Dr. Imteyaz Ahmad Khan, UK: On board Bihar Anjuman Ship - Part2 (Nov. 2005)

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On board Bihar Anjuman Ship

Dr. Imteyaz Ahmad Khan, UK describes his trip to Delhi, Patna, Sabalpur and AMU as an emissary of Bihar Anjuman

For Part-1 of this report, please click here

Part-2

In my last mail I was not able to complete the report of the maiden meetings of the Anjuman during my recent visit to India.

I was expecting an informal meeting with 5 to 6 people in all the places but it turned out to be very formal, popular and welcome meetings in all the places. It was overwhelming and quite unexpected.

The magnitude and the warmth of response showed how most people can flock to cooperate in good causes. On one hand it was a tribute to the sincere efforts of the founders of the Anjuman and on the other hand it was an achievement made possible only by the help of Allah in the efforts made by my dear brother Moiz, Maulana Qasim , Maulana Anisur Rehman , Brother Sufian Badr, Imtiaz Hasan and his colleagues in New Delhi and amazing work done by Khalid Waheed Falahi and Asraul Haque in organizing a well attended meeting in AMU in spite of examinations going on at the same time.
My heart is full of gratitude to every one who made these maiden meetings of the Anjuman possible.
I embarked on this journey with some trepidations but it turned out to be great. I must say that desire to see Sabalpur Eye hospital and the Madrassa was strong enough to make me decide to take up the strenuous journey.

Dr Moiz & Maulana Anisur Rahman’s visit to my home

Dr Moiz Shamsh came first to my house in Chhapra (Olhanpur) with his family and Maulana Anisur Rehman .I was honoured and immensely pleased by their visit .They arrived by car at about 11 am and left by 6pm, we couldn’t talk enough in that time. Dr Moiz was kind enough to examine the eyes of my sisters and auntie and give some indications of the problem. 

Travel to Patna / Sabalpur Madrassa & Eye Hospital

I hired a taxi for the day and travelled to Sabalpur on 20th November with my wife and son Khalid. We arrived in 3 hours door to door from my place Olhanpur to Dr Moiz’s house in Sabalpur. The other guests invited at his house were Maulana Anisur Rahman, Maulana Qasim, brother Aijaz, Dr Saroj (Thakur) Anis and her husband to this meeting. The latter is also a graduate of Ranchi Medical College, 2-3 years after my batch. She reverted to Islam after graduation and married Mr Anis. She has had since been to Hajj and Umra. She was professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in Patna Medical College. She is now retired. She is the niece of a famous cardiologist in Patna, Dr Srineevas. It was a pleasure to meet her. 
I was also delighted to meet Brother Aijaz who took the trouble to attend Sabalpur meeting. He seems to be very sincere and full of enthusiasm to take part in Anjuman activities.
All the guests were entertained to a lavish lunch in the board room of the hospital which serves dual purpose of holding conference, seminars and also as a large dinning room. 

A pic from Free Eye Camp at Dr. Moiz's hospital   ........... More pics

All of us were taken to the tour of hospital, examination room, screening room, waiting room, operation theatre, recovery room, and the rooms for the patient to stay the night.
His house is the hospital and the hospital is his house. The house is situated in a large complex which he has been improvised, modified and extended to provide all the facility. Further extension and construction of new building is in progress to provide more space and better facility. We also visited the eye camp site.
The hospital is clean, meticulously planned and organised, much better than many government hospitals. It beggars the belief how he has done it single handed. You need at least 10 doctors like him to achieve what he has done. We were most impressed by the organization and the record number of operations he has performed free of charge for the pleasure of Allah SWT. I salute his determination and dedication to help the poor and needy. He is a man of action, pursuing his mission with single-mindedness. 
(Whoever believed (in Islam) and did good deeds, his reward is unto Allah and he has nothing to fear and to be sad about.)
While we were there I was interviewed by a reporter of an Urdu daily regarding the hospital, Anjuman objectives and my impression of India and what made me go to UK

Plan to build a modern Eye Hospital

Brother Moiz is negotiating with Imarat Shariah to have a new hospital in their campus. Maulana Anisur Rahman (Gen secretary) has agreed to the proposal but there are some possible difficulties and reservations at higher level of decision making. All of you must have seen the proposed plan posted by Dr Moiz few days back...
I hope Anjuman would support this plan in whatever way it can and use its contacts with elders of Imarat Shariah to make them irrevocably approve the project. It should be finalised as soon as possible. I have sent an email to Nazim e Imarat in this regard requesting him to clarify the decision. I await his answer.

Sabalpur Madrassa & the Mosque without a building!

All of us were then escorted by respected Maulana Qasim to the site. It was ASR prayer time. All the students (about 600) and the teachers were waiting for us in the campus of the mosque which had no roof, no wall, just the pillars.
I was struck by the plight of the mosque and the sight of poor little innocent children- future scholars and huffaze Quran.
After Asr Salat, one after another three children recited Quran which was beautiful to listen to. Maulana Anisur Rehman, Dr Moiz, Maulana Qasim and one of the generous benefactor (who gave a huge chunk of his land to the project) gave speech and shed lights on the history of Madrassa and its present and future requirements. We were shown the Madrassa building which is in progress. It was upsetting to see the student’s hall of residence- a bare concrete floor, with big holes/ gaps cut in the wall for windows but no windows yet.
God knows how they survive frosty cold winter, heat waves in summer and heavy down pour in Monsoon.
Like Dr Moiz Shamsh, Maulana Qasim has been pursuing the cause of Madrassa and mosque single handed .May Allah reward him.
Madrassas requires the urgent attention and help of all Muslim brothers and sisters. 
Detailed plan and expenses involved has been posted in the yahoogroup.

