried away emotionally by idea of the Turkish
Khilafat as the Ali Brothers and some of the other Indian enthusiasts,
lend support to Faruqi 's thesis. Azad's participation in the Khilafat
movement was more inspired by political than religious considerations.
He threw his weight behind the Khilafat Movement realizing that it

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 Modem India 67 1

could serve the cause of Indian nat

1920 special session of the Congr
supporting the Khilafat Moveme
the least perturbed at the abolitio
Turkey while the whole of Muslim
detailed comment on the incident ap
(in seven parts) in the Zamindar o
an interesting reading.49 It show
also a matter of dismay and despa
co-religionists he tried to ratio
disturbing incident in a manner t
him knew that Khilafat currently p
could keep the Muslims united ag
as a source of strength for his idea
was a challenge to the British p
very ably expounded in his Presiden
Conference, Kanpur on December
the Muslims in India not to be em
the real work of the Khilafat c
organization of the Indian Muslim
that members of the Khilafat Comm
as they believed that the liberatio
the realization of the ideal of a
Qaumiyat). The current unfortun
serious impediment in their way, b
this ideal; they had due regard for
community, but refused to seek the
and be used as a pawn by them ag
asked them to devote themselves to
and progress among Muslims. He
Committee must henceforwa
comprehensive projects for edu
social, moral and religious reform
Muslims. Thus, on the whole, Az
that, like himself, he wanted the
their own fate, concentrate thei
pay their undivided attention to
of utmost importance in regard to
independence and then in a free I
The impression that contact wit
Islamic context and was divorced
not correct. Finding the Islamic
Azad thought of stirring the Ind

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672 IHC: Proceedings, 71st Session, 2010-11

his support to freedom fighters in other lands he strengthened the moral

foundations of Indian freedom struggle.51 Thus it can be said with
certainty about Azad that "it was no reactionary fundamentalist
philosophy that he brought back with him from the Middle East, but a
vision of national revolution. It must be stressed that nationalism was
an integral part of the Pan-Islamic outlook that he acquired during his
tour of the Middle East. When he identified himself emotionally and
intellectually with the Islamic world of the Turks, the Arabs and the
Iranians, he identified himself with the urge for national liberation that
was stirring these peoples and his own people back in India. That is
why Azad stuck to the nationalist movement even in the difficult
decades of the thirties and the forties when many Khilafat leaders turned
against the Indian National Congress. His decision to stay with the
Congress isolated him from the majority of his own community. He
could accept this and go through that dark period when his world laid
in shambles because of his intense moral conviction that nationalism
and Islamic brotherhood was not contradictory but one and the same
thing. This conviction - that the true believer in Islamic brotherhood
was a good nationalist - was based on his Middle Eastern experience".52
As far as religious character of Azad's message is concerned one can
say that it was almost the same as with the leaders of the Hindu
Renaissance in the second half of the 19th Century as with Tilak's
experiment at the turn of the century and later with Gandhiji who sought
to use religious idiom and symbols for a political purpose with great
success. But it was credited to Azad that he never allowed the
'religiosity' of his call to overshadow the political purpose. This aspect
of Azad's politics was very much reflected in his submission before
the Calcutta magistrate in 1922, popularly known as Qaul-e-Faisal. He
said; "I must add that al-Hilal was out and out an invitation for liberty
and death. It is not necessary to speak of my enunciation of the new
approach to the understanding of Islam in respect of its teachings. Only
this much I would mention that what Gandhiji is doing today to inculcate
the spirit of a religious life, al-Hilal had already done in
19 14. ""Moreover, one should not be misled to think that Azad's plea
for cooperation with Hindus during Khilafat Movement was a new line
of thinking on his part. It had always been there and the Khilafat and
Non-Cooperation movements provided a ripe opportunity to assert it
with added force. During the al-Hilal period of his public career Azad's
audience were mainly the Muslims who were made to believe that they
should not be afraid of the Hindu majority and extend their hands of
cooperation towards them. The main thrust of his number of articles in
the al-Hilal and al-Balagh, blended skillfully with religious idiom and
symbols, was to impress upon his co-religionists that their fear of the

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 Modem India 673

Hindu majority was baseless, ill-j

imperative for them to come close
freedom. Later, with his emerge
of Hindu Muslim cooperation in
main component of Azad's percep
to the development of a composite
proved his points by referring to t
(Peace Be Upon Him) had made
become one nation. Thus Azad ba
and cooperation on the Sunnah of
could make peace and enter into
tribes to face the threat from a h
not the Indian Muslims join with tw
and make a united entity to oppo
Empire), in its pride, haughtin
trampling the freedom of all the Ea
his life the Maulana laid stress on
became the principal mission of
again. Hindu-Muslim riots which
of the country and the propagand
emphasizing that Hindus and Mus
live together, did not in any way
brushed aside the sermons of tho
who considered India to be Darul-Harab.

