Hakim Ajmal Khan

A Man of Exceptions

Central Council for Research in Unani Medicine

Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

ISBN: 81-87748-58-3
© Central Council for Research in Unani Medicine
First published: February, 2018
Copies printed: 300

Published by
Central Council for Research in Unani Medicine
Ministry of AYUSH, Government of India
61-65, Institutional Area, Opposite ‘D’ Block, Janakpuri
New Delhi – 110 058
Telephone: +91-11-28521981, 28525982
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://ccrum.res.in

Printed at
India Offset Press
A-1, Mayapuri Industrial Area, Phase-I
New Delhi - 110064

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this compilation are of

their respective authors. The publisher or editors do not take
any responsibility for the same.

ii
 Guidance & Patronage
Dr. Anil Khurana
Director General (I/C), CCRUM

Supervision
Dr. Mohammad Fazil

Editors
Dr. Ahmad Sayeed
Dr. Amanullah

Associate Editor
Mohammad Niyaz Ahmad

iii
 Contents
Foreword v
Preface vii

Introduction: Envisaging Indian Tradition and

Hakim Ajmal Khan 1
– Ahmad Sayeed

Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition

and Modernity 17
– Saad Ahmad

Ajmal Khan’s Vision: Retaining and

Re-strengthening Traditional Character
of Unani Medicine 37
– Kunwar Mohammad Yusuf Amin

Hakim Ajmal Khan and Unani Medicine:

Ideas and Arguments
– Farooq Ahmad Dar 53

Hakim Ajmal Khan and Freedom Struggle 79

– Javed Ahmad Khan

Hakim Ajmal Khan and his Ideology 97

– Mohd Fazil Khan

Hakim Ajmal Khan and Arabic Literature 105

– Aurang Zeb Azmi

xi
Hakim Ajmal Khan: The Reviver of
Unani Medicine 119
– Abdul Wadud

Hakim Ajmal Khan and Communal Harmony

in the Light of his Speeches 127
– S. M. Hassan Nagrami

Sharīfī Family: An Introduction 137

– Noman Anwar

Sharīfī Family: A Brief Profile 153

– Azma

xii
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between
Tradition and Modernity
– Saad Ahmad

In the nineteenth-twentieth century historical narrative

of South Asia, terms such as apologetic, modern,
Western and traditional largely influenced the social,
political and civilisational realm of reasoning. They also
invite one to look at the ideologically corrosive basis
where modernity mattered more than other things. It
represented a variety of intellectual orientation all were
mused with modern ambivalence. In this regard, some
other terms like liberal, secular, enlightened or rational
Muslim intellectuals are also related with modernity.
These terms project its ideological agenda as well as
play a role in the making of a nation-state. India as an
undivided country during this period of the history
received challenges from the very modern ambivalence.
Secularism is one of them. Surprisingly, Indian people
opted secularism not as antithetical to religious belief
but in some sense a neutral functioning of the modernity.
Imaginative formation of the local and national politics
was also trying to synchronise with as well as resisting to
rational conditions decided by a chunk of the culturally
rooted conservatism of the West. It is intended here to
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

show inter-linkage of global politics of the nineteenth-

twentieth century with rationality, tradition and politics
of secularism in the formation of a nation-state and
Muslim intellectual responses to them.

The case of Hakim Ajmal Khan (1868-1927) intends to

introduce his cerebral engagement and social activism
which equally served to the broader realm of knowledge.
His contribution sways between two extremes; an
utterly rational height was frequently appearing after
refashioning of the political systems in the form of the
nation-state; and a rarely mystique extreme, quickly
disappearing from emerging rational society in the
same nation-state. However, illustrating the global
connection of the politics with Indian intellectuals, need
not say, they eavesdropped the sigh of the Ottoman
Empire in the dungeon of Western rationality before
Ottomans could have been able to feel it.

