Nawab Mohsin-ul-Mulk

Nawab Mohsin-ul-Mulk, born Syed Mir Mehdi Ali (9 December 1837 – 16 October 1907), was an Indian Muslim politician, the closest associate and successor of Syed Ahmad Khan in the Aligarh Movement, and a founder of the All India Muslim League in 1906. He served the state of Hyderabad for two decades, where the Nizam gave him the titles Munir Nawaz Jang (1884) and Nawab Mohsin-ul-Mulk (1887). Born into a Shia family, he accepted the Sunni creed and defended it in his book Ayat-i Bayanat. ^{1 2}

Syed Mir Mehdi Ali was born on 9 December 1837 at Etawah in the North-Western Provinces, the son of Syed Mir Zaamin Ali, of a branch of the Sadaat-e-Bara. He received a thorough basic education in Persian and Arabic in and around Etawah. In 1867 he sat for the Provincial Civil Service examination and topped the list of successful candidates; he was appointed Deputy Collector, with his first posting in Mirzapur district. In 1874 he entered the service of the Nizam of Hyderabad, where he served for nearly twenty years and received his titles. ^{1 3}

He met Syed Ahmad Khan while serving as a tehsildar at Etawah, and became his lifelong companion and one of the strongest supporters of his mission. He was a member of the Scientific Society from its inception in 1864, wrote in Tahzeebul Akhlaq in support of Syed's ideas, and collected donations for the Committee of the Supporters of the Advancement of Muslim Education. Retiring from Hyderabad service in 1893, he settled at Aligarh; after Syed Ahmad Khan's death in 1898 he became secretary of the MAO College management and, in 1899, Secretary of the Muhammadan Educational Conference, holding both until his death. He worked to bring religious and oriental scholars onto the college's platform alongside modern scientific education, appointing a committee under Maulana Habibur Rahman Khan Sherwani to improve its religious studies courses. ¹

In 1906 he was among the founders of the All India Muslim League, launched at the Dacca meeting of the Muhammadan Educational Conference; the correspondence preceding the Simla Deputation of 1 October 1906 was addressed to him. ^{1 4}

Mohsin-ul-Mulk was born a Shia. The English article states that he "converted to Sunnism despite being born a Shia and authored the book Ayat-i Bayanat in which he showed why the Sunni faith was preferable". Independently, Maulana Abu al-Hasan Ali Nadwi's published opinion on the book and its author states that "owing to his extensive study, sound nature and deep contemplation he accepted the creed of the Ahlus Sunnah", and calls the book a tour de force in its field, written from the author's own eyewitness observations. On the basis of these two texts the museum records his affiliation as Sunni; no source read names a legal school for him, so no school is recorded. ^{1 2}

He died on 16 October 1907, still secretary of the college and the Conference. In that same year Nawab Viqar-ul-Mulk was appointed honorary secretary of the MAO College. ^{1 5 6}

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