The Musalman - the last handwritten newspaper in the world

In the bustling city of Chennai, the capital of the southeastern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, nestled in the shadow of the Wallajah Mosque is an old building, but what goes on inside it commands special attention.

Since 1927, every day, a group of calligraphers have been working tirelessly to create a handwritten daily newspaper called The Musalman.

Handcrafted work

The Musalman was founded in 1927 by Urdu journalist and social activist Chenab Syed Azmathullah Sahi. At that time, India was still under British colonial rule and the independence movement was growing. The newspaper was founded not only to provide news but also to connect and awaken the Urdu-speaking community in the patriotic movement.

The first article was published in the presence of Dr. Mukhtar Ahmed Ansari, then President of the Indian National Congress . Since then, The Musalman has been maintained as a family business. After Chenab Syed Azmathullah Sahi passed away, his son Syed Fazlullah took over.

Syed Fazlullah personally wrote the articles for The Musalman, assisted by three professional calligraphers known as katibs and three news reporters. In 2008, Syed Fazlullah passed away and his nephew, Syed Arifullah, took over the responsibility of maintaining this special newspaper.

Syed Arifullah reviews a transcription of the newspaper's manuscript before it is published.

Today, The Musalman has correspondents across the country, including Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai and New Delhi. It also has subscribers in all these places. The Musalman’s readers are mainly Muslims, but there are also Hindus who know Urdu. Besides subscribers, other readers can also find The Musalman on street newsstands. In addition, The Musalman has always received support and contributions from many famous people such as religious leaders, writers and poets...

Writing for The Musalman is an art, and everyone on the team is passionate about it. Previously, to add the latest news, the entire page had to be rewritten. But now, there is always a blank space in the corner of the front page for such news, as long as it reaches the office before 3 p.m.

Unlike any modern newspaper, each page of The Musalman is handwritten in Urdu calligraphy. Four katibs sit side by side in a room measuring less than 80 square metres in an old building nestled in the shadow of the Wallajah Mosque in Chennai. Each is responsible for a page, using traditional pens, rulers and paper to meticulously copy out the daily news. Each page takes about three hours to complete. Once completed, the handwritten pages are photographed onto negatives and fed into offset printing presses (a technology that dates back to 1875, originating in England) to print thousands of copies.

The Musalman is a four-page daily newspaper that covers international news, national news, poetry, editorials, sports and community affairs. The paper’s calligraphers include women – a rarity in the traditionally male-dominated Urdu calligraphy profession. But their presence in The Musalman is also a testament to the harmony between social innovation and cultural preservation.

The newspaper was once praised by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi as a model of modern Indian culture. Foreign reporters from news agencies such as Wired, Al Jazeera, BBC… also visited the small office of The Musalman to find out why a handwritten newspaper can survive in the digital age.

Offset printing press for printing thousands of copies of The Musalman.

Mission to preserve Urdu heritage

Until the 1980s, all Urdu newspapers followed the tradition of handwriting. And now, while other newspapers have adapted their printing processes to keep up with the digital technology that has taken over the international newspaper landscape, The Musalman continues to maintain this tradition. The paper is published every evening and is meticulously hand-crafted. Even many of the advertisements are hand-drawn, although they are often sent digitally.

Another notable thing is that Urdu is quite poetic, with a Perso-Arabic influence, and was once the language of the Mughal dynasties. After India gained independence and partitioned the country, Urdu was increasingly pushed to the margins of the mainstream language flow, especially in the southeastern states such as Tamil Nadu. Therefore, from the very beginning, The Musalman was not only an information product, but also a cultural manifesto, acting as a "living museum" for the art of Urdu writing.

Furthermore, calligraphy has a special place in the Muslim community in India because it is rooted in religion. The position of katib in the ancient world was a highly respected position. Therefore, writers or people who were very good at the art of writing and had achievements in the art of calligraphy were always highly regarded, even in the present era.

The calligraphers for The Musalman included women—a rarity in the traditionally male-dominated profession of Urdu calligraphy.

According to the katibs, writing Urdu is not just about recording the language but also about meditation, a way to honor the holy Quran and preserve Muslim identity in a multicultural society. The staff at The Musalman believe in the newspaper, consider it a family and are willing to work until their last breath. The Musalman's katib head, Rehaman Hussein, shared in an interview with Khaleej Times: “Urdu is the language of the soul. Writing connects me to my ancestors and my faith. Calligraphy is the heart of The Musalman. If you take the heart out, there is nothing left.”

When asked why they didn’t switch to type or online publishing, generations of The Musalman leaders have given the same answer: Handwriting is identity. “If everyone follows technology and no one preserves tradition, we will lose everything,” says Syed Arifullah, who now runs the paper. “We are not against digital, but we choose to be the custodians of cultural identity.” Since 2007, many proposals to go digital have been made, but Syed Arifullah has rejected them all. The paper still uses faxes to receive news from reporters everywhere; there are no computers in the office, and handwritten manuscripts are kept as original manuscripts—a living cultural archive.

The Musalam is the only daily newspaper in the world that is handwritten.

The challenges of survival

Today, The Musalman costs just 75 paisa (less than a rupee) and has a circulation of 20,000 to 21,000 copies a day. So how has The Musalman survived the digital age? The answer lies in a combination of three factors: minimal costs, a loyal community, and local advertising. The katibs are paid a modest salary of about 80 rupees per page, or just over 2,400 rupees a month (about $30). The office is minimalist: just a few ceiling fans, fluorescent lights, and an old offset press.

Advertising came mainly from local shops, wedding events, pharmacies and community organisations. In addition, The Musalman received informal support from the Tamil Nadu state government and especially from the Urdu community across the country, who saw it as a cultural preservation rather than a mere journalistic product.

But despite its symbolic significance, The Musalman is facing many risks: a lack of successors due to the dwindling number of people who know how to write Urdu calligraphy; difficulties in training new katibs due to low wages, long working hours and pressure to maintain the quality of writing; rising costs while the price of newspapers remains almost unchanged; competition from online newspapers as young readers increasingly turn to online news; the model of handwritten newspapers finding it difficult to attract new audiences without a flexible digital approach…

The Musalman's office is unair-conditioned, poorly lit and less than 80 square metres in size, in an old building nestled in the shadow of the Wallajah Mosque in Chennai.

There are also some opinions that, in order to continue to exist, The Musalman should build a “parallel” model, that is, both handwritten and published in electronic or PDF versions to reach young and international readers. Organizing calligraphy exhibitions, handwriting workshops, or raising funds for culture are also feasible directions.

However, regardless of the future, The Musalman still deserves to be honored as the embodiment of a living value, that in a world revolving around speed and convenience, there are still things that exist thanks to perseverance, love and faith in indigenous culture.

Source: https://baohatinh.vn/the-musalman-to-bao-viet-tay-cuoi-cung-tren-the-gioi-post290773.html