A BRIEF REVIEW OF URDU IN CANADA
W. A. Shaheen

It is late autumn in Canada’s capital. The trees are almost reduced to bare skeletons and the fallen leaves are blown randomly by the cold, unassuming wind.

In a spacious hall on the Parliament Hill, close to where the Canadian legislature sits, an Urdu poet is reciting his ghazal to a large receptive and appreciative audience. It is the evening of Sunday, November 10, 1991. Tomorrow is Remembrance Day in Canada and people are in no hurry to go home. And it is fast approaching midnight.

The chief guest this evening is Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi whose 75th birthday is just being celebrated in the Urdu literary world on a large scale. Professor Fateh Mohammad Malik of the Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, is in the chair. Other literary figures of the subcontinent include Dr. Qamar Rais, Shahzad Ahmad, Mohsin Ehsan, Jon Elia, Sahar Ansari, and Salman Abbasi. Some notable North American Urdu poets are also participating in the mushaira. Among them are Professor M. Zaki, Hanif Akhgar, Hifzul Kabir Qureshi, Shaheen, Ashfaq Hussain, Abdul Qavi Zia, Nuzhat Siddiqui, Noor Ahmad Shaikh, Tasleem Elahi Zulfi, Hafiz Ishtiaq Talib, Matloob Hossain, and Khalid Farid.

Two weeks earlier, a number of speakers had paid glowing tributes to the distinguished guest from Pakistan at the Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi International Seminar held at Holiday Inn Downtown Toronto under the auspices of Writers’ Forum. The celebration concluded with a live interview of the visiting author conducted by Khalid Sohail and Baidar Bakht in front of the audience attending the seminar.

Such events are no longer rare in Canada.

Almost the entire Urdu-speaking population of this country estimated at over 60,000 lives in large cities like Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg, Vancouver and some smaller cities of southwestern Ontario.
The history of Urdu language and literature in Canada is in its nascent stage of growth. Hardly two decades old, it is yet to be shaped and nurtured.

It may not be out of place to mention in brief that the Canadian mainstream literature, both in English and French, has come of age only recently. Less than forty years ago, Canadian literature existed mainly on the neglected book shelves of private collections. It was not recognized as a cultural asset worth paying attention to. Even the Canadian schools and universities largely ignored it.

From Susanna Moodie’s Roughing It in the Bush (1852) to Hugh MacLennan’s Two Solitudes (1945), from the earliest totem poles to the paintings by the Group of Seven, there has been a continuous effort to define and establish Canadian art, literature and culture as distinct entities. Margaret Atwood in her book Survival (1972) deplores the colonialism which until recently crippled the arts in Canada.

The Times Literary Supplement of 26 October, 1973 featured articles on Canadian writing that elaborated on the state of the Canadian literature and publishing at that time. Of special significance are three articles:

Canada’s Elizabethan Age? by Ronald Sutherland
The Beaver and the Elephant by Tony Kilgallin
Poetry in the Buffer Zone by Margaret Atwood
Sutherland noted that the Canadian writer in both English and French seems, like Stephen Leacock’s horseman, to be leaping on his horse and riding off in all directions. Kilgallin quoted Northrop Frye:
Canadian literature...seems constantly to be trying to understand something that eludes it, frustrated by a sense that there is something to be found that has not been found, something to be heard that the world is too noisy to let us hear...I should like to suggest that our identity, like the real identity of all nations, is the one we have failed to achieve.
Atwood explained how things have changed and that they are different now (1973) than they were fifteen years ago. Most importantly, a poet will potentially be taken seriously, not only by other poets and literati, but by a considerable segment of the reading public.
The above digression, perhaps, makes it easier to think of Urdu in Canada in a broader perspective. Canada became a nation in 1867. Canadian literature took a hundred years to shape up. In drawing conclusions, however, there is no need to rush as there are not many parallels to be drawn.

Canadian authors who write in one of the non-official languages, Urdu being one of them, are neither considered part of their original cultural and linguistic heritage nor they are accorded the respectability enjoyed by the Canadian mainstream writers. It is only through translation that they can make their presence known and that too in a limited way.
Emigration to a new country makes it difficult to retain old connections and develop new ones. Ethnic writers, in general, suffer from isolation. They are isolated from their country of origin, from their readers, from media, from other contemporary writers and from almost everything that is conducive to creative writing.

