AN INTERVIEW WITH PROF. FARIDA KHANAM

How did you start playing such a pivotal role in CPS mission? My father’s Urdu monthly Al-Risala began to be published in 1976. My father has been a perfectionist all his life. He would never trust anyone to work with the same diligence and accuracy that he aspired for. That’s why, he preferred to work alone. But there are some aspects of writing that the author cannot do himself, for example, calligraphy, proofreading, etc. To rule out any mistakes in the written piece, he would often ask us to help him. We would proofread from a copy and he would corroborate it. This was how I got involved with this mission. Then I developed interest in his ideas. His working room was adjacent to ours. I would often listen to his conversations with visitors. It was quite rare then that he addressed me directly. When the magazine came out, my younger brother Saniyasnain Khan was still in school. We didn’t have enough resources to get people to work for us. So, in the beginning, I did all the work. Then after that, two sisters Ms Qaiser, and Ms Shahjahan studying in Delhi College joined us. They helped us in getting the magazine packed and dispatched. My elder brother, Dr Zafar-ul-Islam Khan was studying in Cairo. When he came home during a vacation, he got hold of the manuscript of a book my father had written titled Al-Islam (published in English as The Vision of Islam). We had no money to publish it. My brother was very much impressed by the book after reading it. He asked a college professor to translate the book in English. The translation was not good and needed revision. But I was not capable enough then to revise it, therefore this book was published about 30 years later after thorough revision. I started on a very important project that became a defining moment of my life. My father had published a very popular Urdu book titled Mazhab aur Jadeed Challenge way back in 1966 while he was in Lucknow. Due to the subject matter of the book, my father wished to make this book available in English. It was first translated by one IAS officer, but it was not up to the mark. A major drawback in the book was the unavailability of quotes in original English. My father used Urdu translations of the quotes after reading them in different libraries. Now, he had no record about which book was available in which library. The English version would be imperfect if it did not contain the original quotes. My father had never hoped that someday the book would be published in English. Therefore, he did not keep a record of the original English sources. He was satisfied with a translated version of them. It was great challenge for us. I had then completed my M.A. in English from Delhi University a year ago. I knew that the library there was really great. I took this