In theory, Muslims around the world preferably and

successfully looked to the Caliphate as the politico-
theological form of governance till the first two decades
of twentieth century. They believed that Caliphate is a
shadow of God on the earth. It is accountable for the
protection of Islam, therefore, its people and whoever
comes under the shadow of Islamic government.
Another aspect of this belief comes from the cultural
consciousness1 that Caliphate maintains and protects
turās (heritage) that is not limited to the communitarian
image but also includes a Ummah (community). The
heritage is a cultural production and responsible for
shaping the mores and values in the society. It, in the

18
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

case of Muslims, relates to the religion of Islam and

gives a sense of pro-cultural induction too. Counting
these aspects of the Caliphate, a national secular politics
found global encounter of the Empires as an incentive
for ingraining anti-colonial political culture.2

To explain the inter-linkages of international politics

and responses of Muslim intellectuals advocating
for Ottoman Caliphate, we find certain trends among
Indian Muslim intellectuals. Firstly, they looked to
Ottoman Caliphate to counter the colonial dominance
everywhere they were under its effect. This view was
advocated chiefly by Muhammad Ali Jauhar (d.1931).
Secondly, a more practical belief is that India must be
liberated from colonial rule. Though, this view favours
Ottoman Caliphate and maintains solidarity with it. It
champions secularism as a backbone of a state. It says
that God has promised Muslims to be his successor on
the earth, so that, Caliphate could be re-established if
they have performed Islam righteously. This view is
advocated by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad (d.1958).
Thirdly, the Muslim intellectual Maulana Maududi
(d.1979) discussed a different view of Caliphate known
for political concerns of Ummah (community). Thus, for
Maududi, the political need of the Caliphate would be
fulfilled by an Islamic democracy (Islāmī Jumhūriyat).3

Viewing the secular aspect of the nationalist

mobilization, Muslim intellectuals find more of the
temporal/secular virtues from the rationality of religious
imagination in India as it supported the nationalist
vision too, for example, the phrase ‘our composite

19
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

culture’ is about undertaking the responsibility to unify

the country.4

Here, mutual understanding in the result of religious

pluralism emerged. In some of the recent academic
circle, the point is raised that Mughals hardly established
a secular public sphere, if there are some favouring
points, it is misleading. The point to be noted here, if
Mughal period could not generate a temporal order
in a decidedly very non-Western sense we find rest of
Mughals had religion but not culture. If religion without
culture emerges as a broad observant of an empire, then,
what made Mughals and other parallel Muslim rules to
carry the burden of opposite ideas and believes different
from their own for almost eight hundred years? Coming
to the point of secular imagination whether it belongs to
the Western modernity or preached by colonialism, or is
there any culturally Muslim memory where secularism
functioned as the primary source of legitimacy in the
empire? If we assume that Muslim intellectuals’ secular
attitude in India, particularly in the twentieth-century
historical setup, is a rational gift of the West to their
cognitive mind, then, how quickly intellectuals trained
themselves to perform secularly (Western)? And why
there is no outcry among religiously trained Muslim
intellectuals against their political leaders who were
adopting Western ideas? Even this secular attitude is
smoothly aligned with physically and culturally distant
political set up of the Ottomans. Further, on what
grounds subjectivity speaks to non-Muslim intellectuals
of India to stand with a political responsibility of one’s
religion? Thus, we find, Khilafat movement did not

20
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

come to India through any secret route but its emporary

noise filled Indian struggles with new meanings.
For Indian Muslims, keeping a line of solidarity with
Khilafat movement was not only continuity of secular
tradition, but an emotive expression also served a kind of
communitarian agenda where the political imagination
of Ummah compels one to behave like a body feels pain
when an organ of it gets hurt.

Trauma after the abolition of Ottoman Caliphate had

its space on secular intellectual lines of both kinds; one
which looked to the secular attitude of the Mughal rule
in India, another which found modern education a
significant reference for being a secular Man. Caliphate
became part of the Indian nationalist subjectivity. It was
more than to register resistance against the Western
domination. India struggled against British Empire.
In this sense, there were various streamlines upon
that these struggles continued. As above have been
mentioned that modern was a grand theme which
shaped the ideological lines of the Muslim intellectuals,
i.e. liberal, secular or rational. One could be a secular
(thinking of secular attitude of Muslim culture or
realizing the secular age of modernity) Muslim without
violating the fundamentals of Islam. If theologically,
there is no objection to being secular, one could reflect
from local to global, from imamah (leadership) to the
cause of ummah (community). By birth, it is a right of
every Muslim to speak against unjust through defined
means, and if somebody declared himself to be so, then
he must fight to assure his rights.

