And the Caravan Moves On: Ghulam Naqshband
He was a young man growing up in the 1930s in a small town of what is now Pakistan. From these provincial beginnings, he would go on to discover the vast world beyond his own—and bring the two together. Ghulam Naqshband, popularly known as the 'travel guru of India,' founded the Caravan of India, an influential cultural organization, in the 1940s and India's first branch of the Alliance Française. He was an employee of the Government of India when Partition came and one of only two Muslim government servants from what is now Pakistan who opted for India. No one else from his family joined him. But he believed in the idea of the new nation of India and played a vital role in the forging of its international identity. He was always the 'different' son of a Sufi Khalifa in Kasur, a town in the Pakistani Punjab best known for Kasuri Methi (fenugreek). When he was studying in an all-boys school and college, he took an immense interest in becoming pen pals with the 'goras' of other countries. When his brothers were simply being boys, he could often be found penning letters to friends in faraway lands that he had little hope of visiting then. From these pen friends he came to know of an international socio-cultural movement called the Caravan. The young man was immediately drawn to the core beliefs of the movement. "The Caravan believed that in the World of Tomorrow, the people will salute One Flag, symbolizing this great, round, rolling Earth created without frontiers," Mr. Naqshband reminisced. From that stage he began organizing activities that would bring people of diverse backgrounds and cultures together; the kinds of activities he would continue organizing for the rest of his life. As a young man he invited the editor of Star Magazine in Lahore, a Hindu who wrote under the pseudonym Qamar Jalalabadi, to visit predominantly Muslim Kasur and speak on Krishna at the Town Hall. The event was organized with help from some of Mr. Naqshband's similarly 'different' friends in Kasur and the town crier who went about announcing the event. The response was over a hundred people, almost all Muslim, coming to listen to the story of Krishna. Mr. Naqshband founded India's official branch of the Caravan in January 1944. The Statesman in its NEWS IN BRIEF, January 8, 1944 stated, "A Branch of the 'The Caravan', an American youth movement which aims at inspiring young people of all nations towards a better world order has been formed in Delhi. The Society's next meeting will be held on Sunday at 4, at 7, Rajpur Road, Delhi." This clipping along with several others from popular dailies of the 1940's form the first pages of Mr. Naqshband's meticulously prepared and preserved scrap book. As I flipped through this thick book full of clippings, complete with photographs and event details of the Caravan of India, the organization's activities struck me as almost a prototype for the Programmes Desk at the India Habitat Centre: events featuring statesmen, writers, artists, and intellectuals coming together from India and around the world. As I carefully turned more leaves of the scrap book, I discovered that in the 1940s this intercultural youth movement spread like fire. Eminent speakers and patrons from various walks of life and countries addressed the young members. A clipping of an article from October 1944 published by the New History Society, New York, of which the Caravan of India was a branch, states that the Caravan under the leadership of G. Naqshband intends to do big things in a big way. "In a country where the population is so gifted and varied, Mr. Naqshband and his branch may strike a unifying note that will electrify the different communities." Indeed the Caravan organized inter-communal Diwali and Id celebrations, hosted receptions for national and international dignitaries, held fundraising dinners and balls, and collected funds for famine relief and orphans. In June 1945, the Caravan organized a world-wide contest and announced $ 1000 as prize-money for the best essay on 'A United States of the World and a Universal Religion.' The Caravan of India's young members were most active in arranging lectures and art exhibitions on subjects ranging from trends in modern Indian literature to youth movements around the world, recreation, health, India's economic future, and feminist movements. Some of the Caravan's speakers, who were rather unknown then, are highly respected figures today. The movement of the Caravan of India took another turn when Lady Mountbatten and her daughter Pamela, the wife and daughter of the British Viceroy, responded to Mr. Naqshband's insistence that they take up an active role. A hesitant Pamela Mountbatten gave her first public speech in May 1947 with the encouragement of the Caravan's members. With Pamela and her mother as patrons, a new momentum grew behind the already popular Caravan activities. The movement's activities began receiving extensive coverage from national and international newspapers and magazines. This prompted many older people to seek membership in the Caravan. In retrospect, Mr. Naqshband feels that these new members did not join because they believed in the movement's cardinal principles of being a non-political, non-religious, and non-sectarian force for unity. "They thought of it as an elite networking group that would help them with social connections," he told me. The Caravan moved from its first residence at a home in the Civil Lines of Delhi to Room Number 42 of the Y.M.C.A in