Page 19 - Pakistan Link - April 21, 2023

COMMENTARY PAKISTAN LINK - APRIL 21, 2023 - P19

Dr Schimmel remarks that “Whether Dr Schimmel compares this sentence springs in the eyes. It is this very kind sive study on Iqbal’s thought and phi- (dr.a.s.khan@ieee.org) is a Fulbright
or not the Muslim or non-Muslim with Iqbal’s words which he used to of representing the needs of an age of losophy. It is an illuminating and fas- Specialist Scholar. Professor Khan
readers will approve of Iqbal’s ideas, characterize the prophetic revelation: a society which can be witnessed in cinating read for all seekers of truth has over 40 years of experience in
or his way of expressing them, they ‘The world-life intuitively sees its own Iqbal whose whole personality tended and wisdom. Today, the world needs Higher Education. He has authored
will have to acknowledge that Iqbal, needs, and at critical moments defines to a prophetical interpretation of reli- people like Dr Schimmel who can several technical and non-technical
to quote Kenneth Cragg, was ‘the its own direction. This is what, in the gion. Nobody will assert that he was build intellectual bridges to promote books, including Nanotechnology:
spokesman of something deep with- language of religion, we call prophetic a prophet…but we may admit that he love, global peace, harmony and coex- Ethical and Social Implications, and
in the contemporary soul…The age revelation.’ Dr Schimmel observes that has been touched by Gabriel’s wing.” istence. a series on Science, Technology & So-
them must have felt its need of him.’ “the similarity of the two sentences Gabriel’s Wing is a comprehen- [Dr Ahmed S. Khan ciety (STS). ]

