Documents from Sir Abdool Raman Osman's legal studies a century ago are now available

By Shafick Osman

 

Mahomed Osman, the 'founding member' of the Osman family, arrived in Mauritius from India on 16 February 1879, exactly 144 years ago (according to the Gregorian calendar), at the age of three, together with his parents Tejally and Mooleea, and siblings (Rohemun, Sohemun, Nuzeebun). On the Canada-named vessel, number 1294, they arrived from the port of Calcutta.

 

We are happy to share important papers from Sir Abdool Raman Osman, his second son, with the family and the rest of the world in remembrance of this historic day. Sir Abdool Raman became the country's first Muslim lawyer, Magistrate, Supreme Court judge, and—possibly most significantly—the nation's first Mauritian Governor-General. We are extremely thankful to the Archives of The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple in England for not only giving us with these historical documents, but also for enabling us to share them with the public today. These documents date back more than a century.

The Admission Papers

 

According to documents obtained from The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, Sir Abdool Raman was admitted to the Middle Temple for legal studies on 27 March 1922, following his request for admission on 8 February 1922 (in another official document, it is mentioned 3 February 1922). He was 19 years old at the time. He presented Certificates of Character from the Mayor of Port Louis (Mauritius) dated 6 December 1921 and signed by Mayor Edouard Nairac, as well as from the Acting Rector of the Royal College Mauritius. 

We also learn that Sir Abdool Raman took the Cambridge Senior Local Examination in Latin in December 1921 at the Holloway Centre (London). Sir Abdool Raman had a Senior Local Certificate from Mauritius, but he did not meet the required level in Latin for legal studies, according to a memo from the University of Cambridge dated 1 February 1922 from the Assistant Secretary for Examinations, A. H. N. Sewell.

 

Sir Abdool Raman enrolled in the Royal College Mauritius' Junior Cambridge Class in January 1918, according to the Royal College Mauritius' Certificate of Character dated 11 February 1921. "In July 1920, Mr. Osman obtained the Senior Cambridge Local Certificate, passing with Credit in English, Composition, French, Mathematics, and Botany," the Certificate states. "He was promoted to the English Scholarships Class's Second Section."

 

However, in a Petition for Admission to The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple dated 18 August 1921, it is stated that he is "fairly proficient in Latin" and has "a Senior Cambridge certificate in English Composition including Literature, French, Mathematics, [and] Botany." We can conclude that Sir Abdool Raman chose to take Latin in London before joining The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple because he did not meet the required standard in Latin in Mauritius.

His years in London

 

The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple's records reveal that Sir Abdool Raman arrived in England on 1 April 1921, and that he lived at three different addresses between that time and the day he was admitted to the bar on 26 January 1925:

• London's Finsbury Park, N4, 12 Portland Road.

• London's Tavistock Square, WC, 3 Endsleigh Street.

• London's Tufnell Park, N19, 117 Brecknock Road.

On 7 January 1925, Sir Abdool Raman submitted an application to the Middle Temple to be admitted to the Bar.

 

Good character

 

Sir Abdool Raman's "good character" is attested to in a number of documents. The General Secretary of the Indian National Council of YMCAs, P. D. Runganadhan, states that he is a man of "studious habits and good character" in a reference letter dated 8 January 1925. In the Certificate of Character dated 11 February 1921, the Acting Rector of the Royal College stated that his conduct was excellent. Edouard Nairac writes that his parents were "honourable" in the Certificate of Character issued by the Mayor of Port Louis on 6 December 1921. In another referral letter dated 8 January 1925, a lawyer from Montpelier Lodge (London) writes that "his time was strictly devoted to study and his conduct irreproachable".This letter also reveals that Sir Abdool Raman visited France during his studies.

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

 

 

 

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

 

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

© The Honourable Society of Middle Temple, 2023

Note: I would like to thank from the very bottom of my heart my cousin Azad Osman who hinted to my father and me the Middle Temple for Sir Abdool Raman's law studies. Thank you very much, Azad!

Hommage à Mouslim

 Par Monique Stegen (Canada) 

 

Photo d'en haut : Mouslim et moi à Niagara Falls (Canada).
Source : Monique Stegen, Canada.

Mon mari et moi avons fait la connaissance de Mouslim alors que nous habitions à Londres dans les années 60. Il était si jovial qu’il est vite devenu un ami. À Londres, à cette époque, c’était difficile d’avoir un téléphone, cela prenait une année ou plus avant l’installation. Donc, c’était chez lui que nous nous rendions pour faire nos appels et moi, surtout, quand mon mari était déjà parti pour le Canada en 1967. Laissée seule à me débrouiller, Mouslim dès lors, était devenu mon conseiller à propos de la vente de ma maison et s’échauffait quand mon mari du Canada exigeât que tout se passât plus vite.