21
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

Seemingly, association with modern intellectual lines

in Indian struggle is more remarkable than assumed
(in modern observation) less reflective religious
intellectuals and other traditions. By tradition, it is
meant here that “a body of values, beliefs, rules, and
behaviour patterns that are transmitted generationally
by practice and word of mouth and is integral to
socialization processes. Connoting fixity, stability,
and continuity, it guides daily behaviour and justifies
shared beliefs and practices. However, tradition is
always open to variation, contestation and change,
and becomes a model of past practices rather than a
passively and unreflectively inherited legacy”.5 Thus,
the current intellectual engagements are lingered with
the modernity or tradition or with both. Modernity is
said to be as devastating as anything could be. It is an
attitude which says that “a particular cultural current in
modern society that captured the sense of renewal and
cosmopolitanism of modern life. Anthony Giddens in
different but related ways has highlighted the reflexivity
of modernity. The notion of reflexive modernization, or
reflexive modernity, is aimed to capture how much of
the movement of modernity acts upon itself”.6

Despite these definitions of what is meant by tradition

and how modernity refers a cultural current as its
meta-reference that there hardly exists any modernist
attitude in societies other than the cultural current of
the West. In our daily life, a blurred idea of modernity
and tradition is perceived. We understand modernity
as a rational attitude which is interpreted as continued
intellectual follow up where enlightenment narrative

22
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

is an attraction. Hence, an import of rationalities is

taken from that enlightenment narrative to the newly
‘invented irrational society’ namely Eastern, Asian,
Islamic or Muslim. For example, Sir Sayed Ahmad
Khan (d.1898) advocated purely rational ideas in Islam.
To fulfil modern conditions of a developing society,
he determined to drop everything which confronts the
modern rationality. The heavy honorary salutation of
‘Sir’ is a self-assuring compensation of the ‘modern’ to
a newly converted traditional mind as he paced up to
a modernist experience of rationality. This is one side
of the story. Sir Sayed’s thought in constructing Indian
Muslim mind plays an important role to understand
and initiate a dialogue between two or more societies.

However, by the belief in modernity, it is assumed that

what is not modern is static and modernity happened
only once.7 Being the immediate heir and self-assumed
guardian of scientific developments associated with
modernity, it is up to the West or British Empire to civilize
the world. Thus, two broad realms of struggle opposing
to each other emerged, namely colonialism and anti-
colonialism. Advocay to judgmental rationality made
Western scholars to profess tradition as a cage where
ideas of freedom and rationality are unimaginable.
Modernisation theorist Daniel Lerner left no room
for Muslim societies if they adhere to their declining
tradition. He argued that Muslims must choose Mecca or
mechanization.8 Muslim intellectuals during this period
tried to respond to the modernity but hardly could go
beyond the realm of European modernity. Thus, they
founded a clumsy culture where claims that everything

23
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

from modernity is already found in the Qur'an. For

example, the case of rationality is taken as the method
to re-interpret Qur'an in the light of discursive trend in
the West.9 Sir Sayed Ahmad Khan in his exegesis of the
Qur'an, preferred the rational interpretation on the line
of the Western intellectualism. In doing so, he denied
certain fundamentals of Islamic belief. Possibly, this
was in pursuit of his understanding of the reason, upon
that the mental capability of following two centuries
will depend.10

