I’m not against any language and dont support violence but Stop this hyper secularism. Urdu or persian was imposed right from bahaminis till Nizams rule in deccan. osmania uni in 1918 had urdu as medium, there was no telugu medium. Why should telugu or kannada or marathi people speak and learn urdu? Shouldnt muslims who live in TG should adopt telugu ? Why still many are not fluent in telugu in old city?
The incident reveals so many problems: impotent police, assault wthout consequences, bigotry of the highest order, no one speaking up. Learning a language is a good thing. The language stays alive, it helps appreciate literature and culture, and can help keep cognitive decline at bay. The people who want to ban languages are cognitively chimps; they are beyond help.
Nothing can and should justify violence but the premise is laughable. Anyone who knows even a smattering of Urdu would know that the language is deeply immersed in Islamic culture and a worldview that is invariably Islamic.
Right from greeting someone ‘peace’ under submission to Allah (salam, etymologically tied to Islam; the full greeting means ‘peace, mercy, and blessings of Allah unto you’) to making a ‘dua’ (Islamic supplication) for their ‘khairiyat’ (well-being by Allah’s decree), to parting with ‘Allah keep you safe/in his protection’ (Allah hafiz/fi Amanullah) – and that’s just the everyday examples.
Examine the lexicon and idioms of Urdu. Talk of 7 heavens, theological concepts like qurbani, sadqa, sajda, iman, ibadat, qibla, wahiyy, and so much more. I’m not advocating that this is reason to despise the language, but it’s a profound ignorance to think it is not a language that evolved in an Islamic cultural milieu and evolved to express its ideas and reflect its thought paradigms.
And only as a final footnote do I bring in, one, the overwhelming body of literature from the classics to contemporary popular writings that are often explicitly didactic in nature and Islamic in character.
My second point is deeply connected to the history and evolution of the language, but I’d consider it a footnote because it is merely one small (if significant) way in which the Islamic character of Urdu becomes manifest – its metaphors and epithets allude to Islamic lands – Arabia, Iran, or at best Khorasan (rarely) – and folklore figures/legends far removed from Bharatiya geographies and local cultures. Even the Islamic doctrine of the kafir makes a cameo – kufr, sanam, but being frequent negative metaphors.
There is one exception – some idioms refer to munh mein Rama, or pujari, or mandir/devata. But these exceptions only prove the rule – munh mein Rama [mispronounced Ram in Urdu], baghal mein churi ; shaitani taqaton k pujari ; shehwat ka mandir / devata. As much as my lizard brain accustomed to rustic, lowly, uncultured Bharatiya languages wants to save myself from a 295 A or an STSJ crowd, I ask because someone must ask – why not munh mein Allah / Muhammad ; shaitani taqaton ka aabid/molvi ; shehwat ka masjid / khuda?
Oh yes I’m sorry, I know why not – Urdu is not a Muslim language.
You put zero effort into checking the facts of this school incident. You watched a viral video, took the principal’s excuse about “construction” at face value, and stopped reporting. You didn’t ask the basic questions: What was actually being taught in that room? Did the parents consent? Was Urdu part of the approved curriculum? You skipped these details because answering them would completely destroy the simple story you wanted to tell.
Instead, your writing reflects consistent anti-Hindu bias. You look at a legitimate, high-friction local dispute over curriculum and parental consent, and immediately use it as an opportunity to attack Hindu society, labeling valid parental concerns as mere bigotry. You invoke three Hindu poets across centuries to claim Urdu was never a Muslim language, but the official historical record you conveniently buried tells a completely different story.
The Census of India records—specifically the 1941 Hyderabad State Census Report and the 1931 Imperial Tables archived by the Government of India—show the raw demographic reality: Telugu speakers made up nearly 50% of Hyderabad State. Native Urdu speakers accounted for barely 9% to 10%. Yet, under the 1884 diktat of the 6th Nizam, Urdu was enforced as the sole official language of administration and courts. The 7th Nizam pushed it heavily into education, founding Osmania University in 1918 with Urdu as the mandatory medium of instruction, entirely bypassing Telugu despite it being the native language of the overwhelming majority.
This wasn’t organic cultural patronage. It was systematic, top-down institutional suppression. The Nizam imposed the language of the capital’s elite 10% minority onto the 90% of the population that spoke Telugu, Marathi, and Kannada, creating conditions for educational and economic disparities for the native Hindu population. You intentionally confuse Hyderabad City’s Urdu-dominant nobility with the broader, Telugu-dominant Hyderabad State just to make your argument work.
A violent assault happened, and that is indefensible. But you are using that violence as a shield to shut down legitimate questions about curriculum transparency. The token Hindu poets, the weaponized nostalgia, and the erased history of linguistic coercion all collapse when confronted with documented demographic data. You aren’t defending a language; you are romanticizing elite imposition to run cover for historical linguistic coercion and current misrepresentation of Urdu’s actual role in state administration. Do some actual reporting next time
I’m not against any language and dont support violence but Stop this hyper secularism. Urdu or persian was imposed right from bahaminis till Nizams rule in deccan. osmania uni in 1918 had urdu as medium, there was no telugu medium. Why should telugu or kannada or marathi people speak and learn urdu? Shouldnt muslims who live in TG should adopt telugu ? Why still many are not fluent in telugu in old city?