Mouslim, en collaboration avec un autre Mauricien, s’occupait des vols affrétés de Londres à Plaisance. Il avait réussi à convaincre quelques amis mauriciens, mon mari et un Anglais que nous connaissions pour cette démarche et les réunions se faisaient dans notre salle de séjour à Londres. Je me souviens avoir assisté à quelques-unes de ces réunions et si je ne me trompe pas, je faisais aussi le procès-verbal!

 

Mouslim, en collaboration avec un autre Mauricien, s’occupait des vols affrétés de Londres à Plaisance.  Il avait réussi à convaincre quelques amis mauriciens, mon mari et un Anglais que nous connaissions pour cette démarche et les réunions se faisaient dans notre salle de séjour à Londres.

 

Partie de l’Île Maurice après mon mariage, en 1957, et n’ayant pas beaucoup de ressources financières, je n’avais aucun moyen d’aller visiter ma famille à Maurice et cela me chagrinait énormément bien que plusieurs membres de ma famille vinssent en vacances chez nous. Dix ans se passèrent et j’avais la nostalgie de revoir mon île et ceux que j’avais quittés depuis si longtemps. Nous avions aussi une petite fille née en 1960. Maintenant que j’allais bientôt rejoindre mon mari au Canada après la vente de ma maison à Londres, je n’avais aucune perspective de revoir mon île, il fallait s’établir au Canada avant de penser aux voyages. D’autre part, toute ma famille de l’Île Maurice allait émigrer en Australie en 1968.

 

 

Deux billets gratuits pour l’Île Maurice

 

Mouslim est arrivé chez moi, un jour, avec deux billets gratuits pour l’Île Maurice : un pour ma petite fille de 7 ans et l’autre pour moi! Quel bonheur! Je ne sais pas exactement ce que je lui ai dit. Il nous fallait partir vite. Le séjour à Maurice était prévu dans trois semaines. Mon premier voyage en avion et quel voyage ce fut!

Notre première escale était en Libye où des soldats libyens braquaient leurs fusils sur les passagers qui descendaient de l’avion pour nous rendre dans un bâtiment qui ressemblait plus à un bar qu’à un aéroport. Tout était recouvert d’une poussière rouge et nous buvions du Coca Cola tiède. La prochaine escale se faisait à Entebbe, là encore cela ressemblait à tout autre chose qu’un aéroport. Je me souviens que ma fille et moi avons pris une douche pour nous laver de cette poussière rouge de la Libye. Tout fut oublié aussitôt rentrées à l’Île Maurice où nous avions passé un merveilleux séjour comme un conte de fées, grâce à la générosité de Mouslim.

Chez nous, au Canada, il était venu d’abord avec Amina qui avait des problèmes de santé. Ensuite, après le décès de celle-ci, il est venu seul nous revoir et nous avons passé d’excellents moments ensemble. En souvenir de lui, il m’avait donné un rosier filant qui donnaient des fleurs extraordinaires. Il ne manquait jamais de nous écrire. Si je me souviens bien, son anniversaire était la même date que celui de mon mari, c’est-à-dire, le 8 novembre. Que tu reposes en paix, Mouslim! 

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Mouslim Mahomed Osman is the son of Mahomed Osman.

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An English version of this tribute is available here: Tribute to Mouslim.

 

Chacha Mouslim: See you in Paradise inshallah!

 By Shafick Osman

(Ontario, Canada)

 

Mouslim Mahomed Osman, England, 1962.
Credit: Amin Osman archives.

   

He probably would have preferred that we write this tribute in English, British as he was, but we feel much more comfortable writing it in (Canadian) French.

He was a key figure in our family, he lived far, far away in London, and when we talked about Chacha Mouslim, there was an element of reverie, because far from the age of the Internet, it was a mystery, something vague when our mother told us about this paternal uncle who quickly became an icon in my memory. The mystery thickened when mother told us, in detail, about Aslam, his eldest son, and Chachi Amina, his wife. But one thing is certain: Chacha Mouslim's family was close to our mum and to my father, and therefore to us! He was our father's elder brother, a bit of a mentor in many ways, and our mother, living in London for a few months with me in 1970, had become close to Chachi Amina. And as Aslam is a year older than us, he was automatically our reference at the time, as I was too young to choose one!