New Delhi. The move to New Delhi facilitated more guest lecturers and activities in the form of a reading room and an auditorium. The space for a reading room was obtained through a clever request to the Commander-in-Chief, Indian Army. Mr. Naqshband wrote to the chief requesting the donation of an Army tent that the Army Commandant used during his travels. The Army donated the tent and encouraged the Caravan's initiative. The tent was duly pitched on the Y.M.C.A. grounds and the Caravan had itself a reading room. How did he manage to work with so much dedication for the Caravan, though he also had a full time job as a government officer? His answer was as prompt as the man himself is: "Since we all worked after office hours and were committed to our movement, we worked voluntarily without expecting any money. We devoted some part of the day to the Caravan religiously." Even before I could think of the next question, Mr. Naqshband added. "Those days the leaders would come to our social gatherings to speak. They were deeply dedicated to the society that they wished to serve. They appreciated a platform such as the Caravan and happily shared their time and views. There were times when the response of acceptance to our last minute programmes was sent with equal promptness by the leader." He added that esteemed figures such as Pandit Nehru, Rajagopalacharyaji, Rajendra Prasad and other leaders were happy participants in the movement. He noted one incident in particular of which I saw many photographs in his scrap book. On the United Nations Charter Day in June 1947 the Caravan organized a last-minute celebration at the Constitution Club. Mr. Naqshband was in such a rush he could not personally hand over the invitation to Pandit Nehru's office, so he was forced to post it. Nehru, to everyone's surprise, arrived right in time for the event and spoke extemporaneously at the request of the gathering. After independence, the Caravan continued to make inroads as a major youth movement. Active branches had already opened in cities such as Lahore and Shimla. The group organized regular health and sanitation workshops in the refugee camps and 'good-will' concerts in the troubled post-partition times. But with success also came inevitable challenges. The movement became a bitter ground for political rivalries to play out. Older people with vested interests took control of a movement that was meant to be lead by the young. Mr. Naqshband left the scene quietly and never looked back. So what did he do after he left? He continued building institutions to bring peoples and nations together. "I started the Club Française," he told me. The Club was founded in 1952 and he became its secretary. Together with other French-speaking friends in India he held the first French classes and ran a small library out of his own home. "Basically we got hold of any French-speaking people and convinced them to either teach or join our club." The library began with the support of a retired I.C.S officer living in Mussoprie. Mr. Naqshband along with an officer from the French Embassy drove to Mussoorie one weekend and brought back the donation of books in the boot of his car. In 1955, the French government recognized Mr. Naqshband's promotion of Indo-French friendship by inviting him to visit France. The Club Française would later transform into India's first branch of the Alliance Française. Mr. Naqshband decided to join the travel business in India when it was still in its infancy. There were very few companies then organizing tours for foreign visitors to India, but Mr. Naqshband brought to his new job the organizational and public relations skills that founding the Caravan and the Cercle had given him. He became a pioneer of India's travel industry. Having now traveled all over the world to promote India as a destination, I asked him how he feels now about his life's work. He told me that he still wakes everyday up with new ideas and works towards achieving them. Today at 85 years old, he still goes to his office each day at a travel company, where he serves as Chairman Emeritus, with the same enthusiasm he had 60 years ago. Many of us are so stressed by our studies and work responsibilities that we find little time to even sleep and eat properly. How did Mr. Naqshband ever find the time for all the activities he has undertaken? His advice for young people today comes down to this: Time management and discipline are extremely important in the creation of a better society. If you have honesty of purpose, the rewards will come. Today you have the benefit of technology and social networking groups on the web. The youth should prioritize their lives and give some time back to their society and country. There is endless potential and one needs to keep looking for ways to make a contribution. Do not wait for people to make a contribution. Start making your own efforts from today. Mr. Naqshband has now outlived many of his colleagues and fellow Caravan members. But he's not giving up on working for his vision of the world anytime soon. "I believe in God—after all he saved me when I religiously cycled up and down from Old to New Delhi during the intense post-partition days for work. I also believe in unity of the world and I think God wishes that." During those troubled times at India's birth, Mr. Naqshband and the other young people stood against the division and mistrust to build a more united nation. They remind us how powerful youth with dedication and vision can be in shaping our country's future.
