In memoriam: Remembering Sibt-e-Hassan and his words

KARACHI: The halls of the Pakistan Medical Association's Karachi division were echoing with Sibt-e-Hassan's voice - his lectures on cultural diversity and socialism were playing on repeat at the association's office.

This was made possible by Dr Haroon, who had been invited to talk about Sibt-e-Hassan - the journalist, socialist and anthropologist. In his hand, Dr Haroon had brought a tape recorder with recorded lectures of the late scholar. For many attending the event to celebrate Hassan's 98th birthday, it was almost as if he was there talking to them.

The event was organised by the International Youth and Workers Movement on Saturday. They wanted to share Hassan and his story.

Who was Sibt-e-Hassan

Sibt-e-Hassan was a scholar and journalist, and is regarded as the pioneer of Socialism in Pakistan. He was the brains behind the Progressive Writers Movement in pre-partition India.

He was born in 1917 in Uttar Pradesh, India. Hassan graduated from to the Aligarh Muslim University and went on to study at Columbia University.

In 1942, Hassan joined the Communist Party of India. He moved to Pakistan after the Partition and has served as editor for Naya Adab and Lail-o-Nehar. He died of a heart attack in April, 1986 and was buried in Karachi.

According to his daughter, Noshaba Zuberi, her father was from a small, middle-class family and loved to make friends.

Hassan's former student and now director of the Pakistan Study Centre, Dr Jafar Ahmed, said that he felt that he was constantly learning something new from his teacher.

"I used to ask a lot of question on socialism and he'd ask me to write them all down for him," he said. "The list grew to a 100 and when I gave it to him, he said that he felt that I had asked him to write a book on the topic." He added that he was proud of the day Moosa se Marx tak got published as it was a book which did actually answer all those questions.

Five of Hassan's books, including Sukhan dar Sukhan and Marx aur Mashriq, were published after his death.

While talking about Hassan, Dr Tahir, another one of his students, said that Hassan was a straight forward person and would always point out if you were making a mistake in quoting something from literature or history.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 15^th, 2014.