Ansari hails Hyderabad's rich history

Hailing Hyderabad's rich history, Vice-President Hamid Ansari today hoped the city's tradition of tolerance and co-existence would continue and it will remain an example for the country.
"Contemporary Hyderabad has crafted with skill and success a place for itself in the new world of the 21st century. One can only hope its inherited tradition of tolerance, co-existence, inclusiveness and cultural effervescence would continue to signal its uniquenness and remain an exmaple for the country," he said here.
Ansari, who delivered the first Mohammed Quli Qutub Shah Memorial Lecture at the Maulana Azad National Urdu University, said historians and even normal citizens would ponder over the legacy of Mohammad Quli Qutub Shah, the founder of Hyderabad.

"What kind of political and socio-economic culture did the successor states of Hyderabad inherit? Was there anything of value left by the state of Hyderabad and can it still contribute to the Indian polity?" he said.
Tracing the rule of Quli Qutub Shah and the origin of Hyderabad, Ansari quoted historians who hailed the secular nature of his administration.
"Writing about the administrative system in the reign of Ibrahim, father of Mohammad Quli Qutub Shah, the historian Haroon Khan Sherwani has noted 'very little differentiation was made between the Hindus and the Muslims so far as the affairs of the state were concerned."

Noting that Telugu, the local language, was 'like a mother tongue' for Mohammad Quli, the Vice-President said the ruler's official announcements were bilingual.

"The Sultan thus made 'a deliberate attempt to synthesise cultures in the Deccan, imbibing in the people of Hyderabad a relish of tolerance, love of spectacle and mildness of nature'," Ansari said.
He also talked about the attempts of Mughal empire to dominate Deccan entities.
"In the final analysis, the Moghul Empire was able to beat off the threat and prevail. It is different matter that effective dominance did not last very long since by the beginning of the eighteenth century signs of weakness and eventual disintegration were visible," he said.