Mahmood Hashmi

Baba-e-Urdu

Birmingham

1953–2014

Mahmood Hashmi was born in 1920 near Mirpur, now in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. Before migrating to Britain he received degrees from the University of Punjab and University of Aligarh. He also wrote literary criticism, short stories and plays, some of which were performed for radio. In 1950 Hashmi published his critically acclaimed and commercially successful reportage on life in Kashmir, Kashmir Udhas Hai.

In 1953 Hashmi migrated to Leeds where he obtained an MA in education from the University of Leeds. Subsequently, he moved to Birmingham and became a teacher at Loxton School in Duddeston.

Hashmi had long given thought to publishing an Urdu newspaper in Britain. In 1961 he met with a delegation of Pakistani journalists in London, led by his friend Inayat Ullah, who directed the Urdu daily newspaper Kohistan. After a conversation with Ullah, Hashmi decided to launch a newspaper from London called Mashriq, which means ‘the East’. Funding for the newspaper came from donations by South Asian factory workers who lived in Birmingham. This began when Hashmi’s roommate, a labourer named Khan Wali, heard about Hashmi’s plans and decided to donate £500 to launch the paper. Others followed and, on 8 February 1961, Hashmi founded his publishing company, Loxton Publishers. He worked with Wali, a photographer named Rahman Sahib and a local named David Hardy, who had experience in printing.

On 1 April 1961 the first issue of Mashriq was published. The newspaper covered topics such as politics in Kashmir, British laws, social welfare, information about Pakistani organizations and adverts for Urdu films. In addition, locals would send their poetry to the newspaper for publication, as well as readers' letters. Later, as more women from Pakistan migrated to Britain after the enactment of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1962, the newspaper added a women’s page, which was written by Rafat Mahbub and Mohsina Jilani. This represented the first time many Pakistani migrants in Britain had the opportunity to learn about issues of significance in their own language, particularly if they could not read in English. To produce this content, Urdu-language journalists based in Britain were recruited, resulting in the development of Urdu journalism in the UK.

In 1972 Hashmi left Mashriq to launch his own interpreting service. In addition, he became co-editor of Saltley News, a bilingual newspaper. By the 1980s he had moved to Peterborough, where he taught Urdu in schools and refined teaching methods. Subsequently, he worked with Bradford Council to produce a teaching guide for Urdu education called Qaida, which was published in 1986.

Hashmi’s work as a promoter of Urdu earned him the nickname Baba-e-Urdu. He became a respected and highly sought-after advisor on the promotion of Urdu language and literature.

He died on 31 January 2014, aged 94.