Memories (Episode 13)

Residence at Lasbela House

Until Ramadan 1374 AH (approximately May 1955), our residence was in an apartment on Campbell Street near Burns Road. We lived in that apartment for five years. This period turned out to be very blessed. During this stay, we were granted the opportunity to perform Hajj, which I have mentioned earlier. It was also during this stay that my elder brother, Hadhrat Mawlana Mufti Muhammad Rafiʿ (may Allah grant him a long life), completed his memorization of the Qur’an and led the Tarawih prayer for the first time. During this stay, Dar al-ʿUlum was established in Nanak Warah, and our formal education began. It was also during this stay that our elder sister, respected ʿAtiqah Khatun, who had come from Deoband as a widow, was married to Hadhrat Mawlana Nur Ahmad (may Allah have mercy on him). Here, too, our second sister, whom we call Choti Apa, was married to the late Hafiz Shafqat Ali of Lahore. Our elder brother, respected Muhammad Raḍi, was also married here, and his wedding was conducted by Hadhrat Mawlana Muhammad Yusuf Binnori (may Allah have mercy on him). It was while living here that our respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) and his companions, as members of the Board of Islamic Teachings, laid down the Islamic foundations for the Constitution of Pakistan, as a result of which a first draft of the Constitution, together with enforceable Islamic articles, was prepared in 1954. (Although later Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad dissolved the Constituent Assembly and derailed the country, and this draft Constitution was relegated to oblivion).

However, this apartment was also rented, and our respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) desired to have his own house in Karachi. At the time of migrating from India, our respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) owned considerable property, which included a large house, some inherited agricultural lands, and a garden that he had lovingly planted. The year he migrated was the year the first mango fruit was expected to grow on its trees. However, our respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) used to say: “The day I stepped out of that house and garden, they left my heart.” After our migration to Pakistan, the Indian Government took over all these properties.

Eventually, as a result of an agreement between Pakistan and India, it was decided that people who had left behind their properties due to the population exchange would be allotted a portion of the abandoned properties in the new country according to a specific framework. Thus, our respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) received a plot in the Lasbela House locality of Karachi in exchange for his abandoned properties, upon which he built a four-room house. (I remember that our respected father رحمہ اللہ used to say that the construction of those four rooms cost eight thousand rupees).

The construction of this house was completed in Ramadan 1374 AH, and we were waiting for Eid to move in. We brothers decided to spend the 27th night of Ramadan al-Mubarak by conducting Shabīna on the roof of the house. My respected brother Hadhrat Mawlana Mufti Muhammad Rafiʿ (may Allah grant him a long life) is Masha Allah a Ḥafiẓ of the Qur`an. He gathered several of his fellow Ḥuffaẓ and conducted Shabina in Tarawih prayer itself. Probably ten or twelve ajza of the Qur’an were recited in the Tarawih prayer. After Eid, on the 4th of Shawwal 1374 AH (approximately 25 May 1955), we moved into that house.

While we could walk to the madrasa from our house on Burns Road, the Lasbela House residence was about three to three-and-a-half miles away from the madrasa, so we two brothers would cycle there. Hadhrat Mawlana Mufti Muhammad Rafi’ (may Allah have mercy on him) would ride the bicycle, while I would sit either on the carrier at the back or on the front bar. Sometimes, when the bicycle would be unavailable for some reason, we would have to travel by bus, in which case we had to change buses twice to reach the madrasa.

Journey to Lahore and Deoband

During that academic year, when I was twelve years old, my respected mother had to undertake two journeys. One was to Lahore, and the other to Deoband, where she wished to meet her brothers and other relatives. Although it was my time of studies, and the journey was expected to take over a month, which would be detrimental for my studies, I was only twelve years old, and my mother could neither travel without me nor could I stay behind without her. Therefore, on the 1st of November 1955, I departed with her. At the same time, my respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) had strongly emphasized that I should attend the classes at Jami’a Ashrafiya while in Lahore, and at Dar al-ʿUlum Deoband while in Deoband. Upon arriving in Lahore, I presented myself to Hadhrat Mawlana Mufti Muhammad Hasan (may Allah have mercy on him) and conveyed my respected father’s (may Allah have mercy on him) instructions. With great affection, he permitted me to attend the relevant classes. Thus, I continued to participate in all my lessons there. Coincidentally, two sons of Hadhrat Mufti Sahib (may Allah have mercy on him) — Hadhrat Mawlana Abd al-Rahīm (may Allah have mercy on him) (who later passed away in his youth) and Hadhrat Mawlana Faḍl al-Rahim (may Allah grant him a long life) (who is the current Rector of Jami’a Ashrafiya) — were also studying the same books as me. In this way, I received the honour of being their classmate, and we attended all the lessons together.