What follows is a brief outline of some activities concerning preservation and promotion of Urdu language and literature that have taken place on Canadian soil, most notably during the past thirty years. The details are not complete and exhaustive. Some errors and omissions are likely to have crept in. Any claim to thoroughness would be misleading in a review of this nature. Also, the names of writers and poets, wherever they appear in this article, have been listed without any specific order. This clarification is necessary in view of the fact that maintaining a proper sequence in listing names forms part of the Urdu literary tradition. Should this result in some hurt feelings, I offer my sincere apologies.

The first mushaira in Canada was organized by Shaista Ikramullah in 1952 in Ottawa where her husband headed the Pakistan High Commission. It was attended, among others, by Shahid Suhrawardy, Rahat Saeed Chhatari, Iqbal Akhund, Riyazuddin Ahmad, Sayud Ahmad, Ehsanul Haque Anwar, Arshad Mirza, Ejaz Ahmad Naik, Majid Ali (who later married Zahra Nigah), Saad Khairi (son of Rashedul Khairi), Shareef Ahmad, and Syed Moin Ashraf who has lived in Ottawa since 1951. Arshad Mirza who wrote good poetry was fatally injured in a tram accident in Ottawa and lies buried in the local Beechwood cemetery. A report based on this mushaira was broadcast from Radio Pakistan, Karachi. It was also published in Mah-i-Nau.

Many events took place in the late 1970s after which the pace has considerably accelerated. A few of the important literary events are recorded here in order to provide a glimpse of those years of nascent cultural growth in a new environment.
In 1977, Ottawa witnessed the Iqbal centenary celebration on a scale that would have appeared, only a few years before, to be a far cry. A grand display of books, a mushaira and a symposium were the highlights of the occasion. Scholars, writers and poets from all over Canada and U.S.A. participated in the celebration organized at the University of Ottawa campus under the auspices of the Canada-Pakistan Association of Ottawa-Hull. The proceedings of the symposium were published later in the form of a book. Those who presented papers in the symposium included the then Iranian ambassador to Canada Fazlollah Raza, Marietta Stepaniants, Hafeez Malik, Abdul Qavi Zia and M.H.K. Qureshi. The poets participating in the mushaira included Munibur Rahman, Inayet Hussain Shadan, Abdul Qavi Zia, Shaheen, M.H.K. Qureshi, Irfana Aziz, Mamun Aiman, Mohammad Ali Raza, Roushan Sharma, Iftikhar Haider, Rasheda Sial, Faquir Sahgal, Khalid Farid, Khalil Ahmad and some others .

Next year was equally eventful. Faiz Ahmad Faiz was invited to Toronto by Abdul Rahim Anjaan, a short story writer and editor of Mulaqat. Faiz was accorded a warm reception on his arrival in November, 1978. The warmth generated by his fall visit partially eroded the harshness of the winter that followed. Aziz Ahmad, one of the most acclaimed novelists of Urdu and Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Toronto at that time, was suffering from terminal cancer that had reduced him to a skeleton. He could hardly walk. But he attended the mushaira held in honour of Faiz Ahmad Faiz and presented a paper on the poetry of the distinguished guest. A few weeks later, Aziz Ahmad died.