However, Hakim Ajmal Khan is one of those figures of

Nineteenth–Twentieth century India who shared ideas
and contributed to the grand anti-colonial struggle. He
responded to the modern science and worked in the
field of medicine, philosophy and education. He was
very famous among Sufi circles for his sojourn to Iraq as
well as among Salafi intellectuals as it is discussed that
he was corresponding with Rashid Rida (d.1935), an
Egyptian Salafi scholar.11 Being a guardian of cultural
future of India, he majestically stood up and made a
responsible career in Indian national politics.12 He had
royal blood as his forefathers migrated with Babur (d.
1530) from Turkestan in the Sixteenth century. They
were political advisors to Babur. After Babur, the
family stayed in Mughal India. Later, the family turned
from politics to serving religion. Khwaja Qasim and
Khwaja Hashim, two Sufi figures from his ancestors
were very popular among Sufis of Hyderabad. Hakim
Sharif Khan (d.1807) and later Hakim Mahmood Khan
(d.1892) are known for their full range of command on
different knowledge, i.e., philosophy, theology, logic

24
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

and traditional medicines. Thus, the whole family

contributed to strengthening the theoretical bases of
what we have in the form of Unani medicine.13

Most of the Western scholarship on the South Asian

history and culture included Hakim Ajmal Khan in a
kind of scholarly obscurantism often found in discourses
of Orientalism. Though, they honestly tried to evaluate
the subject of their academic interest, but could not
ignore their own cultural experience while working
on a completely different society based on mores and
traditional values. Noticing a vibrant family profile
of Hakim Ajmal Khan led them to focus more on his
affinity with aristocracy and elitism.14 Thus, they fixed
an aspect of the interaction between Western nobility
and public, on the one hand, Muslim Ra’īsi15 (in the sense
of notables) and its interaction with their public on the
other. They illustrated Hakim Ajmal Khan or to men
like him as desperately seeking refuge in the modern
way of thinking. While on the contrary, Hakim Ajmal
Khan saw the traditional kind of values as the prime
determinant for his mature consciousness, prospicience
and learning. For him, the traditional form of values is
the main source of reference to yet developed societies
of Islamic, Hindus, Chinese, Arab, Greek and Roman
etc. Even modern attitude and thinking emerges from
the traditional ideas itself. As he was also a witness
to his ancestral legacy, his family had pride of being
respected in the society from Turkestan to Delhi. Hence,
the family was famous by the highly-revered title of
Khāndān Sharīfī (Sharifi Family) in the urban culture
of Delhi. In the political realm, Ajmal Khan quietly

25
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

watched the entanglement strategies of British Empire.

He was a devout Muslim, so, deeply anguished by
the contemporary situation (of Twentieth Century)
of the Muslim Ummah. In response, though lately, he
denounced the official status of Hāziq al-Mulk given by
the British Empire. Further, He realised that service to
knowledge production of the Empire would result in
the destruction of his own culture as well as religious
contexts. Thus, by writing in his family magazine Akmal
al-Akhbār, he raised his voice against colonial policies
and re-looked on his engagement with international
and national politics. He also headed a delegation
to the Viceroy of India, in Simla, 190616 and attended
the inauguration of the All India Muslim League in
following days of the same year.

Khilafat Movement and Hakim Ajmal Khan

Khilafat movement was a single formal idea that

could produce a forceful response to the emerging
juggernaut of the West. Primarily Khilafat movement
was lodged to counter several elements which saw the
decaying Ummah could be secured only by defending
the Ottoman Caliphate. As discussed above, it was
believed that Caliphate is a religio-political institution to
guarantee the security of Islam, Muslims and traditional
knowledge along with its adherents. Gopal Krishna
has discussed that in 1915 in a secret treaty of Britain,
France, Russia and Italy, they had decided to partition
the Ottoman Empire into four spheres. The primary aim
behind it was to turn out of Europe to Ottoman Empire as
decidedly foreign to Western Civilization.17 It was only