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Saturday, August 1, 2009
A Hiatus
Back to the turf ! Some of the new entries in Windows to India are based on my articles that profile unsung heroes in India from the days when the idealism that freedom inspired was still palpable. As the hope and pride generated by Obama's victory sweeps America, and young people there find new inspiration to bring change to their country, it's important to remember those in our own country who once used their talent and creativity to build a new India. The article will consist of intimate interviews with men and women who in the late 1940s and 50s were young leaders in India's budding civil society. One such individual built a movement to break down national and cultural barriers by exposing Indian society to other nations. Another individual used the print media and the power of the pen to break down gender barriers and protest social injustice. These were among free India's earliest social activists and investigative reporters, the men and women who first exercised the liberties of our new constitution. There is so much to imbibe from these men and women as India cries out for inspirational figures today. And recording their messages of hope is of such importance now, as they may soon be lost. If we remember those who acted on hope over half a century ago, perhaps we may inspire a similar activism in our youth today.
Relentless Guardians
Qamar Azad Hashmi
Qamar Azad Hashmi is an 83-year-old educationist, activist, author, mother, and survivor. Today her apartment in Delhi is scattered with the writings and photographs of people she has outlived, including one of her two sons, the pioneering playwright Safdar Hashmi. Her life has mirrored the tragedies, fractures, and separations of the subcontinent. Yet in spite of all she has endured, Qamar Azad remains deeply driven by her vision of a creative, dynamic system of education for India’s children. No matter has stood in her way, she has always lived life on her own terms.
Within a few moments of my first meeting with her, Qamar Azad revealed the strength and determination that has sustained her delicate frame all these years. Despite a constant struggle with age-related health problems, she moves effortlessly around her apartment, talking with visitors and undertaking her daily chores. When she finally sat down at an elegant study table designed by her husband—“the table’s older than you”, she exclaimed—I began to appreciate what it is that drives and inspires her.
Surrounding her study table are black and white photographs of her father (who looks strikingly like Lokmanya Tilak), biological and ‘rakhi’ brothers, and extended members of the family. Among the images is a framed photograph of Pandit Nehru taken on the momentous occasion of India’s birth as a nation. Qamar Azad Hashmi is one of the few remaining from a generation that believed deeply in that ‘tryst with destiny’ Nehru professed. She read the last lines of his speech that night for me: “It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity.” She paused and then added, “I do not understand you girls talking about liberation and modernity today. On 14th August 1947, I left my house with my brother’s friend to hear Panditji’s speech at midnight. There was a sea of humans who had flooded the roads of Delhi. I was one of them and even though I could not see the stage or get any where near it, I was proud to have heard Panditji. I was 19 then.”
Born in 1926 in Jhansi to mother’s name and Azhar Ali ‘Azad’, Qamar Azad was educated in Aligarh, Lucknow, Malihabad and Kasmandi. Her father was a tehsildar who had to move his family around constantly. Apart from his administrative position, Azhar Ali Azad was a poet who wrote in Persian and Urdu. He contributed verses to literary magazines. He also published a literary journal that was edited by Qamar’s mother. Qamar describes her family as ‘not wealthy’ but intellectual and creative. Learning in her family was based on recitations of verses and stories that she and her siblings mimed while resting under mango trees outside their home. Young Qamar rejected the family surname Abbasi and chose to call herself ‘Azad’ or ‘free’ (from her father’s pen name).
She had early brushes in her childhood with serving as a teacher. “I was not as bright as my elder sister or as beautiful as my younger sister,” she told me. “But I had a gift—I could monitor well.” Her teacher, who was also the head mistress and the administrator of the small school of 40 girls in Malihabad, asked her to teach the girls while she was busy finishing her other odd responsibilities.
