By Abdul Rashid Agwan for TwoCircles.net,
New Delhi: ‘Saiyid Hamid and His Educational and Social Contributions’, a seminar was held as a tribute to the diverse contributions of Saiyid Hamid, the former vice-chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) here.
Saiyid, the former chancellor of Jamia Hamdard, had succumbed to his long illness on December 29 last year at the age of 94 years.
Naseem Ahmad addressing, sitting Prof. Shakeel Samdani, Seraj Hussain and others
UP Rabita Committee, Aligarh, had organised the seminar last Sunday in collaboration with Hamdard Study Circle at the auditorium of Hamdard Public School, Taalimabad, New Delhi.
Naseem Ahmad, chairman of the National Commission for Minorities and the president of UP Rabita Committee (UPRC) chaired the proceedings whereas Siraj Hussain the former vice-chancellor of Jamia Hamdard and presently the Secretary, Agriculture and Cooperation, Government of India, was the chief guest of the programme.
Dr S Farooq and Brigadier (Retired) IR Khan were other guests on the dais. UPRC’s coordinator Amanullah Khan, its general secretary Dr Mohammad Jamil and its secretary Dr Ubaid Iqbal Asim represented the organization.
In his presidential remarks, Naseem Ahmad remembered the days of his association with Saiyid Hamid and found him a resolute person in implementing things he believed with conviction.
Sirajul Hussain enumerated many less known initiatives which he and Saiyid Hamid jointly took but fizzled out due to different factors. He informed that there was no precedence in the academic community where regular meetings of any vice-chancellor with the chancellor were required but he used to call on Dr Hamid on Saturdays mainly because of his magnetic eloquence. He also remembered that his chancellor never encouraged criticism of Muslim organizations and personalities as he strongly believed in the unity of the community and wished that its internal differences should not be made a public talk.
The vice-president of UPRC Brigadier Israr Rahim Khan found Saiyid Hamid to be a charismatic personality who believed not in speaking much but in action; however, whenever he spoke either in English or Urdu there was no parallel to his eloquence. He recalled how much he took interest in the establishment of information centers in various parts of the country as a follow up of Caravan-e-
Insaf, a campaign undertaken in north India under the leadership of Saiyid Hamid in early 2007 in the post-Sachar aspirations. Brig Khan mentioned that he never saw him bothering for the discomforts of journeys taken up for good motive and gave preference to others’ comfort than his own.
Dr S Farooq shed light on some striking aspects of Saiyid Hamid’s life and assessed him as a person of balanced life, who fulfilled the requirements of the rights of the divine as well as the rights of fellow beings.
In his welcome note, Dr Jamil informed that as the president of UPRC, Dr Saiyid Hamid spearheaded many awareness caravans for the promotion of education, health and communal harmony in Uttar Pradesh and in some other states too. He also let the participants know that the senior secondary school run by the AMU has now been renamed as Saiyid Hamid Boys School as a tribute to his contribution in improving its academic environment when he headed it as the vice-chancellor from 1980 to 1985.
Amanullah Khan recalled the spirited leadership of Saiyid Hamid in the organizations where both of them jointly worked for the betterment of the Muslim community like the UPRC, All India Educational Movement and Muslim Education Trust and pledged that the missions led by the latter will be carried on by all his followers. He especially mentioned some achievements of the said organizations after Saiyid Hamid became ill and committed that a national seminar on Saiyid Hamid’s contributions will be soon held.
Professor Shakeel Samdani, AMU, conducted the proceedings, recalled an instance during his presentation that once he spoke in a programme, chaired by Saiyid Hamid, against the American policy in Afghanistan and many in the audience objected his viewpoint but Dr Hamid defended him when he delivered his presidential remarks and he went on to expose the American callousness in the world for a length of time. Dr Samdani also appreciated Saiyid Hamid’s contribution in reviving the academic life of the renowned university he headed during a time which was full of resistance against the reforms introduced by him.
However, the passage of time had shown that the measures taken by him were visionary and entailing. Professor Samdani further told that as Vice Chancellor Saiyid Hamid himself wrote all the editorials in Tahzibul Akhlaq. He congratulated the present Vice Chancellor Lt. Gen. (Rtd.) Zameer Uddin Shah and the members of Executive Committee of AMU for renaming the Senior Secondary Boys School as Syed Hamid Senior Secondary Boys School.
While recalling some sweet memories of the first educational caravan of April 1992 from Aligarh to Deoband, Dr Ubaid Iqbal Asim said that he was immensely inspired by the leadership of Saiyid Hamid and noted that when most of the fellow travellers were sleeping in the bus he was taking individual reports from some of them enquiring about local conditions, community’s efforts so far and future needs. He remarked that one noteworthy contribution of Saiyid Hamid was the revival of Tahzibul Akhlaq, the journal edited by Sir Sayed Ahmad Khan, and the former’s editorials and writings in the journal need to be published for the knowledge of posterity.
Sitting Prof. Shakeel Samdani, Seraj Hussain, Naseem Ahmad and Farooq Ahmad
Dr Masood Ahmad, editor, Salam-e-Watan, narrated one incident of Saiyid Hamid’s life. Saiyid Hamid was invited to chair a public function in Kannauj. He insisted that he would join any such programme only when local people succeeded in establishing a school there. Consequently, his local fans worked for almost eight months and finally invited him to inaugurate the school called Humairah Girls School, which he pleasantly did.
A note of Mahtab Alam was also read out in the seminar which highlighted the contribution of Saiyid Hamid in the less known field of madrasa modernization. He also applauded the simplicity and humility as the distinct features of Dr Hamid’s personality.
Other speakers of the seminar were Dr Shakeel Ahmad from Maunath Bhanjan, Adil Siddiqui from Lucknow, Islam Mansuri from Kannauj, etc.