26
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

Bolsheviks and their interruption into the great game

of powers that these secrets came to the public. Hakim
Ajmal Khan along with other Muslim leaders18 issued
pro-Ottoman expressions in an annual session of Indian
Muslim League in Delhi in December 1918. On the other
hand, Gandhi also saw Ottoman Empire as part of the
traditional global setup. Sudden institutional break of the
Ottoman as Caliphate would lead devastating results in
Muslim and other neighbouring societies.19 Gandhi, well
aware of this aspect of the traditional continuity, linked
Khilafat movement to his Swarāj movement. By doing so,
he mobilized a Hindu-Muslim unity to counter British
Empire. Ajmal Khan, being a Gandhian, participated
in anti-colonial mobilisation and Hindu-Muslim unity
too. In 1922, with the interference of the Kemal Pasha
Ataturk, a sophisticated strategy to separate the powers
as Sultanate and Caliphate were used. It sent a shock to
Indian intellectuals because of the separation of powers
was a Christian model, for example, separation of
state and papacy. A section of ‘Ulamā and intellectuals
boycotted the decision. But Dr Ansari (d.1936) and
Hakim Ajmal Khan took it as the earlier method of
restoring and electing a Caliph. Therefore, the Khilafat
Conference of Gaya held on 27 December 1922, was
inaugurated which projected Ataturk as the upholder of
original Islamic practice. He was considered a reformer
who would restructure the Caliphate, so that, a title of
Sayf al-Islām (the Sword of Islam) and Mujāhid-i Khilāfat
in honour of Ataturk was released.20

In the worldview of Hakim Ajmal Khan, Caliphate

was an essential institution for the protection of

27
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

traditionalism. He was closer to the Caliph’s (Ottoman)

cause as he belonged to the land of his ancestors.
Ottoman Caliphate preserved Islamic ethos for
relatively an extended period and successfully carried
a plural heritage of traditional Muslim cultures. He saw
British Empire as an emerging racist political set up. In
his view, intellectual developments within it practice
repression in place of progress. Its view of Europe could
afford only desired forms of Christianity. For example,
as above has been mentioned that British Empire was
observing the affiliation of the Ottomans with Islam,
wished to keep them out from geographical set up of
so-called superior Europe.

Traditional Roots of Hakim Ajmal Khan’s

Charisma

It is variously discussed that Hakim Ajmal Khan was a

modernist. He was a giant of Indian nationalism who
believed in pluralism and harmony and in his latter part
of life, he chose to play billiard and sometimes attired
in Western dress. Viewing the importance of university
education for both men and women, he mobilized and
established educational institutions. He also travelled
to Western countries such as London21, Paris, Germany,
Austria and Constantinople.22 As above has been
discussed that during this period, Muslim intellectuals
were seeking the rational attitude of the modern at
the same time they were resisting corrosiveness of
the modernity. Most of the contemporary literature
presents that the so-called rational gates to Eastern or
Muslim societies were opened by the West.

28
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

Hakim Ajmal Khan, since his birth to the Nineteenth

autumn of his life had earned enough hand in theology,
philosophy and jurisprudence. Looking to his cultural
heritage, he eagerly turned to the study of traditional
medicine. And soon established critiques of the
classical foundations of the Unani medical system, for
example, on Galen, Avicenna and Rhazes23 in a time
when nobody dared to do the same. Apart from this, he
maintained deep relation with the Sufi tradition of his
family. After completing his formal learning at home,
he was mature enough to understand society, culture
and politics around him. His master hands made
him a competent professional in the field of Unani
practice. His mastermind led him to read the greed of
the emerging knowledge factories of the West. And his
noble heart guided him to provide solutions for the
cause of the existence of traditional knowledge system.
Subsequently, the composition of these three introduced
him as a healer of the nation. The healer was anguished
by the colonial objection to indigenous knowledge. He
saw that the categorization of the Unani (as communal)
along with “ancient medical tradition of Hindustan”
is an imperialist trick. It aimed to separate medical
cultures on the very communal grounds and left the
existing traditional set up upon that modern identitarian
politics is based. Naturally, the Unani tradition under
the colonial subjection was re-introduced as a Muslim
tradition rather than part of broader cultural context
where Greek-Roman, Indic-Arab-Persian shared each
other’s contributions to the knowledge.24 He had learned
that colonial greed would eat the whole traditional
setting of the society. Thus, breathing in the atmosphere

