CM Naim’s Malicious and Baseless Allegation
Professor Maula Bakhsh
(Aligarh Muslim University)
Relying heavily on beside the point allusions and anecdotes bordering on self-exaltation and self-righteousness, hardly go well with an academic debate especially if it pertains to malicious accusation. Needless to say one counts on reminiscences, hearsay information and unreliable sources when cogent arguments and clinching evidence elude him. CM Naim’s piece “Plagiarise and Prosper” (outlookindia.com, July 24, 2009) bears a testimony to the fact.
Endorsing a malicious and sectarian campaign against an eminent scholar, critic and theorist Professor Gopi Chand Narang, held in high esteem in the academic circles, CM Naim joined those who are at best “greenhorns” who have touched a new low in irresponsible and unethical writing. Narang’s trail-blazing book in Urdu, “Structuralism, Post-structuralism and Oriental Poetics” which is extremely popular and has been translated into 14 languages, is the subject of some unknown pseudo writers jealousy. The allegation is absolutely baseless and malicious as Narang has acknowledged all his sources and NOT infringed any copyright of any sort, Relying on pseudo writers of ill repute doesn’t Naim know the meaning of the words and the term he is using? This raises doubt whether he has read Narang’s book from cover to cover. His ill-intention is obvious as he has tried to cover-up the clear fact that Narang’s each chapter is followed by a thorough bibliography where he has acknowledged all sources and also highlighted the seminal sources with the asterisk mark (See Narang’s Book, p.153). Naim’s cover-up is part of a malicious and felonious design.
Contrary to the irresponsible allegation, Narang had categorically mentioned in the ‘Preface’ of his book that the theory and theoretical discourse belongs to the philosophers and theorists, he is introducing them in Urdu; and all such writers and their works are acknowledged and indicated with an asterisk mark in his Chapter-wise Bibliographies. He has given full credit to theorists and has made it clear. In his words “Only the interpretation and communication (in Urdu) is mine. I am conscious of the deficiencies of Urdu expression as Urdu lacks the necessary contemporary terminology as well as the precision and rigour of the original writers. The basic texts and sources are mentioned as far as possible so that the inquisitive reader may go to the original theorists and sources for deeper thought and further study”. (Narang’s Preface, P 14). It is quite evident that Narang is hardly claiming any credit for himself as he has given full credit to the original theorists and their seminal works. Naim deliberately and wilfully ignores these facts, he does not mention Narang’s Preface as otherwise his malicious charge will not stick.
Curiously, Naim joined the debate at a much later stage as part of a sectarian and malicious design and certainly he has not examined the book objectively. Though he strove to build a case, nevertheless unwittingly he did leave many a hole in his arguments by acknowledging that Narang’s Bibliographies do contain the names of Selden, Sholes, Hawkes, Culler, Belsey et al besides the original philosophers such as Saussure, Russian Formalists, Jakobson, Barthes, Lacan, Foucault and others. Narang while discussing them has frequently quoted them and given citations; under every citation the name of the writer is mentioned. One wonders once both the names of the authors and the names of the books are mentioned and source bibliographies are given, then how can one be accused of plagiarism. The different editions of some of the frequently referred basic books in the last 25 years notwithstanding, the only count left then is that some page numbers perhaps might not tie up with the later editions or Asian editions. This cannot be called plagiarism by any stretch of imagination.
The fact of the matter is that Narang’s bibliographies, which in Urdu he calls “MASAADIR” (Sources) are chapter specific and have always been comprehensive and inclusive. In his other books also, such as the books on Amir Khusrau, Urdu Masnavis and Urdu Ghazal, credits and annotations are given at the bottom of the page, while in this book they had to be given at the end of chapters to facilitate reading a difficult subject that was being introduced afresh.
