ashad Mahmood, the communist ideologue and progressive writer, passed away in Karachi on June 27. He was 91.

He had joined the Communist Party in the 1940s. At around the same time, he had also started participating in the meetings of the Progressive Writers’ Association. Arriving in Pakistan after independence and partition of India, he had a role in organising the Communist Party in Pakistan.

Mahmood came from a lower-middle class family. He did not have a college degree. However, he had developed a reading habit and was a keen observer of the world around him. These qualities helped him emerge as a public intellectual. As a participant in and witness to the evolution of various factions of the Communist Party, the Azad Pakistan Party, the Awami League and the National Awami Party, he had accumulated a wealth of political insights.

I had occasion to meet him in March 2022. I had recently read a review of his first book, Marxism Aur Aaj Ki Dunya (Marxism and the Contemporary World) and been impressed. I was in for a surprise. He had an old man’s face but was intellectually agile and his memory of significant 20^th Century events and debates was remarkably sharp. He would analyse every issue from a Marxist perspective.

I find it strange that in terms of publications, his output was limited to a couple of books consisting of essays originally published in the Badalti Dunya magazine and his memoir. As a clearheaded teacher and mentor for the youth he was matchless, being an enlightened and optimistic person.

His lack of formal education did not prevent him from developing a multidisciplinary approach. He impressed his readers as a historian, a sociologist and a critic of capitalist values and methods.

Mahmood was a man of many parts. Among other things, he was a walking encyclopaedia of the progressive politics in India. A conversation with him could save a research scholar much effort and launch them in the right direction.

He could, for instance, describe the pre-partition India accurately and succinctly. He could list the various movements launched in pursuit of freedom from the British. Not just that, he could also explain the ideological foundation of all these movements and name their significant leaders. He could dilate on the Communist Party’s role in the freedom movement and the state of its internal affairs on the eve of independence. He had definitive opinions on the differences between various leaders of the Party and who among them was proved right in the end. He could recall the Party’s public position on partition of India as well as the conflicts within the Party concerning it.

He had been an eyewitness to some of the events he recounted. He remembered how the Communist Party was organised in Pakistan and which Party workers came to Pakistan or were sent to Pakistan by the Party.

Rashad sahib was probably among the most knowledgeable in this regard. He had worked for the Party in India and maintained his association with the organization after coming to Pakistan. He counted many of the Party leaders among his personal friends. As such he was also a great, reliable source of information on these people.

Rashad sahib’s youth had been spent in Bombay. He would recall that when King Charles II of Britain married the Portuguese princess, Infanta Catarina, in 1661, the area was ceded as a gift to the king. In 1665, the royal military had seized Bombay.

Rashad sahib remembered the city as a place many political leaders, from Gandhi to Jinnah, had made the hub of their activities. He also remembered it as one of India’s largest industrial cities and the headquarters of the textile industry. He recalled that some of the biggest Indian industrialists who used to live there would support various political parties during the independence movement.

The Communist Party had its headquarters in Delhi, but Bombay was an important centre of political activity. Trade unions had taken hold following a very large workers’ strike in 1908. Bombay had seen significant action during Quit India, Civil Disobedience, Satyagraha, Swadeshi Khadi and Khilafat Movements.

Rashad sahib had also been a witness to the Royal Indian Navy sailors’ mutiny in 1946 and had ardently supported it. The uprising, after the World War II had ended, raised many issues including the edition trial of the members of the Indian National Army of Subhas Chandra Bose.

The uprising that started in Bombay had spread to Karachi, Calcutta and Visakhapatnam. Later, soldiers from the land and air forces had also joined it. In the end Pandit Nehru and Vallabhbhai Patel had to intervene to end it. Rashad Sahib used to narrate the events of this historic uprising in eyewitness detail.

Rasahd sahib said his life in Bombay had been one of extreme hardship and poverty. However, he also said that it was a choice and never complained.

Many in the communist movement were disappointed at the fall of the Soviet Union. Rashad sahib was undaunted. He continued to insist that Marxism was a science. A science could not be defeated, he pointed out, cheerfully.

As long as there was inequality and exploitation of man by man, racism and parochialism, he held, Marxism would remain relevant.

Rashad sahib had the knack of reciting the perfect couplet for every occasion. He also had a great taste in films.

He was a remarkable scholar of progressive literature. In this he had the great advantage of having met most of the writers, poets and journalists and remained in touch with them over prolonged periods.

Rashad sahib also remembered fondly the slogans popular among workers and students during the struggle for independence. He could recite many revolutionary anthems sung by the workers. He remembered the poems they used to learn by heart and read when a baton charge to break a public rally took place. He remembered the firing of bullets and the people who fell, the martyred and the injured. He remembered the ones who went to jail and the slogans some them chanted when embracing death.

Despite his lifelong devotion to Karl Marx’s philosophy, he was no dogmatic fundamentalist.

His courage and clarity are reflected in his writings.

The writer is an award-winning researcher and translator based in Lahore and president of the Progressive Writers’ Association. He may be reached at razanaeem@hotmail.com. He tweets at @raza_naeem1979