Where are they all? Some raise their heads
As tulips and the rose
What faces must have decked the earth
That under it repose?
(Asadullah Khan Ghalib translated by Ahmad Ali)
In 1980, Faiz Ahmad Faiz again visited Toronto where he presided over a mushaira held on 25th October under the auspices of Urdu Society. Prominent among other poets who participated were Akhtarul Iman, Sardar Jafri, Kaifi Azmi, Wajeda Tabassum, Meena Qazi, Bekal Utsahi, Aziz Qaisi, Shaheen, M.H.K. Qureshi, A.Q. Zia, Ashfaq Hussain, Abrar Hasan, Aqeela Shaheen, Nuzhat Siddiqui, Tazeen Hena, Afzal Imam, Josh Mandozai, Abid Jafri, Talat Isharat, Jamal Zuberi, and Ishtiaq Talib.
Athar Razvi and Ashfaq Hussain have been instrumental in sponsoring groups of Urdu writers and poets from the Indo-Pak subcontinent. The first such group from Pakistan included Zamir Jafri, Jamiluddin Aali, Qateel Shefai, Hemayat Ali Shair, Sehba Akhtar and Parveen Fena Syed. They toured all important cities of Canada, ending their trip in Vancouver, British Columbia, where a mushaira was held on August 23, 1981 at Robson Square Cinema. All with the exception of Zamir Jafri were present at the Vancouver event. Local poets included Khalilur Rahman Chishti, Hazeen Lukhnavi and Bismil Lukhnavi.
The same year on the 3rd day of October, the Pakistan Canada Friendship Society of Vancouver also organized a symposium followed by a mushaira. The papers presented in Urdu at the symposium included Ghazal and Its Evolution by W.A. Shaheen; The Political Poetry of Faiz Ahmad Faiz by Ashfaq Hussain; Majaz by Tariq Rafay; A Glance at the Poetry of Noon Meem Rashed by Abrar Hasan; and Characteristics of the Poetry of Kalim Ajiz by Afzal Imam. Syed Amir Hussain Naqvi, Tariq Rafay and Zafar Alam were responsible for organizing the event.

The Urdu Society of Canada, Toronto, with Hifzul Kabir Qureshi as its president, held a mushaira and the first Urdu Conference on September 25-26, 1982, in which Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Jameeluddin Aali, Ada Jafri, Ahmad Faraz, Ali Sardar Jafri, Gopi Chand Narang, Iftikhar Arif, Carlo Coppola, Annemarie Schimmel and a large number of North American poets participated. The following papers were presented:

Trends in Modern Urdu Poetry by Gopi Chand Narang
Progressive Movement and Its Influence on Urdu Poetry by Ali Sardar Jafri
Mushaira as an Institution by Munibur Rahman
History of Progressive Poetry by Carlo Coppola
The Concept of Tasawwuf in Urdu Poetry by Annemarie Schimmel
Modernism in Classical Urdu Poetry by Hifzul Kabir Quraishi
Writers Forum of Pakistani Canadians in co-operation with Pakistan Canada Amity Forum held an International Urdu Conference on September 18, 1983 in which the following papers were presented:
Evolution of Urdu Literature in Canada by A. Q. Zia
Urdu and Its International Links in Canada by Raees Amrohvi
Aesthetics in Pakistani Literature by Sahba Lucknavi
New Trends in Pakistani Literature by Mohammad Ali Siddiqui
Urdu Poetry About the Close of 20th Century: The Scene in Pakistan
by Shanul Haq Haqqi
Comparative study of Iqbal in Pakistan and India by Jagan Nath Azad
Panel discussants included Muhammad Umar Memon, Akhtar Ahsan, Iftikhar Arif, Hasan Abid, Shaheen and Faruq Hassan. The night before, prominent poets had read their poetry to a large audience. Raees Amrohvi, Shanul Haq Haqqi, Hasan Abid, Jagan Nath Azad, Munir Niazi, Kishwar Naheed, Sehba Akhtar, Sahba Lucknavi, Iftikhar Arif, Mujib Khairabadi, Aziz Hamid Madni, Munibur Rahman, Shaheen, Abdul Qavi Zia, Akhtar Ahsan, Rasheeda Ayan, Aziz ul Hasan, Talat Isharat - all of them were there.
An important literary event arranged early in the year 1983 (April 23 to be exact) by a young and promising poet Akhtar Asif took place in Scarborough. The occasion was the first death anniversary of Josh Maleehabadi. The poets were given notice in advance and requested, as was customary in olden days, to pattern their ghazals for rhyme and metre on a prescribed format which in this case was a hemistich from Josh:
Aadmee khursheed se dast-o-garebaan kyon na ho

It was a solemn yet lively function, made livelier by the enthusiastic participation of the audience. Good poetry was in abundance. Poets came from Washington, D.C., Baltimore, New York, New Jersey, Chicago, Ottawa, Hamilton, Sudbury, Brantford, Toronto, and its suburbs. The proceedings edited by Akhtar Asif were published later.
On November 2-4, 1984, the Urdu Society of Canada arranged a symposium and mushaira followed by a workshop. Four papers, three in English and one in Urdu, were presented at the symposium:

