Gopi Chand Narang

Narang received a master's degree in Urdu from the University of Delhi, and a research fellowship from the Ministry of Education to complete his PhD in 1958.

Narang taught Urdu literature at St. Stephen's College (1957–58) before joining Delhi University, where he became a reader in 1961. In 1963 and 1968 he was a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin, also teaching at the University of Minnesota and the University of Oslo. Narang joined Jamia Millia Islamia University in New Delhi as a professor in 1974, rejoining the University of Delhi from 1986 to 1995. In 2005, the university named him a professor emeritus.

Narang's first book (Karkhandari Dialect of Delhi Urdu) was published in 1961, a sociolinguistic analysis of a neglected dialect spoken by indigenous workers and artisans Delhi. He has published over 60 books in Urdu, English and Hindi.

He has produced three studies: Hindustani Qisson se Makhooz Urdu Masnaviyan (1961), Urdu Ghazal aur Hindustani Zehn-o-Tehzeeb (2002) and Hindustan ki Tehreek-e-Azadi aur Urdu Shairi (2003). Narang's related volumes—Amir Khusrow ka Hindavi Kalaam (1987), Saniha-e-Karbala bataur Sheri Isti'ara (1986) and Urdu Zabaan aur Lisaniyaat (2006)—are socio-cultural and historical studies.

In addition to teaching, Narang was vice-chairman of the Delhi Urdu Academy (1996–1999) and the National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language – HRD (1998–2004) and vice-president (1998–2002) and president (2003–2007) of the Sahitya Akademi.

Narang has been recognized for his work. He was an Indira Gandhi Memorial Fellow of the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts from 2002 to 2004, and a 1997 resident of the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center in Italy. Narang received the Mazzini Gold Medal (Italy, 2005), the Amir Khusrow Award (Chicago, 1987), a Canadian Academy of Urdu Language and Literature Award (Toronto, 1987), an Association of Asian Studies (Mid-Atlantic Region) Award (US, 1982), a European Urdu Writers Society Award (London, 2005), an Urdu Markaz International Award (Los Angeles, 1995) and an Alami Farogh-e-Urdu Adab Award (Doha, 1998). He is the only Urdu writer honoured by the presidents of both India and Pakistan. In 1977 Narang received the President's National Gold Medal from Pakistan for his work on Allama Iqbal, and received a Padma Bhushan (2004) and Padma Shri (1990) from India.[1] He received honorary Doctor of Letters degrees from Aligarh Muslim University (2009), Maulana Azad National Urdu University (2008) and the Central University in Hyderabad (2007). Narang received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1995, the Ghalib Award in 1985, Urdu Academy's Bahadur Shah Zafar Award, Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad Award (both in 2010), Madhya Pradesh Iqbal Samman (2011) and the Bharatiya Jnanpith Moorti Devi Award (2012). The Sahitya Akademi conferred on Narang its highest honour, the Fellowship, in 2009.[2]

There have been allegations of plagiarism against Gopi Chand Narang for copying and translating from secondary sources major portions of his Sahitya Akademi award-winning book Sakhtiyat, Pas-Sakhtiyat aur Mashriqui Sheriyat (Structuralism, Post-Structuralism and Eastern Poetics) but Narang has responded to it and now it has been proved that the allegations were baseless and a result of maligning campaign. Narang has scholarly exposed the Urdu modernism and claimed that it was an anti-liberal movement hence he was targeted by the propagators of Urdu modernism like CM Naim.[3] Imran Shahid Bhinder and Prof. CM. Naim of Chicago University have provided textual evidence of plagiarism.[4][5] There have also been allegations of corruption and controversial appointments under his Presidency of Sahitya Akademi, which he headed from 2003 to 2007.[6][7]

However, the fact is that the plagiarism charges have been countered in a recent article titled "How author and critic Gopi Chand Narang survived a maligning campaign". The same article, in fact, exposes both Imran Shahid and C.M.Naim that how and why they had carried out a negative campaign against Narang and how they failed.[3]

Similarly, in a recent interview, Narang has responded to allegations of corruption during his tenure as the President of the Sahitya Akademi. Narang has said that if he had done something wrong those who carried out false propaganda should have gone to the court. It was libelous and baseless allegations on the ground of personal animosity.[8]

Narang has published more than 60 scholarly and critical books on language, literature, poetics and cultural studies; many have been translated into other Indian languages.

• Official website
• 2012 BBC interview (in Urdu)
• High priest of Urdu: Gopi Chand Narang by Feroze Bakht Ahmed (Milli Gazette)
• Gopi Chand Narang - Versatile Scholar & Writer (FacenFacts)

• Narang, Gopi Chand in Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi, 1989, ISBN 81-260-1804-6.
• Jadeed Adabi Theory aur Gopi Chand Narang by Maula Bakhsh, New Delhi, 2009, ISBN 978-81-8223-536-6.
• Deedawar Naqqad by Shahzad Anjum, New Delhi, 2002, ISBN 8187667648.
• Insha Special number on Gopi Chand Narang, ed. by F. S. Ejaz, Kolkata, 2005, ISBN 8186346198.
• Gopi Chand Narang: Bainul Aqwami Urdu Shakhsiyat, ed. by Nand Kishore Vikram, New Delhi 2008, ISBN 9788188298020.
• Kaarwan-e Adab's special issue on Gopi Chand Narang, ed. by Javed Yazdani and Kausar Siddiqui, Bhopal, March 2012. RNI No.: MPURD/2005/16563.