The incident reveals so many problems: impotent police, assault wthout consequences, bigotry of the highest order, no one speaking up. Learning a language is a good thing. The language stays alive, it helps appreciate literature and culture, and can help keep cognitive decline at bay. The people who want to ban languages are cognitively chimps; they are beyond help.
Nothing can and should justify violence but the premise is laughable. Anyone who knows even a smattering of Urdu would know that the language is deeply immersed in Islamic culture and a worldview that is invariably Islamic.
Right from greeting someone ‘peace’ under submission to Allah (salam, etymologically tied to Islam; the full greeting means ‘peace, mercy, and blessings of Allah unto you’) to making a ‘dua’ (Islamic supplication) for their ‘khairiyat’ (well-being by Allah’s decree), to parting with ‘Allah keep you safe/in his protection’ (Allah hafiz/fi Amanullah) – and that’s just the everyday examples.
Examine the lexicon and idioms of Urdu. Talk of 7 heavens, theological concepts like qurbani, sadqa, sajda, iman, ibadat, qibla, wahiyy, and so much more. I’m not advocating that this is reason to despise the language, but it’s a profound ignorance to think it is not a language that evolved in an Islamic cultural milieu and evolved to express its ideas and reflect its thought paradigms.
And only as a final footnote do I bring in, one, the overwhelming body of literature from the classics to contemporary popular writings that are often explicitly didactic in nature and Islamic in character.
My second point is deeply connected to the history and evolution of the language, but I’d consider it a footnote because it is merely one small (if significant) way in which the Islamic character of Urdu becomes manifest – its metaphors and epithets allude to Islamic lands – Arabia, Iran, or at best Khorasan (rarely) – and folklore figures/legends far removed from Bharatiya geographies and local cultures. Even the Islamic doctrine of the kafir makes a cameo – kufr, sanam, but being frequent negative metaphors.
There is one exception – some idioms refer to munh mein Rama, or pujari, or mandir/devata. But these exceptions only prove the rule – munh mein Rama [mispronounced Ram in Urdu], baghal mein churi ; shaitani taqaton k pujari ; shehwat ka mandir / devata. As much as my lizard brain accustomed to rustic, lowly, uncultured Bharatiya languages wants to save myself from a 295 A or an STSJ crowd, I ask because someone must ask – why not munh mein Allah / Muhammad ; shaitani taqaton ka aabid/molvi ; shehwat ka masjid / khuda?
Oh yes I’m sorry, I know why not – Urdu is not a Muslim language.
Mr. Yunus L,
You put zero effort into checking the facts of this school incident. You watched a viral video, took the principal’s excuse about “construction” at face value, and stopped reporting. You didn’t ask the basic questions: What was actually being taught in that room? Did the parents consent? Was Urdu part of the approved curriculum? You skipped these details because answering them would completely destroy the simple story you wanted to tell.
Instead, your writing reflects consistent anti-Hindu bias. You look at a legitimate, high-friction local dispute over curriculum and parental consent, and immediately use it as an opportunity to attack Hindu society, labeling valid parental concerns as mere bigotry. You invoke three Hindu poets across centuries to claim Urdu was never a Muslim language, but the official historical record you conveniently buried tells a completely different story.
The Census of India records—specifically the 1941 Hyderabad State Census Report and the 1931 Imperial Tables archived by the Government of India—show the raw demographic reality: Telugu speakers made up nearly 50% of Hyderabad State. Native Urdu speakers accounted for barely 9% to 10%. Yet, under the 1884 diktat of the 6th Nizam, Urdu was enforced as the sole official language of administration and courts. The 7th Nizam pushed it heavily into education, founding Osmania University in 1918 with Urdu as the mandatory medium of instruction, entirely bypassing Telugu despite it being the native language of the overwhelming majority.
This wasn’t organic cultural patronage. It was systematic, top-down institutional suppression. The Nizam imposed the language of the capital’s elite 10% minority onto the 90% of the population that spoke Telugu, Marathi, and Kannada, creating conditions for educational and economic disparities for the native Hindu population. You intentionally confuse Hyderabad City’s Urdu-dominant nobility with the broader, Telugu-dominant Hyderabad State just to make your argument work.
A violent assault happened, and that is indefensible. But you are using that violence as a shield to shut down legitimate questions about curriculum transparency. The token Hindu poets, the weaponized nostalgia, and the erased history of linguistic coercion all collapse when confronted with documented demographic data. You aren’t defending a language; you are romanticizing elite imposition to run cover for historical linguistic coercion and current misrepresentation of Urdu’s actual role in state administration. Do some actual reporting next time
Agreed. Urdu needs to be delinked from religion.