Family fortunes kept changing over time and the family moved to Delhi to stay with Qamar’s elder brother, who was a lecturer in English at the Kashmiri Gate Polytechnic. Despite the communal tension rising before independence and partition, young Qamar simply dreamed of finishing her education. But tremendous upheavals stood in her way. Her brother surprised everyone at home by opting to migrate to Pakistan. Because her parents and younger siblings were dependent on him, they reluctantly agreed. The family faced numerous threats to their lives before reaching Pakistan. But to Qamar the biggest loss was leaving her books and notes behind.
Adapting to life in Pakistan was a challenge. Qamar and her parents could not find the space for a progressive, educated Muslim family in the bitter social and political environment after independence. Qamar took it upon herself to add to the family’s diminishing income and growing expenditures. She wrote for a newspaper called Imroze and made handkerchiefs for a shopkeeper in the Anarkali Bazaar of Lahore. The need to earn something extra inspired her to create a new line of handkerchiefs for the shopkeeper. He was so impressed by her creativity and conversational skills that he requested her to teach his daughter. Qamar took up the assignment and within a month her student’s grades improved, much to the shopkeeper’s delight. So he entrusted his son’s tuitions to Qamar as well.
Qamar’s life would take a new turn through the influence of the politically active Hashmi family, friends of her parents since their days in Delhi. The Hashmis encouraged Qamar to attend meetings of the Progressive Writers Association. She met young poets of the Indo-Pak literary movement, listened to their poetry, and studied trends. Her literary horizons expanded.
But the Hashmi family’s influence would extend beyond literature. The Hashmis proposed that Qamar marry their son Haneef, who had opted to remain back in Delhi. Haneef Hashmi was an avant-garde craftsman whose workshop made furniture for embassies in Delhi. Qamar and her family accepted, though it meant saying painful goodbyes. She would not see her family again for decades.
Qamar set up a home with her husband in Delhi. Upon a family friend’s request there, she filled out the forms for International Montessori training at Delhi College and informed her husband only after getting admission to the school. The family was going through one financial misfortune after the other, but Qamar was still determined to let nothing come in the way of her learning. By that time she had three young children at home and another was born just four days after her final Montessori exam. But nothing could deter her.
Dr. Zakir Hussain, then the Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University and a family friend, encouraged Haneef Hashmi to move to Aligarh. During her years in Aligarh, Qamar was itching to be useful and do more than create fancy dress costumes for her children’s school functions. She enrolled in a graduate degree course at the Aligarh Muslim University. Her husband took over the household responsibilities for three months during her exams. The young Qamar’s dream of being a graduate, a dream disrupted by partition, marriage, and children, was finally fulfilled.
Qamar took a vacation with relatives in Delhi that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. She interviewed for the position of a nursery teacher advertised by the Delhi Municipal Corporation and was not only accepted, but swiftly upgraded to the position of head mistress. She was at the threshold of a new journey.
Qamar lived alone in Delhi for over three years, meeting her family in Aligarh only every ten days. Her “independent lifestyle” became a matter of debate within the family but Qamar remained determined. Her position’s administrative duties coupled with burgeoning family pressures only increased her determination to keep going.
When Qamar speaks of her career as a head mistress her voice fills with enthusiasm. She took me to her study where she has cartons full of material she has been busy creating for over 40 years. One almirah holds three decades of experiences in education. As I unraveled the contents—match-boxes, beads, seeds, elastics, corrugated sheets, cardboard shapes and jars of various shapes and sizes—I heard her say, “Sometimes people find it embarrassing that I scan the dust-bin before I send it out. I never let anything interesting, any shape, pass out of the house. They all enter this box to be a part of my nursery kit.”
The genesis of her collecting is Maria Montessori’s resource kit that she and her teachers struggled to implement at the NDMC Nursery School. In order to create new experiences for children, so they would have a better understanding of the world around them, she and her team of teachers stretched their imaginations to prepare more effective and economical means of preparing the Montessori kit. They adapted and expanded the kit and Qamar was proud of her teacher’s creativity. Three of them won prestigious awards from the NDMC.
