Syed Hossain

Syed Hossain
Born(1888-06-23)23 June 1888
Dhaka, Present Day Bangladesh, [[Dacca], Bengal Presidency, British India
Died26 February 1949(1949-02-26) (aged 61)
Cairo, Egypt
Burial place
Cairo
Relatives

Syed Hossain (also Syud Hossain; 23 June 1888 – 26 February 1949) was an Indian journalist, an Indian independence activist, and the first Indian ambassador to Egypt in the Jawaharlal Nehru administration.

Early life

Syed Hossain was born in Dhaka in 1888. His father, Nawab Syed Mohammad Azad Khan Bahadur (1850-1916) was the Inspector-General of Registration, Bengal. His great-great-grandfather was Mir Syed Ashraf Ali Khan (d. 1829). Syed Hossain's mother was the daughter of Nawab Abdul Latif, a social reformer of Bengal. Sher-e-Bangla A. K. Fazlul Huq (1873–1962) and Sir Hassan Suhrawardy (1888–1946), were his brother-in-laws.

Hossain passed his Entrance Examination in 1904 and F.A. in 1906 from the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College of Aligarh. He then joined the Bengal Civil Service as a Sub-Deputy Collector in Calcutta but he soon went to England to pursue further education in 1909.

Career

Hossain started his journalism career early in life and became the editor of Motilal Nehru's nationalist newspaper, The Independent.

Hossain wrote "Echoes from Old Dacca", published in May 1909 and "Gandhi: The Saint as Statesman" in 1937.

Hossain represented India at the Paris Peace Conference in 1920 for the Near Eastern Peace settlement.

In the 1930s, he moved to California. He served as a lecturer at the University of Southern California's Department of History as a visiting faculty lecturer. He taught two courses entitled "India's Civilization" and "Islamic Civilization" in the summer of 1934. The university later conferred on him an honorary doctorate degree.

When Hossain left the United States for India in 1946, a farewell dinner was organized for him at the Ceylon India Inn in New York City where the guests included Ragini Devi, Habib Rahman, and Indrani Rahman.

Personal life

Hossain was in a brief relationship with Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, sister of Nehru, though this was opposed by her family. Pandit later wrote in her autobiography, The Scope of Happiness, "...while still in my teens, I had become attached to a young man, Syed Hossain (sic), whom my father had appointed editor of a newspaper he had just started, The Independent. In an era that proclaimed Hindu-Muslim unity, and belonging to a family that had close Muslim friends, I must have thought it would be perfectly natural to marry outside my religion. But in matters such as marriage the times were deeply traditional, and I was persuaded that this would be wrong." Historian Manu Bhagavan states that Hossain and Pandit "definitely married", though notes the marriage may have been 'informal'.

He has been buried in Al-Arafa in Cairo. He was then one of the only Indians who was buried there. A state funeral was accorded to him by the Egyptian government. The road serving the tomb was later announced to be named after him.

Works

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Embassy of India, Cairo, Egypt : List of former Ambassadors". www.eoicairo.gov.in. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
  2. ↑ Vinodh, N. S. (29 December 2020). A Forgotten Ambassador in Cairo: The Life and Times of Syud Hossain. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-81-947520-9-7.
  3. 1 2 Choudhury, Enam Ahmed (4 October 2021). "Syud Hossain and his times". The Daily Star. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
    1. ↑ BBC News Hindi (25 August 2023). Syud Hossain और Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit की कहानी (BBC Hindi). Retrieved 19 October 2026 – via YouTube.
  4. 1 2 Hossain, Syud (1909). Echoes from Old Dacca. Edinburgh Press.
  5. ↑ "Syud Hossain: A forgotten ambassador brought back to life". South Asia Monitor. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
  6. ↑ Hossain, Syud (1937). Gandhi: The Saint as Statesman. Suttonhouse, Limited.
  7. 1 2 "Pamphlet for Lectures by Dr. Syud Hossain". South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA). 5 September 2016. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
  8. ↑ "Syud Hossain Pamphlet". South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA). 23 July 2015. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
  9. ↑ "The Resurrection Of a Forgotten Ambassador". Valley of Words. 4 August 2021. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
  10. ↑ Vinodh, N. S. (29 December 2020). A Forgotten Ambassador in Cairo: The Life and Times of Syud Hossain. Simon and Schuster. p. 40. ISBN 978-81-947520-9-7. Retrieved 25 July 2026.
  11. ↑ Wolpert, Stanley A. (1996). Nehru: A Tryst with Destiny. Oxford University Press. p. 48. ISBN 978-0-19-510073-0.
  12. ↑ Bhagavan, Manu (30 September 2025). "Notes". The Remarkable Madame Pandit: Champion of India, Citizen of the World. Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-56424-3.
  13. ↑ Hossain, Syud (2001). Echoes from Old Dacca. Hakkani Publishers. p. 11. Retrieved 25 July 2026.
  14. ↑ D.C, India Information Services, Washington (1949). Releases. Embassy of India. p. 8. Retrieved 25 July 2026.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)