It is clear that in an introductory book in order to make a difficult subject more understandable and readable, the Bibliographies were given at the end of each section. Naim ignored the fact that Narang was introducing an altogether new subject on which almost nothing was written cogently in Urdu before him. He is the first who interpreted and introduced the theory to Urdu readers and started a new discourse in Urdu and made it comprehensive for his readers. Naim ill-intentionally and purposely turned a blind eye to Narang’s Note on page 153 of the book where besides the Preface, Narang has clearly stated that his basic sources are marked with an “asterisk”. Naim either did not read the book carefully, or wilfully ignored all this to the point of being unethical and dishonest.
If Narang did not come down charging on Naim and others and maintained his dignity, the reason is obvious as readers can see for themselves that all this is malicious and part of a sectarian campaign. Many an honest and unbiased writer have spoken out against the malicious propaganda and rebutted the baseless charge.
Perhaps Narang’s irresponsible detractors did not pass on all the related material to Naim for fear of being exposed. In fact many writers and scholars have come out questioning the credentials of these motivated detractors. Some references / sources may be revealing for those who are interested in fair play:
1. Javed Joya in Jadeed Adab No. 10, 11 (2008)
see : HYPERLINK "http://www.jadeedadab.com" www.jadeedadab.com
2. Shamim Tariq (e-mail : HYPERLINK "mailto:shamimtariq01@gmail.com" shamimtariq01@gmail.com, Mob.:+91-9224751077)
in the journal Isbaat (Bombay) No. 3, Dec. 2008-Feb. 2009. “Kargas ka Jahan aur hai…”, Pp. 119-123.
3. Haider Tabatabai (e-mail : HYPERLINK "mailto:sudhasharma12@hotmail.com" sudhasharma12@hotmail.com) “Heelagaraan-e-Adab” in Aag (Lucknow) and Adabsaaz (Delhi) in No. 8-9, July-Dec. 2008,
Pp. 281-282.
see : < HYPERLINK "mailto:adabsaaz@gmail.com" adabsaaz@gmail.com >
4. Maula Bakhsh in his comprehensive book, Jadeed Adabi Theory aur Gopi Chand Narang, (Delhi 2009) ISBN 978-81-8223-536-6
“Motarizeen-e-Narang par ek Nazar”, Pp. 230-280.
see : HYPERLINK "http://www.gopichandnarang.com/j_a_theory.pdf" www.gopichandnarang.com/j_a_theory.pdf
5. Zafar Iqbal (e-mail : HYPERLINK "mailto:zafar.iqbal@dunya.com.pk" zafar.iqbal@dunya.com.pk ), front ranking Pakistani poet in his famous column in Daily Waqt, Lahore (Pakistan),
dated 29 May 2009. “Aakhir Gunaahgaar Hon Kafir Nahein Hon Mein”.
see : HYPERLINK "http://www.dailywaqt.com/editorial" www.dailywaqt.com/editorial
(He has referred to this campaign as not ‘Eemaani’ (honest) but ‘Shaitaani’ (Satanic).
6. Nusrat Zaheer (e-mail : HYPERLINK "mailto:nusratzaheer@gmail.com" nusratzaheer@gmail.com) in his open letter dated 23 July 2009, denouncing in the strongest terms the distorting of facts and misquoting out of context in the Akkas Narang Number.
7. Haider Tabatabai “Adabi Bhujang” (A Literary Black Crow) in Daily Jang, London, (23 July 2009). < HYPERLINK "http://e.jang.com.pk/07-23-2009/London/" http://e.jang.com.pk/07-23-2009/London/ >
HYPERLINK "mailto:writers_forum@yahoogroups.com" writers_forum@yahoogroups.com
The information given regarding translations of Narang’s book into different Indian languages also stands to be corrected. Besides Tamil, the book has also appeared in Hindi, Punjabi, Marathi, Nepali, Bengali, Kashmiri, Maithili, Gujarati, Kannada, Odiya, Assamese and Malayalam, and is extremely well received as there is no such book which introduces and discusses western theory alongside with the oriental Sanskrit poetics, and also the Persian-Arabic Poetics. Some translations have run into many editions, and have three new appendices added, one on “Post-modernism”, the other on “New Historicism” and further, the Dravidian translations have an additional chapter on the “Sangam Poetics” contributed by a Tamilian scholar. The credit is fully given.
