Madinah Handwritten Urdu Newspaper Bijnor Subcontinent

The handwritten Urdu newspaper ‘Madinah’, launched in 1912 by Mohammad Majeed Hasan in Bijnor, grew from a local bi-weekly to a major subcontinental voice. Its women’s section, Akhbar-i-Nisvan, highlighted Muslim women’s issues. Embracing qasbah culture, it resisted urban elitism. During WWI, it supported the Khilafat Movement and anti-separatism. Banned in Punjab after covering the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, it relaunched as Yasrab in 1919. Declining readership followed Partition and Hindi imposition. Closing in 1975, its legacy endures as a symbol of Muslim nationalist identity.