Details of mosque at Sabalpur madarsa

My first visit to Imarat Shariah 21st November 2005

View pictures from trip to Imarat-e-Sharia

Next morning on 21st November we went to visit Imarat Sharia at the invitation of Hazrat Maulana Anisur Rehman. He had invited us to breakfast.
Dr Moiz & his brother, Mr Sohail Ahmed Khan, chairman minority commission and other guests were also invited there. Sohail Sb is my old friend whom I met after nearly 38 years.
Amire Shariat, Hazrat Maulana Nezamuddin saheb honoured us by his presence. 

After the breakfast we were taken on a guided tour of the hospital and technical college at the instance of Hazrat Maulana Amire Shariat. My son Dr Khalid was asked to inaugurate the new maternity ward. Recently a generous brother of Patna living in USA has had donated around 60-70 Lakhs rupees to the hospital to build a ward/ theatre in the memory of his wife, which has been completed... We met the doctors and staff of the hospital.
Again the facility and free treatment provided by Imarat for the Maulana Sajjad Memorial charity hospital is amazing and very impressive. So was the technical college. It is a pity that it was a hurried tour because I needed to catch my flight to Delhi the same day at 1pm. After the tour of the hospital we had dashed to the site of the proposed new Eye Hospital in the company of Maulana Anisu Rehman and Dr Moiz. We returned to Imarat to say Khuda Hafiz to Amire Shariat and then headed for the air port and arrived Delhi via Ranchi at about 05.30 pm.

Anjuman maiden meeting in Delhi 22nd November 2005

Next day meeting of the Anjuman was scheduled to take place in Jammate Islami Mosque in AF enclave after Asr prayer. The proceeding started with Quran “tilawat” and then brother Sufiyan Badr conducted and chaired the meeting at my request. As it was the first meeting there was no agenda. 

However it was decided after discussion that they would hold Anjuman meeting at least once a month and coordinate with each other. Some brothers were eager to meet twice a month or once every 3 weeks. Alhamdolillah they all seemed very passionate about Anjuman.

The members also proposed to help fellow students and Muslims in whatever they can. I was so pleased to hear from brother Imtiaz who works at the AIIMS that he helps the muslim patients in getting tests done. This should be the spirit of the community. It was refreshing to see the zeal and the spirit of action of the group members.

The maiden meeting in Aligarh Muslim University 23rd November 2005

We got a text message in the morning that Prof. Abdus Salam had invited us to lunch at his residence. That was a good start!
Again I hired a taxi for the day and set off for Aligarh with my wife in the company of my two nephews, Shakeel and Allauddin. Unfortunately we set off much later than planned and arrived there late around 1pm. Journey was comfortable and the driver was good and jovial.

We were welcome on the outskirts of the University by brother Khalid Waleed Falahi and his friends. KW Falahi accompanied us to Prof. Abdus Salam’s house. It was very kind of him to welcome us warmly and entertain with delicious lunch. I was really struck by his gentle polite pleasant manner. He turned out to be a very close pal and room mate of my wife’ younger brother Dr Haroon Rashid Khan who after doing his Phd went to work in Japan, Saudi and now has settled in Toronto , Canada.
I requested Prof Salam to join the Anjuman and he promised he would. His presence will be a great asset guiding and boosting the work of the Anjuman at local, regional and national level. He was not aware of the Bihar Anjuman until very recently. 

Meeting venue VM hall

After lunch we all went to the splendid VM hall where people were waiting for quite some time. Visiting AMU for the first time and standing on the dais of one of its famous hall was a dream come true. I always wanted to visit this world famous Muslim University which has produced so many great sons (political and academic) in the subcontinent.
I felt both humbled and honoured sitting between distinguished professor, lecturer, provost, under graduates and post graduates students of the University. It was a great privilege to be there though I was there only by proxy. 

The warmth and affection displayed by the organisers and the audience was overwhelming and I will treasure the memory of those moments.
Many wanted me to stay another day and visit various faculties but unfortunately it was not possible though I would have loved to spend some more time there...

The full report of the meeting has already been posted at the Anjuman web site.

All I can say that it was wonderfully meticulously organised meting and credit goes to Khalid Waleed and his colleagues in the faculty of Economics with full support of Prof Abdus Salam and also to brother Asrarul Haq ( medic)
Meeting was conducted in an excellent manner by brotherMr Ghufran Ahmed. He was an eloquent articulate speaker. 

I noticed lot of interest amongst the audience. They wanted to know how they can contribute and help the movement.

Antagonism to Bihar Anjuman

I am led to believe that in AMU there is some misgiving or a degree of antagonism to the establishment of Bihar Anjuman due to misunderstanding or misinformation. People who are not from Bihar think that this is some sort of political organisation aimed against non Biharis. There is urgent need to clear the air and remove those unfounded beliefs and allegations.

Future

I believe that in AMU and in Delhi we have lot of opportunity to promote the Anjuman objectives .These two places are a fertile ground to recruit really active new members to form the back bone of the movement.
I would very much recommend that next year a follow up visit should be taken up by one or two of the pioneer members, preferably by one or two of the “S” of the movement.

To be concluded: “What Next” ???

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