Translating a Culture by M. Hifzul Kabir Qureshi
Some Problems of Urdu Lexicography by Shamsur Rahman Faruqi
Teaching of Urdu at Columbia University by Frances Pritchett
Concept of Lover in the Poetry of Mir and Ghalib by S.R. Faruqi
The mushaira was presided over by Shamsur Rahman Faruqi and emceed by Hifzul Kabir Qureshi. Among those who recited their poetry were Kalim Ajiz, Bekal Utsahi, Shamsur Rahman Faruqi, Abdul Qavi Zia, Shaheen, Humaira Rahman, Nuzhat Siddiqui, Afzal Imam, Ishtiaq Talib and Hifzul Kabir Qureshi. It may as well be mentioned in passing that Rahman Nayyar, editor of Biswin Sadi, New Delhi, was also present on the occasion.
A few days later on November 20, 1984, the Writers Forum of Pakistani Canadians arranged to celebrate an evening with Ali Sardar Jafri. Faiz Ahmad Faiz had passed away the same day in Lahore. The celebration was on when the news reached Toronto and all on a sudden from nowhere descended a gloom that permeated the hallways of the Downtown Toronto Holiday Inn to claim the evening for the departed soul. Faiz Ahmad Faiz was so much a part of the Canadian Urdu literary scene. The loss was unquantifiable.

Less than three weeks after, on the 8th of December, 1984, a grand mushaira was held at the Ontario Institute of Studies in Education (OISE), Toronto, in which Jameeluddin Aali, Ali Sardar Jafri, Parveen Shakir, Amjad Islam Amjad, Tasleem Elahi Zulfi and a large number of North American poets participated. The group also travelled to Ottawa and Montreal where similar reading sessions were arranged.

A few years back, Nasim Syed, herself an acclaimed poet, had arranged, in co-operation with some local patrons of Urdu, a number of literary functions in Kingston, Ontario, of which she was a resident.

These and many more events have taken place in the recent past. To describe them all is neither necessary nor possible in a short paper. Perhaps sometime in future an entire book expanding on the details and critical evaluation of the Canadian Urdu writings will not be something unusual to ask for.

The number of Urdu writers in Canada is not insignificant. And many of them are established authors, well known in Canada as well as abroad, and are no less gainfully committed to their craft than their counterparts in the Indo-Pak subcontinent. Shanul Haq Haqqi, Akhtar Jamal, Shahid Hussain Razzaqui, Shaheen, Irfana Aziz, Faruq Hassan, Athar Razvi, Ashfaq Hussain, Abdul Qavi Zia, Noor Ahmad Shaikh, Baidar Bakht, Khalid Sohail, Muzaffar Iqbal, Jawaid Danish, Razaul Jabbar, Iftikhar Haider, Hifzul Kabir Qureshi, Ikram Brelvi, Sultan Jameel Nasim, Syed Moin Ashraf, Syed Khurshid Alam, Nuzhat Siddiqui, Abid Jafri, Shakila Rafiq, Afzaal Naveed, Nasim Syed, Ishtiaq Talib, Muneef Ashar, Josh Mandozai, Tasleem Elahi Zulfi, Jagdish Mehta Dard, Abrar Hassan, Tabassum Afzaal Malik and Nilofar Taimuri are established, published authors. Some, like Shanul Haq Haqqi, have authored books in dozens. The late Aziz Ahmad is considered one of the most important Urdu fiction writers of the twentieth century.

Most of the Canadian Urdu writers are poets. Notable among the fiction, drama and travel writers are late Aziz Ahmad, Muzaffar Iqbal, Ikram Brelvi, Razaul Jabbar, Anwar Khalil Shaikh, Shakila Rafiq, Khalid Sohail, Jawaid Danish, Syed Moin Ashraf, Abdul Rahim Anjaan, Nilofar Taimuri, Naushad Ali, Naushad Siddiqui, Abid Jafri, Tabassum Bano, and Faisal Farani. Akhtar Jamal and Sultan Jameel Nasim, prominent short story writers of the subcontinent, are important recent additions.
In non-fiction (literary criticism, book reviews, essays), some of the well known writers include Shanul Haq Haqqi, Urooj Akhtar Zaidi, Athar Razvi, Ashfaq Hussain, (late) Abdul Qaiyum Lodhi, (late) A.Q. Zia, (late) Syed Khursheed Alam, Sajida Alvi, Jalaluddin S. Hussain, Nuzrat Yar Khan, Muzaffar Iqbal, Muhammad Fayyaz, Faruq Hassan, M.H.K. Qureshi, Khalid Sohail, Munir Pervaiz, Linda Voll, Anwar Nasim and W.A. Shaheen. A few of these non-fiction writers have written only in English but they invariably deal with Urdu creative writing.