An important aspect of Azad's religio- political thought is his

independence of thought and originality in thinking. He did not follow
any Muslim thinker or reformer in entirety. His own independent
thinking discouraged total identification with any individual. He
admired qualities which appealed to him but never committed himself
to any thinker or scholar. He had great admiration for Ibn Taimiya's
spirit of jehad and ijtihad,and crew inspiration from him in his political
struggle and fresh approach to Islamic law, but did not subscribe to his
criticism of Ibn Arabi. He was the first Indian to present Shaikh Ahmad
Sirhindi Mujaddid- Alf- I Sani in a broad reformist perspective, but
did adopt his criticism of wahdat- ul- wujud. All the elders of his family
had deep respect for Shah Abdul Aziz at whose feet they all learnt
religious sciences, but his respect for his erudition did not prevent him
from criticising him on certain issues. He admired Maulana Jamaluddin
Afghani's restless spirit of resisitance to foreign domination, but pointed
out in his Presidential Address to the Jamiat ul Ulama in November
1 92 1 that his own path was distinct and different. He admired Sir Syed's
progressive movement and his own contribution to Muslim education
and social reform, but firmly combated his approach to politics. He

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 674 IHC: Proceedings, 71st Session, 2010-11

had profound respect for Maulana Shibli, but his notes on the margin
of certain books show that he could disagree with his views also.
It may be said in conclusion, that Azad's religio-politica! thoughts
did not move on a smooth plane. The evolution of the Maulana's
thoughts showed the emergence of many contradictory strands. And
yet it can be argued that Azad strove to resolve those contradictions
and succeeded on many counts. The resolution of some of these
contradictions was due to the influence of the political process he had
become, an integral part of. Like many other great thinkers, one can
argue, Azad also underwent the trials and tribulations of evolution in
his thoughts.

NOTES AND REFERENCES;

1. Malik Ram (ed.), Ghubar-i-Khatir, New Delhi, 1983, pp. 48,68,70,86.
2. Ibid., p. 83.
3. "The uproar of political activity and the calmness of literary life could not proceed
together. Conciliation between fire and flake of cotton is never possible. I wished
to bring the two together. On the one hand, I went on piling up the efforts of my
thought, and on the other, invoked incessantly the scorching lightning to touch
them. I knew the result. I have, therefore, no right to complain". Syed Abdul Latif
(ed.), Tarjuman-ul-Quran , Bombay, 1965, p. 29.
4. Asghar Ali Engineer, Theological Creativity of Abul Kalam Azad, Islam and the
Modern Age, May, 1992, pp. 128-138
5. Ziya-ul-Hasan Faruqi, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Towards Freedom , New
Delhi, 1 997, p.40.
6. Abdur Razzak Malihabadi, (ed.), Azad Ki Kahani Khud AzadKi Zubani, Delhi,
1958 .,p. 359
7. V.N. Dutta, Maulana Azad, New Delhi, 1990, p. 20.
8. Douglas Ian Handerson, Abul Kalam Azad: An Intellectual and Religious
Biography , Delhi 1988, pp. 56-57, No. 74.
9. Ghubar-i-Khatir, op. cit., p. 1 00
10. Ibid., pp. 102.
1 1 . Abdur Razzak Malihabadi, Kahani, op. cit., p. 362.
12. Ibid., pp., 397-398.
13. Ibid., P.400

14. This essay was first published in the Shahid Number of Urdu periodical Nizam-
ul- Mashaikh, edited by the Sufi and literary figure Khwaja Hasan Nizami, in
1910. The mysterious non-conformist Sufi martyr of Aurangzeb's reign, 1658-
1707 who was executed in 1661 by Aurangzeb more for political than any other.
See, Rubaiyat-e-Sarmad Shahid, 1360 A.H. in which Azad's essay is included as
introduction (pp. 1-16) with the title Sawanih S armad Shahid. See, Ziaul Hasan
Faruqi, op. cit. , p. 50, in footnotes.
15. V.N. Dutta, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and Sarmad, forward by Jayanta Kumar
Ray, Rupa and company, New Delhi, 2007, pp.20-22.

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 Modem India 675

1 6. Abul Kalam Azad, Hayat-e- S arm ad S

n.d., pp. 16-17
17. Douglas, op. cit., P.290
18. Malik Ram, ed., Abul Kalam Azad , Kh
New Delhi, 1991, pp.83-90.
19. Abul Kalam Azad, Sarmad Shaheed , o
20. Douglas, op. cit., p. 287
21. Al.Hilal's first issue appeared on Jul
22. Ibid., volume to, nos., l-3(January 8
23. Louis Massignon, " My Meetings wit
A Memorial volume, (ed.), Humayun
1959, pp. 27-29; Kahani, op. cit., pp. 67
24. Ed. Abdush Shahid Khan Sherwani,
1946, pp. 74-78
25. Tazkirah, (ed. ), Malik Ram , Sahitya
26. Kahani, op.cit., pp.343-76; M. Mujee
in Humayun Kabir(ed.), Memorial, op
27. K. A. Nizami, Maulana Azad , A Com
28. Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, "The impact o
Islamic Studies , 1990, Oxford Islamic c
29. Ziaul Hasan Faruqi, op. cit., p.48.
30. Al - HilaU July, 20, 1914, p. 5-8.
31. Kahani, op.cit., pp. 275-92.
32. Ibid., p. 400.
33. Ibid.