29
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

of modernity, he resisted its ruling plan over the

body and tried to re-systemize the medical cultures in
India. Ajmal Khan also had learned that future would
be with modern institutionalism. To counter it, he
developed an institutional solution for the nation. In
developing the method of responding to the West, he
equally contributed to the cause of anti-colonialism. It
happened in 1910; the government decided to launch
Medical Registration Act with the pretext of controlling
the quackery. The Government stated that tibb qadīm
(old medical system) is incomplete and unable to cure
people.25 Confident with the rationality of his traditional
knowledge systems, Hakim Ajmal Khan stood against
the decision of the government and launched an anti-
government agitation which demanded medical
practice of the Hakīm and Vayd to be allowed.26

However, in pursuit of resistance against British

colonialism, he used two broad strategies. Firstly, he
wished a plural society where different knowledge
systems respecting each other could be developed.
Therefore, the intrusion of Western political repression
would be checked, and hence, the positive aspect of
it be included. Secondly, he focused on the cultural
dimension of the society. Thus, the pro-traditional
mobilisation quickly managed the momentum on the
scene of the nationalist struggle. Decided not to provoke
traditional ideas to wrestle with modernity, he liked
forming organizations to educate the same traditional
ideas but with developing spirit. These organizations
took the cause of agitation, such as, anti-colonialism and

30
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

Khilafat Movement as the mission statement for their

vision. Hence, Ayurvedic and Unani Tibbia College
and Jamia Millia Islamia, two sisters of anti-colonial
movement came into existence.

Conclusion

Outline of the intellectual trend among Indian Muslims

leads to a conclusion that Western scholarship plays with
the politics of contextualization; that leads us to perceive
Western reason at first reference. It caused the development
of the Western society, subsequently posed threats to the
societies where non-modern ideas rule cultural norms
and values. Their analysis is too generalized to capture
a real meaning of the development of Muslim thought.
This trend results in filling up the emerging requirement
of communal politics in the society by projecting the so-
called ‘othering process’ more aggressive and alive. Thus,
the very binary of modernity and tradition dealt in Western
scholarship presented Indian Muslim intellectuals with
a careful articulation themed as “emotiveness”. They
argue that emotive attitude dominated Muslim politics
due to an absence of rationality in constructing a global-
local context of Muslim thought. In this regard, effects of
modernity are interpreted as it turns them to be rational
in a sense in which we understand it today. The case
of responding positively to modern ideas, on the one
hand, adhering with traditional believes on the other,
confronting injustice in the form of anti-colonialism and
running on the line of Islamic modernism, Ajmal Khan
was a modernist as he opened the gate of rethinking
in traditional medical knowledge. He locked the gate

31
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

of taqlīd (blind following) and rejected the customary

philosophy of reading and adhering. Despite this, he
had never been shaken on the ground of his belief that
tradition is a source of upgradation for humanity. He also
believed that unguided knowledge needs to be countered.
Otherwise, it will face downfall or would be incarnated
into a political mechanism of repression. However, at
each step of his belief, He was firmly attached with his
purpose of the life; to revive a dying tradition. As soon as,
Ajmal Khan’s view of tradition got the life back, it made
him happy as he had healed the entire nation.

Acknowledgement

In preparing this draft, scholarly interaction and academic

guidance provided by Prof A K Ramakrishnan (JNU) is
gratefully acknowledged. I thank my father and teacher M A
Farooqui (al-Jamiah al-Salafiah) for his advice on the method
to approach culture in Indian history and its global view.

References
1. Panikkar, K N (2007), Colonialism, Culture and
Resistance, New Delhi: Oxford University Press,
pp. 29-76.
2. Zaman, Muhammad Qasim (2015), “South Asian Islam
and the Idea of Caliphate” in Madawi al Rasheed,
Carool Kersten and Marat Shterin (eds.), Demystifying
the Caliphate: Historical Memory and Contemporary
Contexts, London: Oxford University Press, p. 57.
3. Hartun, Jan-Peter (2015),”Who Speaks of What
Caliphate? The Indian Khilafat Movement and its
Aftermath”, in Madawi al Rasheed, CaroolKersten

32
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

and Marat Shterin (eds.), Demystifying the Caliphate:

Historical Memory and Contemporary Contexts,
London: Oxford University Press, pp. 81-94.