Judy Young, in a survey of Canadian literature in the non-official languages of Canada (Canadian Ethnic Studies, XlV, 1, 1982) provided, among others, a list of literary works published since 1970 in Urdu or in translation. She also referred to work in progress in this area. Stephen Gill, as far back as 1976, had published an anthology of Canadian poets of Asian origin (Green Snow, Vesta Publications) that included Shaheen’s poems in translation. The same year John Miska, a Hungarian writer and scholar, compiled a biobibliography of ethnic writers of Canada that also included Urdu. A few poems of Shaheen have recently been collected in an anthology Symbiosis (Girol Books, Ottawa, Canada) edited by Chilean-Canadian poet Luciano Diaz. The book containing poems by 38 Ottawa-region poets of diverse cultural backgrounds was published from Ottawa in November, 1992. Shaheen is also included in Windhorse Reader: Choice Poems of 1994 (Samurai Press, Yarmouth, NS, Canada). The Canadian Encyclopedia (Hurtig, 1988) mentions three Urdu writers, Shaheen, Irfana Aziz, and A. Q. Zia. A recent publication Encyclopedia of Literature in Canada (Edited by William H. New, University of Toronto Press, 2002) includes references under multicultural voices to works by Aziz Ahmad, Wali Alam Shaheen, and Nuzrat Yar Khan.
Whatever be the inadequacies of translation, it is one of the most vital tools that enables us to know and be known on cultural, literary and linguistic levels. Fortunately, Urdu has attracted a number of good translators in Canada. Baidar Bakht, Kathleen Grant Jaegar, Derek M. Cohen, Leslie Lavigne, M.H.K. Qureshi, Faruq Hassan, Stanley Rajiva, Carla Petievich, Cameran Mirza, Nuzrat Yar Khan, Shehla Burney, Kenneth Bryant, A.Q. Zia, Nazneen Sadiq, Khalid Sohail, Linda Voll, Zamir Ahmad, and W.A. Shaheen are among some of the best known Canadian translators of Urdu literature.

A number of community-based Urdu periodicals like Al-Hilal, Pakeeza International, Imroze, Millat, Leader, Sahafat, Sukhanwar, Alumni International, The Eastern News, Awaz, Watan, Afaq, Tarjuman and a few others, all published in Toronto, have grown over a period of time. Some of them have been there for more than ten years. A good number of them appear on the scene for a short while and pass into oblivion thereafter. Majority of them are distributed free and are available in community stores. They all serve a good cause in that they reinvigorate the literary and cultural environment of the Urdu-speaking populace. At the same time, they also help strengthen the common bonds. In short, they keep the flame burning.

Various levels of government - federal, provincial, regional and local - and private businesses, largely community-based, provide the advertisements that make them financially viable to a certain extent. The most important ingredient, however, is the zeal and the commitment shown by the publishers to preserve and promote their heritage. M. Lateef Owaisi, Zafar Bangash, Sabih Mansoor, Shahtaj Fatema, Abid Rizvi, Abdur Rahim Anjan, Abid Jafri, Nazeer Sadar, Sajjad Haider, Tahir Aslam Gora, M. Hameeduddin, Zafar Mahmood, Mosharraf Hasni, Afzal Imam, Masood Khan, Darakhshan & Adeel Siddiqi, late Sardar Butt and many others have made immense contributions in this regard.

A few periodicals published mostly by local associations are also important. Their main purpose is to keep their membership informed of the community affairs including various planned events. In general, the texts they carry are bilingual, Urdu and English. Payamber, a publication of the Pakistan Association of Quebec, is a good example.

