Education among Indian Muslims. Jamia Millia Islamia's journal Payām-e taʿlīm

Abstract

The rapid changes caused by high imperialism and modernisation induced an orientation towards the future among the Indian Muslims: where was the community and the nation heading? What did the young generation need, in terms of both character and knowledge, to master the future and to shape it in such a way as to bring justice and civilisation, honour and prosperity to the country? This article aims to investigate how such important, lofty questions on education were translated into everyday pedagogical practices by looking at Payām-e taʿlīm, a journal for children that was brought out by the Jamia Millia Islamia, the nationalist Muslim university and school in Delhi, from 1926 onwards. Payām provided stories, knowledge, and ideas to students of Jamia's own primary and secondary schools, but which was also successfully aimed at a wider geographical spread.