The Nizam Chronicles- The radicalization of Hyderabad State
There has been an attempt to whitewash the last Nizam of Hyderabad, Mir Osman Ali Khan as an essentially benign ruler, who was misled by Qasim Rizvi on the Razakars. That has been perpetuated by an entire cabal of Indian English writers, praising the Nizam, and downplaying the Razakars.
Osman Ali Khan, became the Nizam in 1911 and the first thing he did was getting the Hindu dewan Kishan Prasad resign. Urdu was the primary medium of education when hardly 10% of the state spoke it, the majority languages Telugu, Kannada and Marathi were completely suppressed. And this led most Hindus to drop out of schools, leaving Hyderabad State with one of the lowest literacy rates of just 28% , compared to 63% in Mysore, and over 70% in the Bombay, Madras presidencies.
He appointed Anwarullah Khan Farooqi his teacher as Sadr Ud Sadr, and Minister of Religious Affairs, who banned dances at Urs, and began to implement religious policing. The UP Muslim Defense Association in turn gave him the title of Mohi-ul-Millat Wad Din, Reviver of the Community and Faith.
However the Nizam very smartly did all form of Taqiya, in order to project himself as secular and progressive. He gave donations to prominent temples like Bhadrachalam, Yadadri, as also institutions like BHU, Bhandarkar Institute that was enough to make Hindus happy. He made some token appointments of Hindus to top positions like Kotwal Venkataramana Reddy, Aravamudam Iyengar, but bulk of the administrative posts were held by Muslims around 75%, 90% in bureaucracy and 95% in police and the Army.
When he set up the Osmania University in 1917, it was fully in Urdu medium, giving a complete advantage to Muslims over Hindus. However he procliamed Urdu to be a vernacular language, and made it appear that he was encouraging it against English medium education, when hardly 10% in the state spoke it. But the propaganda was succesful, to the extent that even some one like Rabindranath Tagore praised him for this. And the Hyderabadi elite willingly played along.
This led to a migration of many young Hindus to Mumbai and Pune for education, while those who could not afford to move out took to akharas and religious activities. He bought most of the Hindu samsthanams under his control that included Wanaparthy and Gadwal. Especially in case of Gadwal, a 3 member Muslim comittee ruled that the widowed Rani had no claims over the throne.
Much before Rizvi, there was Bahadur Yar Jung, who started the Majlis Anjuman Tablighi E Islam, a powerful orator, who started the process of radicalization. When the Nizam imposed restrictions on public activities in 1928, Jung gleefully ignored them, leading public rallies calling for Sharia, while the Nizam looked the other way. Though at times for sake of public posturing, he would show off that he was restricting their activities.
Jung managed to convert around 24,000 Hindus to Islam either forcefully or playing up on caste differences. He was also responsible for the first ever communal riot in 1938 when he led a mob through Dhoolpet, shouting provocative slogans in a predominantly Hindu area. The fact is Jung had the support of the Nizam, which led to the formation of the MIM.
One just needs to look at the objectives of MIM in it’s 1938 statement.
Harmony with non Muslims would be within bounds of Islamic injuctions, and whatever harmony was there, would be only for political purposes to secure the kingdom.
It also specified that the Nizam was only a symbol of collective Muslim power, in other words it was the Ummah that was supreme.
Though Jung passed away in 1944, he had laid the foundation for radicalization, which would be carried further by Qasim Rizvi.
An OU professor openly declared during Milad Un Nabi
“I am pained to see the inertness of Muslims, when there still exists 22 crore Gobar parasth(worshippers)”
The Deendar Siddiq openly started a campaign to cleanse Hyderabad of Hinduism.
“A bowl containing one quarter milk, and three quarters Gobar cannot be clean, as long as there are Kafirs, this region will never be pure”.
And this led to Qasim Rizvi taking over and his rise, which I will look at in more detail later.