Malabar History journal

Anti-British Struggle

Seethi Sahib joined the freedom struggle while he was a student. He was an active participant in the Non-Cooperation Movement, in 1921. In 1922, he lost a year to the boycott of examinations. In 1923, he wrote his exams but continued to observe the boycott of foreign clothes and chose to wear Khadi clothes. In 1922, he participated in a special Khilafat conference held in Thalassery. Further, he became a member of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee and A.I.C.C.(All India Congress Committee).

In 1930, he represented Kerala in Lahore Congress. He was twice elected to the Cochin Legislative Assembly in 1928 and 1931. In 1932, he started publishing ‘Chandrika magazine’ from Thalassery. When the All India Muslim League stopped cooperating with the Congress party arguing that the Congress ruled in a way favourable to the Hindus and destroying the Muslim interests, he along with his colleagues started organising the Muslim League in Malabar District. In 1933, he left the Congress party. By 1937, he became an active worker for the Muslim league. He was the chief organizer of the All India Conference of the Muslim League of Malabar district held on 29 April 1940 in Kozhikode. After leaving the Congress party he was again elected from the Malappuram Constituency to Cochin Legislative Assembly in 1946,1952 and in 1960 from Kuttipuram Constituency. He also became a speaker of the Kerala Legislative Assembly in 1960.

Major Contributions

Seethi Sahib was also a great orator, translator and writer. After his translation of Gandhi’s speech, he translated many prominent speeches after he became a member of the Muslim League in 1934. Among the most famous of his translations was the speech by the then Bengal minister Fazalul Haq in a conference of the Malabar District Muslim league held in Kozhikode in 1941. After his momentous translation, the minister held him close and proclaimed that he was ‘The Translator General’ of India. He also translated the speeches of Nawab Sada liyaqath ali khan, the general Secretary of the All India Muslim League at the time from places Kozhikode, Kannur and Thalassery. He was part of the twelve conferences of Aikya Sangham. He translated the speech of Moulavi Muhammad Ali from the Urdu language from the fifth conference. He was one of the founders of the ‘Husankasam Dada Trust’ formed to provide scholarships for poor Muslim students of Thalassery taluk and Edakkad of Kannur district. He also put pressure upon the Madras government to raise Brennen College from the status of an Intermediate College to a Degree College.

In 1955, he left Thalassery and moved to Ernakulam due to heart disease. While he became the speaker of the Assembly in 1960 and lived in Thiruvananthapuram, he along with his colleagues strove to start a polytechnic. However, he did not live long to see the efforts materialize into a Polytechnic in Tirur. He was also part of the educational plans behind the building of Farook Training College, Mubarak Highschool L.P section of Thalassery and Taliparamaba High school. He also wrote for various magazines such as Malabar Islam, Muslim Mithram, Khilafat Pathrika, Isha’ath, Muslim Aikyam, Yuvalokam, Muslim, Deepika, and Al Islam. He also wrote biographies of ‘Moulana Muhammad Ali’ and ‘Muhammad Ali Jinnah’.

References

K.M. Seethi Sahib. Islam Kavadam. Accessed on 29.12.22 from
https://www.islamkavadam.com/charithram/muslimkal-keralathil/pramughar-rashtreeyam-km-seethi-sahib

K.M. Seethi Sahib. Kerala Legislative Assembly Children’s Library. Accessed on 29.12.22 from
https://klachildrenslibrary.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/speaker.pdf

Savankutty, T.M. Seethi Sahib. Department of Cultural Publications, Government of Kerala.