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The author is Chief Economist, Government of Pakistan, Planning Commission, Islamabad. He holds a PhD in Economics from Cambridge University and a Masters from University of Colorado at Boulder, USA. He is the author of Economic and social thinking of the Quaid-i-Azam.
2002 has been declared the year of Iqbal. While a lot will be said and written on his life and times, philosophy and poetry during the year, his early work on economics is likely to be ignored as ever. Not many people know that his first published book was in prose but not on philosophy. It was called Ilmul iqtisad and was among the first books on economics written in Urdu.
For lack of interest or sheer neglect, the original print of the book seems to have become extinct. Last month I visited Lahore to look for it. Iqbal Academy, Karachi, had brought out a reprint in 1961. This was the result of the efforts of Mumtaz Hasan, a former Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan. According to him, it was difficult to lay hand on even one copy of the original print. Luckily he found one in the Punjab Public Library, Lahore.
Naturally, I went to this library first. I must say that the staff of the oriental section of the library was very cooperative. Hoping that the original prints of the writings of the conceptualizer of Pakistan will have been preserved in a special section, I asked the Incharge of the reading room about its location. There was no such section. I was advised to look up the catalogue. Fortunately the original print was catalogued, as were the copies of the Mumtaz Hasan edition and a reprint of the Mumtaz Hassan edition published by Aina-i-Adab of Lahore in 1991. The original, however, was not there on the shelf.
Thinking that it must have been issued to some borrower, I approached the issue desk to inquire about it. The staff present confirmed the issuance of the book but told me that there was another copy for which I should come back on the next day. When I returned, I was given a copy of the Mumtaz Hasan edition of 1961. I explained that I need the original edition of 1903 or 1904, the exact year being a subject of dispute as the original print did not have a date on it. First they expressed ignorance of any such edition.
On my insistence the register was searched thoroughly. It turned out that the original edition had been issued to a permanent member, a lady lecturer residing perhaps in Misri Shah, for the past several years. I asked the staff to recall the book. I was informed rather curtly that junior staff had no authority to issue a reminder, much less a recall notice, to a permanent member. There is no knowing that the original exists in the Punjab Public Library any more.
There are two institutions in Lahore exclusively devoted to Iqbal and his work. One, supported by the government of Punjab, is Bazm-i-Iqbal concerned mainly with publications. A visit to their office at the elite Club Road did not yield any information on the original edition. I was, however, able to buy a Punjabi translation of Ilmul Iqtisad by Professor Sharif Kunjahi. Also available was a 40 year index of its journal, Iqbal, from January 1952 to January 1992 compiled by Akhtar-un-Nisa.
This had one reference of an article written by Dr Siddique Javed in the issue of October 1989 on the sociological study of Ilmul iqtisad. To find out more, I was directed to the Urdu Academy in Samanabad. Reaching the dilapidated house in which it is located, with a dusty signboard announcing it as West Pakistan Urdu Academy, was not easy.
I had no idea that Dr Siddique Javed is the Director of this Academy. A kind soul believing me to be a friend of the doctor offered me a gratis copy of a selection of articles on Ilmul iqtisad edited by Dr Javed. Apart from Iqbal's own preface, Mumtaz Hasan's foreword to the second edition and Anwar Iqbal Qureshi's introduction also to the second edition, it contains 10 articles on Ilmul Iqtisad.
I disappointed the gentleman by informing him that I was no friend of his boss and that I would like to make it my best buy so far by buying it. This book was published in 2000 but had been, according to its editor, in the works for 15 years. Another interesting publication brought out by the Urdu Academy in 1987 was a collection of Baba-i-Urdu, Dr Syed Abdullah, which contains an article on Iqbal's Urdu prose which also analyzed the prose of Ilmul iqtisad.
The other institution devoted to Iqbal is housed in a multistorey structure called Aiwan-i-Iqbal, also located in a exclusive area. It is a convention centre, publishing house and has a library.
However, to buy any publication of the Iqbal Academy, one has to go to Macleod Road, at Iqbal's second residence in Lahore, which one has to reach after a smelly walk through all manner of workshops. The staff at this shop had no idea of Iqbal's first book. A most interesting book by Dr Malik Hasan Akhtar, researching Iqbal's early career including a detailed background of Ilmul iqtisad, was available. Another book by Chaudhri Muzaffar Hussain on the agrarian views of Iqbal refers to Ilmul iqtisad at three places.
Iqbal Academy also brings out a quarterly journal, called Iqbaliyat in Urdu and Iqbal review in English. An index of articles included two reviews of Ilmul iqtisad by Alif Noon in January 1962 and by Muhammad Hamza Farooqui in January 1976. There I discovered more articles on Iqbal's economic writings: Ahmad Abdullah al Masdoosi on Iqbal's theory of taxes and finance (January 1961), Khwaja Amjad Saeed on "Economic philosophy of Iqbal" (October 1982) and Muzaffar Hussain on "Iqbal on economic development" (October 1983).
The library at the imposing Aiwan-e-Iqbal is a big disappointment. Its focus does not seem to be Iqbal as casually selected books on other subjects massively outnumber those by and on Iqbal. The visit for me personally was rewarding, though, as it did have what I was desperately seeking. There was the original edition of Ilmul Iqtisad, but not quite the original; it rather was a photocopy. Even this photocopy had the cover and the presentation page missing. The staff again was very kind to make a photocopy of the photocopy for me.
Has the original edition completely disappeared, I wondered! I would like to research the subject but I cannot in the absence of the original edition. Later editions have unfortunately attempted to improve the text of the original!
If readers can help, I will deeply appreciate.
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