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13 Sep, 2016

India’s anti-Muslim campaign continues, Urdu cultural centre shut down

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) might have quite missed the irony of this action on their part – barely two years after they named a crossroads in Bhendi Bazaar, the city’s Muslim enclave, as the “Urdu Markaz Chowk” the authorities shut down the Urdu cultural centre after which the square was named within two days of giving them notice on July 29. The non-profit Urdu Markaz was operating out of an abandoned municipal school in Bhendi Bazaar since 1999. It had become popular not just among young Muslim students wishing to learn English but also with others wanting to learn Urdu. The centre was bringing cultures and languages together and in past seven years had held mushairas in both Urdu and Marathi.

Read the rest: Mumbai loses a language, Urdu cultural centre is shut down | mumbai news | Hindustan Times