4. Kaviraj, Sudipta (2011), The Enchantment of Democracy

and India, New Delhi: Permanent Black, p. 167.
5. Ritzer, George and Michael Ryan J (2011), (eds.) The
Concise Encyclopedia of Sociology, United Kingdom:
Blackwell Publishing Ltd, p. 255.
6. Ibid. p. 409.

7. Berman, Marshall (1982), All that is Solid Melts into

Air: The Experience of Modernity, United States of
America: Penguin Books, pp. 1-36.

8. Lerner, Daniel (1964), The Passing of Traditional

Society, New York: The Free Press network, p. 405.
9. Majeed, Javed (2004), ‘Modernity”, in Richard C
Martin, Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World,
USA: Macmillan Reference, pp. 456-58.
10. Fundamentals are faith for being a Muslim, like belief
in afterlife and angels.

11. As Raziul Islam Nadavi argued in Hakīm Ajmal Khān

kā Ta‘āruf ‘Ālam-i ‘Arab Mein (Introducing Hakim
Ajmal Khan in the Arab world), National Seminar on
Hakim Ajmal Khan’s Multidimensional Personality
and Enduring Contributions, (Souvenir and Book of
Abstracts), 12-13 February 2016.
12. Metcalf, D Barbara (1985), “Nationalist Muslims
in British India: The Case of Hakim Ajmal Khan”,
Modern Asian Studies, Vol.19, No.1, pp. 1-28. And
Hasan, Mushirul (1995), “Muslim Intellectuals,
Institutions, and Postcolonial Predicament”, India

33
Hakim Ajmal Khan: A Man of Exceptions

International Centre Quarterly, Vol.22, No.1,

pp. 100-122.

13. Qarshi Hasan M (1928), Tazkira Masīh al-Mulk

(Mushīr al-Atibbā, Masīh al-Mulk Number), Lahore:
Karimi press, pp. 3-67.
14. Nationalist Muslims in British India: The Case of Hakim
Ajmal Khan, pp.1 -28., Aristocracy and elitism had deep-
seated experience of loss in Western history as these are
defined with the reference of privateness that an elite or
an aristocrat can be accessed only by few.

15. Ra’īsi has its root in cultural meaning of ra’īs as in

the Arab society. The deliberate use of the word ra’īs
has a connotation perceived locally. Despite having a
conservative society raisi performs extravagantly as
guardian of the respective society.
16. David Osborn, Hakim Ajmal Khan: Pioneer of Unani
Medicine in Modern India,
http://www.greekmedicine.net/whos_who/Hakim_
Ajmal_Khan.html, accessed on 7th February, 2016.
17. Krishna, Gopal (1968), The Khilafat Movement in India:
The First Phase (September 1919-August 1920), The
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain
and Ireland, No. 1-2, pp. 37-38.
18. Maulvi Abdul Bari, Dr Ansari, Seth Chotani, Abul
Qasim, Maulana Azad, Maulana Hasrat Mohani,
Mushir Husain Kidwai, Maulana Muhammad Ali and
Maulana Shaukat Ali were among top leaders who
took the initiative.
19. For further, kindly look to the lord Chelmsford and
Lord Reading's role.

34
 Hakim Ajmal Khan between Tradition and Modernity

20. Minault, G (1982), The Khilafat Movement: Religious

Symbolism and Political Mobilization in India, New
York: Columbia University Press, p. 88.
21. It was the royal invitation on the coronation of the King
George V, on behalf of the Nawab of Rampur in 1911.
22. Nationalist Muslims in British India: The Case of
Hakim Ajmal Khan, pp.1-28., and Mushirul Hasan,
Muslim Intellectuals, Institutions, and Postcolonial
Predicament, pp. 100-122.

23. Tazkira Masīh al-Mulk, pp. 28-35.

24. Alavi, Seema (2008), Islam and Healing: Loss and
Recovery of an Indo-Muslim Medical Tradition, 1600-
1900, London: Palgrave Macmillan, p. 265.

25. Tazkira Masīh al-Mulk, p. 30.

26. Islam and Healing p. 259.

35