The place at which I had left my lessons at Dār al-ʿUlum did not necessarily match the stage of studies here, and it also takes time to adapt to a new teacher. Therefore, the academic loss resulting from such a journey could not be entirely compensated. However, something is better than nothing, and I considered this opportunity a blessing. Later, this blessing turned into a great fortune. It so transpired that our teacher of Sharḥ Jami and Sharḥ Tahdhīb went on leave. I took this development as adding salt to my wounds and proposed to the two sons of Hadhrat Mufti Sahib (may Allah have mercy on him), who were my classmates: “Let us go to Hadhrat and request him to arrange for another teacher for these two books.” They agreed, and the three of us went to Hadhrat and presented our request. Hadhrat, upon hearing our request, beamed with delight and replied with something far beyond our expectations. Hadhrat said: “Do not worry at all. I will teach you these books myself. Come to me here during the time of those classes.” Hearing this, our joy knew no bounds. Hadhrat had stopped teaching since a long time. After losing one of his legs to amputation, he was physically impaired, and in this condition, his existence was an embodiment of enlightenment and guidance. His gatherings were ever-replete with anecdotes and quotes of his Shaykh (spiritual mentor) Hakim al-Ummah Hadhrat Thanwi (may Allah have mercy on him). At that young age, he appeared to me as the most holy personality in the world, and whenever the thought of pledging allegiance (bayʿah) to a pious elder crossed my mind, no one other than him came to my heart. Seeing him in his current state, no one could have imagined that he could teach books like Sharḥ Jami and Sharḥ Tahdhib. However, Hadhrat overwhelmed us with his affection. His residence was on the third floor of an apartment located at the madrasa of Nīla Gumbad. We would present ourselves in his service every day. During his lessons, we observed how this embodiment of sanctity and wilāyah would explain the intricate details of naḥw (Arabic grammar) and mantiq (logic) with remarkable simplicity. The discussion of hāṣil and mahsul in Sharḥ Jami is considered quite difficult, but I remember that Hadhrat explained it to us with effortless ease. Similarly, the syllabus of Sharḥ Tahdhib at that time extended only to the topic of Ḍābitah, which had been excluded due to its difficult nature. But Hadhrat said: “I will teach you that as well”. And he did teach it, and taught it wonderfully. May Allah Most High have boundless mercy on him.

After spending around twenty-six days in Lahore, on 27 November 1955, my respected mother had to travel to Deoband. Bhai Jan (respected Muhammad Zaki Kaifi) got ready to accompany her to Deoband, and together with him, we set off by train. In those days, travelling to India was fraught with challenges. Clearing customs and then boarding the train were no less than a worldly version of the Plain of Gathering. The train first took us to Amritsar, and from there, another train, which crossed all of Eastern Punjab, brought us to Deoband station late at night. Having spent six years accustomed to the urban life of Karachi and Lahore, the places in Deoband, etched in my childhood memories, now seemed much smaller. It felt as if someone had suddenly miniaturized the images of the station, platform, and other places of Deoband engraved in my mind. A large crowd of relatives awaited us on the platform, and the scene of my respected mother (may Allah have mercy on her) meeting them, with joy radiating from everyone’s face, was truly a sight to behold.

We stayed at the house of our maternal uncle, respected Anwar Karim (may Allah have mercy on him). The next day, I visited the streets in which I had spent my childhood and our former house. Our house was now occupied by immigrants, but they allowed us in. Inside, the inscription placed by my respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) now served as a lesson and reminder to us:

دنیا کا کچھ قیام نہ سمجھو، کرو خیال
اس گھر میں تم سے پہلے بھی کوئی مقیم تھا

Do not count on your stay in this world, take heed
Someone else once lived in this house before you

My respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) had this couplet inscribed at the time of the house’s construction, at a point when the thought of leaving it was unimaginable. However, today, this couplet served as a lesson for its new inhabitants. Additionally, when we were leaving this house, my elder brother Muhammad Raḍi Usmani (may Allah have mercy on him) had written a couplet with coal under an eave on the upper floor. This couplet could still be read at the time:

یہ چمن یونہی رہے گا اور ہزاروں جانور
اپنی اپنی بولیاں سب بول کر اُڑ جائیں گے

This garden shall persist unchanged, while thousands of creatures
Will speak their tongues and fly away

In any case, after entering our own house with the permission of others and becoming obliged to them, we proceeded to our old neighbourhood. Everything in the neighbourhood was in its place, but everything seemed smaller than before. Even the square, which I have mentioned earlier that it appeared to us as a large ground or stadium, now seemed to have shrunk into a small courtyard.