n By Dr Asif Javed The Englishman Who Loved Lahore also on record that infamous General
Williamsport, PA Dyer, who had been condemned by the
House of Commons for his barbaric
he other day, I saw The Jungle classic movie of 1975. In the movie, massacre at Jalianwala Bagh, received a
Book with my son. As the Sean Connery played the role of Dra- monetary contribution by RK. He may
T movie ended, I realized that it vout who along with his companion have loved Lahore, but RK was an im-
was based on Kipling’s famous story, Carnahan deserts the British Indian perialist and English jingoist at heart.
written in India, about a boy who finds Army and carves out a kingdom for RK left India in 1889. A few
himself in Seonee Jungle (in Indian himself. Dravout is perceived as God years later, a young Winston Churchill
state of Madhya Pradesh) and survives by the simple Kafiristan folks, until served in India, as a soldier and a war
having befriended animals. It then the truth is revealed when Dravout is correspondent. WC’s book, The Mal-
dawned upon me that more than a cen- killed. Meanwhile, Carnahan manages akand Field Force was written in 1897.
tury after The Jungle Book was written, to escape and, after a lot of hardships, It was published in The Pioneer where
Kipling’s work is still popular. His writ- meets up with a journalist in a newspa- RK had worked earlier. WC passed
ings have passed one test of a writer’s per office. The story ends at The Mall in through Lahore, on his way to NWFP
greatness - the test of time. Lahore, where a disoriented Carnahan, and visited the Civil & Military Gazette
Born to English parents in India, suffering from a sun stroke, is recog- office in Lahore since Pioneer and Civil
Rudyard Kipling (RK) learnt Hisdu- nized by the journalist from the night & Military Gazette were sister publica-
stani—presumably Urdu—as a child. before, and is sent to an asylum where tions. RK and WC’s paths did not cross
Although the city of his birth was Rudyard Kipling, it is said, contributed more phrases to the English language he dies. It is ironic that Bhawani Junc- in India. But one is intrigued by the
Bombay, the one that he really came than anyone else, except Shakespeare; he was known to, and admired by, men in tion, which was filmed in Lahore in the coincidence that both the future Nobel
to admire was our own: Lahore. Hav- high places (his poem If was the favorite poem of Woodrow Wilson, while King 1950s (when Ava Gardner created a Laureates had a Lahore connection.
ing spent eleven years in a boarding George V was a personal friend); he visited six continents and lived in four. But, sensation) was not about Lahore while Majeed Sheikh, whose father was
school in England, seventeen years old through all that, Kipling did not forget and remained in love with Lahore The Man who would be King, with La- the last editor of C & M Gazette, and
RK returned to India and became the hore background, was actually made in who has written numerous superb arti-
assistant editor of the Civil &Military Shalimar Gardens. lakha. While it is not clear whether Morocco. cles about Lahore’s glorious past, writes
Gazette in Lahore. It did not take him In 1887, RK was transferred to RK had the former or later in mind, RK wrote his masterpiece Kim, of a chair that reportedly had been
long to fall in love with the former Pioneer in Allahabad, a sister publi- his fondness for Lahore is obvious. widely considered his best Indian used both by RK and WC at the C & M
capital of Akbar the Great and Ran- cation of C &M Gazette but missed The novel was not received well. But work, in 1901, twelve years after leav- Gazette office. The newspaper ceased
jeet Singh. RK’s fondness for Lahore is Lahore terribly. As fate would have RK was not quite done with Lahore. ing India. He spent eight years writ- publication in 1963. But what became
often obvious in his writings: he exer- it, he was recalled to Lahore for a few Years later, after he had married an ing it. Those who have read it—I have of that chair? Does anyone really care?
cised at the Racecourse, played tennis months in 1888. Mrs Hill, a friend of American and had come to live in not—are convinced that the writer Perhaps the publicity seeking CM of
in the Lawrence Gardens, danced in RK, noted how he did ‘love those wild the state of Vermont in USA, RK had to be in love with India. The novel Punjab, once he has finished his mega
Montgomery Hall (old Gymkhana), men of the north, whom he called built a house in Brattleboro, VT that opens with the main character sitting projects, can be asked to have at least
had dinner in the Punjab Club, and his ‘own folk’; after living among the he also named, Naulakha. atop Zamzamagun that still sits on a plaque placed on The Mall on the
became a member of the Freemasons frog-like easterners of Allahabad, he Edward Robinson, the editor of the Mall, opposite Lahore Museum. It former site of that newspaper. This will
C&M Gazette, and RK’s boss, reports
this of RK’s interest in Lahore:
Deeply interested in the queer
and works of the people of the land.
He liked to hunt and rummage among
them, especially in Lahore, ‘that won-
derful, dirty, mysterious ant hill’, a city
he knew ‘blind fold’ and which he loved
to wander through ‘like Haroon Al-
Rashid in search of strange things’….he
found ‘heat and smells of oil and spices,
and puffs of temple incense, and sweat,
and darkness, and dirt and cruelty, and
above all, things wonderful and fasci-
nating innumerable’.
Perhaps, RK created the charac-
ters of Daniel Dravot and Peachy Car-
On his next visit to Lahore, this scribe intends to stand on The Mall, on the nahan based on that encounter. RK The Zamzama gun and Lahore museum, or “House of Wonders”, both of
former site of C&M Gazette, and bow his head in gratitude to the memory may also have heard of an American, which feature in Kim - Photograph: John Mcconnico /AP
of the Englishman who loved Lahore and carried his Naulakha with him to Josiah Harlan, an adventurer, who
Vermont and beyond had managed to create a kingdom, on was in Kim that RK used the famous be a well-deserved tribute to RK. RK,
paper, in Northern Afghanistan, hav- phrase “the great game”. It was a refer- it is said, contributed more phrases to
Society. There were moonlit picnics at was happy to be back among the ‘sav- ing signed a written agreement with ence to the struggle for supremacy be- the English language than anyone else,
Shalimar Gardens. Even visits to La- age, boastful, arrogant, hot-headed Prince Mohammad Refee of Ghor on tween Czarist Russia and the British in except Shakespeare; he was known to,
hore’s infamous Red Light Area where men’ of the Punjab. October 16, 1839. Harlan had spent Central Asia. This phrase, in fact, was and admired by, men in high places
the future Nobel Laureate contracted a RK spent about five years at years in India and Afghanistan, hav- first used by a Captain Connolly back (his poem If was the favorite poem of
venereal disease. Lahore. Having left in 1887, he re- ing worked for East India Company, in 1842 but RK was the one who pub- Woodrow Wilson, while King George
RK used to wander in the ba- turned to his beloved city only once. Raja Ranjeet Singh in Punjab and licized it. V was a personal friend); he visited
zaars and alleys of old Lahore that But like Manto who once quipped Amir Dost Mohammad Khan in Ka- RK did have a dark side. At a rail six continents and lived in four. But,
he once described as ‘that prodigious about Bombay (I am carrying my bul. Harlan and RK’s paths did not station in England, RK considering through all that, RK did not forget and
brick honeycomb’. The Grand Trunk Bombay with me), RK seemed to cross since the American mercenary himself a celebrity, jumped the queue. remained in love with Lahore.
Road is described as ‘that broad have done the same with Lahore had left India in 1839. But his exploits Asked to go back in line, RK said to the On his next visit to Lahore, this
smiling river of life’ and Delhi Gate, and for his second novel, he chose had become the stuff of legends and station master, ‘Don’t you know who scribe intends to stand on The Mall,
‘a compound of all evil savors that a the title, The Naulakha. These days, RK may have used his writer’s imagi- I am?’ The station master’s response on the former site of C&M Gazette,
walled city can breed in a day and a Naulakha is a low middle class lo- nation to create the story. The con- must have startled him: ‘I know who and bow his head in gratitude to the
night…combining the foul smell of cality in Lahore. But in RK’s time, it tract mentioned above still exists in you are, Mr Rudyard memory of the Englishman who loved
badly-trimmed kerosene lamps, and may have been different. It is quite Chester County Museum, PA. Bloody Kipling, and you can Lahore and carried his Naulakha with
the stench of native tobacco, baked possible that RK, who was single at Fact or fiction, The Man Who bloody well take your place in the him to Vermont and beyond.
brick, and dried earth’. While at La- the time, lived with his parents in or Would Be King remains one of KP’s queue like everybody else.’ Jumping (The writer is a physician in Wil-
hore, he wrote articles on Mohurrum near Naulakha. One of the pavilions most famous stories, having been im- the queue is a trait that RK might have liamsport, PA and may be reached at
Festival and Festival of Lamps in the in Lahore Fort is also known as Nau- mortalized by John Huston in his sub-consciously acquired in India. It is asifjaved@comcast.net )

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