 

Chacha Mouslim was a great organiser and a 'multi-culturalist' too. He had left Mauritius well before independence and had become, in London, an organiser of charter flights from Plaisance. This made him a well-known figure in immigration circles and among Mauritian families who had just arrived in England (...)

 

There is not a person we know who would not describe Chacha Mouslim as a most amusing personality, with an almost permanent air of joviality and as we used to say in Mauritian Creole, enn farser (a joker). He was six years older than our father, but they got on wonderfully. They were really two friends. Even physically they looked alike, but our father was much more of a technocrat than Chacha Mouslim who was more literary than scientific. It was on the advice of Chacha Mouslim that our father decided not to go to Calgary (Canada) but to go to the Toronto area in 1970 because, according to Chacha Mouslim, Calgary was too far north, whereas in Burlington, near Toronto, he knew a Mauritian woman (married to a German) who could accommodate his younger brother. And our father, while having his ticket to Calgary in hand, decided to stay in Burlington. That's how much influence Chacha Mouslim had on him!

 

Tonn swiv li

 

Chacha Mouslim read a lot of the British press and was very interested in international news, and we were once told that we ‘followed’ him in this respect. He had a diametrically opposed opinion to ours on the Palestinian issue and he was also very British in his approach, following closely the debates in the House of Commons in England. And it was he, Chacha Mouslim, who told us that his brother, Sir Abdool Raman Osman, ran a "newspaper" (a magazine or a review, in actual fact) and he ended up saying to us one day, "tonn swiv li" (you "followed" his steps). When he was in Mauritius, Chacha Mouslim took pleasure in reading the local press with the serious tone that we know him for when he browses the newspapers, an attitude that contradicts his everyday jovial and relaxed mood.

Chacha Mouslim was a great organiser and a 'multi-culturalist' too. He had left Mauritius some time before Independence and had become, in London, an organiser of charter flights from Plaisance. This made him a well-known figure in immigration circles and among Mauritian families who had just arrived in England, as he had mastered the whole ‘system’: welfare, nurseries, housing, first jobs, etc. He was in his element in London and was able to make a name for himself. And like an Osman who lived up to his name, he was rigorous and detail-oriented!

About ten years ago, during one of our visits to London, we went to his house and, in a Franco-French reflex, or perhaps as a grandson would have seen his grandfather, we kissed him quite naturally (on his cheeks), and he let out, "premie fwa enn zom anbrass mwa" (this is the first time a man is kissing me!), with a big laugh as usual.

That was Chacha Mouslim! He passed away today, 2 January, at the age of 91, and will remain an icon of the family, my icon. May the God, the Creator, forgive all his sins, may the God protect him in the hereafter, and may the God reunite us in the highest height of Paradise in the next world! Amen!

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Mouslim Mahomed Osman is the son of Mahomed Osman.

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La version française de cet hommage est disponible ici : Chacha Mouslim : à Dieu!

A short memo on Guar (or Cluster Bean)

By Amin Osman

(13 October 2021)

 

Guar (Tamil Nadu, India).
Credit: By த*உழவன் - Own work,
Public Domain,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7924074

 

Guar, cymoposis tetragonoloba, is known as Cluster Bean is well known mainly in North India and Pakistan and grows extensively in the semi arid regions. It is used a vegetable, green manure, etc. and for the production of seeds from which the guar gum is extracted. The plant resembles an upright garden bean but grows upright to some one metre high.

The tender seedpods are used as a vegetable, the mature plants are used as fodder and green manure. The seeds extracted from the dry seedpods industrially are used to extract a well known gum, oil, etc.

The guar gum is used mainly in the following food industries: ice cream,yogurt, salad dressing and also in the pharmaceutical industry and is used to control diarrhea, obesity, cholesterol, etc. The crop cycle varies from 60 to 90 days, the bean is 3 to 10 cm, height of the mature plant is about one metre. It is an annual legume.

These are some notes compiled from the internet after a hint from my youngest daughter who met a British Lord of Pakistani origin, Aamer Sarfraz, at a lunch in London lately in company of her husband and her eldest daughter who is studying at Trinity Hall, Cambridge University (UK). He is a most succesful businessman trading in guar.

Raising the living dead: Ramosmania rodriguesii

By Carlos Magdalena*

(Published in The Journal of Botanic Garden Horticulture, No. 8, pp. 63-73, 2010)

 

Sir Abdool Raman Osman, Au bout du monde, Le Réduit, Mauritius.