Naim’s reading seems to have faltered on several counts, and wilfully so:
1. The book comprises four sections, the first is on Structuralism, the second on Post-structuralism, the third on Oriental Poetics, and the fourth on current literary scenario and the evolution of a new model of literary criticism. All the above four parts contain detailed respective Bibliographies, a fact unethically and wilfully down-played by Naim.
2. The first part contains five chapters and the Bibliographies for each chapter appears on Pp. 153, 154 and 155. Similarly the Bibliographies for the six chapters of part two are given on Pp. 329, 330, 331, 332, 333 and 334. In part three, the chapter on Sanskrit Poetics is followed by an extensive Bibliography on Pp. 385 and 386. Similarly the chapter on Persio-Arabic Poetics is followed by a comprehensive Bibliography given on Pp. 489-495. In the concluding section discussions on Post-modernism and New Historicism have copious references to their sources (Pp. 523-543) and (P. 612). The bibliographies and details of sources mentioned above follow the general practice of giving the names of author, title, place, year of publication and the relevant pages. Each chapter begins with a seminal quote by a major writer and the book contains hundreds of excerpts and quotations as part of discussions, and everywhere the names of authors are given and acknowledged under the quote.
3. The original sources for literary theory are extremely diversified in European languages, especially Russian, German and French. The mediation of English translations and those who have written commentaries later on the original texts is indispensable for anyone working on literary theory.
4. At the outset, Narang on the ‘Dedication’ page has stated that, “I am dedicating this book to all those Western and Eastern philosophers, theorists, authors and thinkers who have worked on the nature of language and meaning and have established the discourse of literary theory, and from whom I have benefited in my book.” (Dedication, P. 7) Only a highly irresponsible and dishonest person will use the word ‘plagiarism’ for such a work.
5. The names of Jonathan Culler, Raman Selden, Catherine Belsey, John Sturrock, Robert Sholes, Terence Hawkes, etc. are all referred to repeatedly with asterisk mark in the Bibliographies indicating that these texts too along with Saussure, Levi Strauss, Jakobson, Barthes, Derrida, Lacan, Foucault, Todorov, Jameson, Julia Kristeva and others in book 1 and 2 dealing with Structuralism and Post Structuralism are all extensively acknowledged and discussed. To term Robert Sholes, Selden, Culler etc. as mere ‘commentators’ is a misnomer. They are theorists in their own right and are repeatedly referred to in discussions of theory.
It may not be out of place to mention that Narang while concluding his book in all humility, had quoted a paragraph from Altaf Husain Hali’s Muqaddama where Hali says: “God’s rule is in-nal-hasana-te yuzhibnas-saiyaat but man has changed it to in-nas-saiyaat-e yuzhibnal-hasanat-e” (Pp. 573), implying that God has ordained that for a good work done blemishes are forgotten, but the human practice of misguided people is that such people overlook the good work and pick holes to show blemishes.” He said he looked forward to his contemporaries to point out his shortcomings so that he may further improve his work.
It may be suggested that Narang’s detractors would do well by writing a better book to replace Narang’s but maybe it is already too late for them, and Naim included, no body is capable enough (Narang’s book was first published 1993) and then repeatedly reprinted, and already it has left an indelible imprint on the contemporary Urdu world both in India and Pakistan.
(P.S. Revised and abridged after the fizzling out and demise of the unethical controversy, and reposted for record and posterity).
Prof. Maula Bakhsh
Professor, Department of Urdu
Aligarh Muslim University
Aligarh-202002 (UP)
e-mail ID: maulabakhsk1963@gmail.com
Mob: +91-9818932082
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