The first Canadian Urdu literary magazine was Sahba edited by Hifzul Kabir Qureshi. Another periodical worth mentioning is Mulaqaat edited by Abdul Rahim Anjaan. Its few issues published during less than two years of its existence (1976-77) focused on the literary and cultural life of Toronto as seen from the eyes of the Urdu speaking expatriates. These two magazines did not survive long enough to have a lasting impact but they certainly provided a momentum that helped the needed continuity.

The most important single contribution came from Urdu International, a quarterly Urdu magazine published and edited by Ashfaq Hussain. Started in 1982, it survived a dozen issues that earned a well deserved recognition. Ashfaq Hussain had earlier published a volume of his poetry and a treatise on Faiz Ahmad Faiz.

Urdu Canada, an English language journal of studies in Urdu literature edited by Wali Alam Shaheen, aimed at a readership not familiar with Urdu language. It was also intended for those who for some reasons have lost touch with the Urdu mainstream of literature but wish to retain a link with their heritage. Within a short duration (1986-90), it established itself as a prestigious literary magazine.

Another professionally produced quality English tri-annual The Toronto South Asian Review (TSAR) edited by M.G. Vassanji occasionally publishes Urdu short stories and poetry in translation. One of its recent publications is a book of Abdullah Hussein’s short stories translated by Muhammad Umar Memon. Another collection of Urdu short stories Domains of Fear and Desire edited by Muhammad Umar Memon has also been published by TSAR.

Certain individuals in their own ways, apart from their organizational affiliations, have over a period of time served the cause of Urdu in Canada. Prominent among them are (the late) Dr. Abdul Khaliq, Mohammad Naqi and Salim and Regula Qureshi, Dr. Waseemul Haq, and Jalal Syed of Edmonton, Pervez Wakil of Saskatoon, Pervin Shere and Kulsoom Aijaz Mohammadi of Winnipeg, Nasim Syed, Khalid Bin Sayeed, Abdul Qadeer and Mohammad Fayyaz of Kingston, A.Q. Zia of Sudbury, Faruq Hassan, M. Zaki, Shafiq Alvi, Moin Kermani, Riffat Noor, Barkat Hashmi, Ali Abbas Hasnie and Afaque Haider of Montreal, Anwar Nasim, Nuzrat Yar Khan, Syed Moin Ashraf, Umang Bali, Humaira and Anwar Saeed Ansari, Roushan Pukhraj, and Mohammad Ali Raza of Ottawa, Col. Anwar Ahmed, Baidar Bakht, Hifzul Kabir Qureshi, Athar Razvi, Ashfaq Husain and Abid Jafri of Toronto, Irfana Aziz of Winnipeg, Iqbal Haider of Calgary, and Khalil Ahmad of Halifax.

Among the academic community of university teachers who have been actively associated with the teaching and promotion of Urdu and Islamic Studies in Canada, mention must be made of Abdul Rahman Barker, Aziz Ahmad, Charles Adams, Wilfred Smith, Sheila McDonough, Milton Israel, Enoch Padolsky, Kenneth Bryant, Carla Petievich, Marcia Hermansen, Aqeela Shaheen and Sajida Alvi. There is also a large number of dedicated individuals in many urban areas who have been teaching Urdu to small groups of school-going children on weekends and, in some cases, on weekday evenings, with or without government grants. Their services are invaluable. In fact, they are the real torch bearers of the language, selflessly devoted to the cause of Urdu in Canada.

The establishment of the Chair in Urdu Language and Culture at the McGill University, Montreal, with funding provided by the governments of Pakistan and Canada and some private donors, has created a centre for the dissemination of Urdu language and culture in North America. What is needed is a dedicated participation of the Urdu-speaking communities in making it a worthwhile success.

The Multiculturalism Act passed on July 12, 1988, empowers the Government of Canada to promote heritage languages. A total of $6.5 million in the federal money was allocated to be spent over 5 years on projects such as the production of Canadian-oriented heritage language teaching materials, developments of standards for language teaching and organization of conferences. The federal government already spends about $10 million supporting heritage language training as subsidy to offset part of the cost of teaching 62 languages across Canada, Urdu being one of them.

Compared to some other parts of the globe where Urdu has found new homes in recent times, perhaps Canada is a more suitable place for building another new home on a relatively more solid ground. This harsh and beautiful land has never ceased to accommodate what can further enhance its beauty. And the Canadian cultural mosaic, symbolizing unity in diversity, has a charm of its own.