In different stages of life, a person considers certain things to be big and significant, but later, when their reality becomes apparent, one laughs at one’s own self for considering such trivial things as big. This world also appears big to us today, but when we reach the Hereafter, when the reality of this world will be unveiled, we will surely laugh at our shortsightedness.

In any case, during my stay in Deoband, as instructed by my respected father (may Allah have mercy on him), I began attending lessons at Dar al-ʿUlum Deoband. At that time, Sharḥ Jami was being taught by Hadhrat Mawlana Nasir al-Din (may Allah have mercy on him) (who later became Shaykh al-Hadith). Alhamdulillah, I got the opportunity to benefit from him. Kanz al-Daqaiq and Sharḥ Tahdhib were being taught by Hadhrat Mawlana Asʿad Allah, and Maqamat Ḥariri was under Hadhrat Mawlana Jalil al-Rahman. My paternal cousin, Hadhrat Mawlana Sayyid Hasan (may Allah have mercy on him), was, at the time, a highly competent and well-liked teacher at Dar al-ʿUlum. He also taught Maqamat Ḥariri, and both of us wished for me to study Maqamat under him. However, his class timing conflicted with my class of Kanz al-Daqaiq, and I was unable to benefit from him. Nonetheless, a great benefit of this journey to Deoband was that I received the good fortune of becoming a student, albeit informally, at Dar al-ʿUlum Deoband. During my time there, I also had the honour of seeing some of the pious personalities of this institute. I was so young that I lacked the courage to formally present myself to Shaykh al-Islam Hadhrat Mawlana Husayn Ahmad Madani (may Allah have mercy on him), but Alhamdulillah, I did have the good fortune of seeing him from a distance.

One of my maternal aunts was living at a small distance from Deoband in a village in Khatauli tehsil called Sarai Rasulpur. My respected mother (may Allah have mercy on her) went to visit her for two days, and I accompanied her. Khatauli is the town where our spiritual forefather, Hadhrat Mianji Munnay Shah (may Allah have mercy on him), resided. From Khatauli, an unpaved road running alongside a canal led to Sarai Rasulpur. We traveled on this road by rickshaw and reached Sarai Rasulpur, a small, beautiful, lush, and verdant village. The imam of the sole mosque in the village was my maternal uncle, which was the reason for my aunt’s residence here. The two days spent in this village were very pleasant and enjoyable. This was my first experience of observing pure rural life, and during this visit, the following interesting incident occurred. One of my aunt’s neighbours, upon learning that we had come from Karachi, sent for me to visit her house. She was an old lady, and since I was only a twelve-year old child, she did not observe purdah with me. After seating me in her house, she asked: “Have you come from Karachi?” When I replied in the affirmative, she said: “Then you must know my son, Husayn. How is he doing?” I replied: “I don’t know him.” Her astonishment at this response was worth seeing. She exclaimed in a tone of utter surprise: “Hai! You live in Karachi and still don’t know Husayn?” I asked: “Where does he live?” She responded: “Aray! He lives in the same Karachi where you live.” It was then that I realized she was comparing Karachi to Sarai Rasulpur, assuming that just as everyone in Sarai Rasulpur knew each other, the same must hold true for the residents of Karachi. I tried to explain to her that Karachi is such a big city that if one end were in Sarai Rasulpur, the other would reach Meerut. Hearing this, she was so stunned as if I were narrating a tale from the Arabian Nights.

Now, as I reflect on this, it comes to mind that when the Noble Qur’an states that Paradise is as vast as the heavens and the earth, or when the Noble Messenger ﷺ informs us that even the least of the inhabitants of Paradise will be granted a place twice the size of the entire world, our astonishment at such descriptions is similar to that of the old village lady, who could not comprehend that Karachi could be so vast that its residents might not know each other, and whose simplicity makes us laugh. However, the Noble Messengers, who have either directly witnessed the world above with their own eyes, or the Creator of the world above has directly informed them about it, when they look at us naïve inhabitants of this earthly realm expressing our astonishment, they do not laugh at us, rather they have pity on us.

In any case, these journeys to Lahore and Deoband with my respected mother were immensely pleasant and enjoyable, and they became a source of many blessings for me.

In those days, my respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) was on a tour of West Pakistan on behalf of Jamiʿat ʿUlama-e-Islam. While I was still in Lahore, he reached here as part of this tour and was scheduled to continue his journey to other areas of Punjab and then to the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). I had the privilege of accompanying my respected father (may Allah have mercy on him) on those journeys. Before delving into the details of those tours, it seems appropriate to first describe my respected father’s activities during that period.

…………….(Continued)…………….