Qamar’s reputation as a determined, no-nonsense, and dependable Head Mistress grew with each school she was transferred to. She fought with the authorities, teachers and parents to get new learning materials, improved resource kits, stronger roofs, and better teachers. She wanted her students to have membership to Bal Bhawan and pushed to take them on weekly trips to Lodi Gardens. She also advocated for teaching materials that incorporated visuals and the dynamic contents of her brimming cartons, perceived then as “unconventional.” Her attitude was always, “Of course we can do this!” She encouraged her teachers to “unlearn” the books and follow their instincts.
Three decades of distinguished service in education did not mean her life was without grief or tragedy. She witnessed her husband weaken with an illness and then pass away. Later, in 1989, her son Safdar was brutally murdered for his strident and creative opposition to government oppression. But tragedy has never derailed her life’s struggle to improve children’s education.
“Struggles keep going on and life without struggles is not a life enough. But I disagree with the idea of learning by heart. What total non-sense,” she told me. “Teachers find the learn-by-heart pattern easy as it is unchallenging. But observation and using sensory organs is the most effective way of learning. One of the mandatory subjects at my school was to sow seeds and see the various stages of growth. We would relate this to the child’s personal growth. I am amazed how students of the so- called good schools lack basic application. We had no resources… we were poor but we had a fire in us.”
Whether she was working with her daughter to run informal schools for Muslim girls in Nizamuddin basti or speaking at public functions, Qamar’s life during her school years was always 9-9. ‘I just cannot stop imagining,’ she exclaimed.
In 1988 Qamar was honoured with the State Award for Best Teacher. After her retirement in 1990, she completed her Masters in Urdu and published an anthology of her father’s poetry. She also wrote a book The Fifth Flame about her deceased son’s life. Now she is busy working on a book based on her thirty years of experience as a nursery school Head Mistress.
As she read out some passages from her manuscript to me, I remembered the “tryst with destiny.” Each carefully handwritten page recorded her own tryst with educating the children of a free India. Some lines go like: “It is wrong to correct a child. We need to be prepared for a child’s boundless imagination which is not caged like ours. Their strength of mind is different than ours and they can surprise us.” She stopped and reminisced: “Oh, how tough it is to have your teachers think out of the box! Just to use simple words, simple tools...” Another passage of the manuscript notes: “For thousands of years humans have been following their own intellectual and mental freedom to follow pursuits like painting, writing and even today the artist is master of his thoughts. A child can express through colours or clay with his limited verbal vocabulary. We need to observe closer. I always told my teachers to leave them alone while they are painting.”
As we spoke in her study, Qamar began re-arranging her cartons. “I love to keep myself busy. These boxes are a result of fifty years of ‘being busy.’”
Qamar Azad Hashmi is an 83-year-old educationist, activist, author, mother, and survivor. Today her apartment in Delhi is scattered with the writings and photographs of people she has outlived, including one of her two sons, the pioneering playwright Safdar Hashmi. Her life has mirrored the tragedies, fractures, and separations of the subcontinent. Yet in spite of all she has endured, Qamar Azad remains deeply driven by her vision of a creative, dynamic system of education for India’s children. No matter has stood in her way, she has always lived life on her own terms.
Within a few moments of my first meeting with her, Qamar Azad revealed the strength and determination that has sustained her delicate frame all these years. Despite a constant struggle with age-related health problems, she moves effortlessly around her apartment, talking with visitors and undertaking her daily chores. When she finally sat down at an elegant study table designed by her husband—“the table’s older than you”, she exclaimed—I began to appreciate what it is that drives and inspires her.
Surrounding her study table are black and white photographs of her father (who looks strikingly like Lokmanya Tilak), biological and ‘rakhi’ brothers, and extended members of the family. Among the images is a framed photograph of Pandit Nehru taken on the momentous occasion of India’s birth as a nation. Qamar Azad Hashmi is one of the few remaining from a generation that believed deeply in that ‘tryst with destiny’ Nehru professed. She read the last lines of his speech that night for me: “It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity.” She paused and then added, “I do not understand you girls talking about liberation and modernity today. On 14th August 1947, I left my house with my brother’s friend to hear Panditji’s speech at midnight. There was a sea of humans who had flooded the roads of Delhi. I was one of them and even though I could not see the stage or get any where near it, I was proud to have heard Panditji. I was 19 then.”
