Acknowledging his lifelong services to the promotion and preservation of Urdu language in the Middle East, three prominent entities in India recently bestowed Mohammad Habibun Nabi, an Indian expatriate living in Doha, with awards.
Nabi, a passionate community volunteer and patron of leading Asian community welfare organisations, received the awards during his recent visit to India.
His first award was the Hindi Urdu Shatiya Award, given by Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik. His second award was Ashraf Qadari Award for Urdu Tahrik, given by NCP General Secretary Tariq Anwar and Dr Abdul Ghafoor, the Minister of Minority Welfare Bihar Government. His last award was given by the Urdu department of Hyderabad University for the promotion of Urdu in the Middle East.
Nabi, a civil engineer by profession, currently works as project Manager at Qatar Water and Electricity corporation. He is the Chief Patron of AMUAA; Deputy Chief Patron of Bazm-e-Urdu and Bazm-e-Sadaf; and the Patron of World Bihar Organization, Mission 20 and IJBA.
“My passion is to serve the Asian community voluntarily through teamwork and delivering on commitments consistently by building long-lasting bridges and strengthening the cultural ties with our Qatari brethren,” says Nabi.
He studied at Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) and completed his Bachelor of Science in Engineering in 1979. He was the table tennis captain of AMU in 1976 and later became the general captain of AMU and participated at state level in Table Tennis, Kho Kho and Ball Badminton.
“Due to involvement in cultural activities Urdu was very close to my heart and I have always tried to promote Urdu in any form or any manner to the community and by the grace of God, I have achieved a lot of success during the last 40 years of my journey,” says the recently awarded community leader.
Besides Qatar, Nabi has lived in many countries of the Middle East. He began his long journey in the region from Baghdad, Iraq in 1980. During his stay there, he participated in and organised many sporting activities for his company Mid Mac, besides many cultural activities and special programmes related to Urdu.
He moved in 1982 to Oman, where he continued with his community activities and became the joint secretary for AMU’s old boys association there. He also become the committee member of Oman Cricket Association.
In annual international mushairas, he invited Pakistani Qawwali legends Ghulam and Farid Sabri Qawwals for performing a Qawwali in Salalah, Muscat and was instrumental in organising many programmes for the Asian community.
Nabi actively participated in cricket and table tennis tournaments and won many national championships during his 16 years of stay in Oman.
He also had the honour to meet Sultan Qaboos of Oman multiple times during his stay there. He also played an integral part in the construction of the Sultan Qaboos University from the beginning and later worked at the university as Head of Civil Infrastructure.
He moved to Qatar in 1998 and joined RasGas. There he developed the RasGas, Qatargas Housing project with international school, a senior club and a community hospital. He got elected as the president of AMUAA in 2001.
His efforts as the sports secretary and general secretary of Indian Culture Centre (ICC) helped in successfully raising funds from leading corporations and thus ensuring ICC remains a successful non-profit socio-cultural entity.
He has been engaging community leaders and local organisations in social and cultural activities, extending help to the needy. As the vice president of Indian Community Benevolent Forum (ICBF), he raised funds for underprivileged workers and arranged repatriation, and helped with medical assistance, traffic fine problems and other issues related to the workers.
Nabi has been active in organising many fundraising events for a temple with Indian legend singer Lata Mangeshkar and actress Madhuri Dixit, and many more celebrities. He has also raised funds for Shaukat Khanam Memorial Hospital with Imran Khan and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, while being based in Oman.
In Qatar, he has been associated with Bazm-Alig and has been conducting yearly debate and painting competitions among schools to provide platform to students for their better future. Nabi also started ICC-One toastmasters club.
Habibun Nabi, right, receiving Hindi Urdu Shatiya Award from Uttar Pradesh governor.