34. Lisan-ul-Sidq, August-September, 1904.

35. Ziya-ul-Faruqi, op.cit., p. 56.
36. Ian Henderson Douglas, op.cit. , p. 59
37. Ibid., P. 56
38. Shibli Numani, Safar Namah-i-Rum-o-Misr-O-Sham, Agra, 1894
39. Abdur Razzak Malihabadi, Azad ki Kahani Khud Azad Ki Zubani, op.cit. , p. 255
40. Lisan-ul -Sidq, January- February, 1904
41. Ibid., April, 1904
42. Ibid., April-May, 1905
43. Ibid., May, 1904
44. Azad's statement in Kahani speaks of certain events in 1904 and of his visit to Iraq
where he fell ill and returned to Bombay. See, Abdul Razzak Malihabadi, Azad
Ki Kahani Khud Azad Ki Zubani, op. cit., p. 287
45. Mushirul Haq, a Revolutionary Nationalist, in Sayeda Saiyidain Hameed (ed.)
India's Maulana, Centenary Volume I, New Delhi, 1990, pp. 165-66.
46. Rajat Ray, "Revolutionaries, Pan- Islamists and Bolsheviks: Maulana Abul Kalam
Azad and the political Underworld in Cacutta, 1905-1925," in Mushirul Hasan
(ed.), Communal and pan-Islamic Trends in Colonial India , New Delhi, 1981,

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 676 MC: Proceedings, 71st Session, 2010-11
pp. 87-88.
47. Ian Henderson Douglas, op. cit., pp. 78-79.
48. S.P. Sen (ed.), op. cit., pp. 252-53.
49. Abdur Razzak Malihabadi, Azad Ki Kahani, op. cit., p. 362.
50. Intelligence Branch Files, Calcutta, 1913-(Newspaper, al-Hilal), cited by Rajat
Ray, op. cit., p. 88.
51. Ibid.

52. Abul Kalam Azad, op. cit., p. 6

53. Intelligence Branch, 1921, "Mohammadan Secret Organization, Calcutta", cited
in Rajat Ray, op. cit., pp. 102-103
54. Ibid., Intelligence Branch, 1921, 1922, "Lists of Labour Unions and Associations
in Bengal ', in Rajat Ray, op. cit., pp. 103.
55. Ziya-ul-Hasan Faruqi, op. cit., pp. 76-79.
56. Ibid., p. 78.
57. Ibid., p.76.
58. Al-Hilal, 6th November, 1912, pp. 16-20.
59. Ziya-ul-Hasan Faruqi, op. cit., 76-78; Azad's political background and Gandhiji's
earnestness to mobilize public opinion in favour of his movement brought them
closer. "Even before he joined the Congress in 1920", remarked Dr. Radhakrishnan
"he was a revolutionary". (Humayun Kabir (ed.), Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, A
Memorial Volume, Bombay, 1959, p. 4). His entry into the Congress was not as a
novince; he had rich political experience and extensive knowledge of freedom
movements in the Asiatic World. (K.A. Nizami, op. cit., p. 14); The role of al-
Hilal (1912-14) in the political awakening of the country cannot be exaggerated.
His editorials were not merely incisive and unflinching, but were traced in
characters of fire. In January 1922 he thus reviewed the role of al-Hilal: "The
spirit that Mahatma Gandhi is today infusing in the religious life of the Hindus, al-
Hilal finished this job in 1914. This is a strange coincidence that new life and
energy was generated in Muslims and Hindus when both turned to movements of
religious education in place of western culture". (Bayan-i-Maulana Azad, Delhi,
n.d., pp. 45-46); See also, K.A. Nizami, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad-An Assessment ,
in Verinder Grover (ed.), op. cit., p. 524.
60. Ian Henderson Douglas, op. cit., p. 117.
61. Ghulam Rasul Mehr (ed.), Tabarrukat-i-Azad , Delhi, 1963, pp. 173-216.
62. Malik Ram (ed.), Abul Kalam Azad, Khutbat-e-Azad , New Delhi, 1 974, pp. 211-
33.

63. K. A. Nizami, A Commemorative Volume , op. cit., p. 8.

64. Rajat Ray, in Mushirul Hasan (ed.), op. cit., pp. 89-90
65. Bayan-i-Maulana Abul Kalam Azad op. cit., pp. 45-46.
66. Ziya-ul-Hasan Faruqi, op. cit., pp 92-93.
67. Abul Kalam Azad, Khutbat-e-Azad, op.cit., pp. 51-52.
68. Mukammal Khutbat-i-Sadarat, Meerut, 1921, pp. 28-30.
69. See his Convocation Address at Aligarh, February, 1949.
70. See, Syed Masih-ul- Hasan, Hawashi Abul Kalam Azad, Delhi, 1988.

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