Altaf Hamid Rao:
MIRPUR [AJK], (Parliament Times) ; The 25th death anniversary of an eminent worker of Pakistan and the Kashmir freedom movement, Mujahid-e-Azadi, historian, intellectual, writer and founder of Sericulture Department in Azad Jammu Kashmir Mr. Abdul Hamid Nizami was commemorated in Azad Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday with due solemnity and reverence.
Representative groups from various segments of civil society from AJK including social and political workers, journalists, writers, poets and workers of the Kashmir freedom movement prayed for the rest of the departed soul in eternal peace.
Fateha Khawani was held for the departed soul in a simple but impressive ceremony held in his Mirpur residence at Fajr prayer on Saturday.
Participants on this occasion paid rich tributes to late Abdul Hamid Nizami for his life-time meritorious services for the Pakistan and Kashmir freedom movement before and after the emergence of Pakistan and for the promotion of healthy journalism in the country including Azad Jammu and Kashmir through his high intellect and pen.
Late Abdul Hamid Nizami emerged as the active worker of Pakisran and the Kashmir freedom movement as he not only performed the role as an active worker of the Muslim Conference but also as news Editor of “Sada-e-Kashmir” Radio installed at undisclosed location in Occupied Jammu Kashmir in 1947 meant for the promotion of the Pakistan movement as well as the Kashmiris struggle for freedom from the despotic Dogra and India’s tyrannical rule.
In 1947, he was arrested from his Sheirgarhi residence in Occupied Srinagar by the then occupational despotic Dogra forces and was putted behind the bars for an indefinite period for his “crime” of enlightening and raising the beacon of liberation of the motherland from indian and dogra occupational forces and working for the Pakistan and Kashmir freedom movements.
Later on, he was released in 1949 as a result of the pact signed for the exchange of political prisoners and Mr. Nizami opted to migrate to Pakistan, the ultimate destination of the people of the internationally-acknowledged disputed Jammu and Kashmir State.
Since late Abdul Hamid Nizami, a former graduate [with Honors in Persian] from the Sub-continent’s prestigious and historic Prince of Wales College, Jammu in 1943 , served as Sericulture Dev. Officer in the State Sericulture Department in Jammu, Srinagar and other places before 1947, had also earned a great honour and distinguished title as being the founder head of the State Sericulture Department in Azad Jammu and Kashmir after joining the AJK government service as head of the state-run department for his vast experience in the field of sericulture since earlier before i947 in Jammu and Kashmir State, now Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir. He was retired from AJK government service in 1975 on maturity of the stipulated age of retirement.
He was the author and translator of various books on the Kashmir freedom movement. Prominent among the books he translated into urdu include “Azad Kashmir”, “History Struggle for Freedom of Jammu and Kashmir” and “Inside Kashmir” authored by eminent writer, journalist, historian and the staunch supporter of Kashmir’s accession to Pakistan Pandet Prem Nath Bazaz.
He also brought out eminent Urdu weekly of Azad Jammu and Kashmir “Daur-e-Jadeed” simultaneously from Mirpur and Sialkot in 1976 primarily under the spirit of promoting and highlighting Kashmiris struggle for freedom raising the significance of early peaceful solution of Kashmir issue. The newspaper remained in regular publication till he breathed his last on January 13 in 1998.