This article is about Ramosmania rodriguesii, a species endemic to the Island of Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean which has been named after Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam and Sir Abdool Raman Osman, the first Mauritian Prime Minister and first Mauritian Governor-General respectively. They were also schoolmates at the Royal College of Curepipe (Island of Mauritius) and comrades in England during their university studies a century ago. Sir Abdool Raman was a passionate amateur horticulturist.

Abstract

‘Living dead’ is a term biologists have begun to use to describe those species that are not expected to escape extinction without significant human intervention (janzen, 2001), such as captive breeding or cultivation. While the number of taxa that fall into this category continues to increase, this paper reports on a species that may beat the odds and escape its fate, after decades of cultivation at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. an account of the historical facts that led to the recovery of the species in question, Ramosmania rodriguesii, and the latest update regarding its current situation are provided along with cultivation notes.

 

To read the article (PDF): S i b b a l d i a : 63 The Journal of Botanic Garden Horticulture, No. 8

*Carlos Magdalena is a botanical horticulturist in the living collections at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, Surrey, UK. Email: c.magdalena@kew.org.

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Abdool Raman Osman is the son of Mahomed Osman.

A brief overview of the life of Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab

By Amin Osman

(October 2021, Mauritius)

 

The interior courtyard of the Jummah Masjid, Port Louis, Mauritius
(Picture: Karsten Ratzke via Wikimedia Commons)

Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab was born in Mecca, in today's Saudi Arabia, in 1883. He went to India to study Islam for some years and married a Muslim Indian girl before coming to Mauritius to work as Imam of the Jummah Masjid in 1915 at the age of 32 years. After working for a number of years, he went back to India to seek help for the Muslim community. He was partially successful and in 1924, he returned to Mauritius. He was so concerned about the poor education of the Muslims generally that he left the Jummah Mosque to devote himself totally to improve their education.

The Maulana had two sons: Mohammud Abid and Abdul Hamid. They went to Saudi Arabia later and his nephew Ismail Nawwab came to stay with him to attend college at Port Louis.

Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab founded the Muslim Educational Society in 1924 and opened the Muslim High School. His close collaborators at that time were Abdool Gaffoor Abdool Raman, Goolab Malleck Amode, Dr. Hassenjee Joomye and Osman Aumeeruddy. 

The building housing the Muslim High School was the property of the Surtee Sunnee Musalman Society (SSMS) which kindly put it at the Maulana's disposal by Goolam M .Dawjee Atchia, the then president of the SSMS. The property was located in Port Louis at corner Dauphine Street and Corderie Street. The Maulana was conveniently lodged in a house belonging to the Noordally family which was living next at Dauphine Street, where now stands the Muslim Girls College in a new building.

 

Close to Haroun Nahaboo and Abdoollatif Osman

In 1951, Haroun Nahaboo accompanied Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab to the World Islamic Conference in Karachi, Pakistan. Unfortunately, soon after his return, the Maulana fell ill and peacefully passed away in July, during the month of Ramadan, at the age of 68 years. He was buried at the Riche Terre Muslim Cemetery. He was a respected scholar of Urdu and Arabic languages and he reorganized the teaching of Urdu. He got some students to study Urdu and Islam and they were housed in a Boarding School in the same building of the Muslim High School. That was a successful project.
 

Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab wrote a poem in Urdu sounding the alarm against the spread of Ahmadiyyat and Les croyances obligatoires was translated into French from English by Gaffoor Raman. It is worth mentioning that while he was Imam of the Jummah Mosque, he appeared in the Supreme Court in Frebuary1919 in the case which lasted two years, Hanafi Sunnis v/s Ahmaddiyas, as the main witness and finally, the Sunnis won the case.

On a personal note, I wish to say that he was a friend of my brother Abdoollatif Mahomed Osman and he was present at the funeral of my father, Mahomed Osman, in 1948 at 12 Hyderabad Street, Plaine Verte, Port Louis. I was a friend of Yousouf Noordally who was the Maulana's neighbour and we went to visit him quite often. He had an outstanding personality which I admired.

 

Ismail Nawwab

The Muslim Educational Society which built the new Madrassah near the Citadelle Hill (Port Louis) a few years ago, invited the son of the late Maulana and I had the privilege to meet him at the Inauguration Ceremony. I was in contact,thro' email these last years until his demise with the Maulana's nephew Ismail who had Mohamad Vayid as friend at Edinburgh University.

