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In its history spanning more than 300 years, Zakir Husain Delhi College has lived many lives, each woven tight into the many chapters in Delhi’s own tumultuous history – Mughal rule, Company Raj, the Revolt of 1857, British Empire, Partition and Independence.
Its lives have included a Mughal-era madrasa which gave way to disrepair; the famous Delhi College which was plundered during the Revolt of 1857 and shut down; the 20th century Anglo-Arabic Intermediate College which was set on fire during the Partition, revived in 1948, named after Dr Zakir Husain in 1975 and named Zakir Husain Delhi College in 2010.
Through these phases, Dr Aslam Parvaiz, former principal of the college underlines, ran a common thread of “composite culture” and “a spirit of plurality”.
The original madrasa at the root of it had been started near Ajmeri Gate in the early 18th century by Ghaziuddin Khan, one of Aurangzeb’s Deccan commanders and father of who would become the first Nizam of Hyderabad. In his will, Ghaziuddin Khan had established a waqf for its support but the income declined over the course of the century and it fell into disrepair.
Its second life began after the 1813 charter of the British East India company, which allotted one lakh rupees annually for the support of education. The madrasa caught the attention of the Delhi Committee of Public Instruction – which included both British officials and local elites – and it obtained a grant from the fund to support oriental learning there. In 1827, an additional amount was sanctioned by the government to introduce English classes, and astronomy and mathematics on “European principles”, leading to an interesting co-existence in the space which began to be known as Delhi College.
According to historian Gail Minault, the institute had “an oriental section where Arabic and Persian Grammar were taught, and an anglo-vernacular section where western subjects were taught”. Interestingly, in both sections, the medium of instruction was the vernacular Urdu.
In her article, ‘Delhi College and Urdu’, Minault states that one of the college’s significant roles was in translating textbooks into the vernacular Urdu, which aided the dissemination of knowledge. In the early 1840, the college’s principal Felix Boutros started the Vernacular Translation Society whose diverse publications included Euclid’s geometry; histories of England, Greece and Rome; the geography of India; science texts which included both “natural philosophy and unani tibb from Arabic; and Oriental classics such as selections from The Thousand and One Nights, Laila and Majnun and the Dharmashastras. Minault says that study of western sciences such as astronomy and calculus were popular among students, including those in the oriental section.
The composite culture alluded to by Dr Parvaiz was reflected in the students’ body as well. The college website states that of the 460 students in the college in 1845, 299 were Hindus, 146 were Muslims and 15 were Christians.
This vibrant stage came to a violent end after the 1857 uprising in which those killed by insurrectionists number multiple teachers of the college, including the principal J D Taylor. Suspecting the loyalties of teachers and students at the end of the Revolt, the British shut the institution down, and its staff and library were transferred to Lahore.
Half a century later, the principal of the historic Anglo-Arabic school got permission to open an intermediate college which would address the loss of Delhi College. This Anglo-Arabic Intermediate College was affiliated to Delhi University in 1925 and became a degree college in 1929. This phase too ended violently when it was attacked and set on fire during the Partition.
In 1948, its revival began yet again into a very different chapter in a city changed by the Partition. “The college’s revival was being steered with Mirza Mehmood Beg as the principal. After the migrations of the Partition, many displaced Sindhi families approached him saying that their daughters needed education. And so it had happened that when the college re-opened in 1948, 80% of the student body was Sindhi girls. In this, Beg was opposed by the larger community in Old Delhi, the Partition was still fresh in their minds but this move was with the same note of pluralism that has been there historically,” said Dr Parvaiz.
He says that another feature of the college’s history has been proof of some religious institutions favouring modern institutions even in the early 20th century. “If you go to the old campus, outside the old college hall, there is a marble tablet from the 1930s saying that this wing was constructed to accommodate expansion of students and mentions the donors, and among them prominently are the Jama Masjid and the Fatehpuri Masjid,” he said.
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