Written by: Muhammad Suhayb
Posted on: December 28, 2022 | 
| 中文
Habib Hussain Abbasi dealing with a customer
We have all listened to the saying, ‘Seek knowledge even if you have to go as far as China’, but when I was assigned to locate one of the oldest bookstores in Karachi’s oriental Juna Market, travelling to Beijing seemed easier for me. Negotiating the traffic in the oldest part of Karachi, was as difficult as reading Mandarin text. On a weekday, finding the 112-year-old shop was like acquiring Captain Flint’s treasure.
The exterior of Abbasi Kutubkhana
A walk through the narrow streets of Juna Market may be tiring, but the warm greeting by Habib Hussain Abbasi, owner of the store, can make you forget all woes. Abbasi Kutubkhana is a bookstore, which is still trading knowledge with people of a very different world.
Founded in 1910, it is considered one of the oldest bookstores in Karachi. The maternal grandfather of Habib Hussain Abbasi, Ghulam Abbas Daudbhoy, got it in 1928 from a person who fell on hard times and had to pay some debts. Habib Hussain’s father, Abdul Rasool took charge of the store in 1941, after the death of his father-in-law. Rasool had been Daudbhoy’s apprentice since 1928 and only death stopped Rasool from managing the shop sixty year later.
A portrait of Habib Hussain's father
‘My father came to Pakistan from the State of Gwalior before partition. We lived in a joint and a closely knit family. My father was given the responsibility of managing the bookstore, when my grandfather was too old to do it. I used to come and help my father at this store when I was in the fourth grade. It was an altogether different period, when I think back. We used to buy ice creams for four annas, coca cola for five and similarly dahi balay, aloo cholay from Sheeraz Bhai’s shop at unbelievably low prices. Ten rupees were like a thousand rupees for us. There were tubs of water in the bazaar from which horses and donkeys could drink. Ikhlaqiyat ka janaza nikal chuka hai, ub tu insaan ke liye bhi paani nahi hai’ (Culture and courtesies have disappeared from our society, and now people are loathe to even offer water to other humans leave alone animals), lamented Habib Hussain.
Abbasi Kutubkhana was a stop for scholars, historians, journalists and writers in its heyday. ‘Many literary figures of the ’60s and ’70s, including Faiz Ahmed Faiz, visited us quite a few times, especially when he was principal of the Haji Abdullah Haroon Government College, Lyari. Such intellectual luminaries as Professor Karrar Hussain, renowned scholar Hafiz Mehmood-ul-Hasan, famous playwright Fatima Surayya Bajiya, philosopher Mustafa Jauhar, senior jurist Khalid Ishaq, poets Mahir-ul-Qadri, Ehsan Danish, Iqbal Azim, journalist Raees Ahmed Jafri, Shamsul Ulema Dr. Daudpota, Haji Maula Bakhsh Soomro (father of former speaker Ilahi Bukhsh Soomro), well-known writer Pir Hisamuddin Rashidi, Sindh’s renowned scholars Mirza Kalich Beg and Pir Aga Jan Sirhindi would also frequent our store. I can give names of over two hundred literary giants whom I encountered over the last six decades. Each one of them loved books and would come over and have enlightening discussion’, remembers Habib Hussain, whose conversation took me back to the days before my birth.
Book shelves at Abbasi Kutubkhana
Thank God, after the centenary celebrations of the bookstore, Habib Hussain Abbasi decided to keep a visitor’s logbook. In the book, comments from people from far and wide are written, which itself is a novel experience. French researcher Stephane Dudoignon, who has written a lot on the regional issues, jotted down his comments in Persian language. Professor Patrick Laude from Georgetown University in Qatar, Vice chancellor of Damascus University Muntasir Al-Kattani and many others had also visited the three-story bookstore in recent times.
Stephane Dudoignon's comments in the visitor's logbook
The bookstore mostly contains Urdu books, with Islamic History, literature and psychology dominating the shelves. The bookstore also has some novel pieces in Sindhi, among a variety of encyclopedias in Arabic and Persian. ‘I also have the rare copy of Shah jo Risalo, the collection of poems of Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, printed in 1870. If someone asks for it, I would make a copy and give it to him. There is no point in selling rare pieces for huge sums’, comes from someone who has no issues with e-books, though he foresees a bleak future of book-reading in Pakistan.
A rare copy of 'Shah Jo Risalo' at Abbasi Kutubkhana
During our talk, a visitor wanted to photograph some pages of a certain book for reference, Habib Hussain allowed him and he left without purchasing the book. ‘In order to spread knowledge, one has to be generous and not a miser. With so much inflation, people cannot buy books and I don’t ask them to,’ came from a bespectacled grey-haired man who has seen the highs and lows of life.
Habib Hussain’s conversation was filled with poetic reference and idioms. He would give references from Josh Malihabadi’s Yaadon ki Baraat or would recite Suroor Barabankvi’s poetry during our short meeting. A learned man himself, he is quick at making friends, a trait he must have picked from his father.
The 72-year-old Habib Hussain commutes daily from Shabbirabad Society, PECHS to Denso Hall, in a community bus. Bohris usually attach their profession with their names, like Timberwala, Tambawala and Lakdawala. As Habib Hussain Abbasi also belongs to the Bohra Community, I asked him that if he hasn't given such a name a thought. ‘You can call me Kitabwalla’ was the endearing response from someone who is an irreplaceable institution himself.
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