Kashgarhi, Abdur Rahman

Kashgarhi, Abdur Rahman (1912-1971) Islamic scholar, linguist and writer, was born in Kashgarh, capital of Chinese Turkistan (now part of China). He became a teacher at Lucknow';s Nadwatul Ulema where he had earlier studied hadith, tafsir, and arabic literature. Around this time, he obtained the Fazil-e-Adab degree from Lucknow University. In 1938, he became a teacher at Aliya Madrasa in Kolkata. After the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, when the Madrasa was transferred to dhaka, he moved to Dhaka and was upgraded to additional head moulana. He had profound knowledge of Islamic theology. He was also famous as a poet and writer in Arabic. His collection of poems, A'z-z'a'hr'a't (1935, Lucknow) is imbued with patriotism and pan-Islamism. A'l-H'a'dik'a, a collection of prose and poetic writings in Arabic, is used as a textbook for Dakhil classes. Abdur Rahman also compiled Al-Mufid (1961), a trilingual dictionary in Arabic, urdu and Bangla. Abdur Rahman remained a bachelor all his life. [AKM Nurul Alam] [Alam, AKM Nurul Professor of Dawah and Islamic Studies, Islamic University]