Ismail Nawwab stayed in Mauritius, after coming from Arabia, until the demise of his uncle. Ismail passed the General Certificate of Education (GCE) A-level and worked at the Islamic College for some time. Then, three benefactors (Abdool Rawoof Joomye, Cajee Mahmood and Hakeem Abdool Razaqque) generously financed his university studies at Edinburgh. Unfortunately, Ismail did not come back to Mauritius after Scotland but went to Malaysia for postgraduate studies. He then went back to Saudi Arabia, got married and begot two daughters: Nimah and Nesreen. I kept contact with his daughter Nimah, a world renown poetess of English language ...

In 1926, Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab set up in Port Louis the Free Tuition Muslim High School catering up to the Seventh Standard. According to Aunuth Beejadhur, with 600 pupils, of whom 200 girls, it was the biggest and most important of the country’s then 60 such private institutions. His closest collaborators included his former students as A. Gaffoor A. Rahman, Goolab Malleck Goolab Ahmad, Tayyab Tegally and Osman Aumeeruddy. “As subsidiary languages, Urdu, Arabic and Persian are taught. The girls, besides embroidery and sewing, are taught English, French and Oriental languages.”

In the early 1900s, Maulana Abdullah Rashid Nawab (1883-1951), of Saudi Arabia, who was the Imam of the Jummah Mosque (1915-1921), promoted Islamic teaching and learning in Mauritius. Versed in religion, Arabic, Urdu and Persian as well as a writer and educationist, who was also hakim (traditional medical doctor), he conceived the Muslim Educational Society (MES) in the 1940s. He is remembered for preparing for the madrassas a curriculum of studies which he left after his death in Mauritius itself.

(Chit Dukhira, Indians in India, Mauritius and South Africa, Osman Publishing, Mauritius, 2013, p. 341, p. 346 )

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Amin Osman is the son of Mahomed Osman.

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My first attempt to propagate the Magnolia Flowering Tree

 By Amin Osman

 

Bees foraging on a magnolia flower on the family's former property in Balfour, Beau Bassin.
Photo (c): Shafick Osman, 29 December 2007.

I had worked at the Barkly Experiment Station of the Ministry of Agriculture in Beau Bassin for a few years, and I never heard of the Magnolia Flowering Tree. My elder brother Sir Raman Osman, a keen amateur horticulturist who had moved from Quatre Bornes to Baie du Tombeau where he had had a bungalow built to spend his retirement as a Senior Puisne Judge of the Supreme Court, challenged me to provide him with a young Magnolia tree in 1970 or so.

He told me that there were two beautiful Magnolia grandiflora trees in the grounds of the Vacoas Headquarters where the former Colonial Secretaries were residing. I visited the gardens and as they were covered with large showy flowers, I decided to have a go. 

 

My elder brother Sir Raman Osman, a keen amateur horticulturist who had moved from Quatre Bornes to Baie du Tombeau where he had had a bungalow built to spend his retirement as a Senior Puisne Judge of the Supreme Court, challenged me to provide him with a young Magnolia tree in 1970 or so.

I consulted the textbooks and after some research in locally published magazines, I read the article written by Sydney Moutia, a qualified Horticulturist, in the then Revue Agricole. There was a girls’ secondary school of the Catholic Diocese at Curepipe Road. It was in an old wooden house and the main alley was planted with Magnolia trees which did not resist a very severe cyclone and all the trees were blown down. Sydney Moutia who was working at Barkly well before me in the 60s was contacted and he succeeded to propagate a dozen saplings using stems of the blown down trees which he placed in the Mist Propagator where they rooted after some weeks and he produced saplings which he gave to the Manager of the school and these were eventually planted to replace the blown down trees.

In the meantime, I collected seeds and air layered (provin) some mature stems just as we were doing for the propagation of litchis. At the same time, I cut a dozen stems and placed in our Mist Propagator at Barkly. Both methods of propagation gave good results and we then started to sell saplings. I bought some saplings and gave Mot (Raman Osman’s nickname in the family) a few. He planted one in his big garden at Baie du Tombeau and donated the others, I remember he gave one to Haroun Fakim, husband of our niece Gori and they planted it in front of their newly built house at Abdoollatiff Osman Avenue, Quatre Bornes.

I planted one in my garden at Volcy de la Faye Street, Beau Bassin, next to the Plaines Wilhems Irrigation Canal, which crossed our property. It is still there and have been flowering regularly since. Everybody coming for the first time was admiring the large white flowers during the flowering season. I am proud of this achievement which reminded both of Mot and the period which I spent at Barkly as a Senior Technical Officer in charge of Plant Propagation.

 

Coromandel (Mauritius),
12 November 2021

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Amin Osman is the son of Mahomed Osman.