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Translating Modern Urdu Poetry ANUSHIYA RAMASWAMY An Anthology of Modern Urdu Poetry: In English Translation, with Urdu Text. Ed. and Trans. M. A. R. Habib. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2003. 198 pages. $9.95.
In early nineteenth-century British Colonial India (in the transition period from East India Company rule to a centralized governing system under Queen Victoria) , there was great controversy over the language best suited for the colonized population. Lord Macaulay's 1835 Minute on Education officially settled the language question for the colonized people of not only the Indian sub-continent but also for those in other British colonies around the world. English became the singular language of education, and in India the literary studies of Sanskrit, Persian, and Arabic suffered irrevocably as a result. The African novelist/ activist Ngugi wa Thiong'o argues in his Decolonizing the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature that the European colonizers subjugated whole geographical areas by means of their language systems.
Macaulay's Minute, presented to the Supreme Council in 1835, settled all controversy about the medium of instruction for the colonized Indians. The Committee of Public Instruction that had been set up to decide upon the manner of education for the colonized had become severely divided over the issue of language. For the ten-member committee had its equal share of ardent and eloquent Orientalists who argued for the maintenance of the old patronage system of giving stipends to students of Sanskrit, Persian, and Arabic. They argued that Oriental scholarship needed the support of the British government (in the form of liberal grants for the publication of work in these languages) and expressed their reservations over the adoption of English. But mostly they argued about the repercussions such an act would have on Oriental studies. When Macaulay arrived in India, he was made the president of this deeply and equally divided committee. What ensued next was a debate before the Supreme Council between the Orientalists and the English-only group. Macaulay took the side of the English faction and on Feb. 2, 1835, delivered his famous Minute on Education....