Mumbai (Maharashtra): The Karimi library in Mumbai, considered a heritage structure, holds a large treasure trove of Urdu and Persian translations of several Hindu religious scriptures, including the epics Ramayana and Mahabharata.
The culturally prominent library belongs to Anjuman-e-Islam, the largest and oldest educational institution of Mumbai. Despite being one of the oldest structures, the library building still stands strong.
Anjuman-e-Islam is a 147-year-old institution, which runs as many as 97 educational institutions across the state. The educational institutions have more than one lakh students, belonging to different religions, on their roll with three thousand teaching staff. A large number of former students of the institutions are now working and settled in different parts of the world.
A large number of Urdu-language Hindu religious books, which Karimi boasts of, include the Ramayana, Hanuman Chalisa, Bhagavad Gita, and the Mahabharata.
"At the Karimi Library, we have manuscripts and publications which are up to 450 years old. We have translated versions of the Bhagavad Gita and even the Guru Granth Sahib. We also have several important manuscripts from the Hindu and Jewish religions," said Anjuman CEO Sattar Madhok.
As some of these extremely old books have now started to rot, the library management has taken the initiative to digitalise them to preserve the literary treasure.
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"We have digitised many books, nicely bound them and kept them here. The most number of religious books are from Hinduism with 40 books," said Salim Choudhary, an employee of the library.
As far as the Anjuman-e-Islam is concerned, the 147-year-old organisation had played a pivotal role in the freedom movement, with many of its leaders having fought for Indian independence. Many of the leaders were even jailed by the British during the freedom struggle.
The organisation has always stood behind the people in times of crises like pandemics and natural disasters, and has a history of playing its role in rehabilitation work after calamities.
Anjuman-e-Islam has always played a constructive role to preserve and strengthen the 'Ganga–Jamuni Tehzeeb' (Fusion of Hindu and Muslim culture).
Further, the organisation is considered the oldest Muslim organisation, that has been largely contributing to the education sector of the country.
