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Ratan Lal Chakrabarty, like Badruddin Umar, has done truly commendable scholarly work on the language movement, per courtesy of course of Bangla Academy. His extremely informative Bhasha Andoloner Dolilpotro (Documents of the Language Movement), published in 2000, will remain remarkable for the meticulous way in which he has unearthed a number of papers and documents relating both to the period leading up to February 21, 1952 as well as after it. The work, as the title suggests, is truly a documentary enumeration of the history behind the struggle for the establishment of Bangla as one of the two state languages of Pakistan.
Prior to the actual tragic happenings of February 1952, certain elements unwilling to compromise on the matter of the ideology of Pakistan, as they saw it, went all the way toward professing their determination to keep the ideology intact. The consequences were sometimes hilarious. Note may be made of the Aga Khan, who jumped into the fray with the bizarre suggestion that as a way of putting an end to the language controversy, Pakistan should adopt Arabic as its state language. In the process, he went for some defence of Urdu but was not inclined to appreciate the cause of Bangla.
We reproduce here excerpts from some editorial comments by newspapers at the time, meaning February 1951, as they have appeared in Chakrabarty's work.
The Pakistan Observer, in its editorial on February 13, 1951, commented:
"We are glad that the Aga Khan has done some plain speaking, at the risk of being misunderstood, regarding the language controversy. Though we do not think that making Arabic the state language of Pakistan is a feasible proposition still he has done a service by boldly attacking some false notions about Urdu. . . The only wise course under the circumstances is to adopt both Bengali and Urdu as the state language(s) of Pakistan."
The Morning News, on February 14, 1951, injected a note of sarcasm in its response to the Aga Khan's suggestion:
"All the three reasons that the Aga Khan has advanced for Arabic and against Urdu appear to be on the face of them fallacious. . . We mean no disrespect to the Aga Khan when we respectfully differ from (sic) him. Arabic has not been able to unite the Arabs themselves. How can it unite Pakistan with the Arab world?'
For its part, the Azad appeared to be pretty enthusiastic about the Aga Khan's views. On February 13, 1951, it had this to say:
"His proposal is not new. It has got many supporters both in eastern and western Pakistan . . . It therefore appears that the movement in support of Arabic is gaining ground. The leaders of the country should therefore go deeply into this matter."'
On April 18, 1951, the Pakistan Observer, reacting to suggestions in favour of Urdu as the state language of Pakistan, noted thus:
"Maulana Akram Khan is reported to have said at the Urdu Conference that those who oppose Urdu in East Bengal are the enemies of Islam. Presumably he includes among those 'enemies' those who like Dr Mohd Shahidullah have been advocating Arabic as our state language in preference to Urdu. Those who want to see Urdu and Urdu alone as our national language are bad psychologists."
It may be noted that Dr Shahidullah's views on Arabic had come in mock-serious manner. He had actually argued for Bangla but had ventured to suggest that if it was a matter of an Islamic language for Pakistan, then why not go for Arabic rather than Urdu?
Posted in: Aga Khan
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