Born in 1926 in Jhansi to mother’s name and Azhar Ali ‘Azad’, Qamar Azad was educated in Aligarh, Lucknow, Malihabad and Kasmandi. Her father was a tehsildar who had to move his family around constantly. Apart from his administrative position, Azhar Ali Azad was a poet who wrote in Persian and Urdu. He contributed verses to literary magazines. He also published a literary journal that was edited by Qamar’s mother. Qamar describes her family as ‘not wealthy’ but intellectual and creative. Learning in her family was based on recitations of verses and stories that she and her siblings mimed while resting under mango trees outside their home. Young Qamar rejected the family surname Abbasi and chose to call herself ‘Azad’ or ‘free’ (from her father’s pen name).
She had early brushes in her childhood with serving as a teacher. “I was not as bright as my elder sister or as beautiful as my younger sister,” she told me. “But I had a gift—I could monitor well.” Her teacher, who was also the head mistress and the administrator of the small school of 40 girls in Malihabad, asked her to teach the girls while she was busy finishing her other odd responsibilities.
Family fortunes kept changing over time and the family moved to Delhi to stay with Qamar’s elder brother, who was a lecturer in English at the Kashmiri Gate Polytechnic. Despite the communal tension rising before independence and partition, young Qamar simply dreamed of finishing her education. But tremendous upheavals stood in her way. Her brother surprised everyone at home by opting to migrate to Pakistan. Because her parents and younger siblings were dependent on him, they reluctantly agreed. The family faced numerous threats to their lives before reaching Pakistan. But to Qamar the biggest loss was leaving her books and notes behind.
Adapting to life in Pakistan was a challenge. Qamar and her parents could not find the space for a progressive, educated Muslim family in the bitter social and political environment after independence. Qamar took it upon herself to add to the family’s diminishing income and growing expenditures. She wrote for a newspaper called Imroze and made handkerchiefs for a shopkeeper in the Anarkali Bazaar of Lahore. The need to earn something extra inspired her to create a new line of handkerchiefs for the shopkeeper. He was so impressed by her creativity and conversational skills that he requested her to teach his daughter. Qamar took up the assignment and within a month her student’s grades improved, much to the shopkeeper’s delight. So he entrusted his son’s tuitions to Qamar as well.
Qamar’s life would take a new turn through the influence of the politically active Hashmi family, friends of her parents since their days in Delhi. The Hashmis encouraged Qamar to attend meetings of the Progressive Writers Association. She met young poets of the Indo-Pak literary movement, listened to their poetry, and studied trends. Her literary horizons expanded.
But the Hashmi family’s influence would extend beyond literature. The Hashmis proposed that Qamar marry their son Haneef, who had opted to remain back in Delhi. Haneef Hashmi was an avant-garde craftsman whose workshop made furniture for embassies in Delhi. Qamar and her family accepted, though it meant saying painful goodbyes. She would not see her family again for decades.
Qamar set up a home with her husband in Delhi. Upon a family friend’s request there, she filled out the forms for International Montessori training at Delhi College and informed her husband only after getting admission to the school. The family was going through one financial misfortune after the other, but Qamar was still determined to let nothing come in the way of her learning. By that time she had three young children at home and another was born just four days after her final Montessori exam. But nothing could deter her.
Dr. Zakir Hussain, then the Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University and a family friend, encouraged Haneef Hashmi to move to Aligarh. During her years in Aligarh, Qamar was itching to be useful and do more than create fancy dress costumes for her children’s school functions. She enrolled in a graduate degree course at the Aligarh Muslim University. Her husband took over the household responsibilities for three months during her exams. The young Qamar’s dream of being a graduate, a dream disrupted by partition, marriage, and children, was finally fulfilled.
