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Hakim Habibur Rahman (March 23, 1881 - 23 February 1947) was an Unani physician, litterateur, journalist, politician and chronicler in early 20th-century Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Rahman was a close associate of Nawab Sir Khwaja Salimullah of the Dhaka Nawab Family. His two chronicles of Dhaka, Asudegan-e-Dhaka and Dhaka Panchas Baras Pahle, remain important primary source material for researchers working on Dhaka. His wide collection of manuscripts, coins, weapons and artifacts is preserved at the Dhaka University Library as theHakim Habibur Rahman Collection. The Hakim Habibur Rahman Lane carries his name near his birthplace, the Choto Katra, a landmark in the old part of Dhaka.
Habibur Rahman trained for 11 years in tibb (traditional medical practice) and the Unani system of medicine at Kanpur, Lucknow, Delhi and Agra after completing his studies at Dhaka Madrasah. He established his own practice in 1904. In 1939 he was awarded the title of Shifaul Mulk for his contribution in the field of Unani medicine by the British government.
Habibur Rahman was a prominent leader of the
Khilafat Movement in East Bengal. In the 1920s and '30s he performed as a major arbitrator for the Sardar community of Dhaka, who were the traditional leaders of the Panchayet system of local government of Dhaka. He edited Al Mushriq, an Urdu monthly journal, in 1906, and launched another Urdu monthly, Jadu, together with Khwaja Adel in 1924. He founded the Tibbia Habibia College in Dhaka in 1930. Apart from his general support to the Dhaka Museum, he donated 231 old coins, some of gold and silver, to the museum in 1936.
A major Urdu journalist and writer in turn of the century Dhaka, Habibur Rahman wrote extensively, often under the takhallus (pen name) of Ahsan (meaning "mercy"). Apart from the celebrated Asudegan-e-Dhaka (1946) and Dhaka Panchas Baras Pahle (1949), his other major works include Al-Fariq (1904),
Socrates' biography Hayat-e-Sukrat (1904), Tazkiratul-Fujala and Masajid-e-Dhaka. He collected all the Arabic, Persian and Urdu books written in Bengal for more than 40 years and published a catalog titled Sulasa Ghusala. He compiled the correspondence between Mirza Ghalib and Khwaja Haider Jan Shayek, a 19th-century Urdu poet from Dhaka, in Inshaye Shayek. He was the founder secretary of Anjuman-e-Urdu, an organization established to provide a forum for the cultivation of Urdu in East Bengal and Assam.
Hakim Habibur Rahman Foundation
The Hakim Habibur Rahman Foundation was established in 1994 in memory of Hakim Habibur Rahman. The scope of the foundation includes research on and promotion of herbal and Unani medicine, establishment of charitable institutions on traditional medical studies and exchange of knowledge, awards of merit, organization of seminars and symposia, and promotion of the social and intellectual ideals of Hakim Habibur Rahman. Hakim Syed Zillur Rahman from India is one of the recipients of the Foundation ‘awards of merit’ in 1996.
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