Professor Nurul Hasan or Nuru as he was affectionately called by members of the family and those close to him, was not only a profound scholar and a gifted teacher, but a great institution builder. Apart from the Centre for Advanced Study in History at the Aligarh Muslim University, he built many other institutions, such as the Indian Council of Historical Research, the Maualana Abul Kalam Azad Institute of Asian Affairs, the Society for Indian Ocean Studies, etc. He also breathed new life and purpose into many others such as the Victoria Memorial at Calcutta, the Rampur Raza Library where I had the privilege of working as a research scholar in 1945. He had a razor sharp mind, and could analyze with precision any issue – academic, administrative or political. His clarity in expression and articulation of speech were unparalleled. According to Professor S.Z. Qasim, himself an eminent scientist, there was no one better than him "who would collect bits of information from here and there and bring them out in a most articulate form." According to an obituary in the Times of India "though he never wrote a book, his later articles show that he remained to the end a historian of the finest tradition of Ox bridge, firmly grounded in source materials, most of them Persian – rational as well as romantic, skeptical but always sympathetic." Professor Nurul Hasan was extremely generous not only in helping colleagues and researchers but providing them ideas for their own work. He considered this to be more important than working in splendid isolation pursuing his own research. Nevertheless, the total volume of his published work which are expected to be brought together in a volume is impressive.
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