Qamar took a vacation with relatives in Delhi that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. She interviewed for the position of a nursery teacher advertised by the Delhi Municipal Corporation and was not only accepted, but swiftly upgraded to the position of head mistress. She was at the threshold of a new journey.
Qamar lived alone in Delhi for over three years, meeting her family in Aligarh only every ten days. Her “independent lifestyle” became a matter of debate within the family but Qamar remained determined. Her position’s administrative duties coupled with burgeoning family pressures only increased her determination to keep going.
When Qamar speaks of her career as a head mistress her voice fills with enthusiasm. She took me to her study where she has cartons full of material she has been busy creating for over 40 years. One almirah holds three decades of experiences in education. As I unraveled the contents—match-boxes, beads, seeds, elastics, corrugated sheets, cardboard shapes and jars of various shapes and sizes—I heard her say, “Sometimes people find it embarrassing that I scan the dust-bin before I send it out. I never let anything interesting, any shape, pass out of the house. They all enter this box to be a part of my nursery kit.”
The genesis of her collecting is Maria Montessori’s resource kit that she and her teachers struggled to implement at the NDMC Nursery School. In order to create new experiences for children, so they would have a better understanding of the world around them, she and her team of teachers stretched their imaginations to prepare more effective and economical means of preparing the Montessori kit. They adapted and expanded the kit and Qamar was proud of her teacher’s creativity. Three of them won prestigious awards from the NDMC.
Qamar’s reputation as a determined, no-nonsense, and dependable Head Mistress grew with each school she was transferred to. She fought with the authorities, teachers and parents to get new learning materials, improved resource kits, stronger roofs, and better teachers. She wanted her students to have membership to Bal Bhawan and pushed to take them on weekly trips to Lodi Gardens. She also advocated for teaching materials that incorporated visuals and the dynamic contents of her brimming cartons, perceived then as “unconventional.” Her attitude was always, “Of course we can do this!” She encouraged her teachers to “unlearn” the books and follow their instincts.
Three decades of distinguished service in education did not mean her life was without grief or tragedy. She witnessed her husband weaken with an illness and then pass away. Later, in 1989, her son Safdar was brutally murdered for his strident and creative opposition to government oppression. But tragedy has never derailed her life’s struggle to improve children’s education.
“Struggles keep going on and life without struggles is not a life enough. But I disagree with the idea of learning by heart. What total non-sense,” she told me. “Teachers find the learn-by-heart pattern easy as it is unchallenging. But observation and using sensory organs is the most effective way of learning. One of the mandatory subjects at my school was to sow seeds and see the various stages of growth. We would relate this to the child’s personal growth. I am amazed how students of the so- called good schools lack basic application. We had no resources… we were poor but we had a fire in us.”
Whether she was working with her daughter to run informal schools for Muslim girls in Nizamuddin basti or speaking at public functions, Qamar’s life during her school years was always 9-9. ‘I just cannot stop imagining,’ she exclaimed.
In 1988 Qamar was honoured with the State Award for Best Teacher. After her retirement in 1990, she completed her Masters in Urdu and published an anthology of her father’s poetry. She also wrote a book The Fifth Flame about her deceased son’s life. Now she is busy working on a book based on her thirty years of experience as a nursery school Head Mistress.
As she read out some passages from her manuscript to me, I remembered the “tryst with destiny.” Each carefully handwritten page recorded her own tryst with educating the children of a free India. Some lines go like: “It is wrong to correct a child. We need to be prepared for a child’s boundless imagination which is not caged like ours. Their strength of mind is different than ours and they can surprise us.” She stopped and reminisced: “Oh, how tough it is to have your teachers think out of the box! Just to use simple words, simple tools...” Another passage of the manuscript notes: “For thousands of years humans have been following their own intellectual and mental freedom to follow pursuits like painting, writing and even today the artist is master of his thoughts. A child can express through colours or clay with his limited verbal vocabulary. We need to observe closer. I always told my teachers to leave them alone while they are painting.”
As we spoke in her study, Qamar began re-arranging her cartons. “I love to keep myself busy. These boxes are a result of fifty years of ‘being busy.’”
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