Civil society slams Kolkata Urdu Academy for postponing Javed Akhtar event

A group of civil society members expressed dismay over the West Bengal Urdu Academy’s decision to postpone an event featuring Javed Akhtar, alleging the move followed protests from Muslim groups. They wrote to CM Mamata Banerjee, urging intervention to protect freedom of expression

Kolkata: A group of civil society members, many of them belonging to the Muslim community, wrote to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, expressing dismay over the state Urdu academy’s decision to postpone an event featuring noted lyricist Javed Akhtar in the city.

In an open letter to the CM, where she was addressed as Didi, the prominent personalities regretted the decision of the West Bengal Urdu Academy and claimed it “evidently transpired on account of a protest by Muslim religious organisations that Javed Akhtar should not be invited because he is an atheist”.

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The academy, however, had cited unavoidable circumstances for the postponement of the four-day event, which was slated to begin on August 30, and remained non-committal on the issue of the alleged withdrawal of the invitation to the script writer.

“As it turned out, West Bengal Urdu Academy (which does not have the word ‘Muslim’ anywhere in its name) pandered to the fundamentalists and promptly withdrew its invitation,” said the letter signed by Mudar Patherya, Zeeshan Majeed, Taiyyeb A Khan, Zahir Anwar, Palash Chaturvedi, and Navin Vohra, among others.

The signatories pointed out that the academy’s decision goes “against the conviction that Urdu is everyone’s language” and it should not be considered the “exclusive property” of a community.

The civil society members also claimed that the decision has “exposed that the religious leanings of a poet (or any individual) are more important than what the poet has to say about an unrelated subject”. The West Bengal Urdu Academy has postponed an event featuring Akhtar, following protests by some Muslim groups.

The Muslim organisations claimed that certain comments made by Akhtar have hurt the religious sentiments of the community. “Javed was to speak on the subject of Hindi cinema and Urdu, which has nothing to do with religion,” the civil society members said in the letter.

“This embarrassing turnaround in invitation withdrawal has affected the image of Kolkata as the last fortress of liberals,” they said in the letter. The signatories emphasised that the government should have stepped in and directed the West Bengal Urdu Academy to reverse its decision.

The signatories urged Banerjee to ensure freedom of expression. “We are yet to hear from the CMO or the academy after issuing the letter two days back. I wonder why Urdu, as a language, is only associated with the religion of certain groups.

“Urdu is a rich language that has been spoken for centuries, and there are so many poets who regaled generations with their literary works. The programme was organised by the Urdu Academy, not by any religious body,” Mudar Patherya, an activist, told PTI on Wednesday.

He also said, “Will those who are speaking against Zaved Akhtar say they haven’t watched ‘Sholay’, whose script was penned by Salim-Javed ji? Will they say they hadn’t watched films containing songs composed by Akhtar?” Javed Akhtar was the co-writer, with Salim Khan, of the iconic 1975 Hindi film ‘Sholay’. To a question, he said Akhtar will certainly be invited to future literary meets in the city by members associated with civil society and championing liberty.