Ink beyond scripture: The revival of Arabic calligraphy in South India

Achyut Palav, 66, the Mumbai-based Marathi master calligrapher who was honoured with the Padma Shri in 2025, recalls the day when his Class VIII teacher assigned him the task of writing ‘Thought for the day’ on the blackboard. Little did he know that it would lead him to a career in typography and letters.

Palav is credited with the creation of ‘Mukta Lipi’, an amalgamation of Modi and Devanagari scripts. His ‘Calligraphy Roadways’ project in 2024 introduced young students from more than 20 Indian colleges, such as National Institute of Design and Indian Institutes of Technology, to calligraphy as an art form. “Calligraphy teaches patience and concentration. One has to be very aware of one’s stance and space when writing. And the beauty of calligraphy is that it makes even a simple word or phrase look like a masterpiece,” says the founder of Navi Mumbai’s Achyut Palav School of Calligraphy.

Padma Shri Achyut Palav with his artwork, a combination of Om and Shri Ganesha using Arabic calligraphy.
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

Mumbai-based Marathi master calligrapher Achyut Palav’s artworks.
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Special Arrangement

The good old days

Said to have been seen in ancient scripts such as Brahmi and Kharosthi, Indian calligraphy today encompasses the vast linguistic heritage of the nation. Regional scripts like Bengali, Tamil and Telugu used calligraphy from 6th-16th centuries, while from the 8th-12th centuries, Arabic and Persian calligraphy blended with Indian styles to create a vast ocean of literary and artistic works.

There was a time when India’s popular culture and artistic sensibilities were shaped by multilingual calligraphy — for instance, in Urdu, which adapted from the Arabic script. Indian film posters (Alam Ara, 1931; Mughal-e-Azam, 1960; Pakeezah, 1972), wedding cards, shop hoardings and even legal documents were handwritten/hand-painted in Urdu, as were a number of magazines (Shama; Din Dunia) and newspapers (The Musalman) that set the foundation of a booming publishing industry. Until 2020, The Musalman, published from Chennai, was known to be among the few handwritten publications in India. “We went for online production since the pandemic, and now print 15,000 copies every day. Our readers are spread across the nation,” says editor Syed Arifullah.

Urdu and Arabic calligraphy used in secular publications were quite distinct from the embellished Islamic calligraphy found in religious texts like the Quran. From the 16th century, it became a practice to assemble albums of Arabic calligraphy, and India is among the countries that have museums with sizeable collections of these rare documents. The Raza Library in the erstwhile princely state of Rampur in Uttar Pradesh, for instance, has over 5,000 manuscripts in its collection, including rare specimens of calligraphy by masters from India and Iran, , and a 7th-century AD Quran written on parchment in early Kufic script attributed to Hazrat Ali, the nephew and son-in-law of Prophet Muhammad is among its prized exhibits..

In 2025, Kerala’s Narayana Bhattathiri, founder of KaChaTaThaPa Foundation, became the first Indian to be appointed honorary director of the World Calligraphy Association.
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Special arrangement, Roshni R.K., Nirmal Harindran / The Hindu

The once-ubiquitous calligraphy became outmoded with the advent of digitalisation and desktop publishing in the early 1990s in India. Recent years, however, have seen a renewed interest as artists are being drawn to Arabic calligraphy’s retro appeal, beyond its assimilation in regional-language scripts (Arabi-Malayalam, Arwi) and religious texts (the Quran). Its cultural resurgence in South India is being steered by a small group of artist- revivalists. If Doha-based Malayali artist-designer Abdul Kareem creates calligraffiti (graffiti with Arabic calligraphy), at a South Korean exhibition last year, Malayali calligrapher Narayana Bhattathiri, the KaChaTaThaPa Foundation, became the first Indian to be appointed the World Calligraphy Association’s honorary director. The recently formed Tamil Nadu Arabic Calligraphy (TNAC) Hub groups more than 100 young people who are engaged in the art.

Space to learn and grow

At Tiruchi’s Jamal Mohamed College, heads are bowed in concentration as a group of women students of the Urdu department practise the art of khat (Arabic calligraphy). TNAC Hub founder Aashifa Banu shows them how to write the first Arabic letter alif using the qalam (bamboo pen). “Since TNAC began, over 120 women and 80 men have joined our platform,” says Banu, who runs a calligraphy-based craft business in Pollachi and conducts online classes.

Aashifa Banu, founder of Tamil Nadu Arabic Calligraphy (TNAC) Hub, at Jamal Mohamed College in Tiruchi.
| Photo Credit:
 R. Vengadesh / THE HINDU

Social media has fuelled “a growing interest in calligraphy among young people”, says Coimbatore-based writer, translator and calligrapher Faiz Qadiri, who is mentoring the TNAC Hub team. He adds that irrespective of students’ interest, because of the Indian marks-oriented education system, not many Tamil Nadu schools or parents want it to be taught as an additional subject. “I always advise my students to learn both streams: study the six Arabic classical fonts naskh, thuluth, muhaqqaq, rayhani, tawqi, and riqaa; and the other is calligraphy as a freehand art,” Qadiri adds.

Faiz Qadiri, Coimbatore-based writer, translator, calligrapher and TNAC Hub mentor.
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Special Arrangement

Kochi-resident Jasila Jafar specialises in the classical thuluth and naskh scripts.
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Special Arrangement

Kochi-resident Jasila Jafar specialises in the classical thuluth and naskh scripts, is learning diwani and riqaa scripts and has learnt the Tezhip Islamic illumination art. She says, “Islamic calligraphy has evolved continuously over centuries, and women have always been part of its development — even if their contributions were not always fully documented.” Jafar runs the Nisa ul Khatt project, an online community dedicated to women calligraphers, which has more than 100 members from India and abroad. “We want to spread awareness about Arabic calligraphy, its artistic depth, historical roots, and spiritual significance — while creating a supportive space for women to learn and grow together,” she says.

Into the fold

For over 30 years, Hyderabad-based Anil Kumar Chawhan, 56, has painted Quranic verses on the walls of around 200 mosques and dargahs in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra. “I began painting Urdu signboards in Hyderabad, even though I didn’t know the language. People would write it out for me on paper, and I’d just replicate the letters on the boards. Gradually, I became interested in Urdu and Arabic calligraphy, and began to understand what I was painting. I also started dabbling in Urdu poetry after learning calligraphy,” he says.

Hyderabad’s non-Muslim artist Anil Kumar Chawhan paints Quranic verses in Islamic and Arabic calligraphy on shrines.
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Nagara Gopal/The Hindu

Hyderabad artist Anil Kumar Chawhan performing wudu ablutions.
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Nagara Gopal/The Hindu

Hyderabad artist Anil Kumar Chawhan at his calligraphy shop in Old City.
| Photo Credit:
Nagara Gopal/The Hindu

As he reads out the verses he painted on the walls of the historic Shahamat Jung mosque, Chawhan says his journey as a non-Muslim artist commissioned to work in Islamic buildings wasn’t an easy one. A decree by Hyderabad’s Jamia Nizamia university allowed him to work so long as he respects the shrines’ sanctity and keeps himself clean by performing the wudu ablutions. Assisted by his younger brother, Chawhan travels to calligraphy assignments around India, and wants “to traverse the world with this skill that has given me so much”, he says.

Members of the Tamil Nadu Arabic Calligraphy (TNAC) Hub display their work at Jamal Mohamed College in Tiruchi.
| Photo Credit:
 R. Vengadesh / THE HINDU

Meanwhile, Tiruchi’s Jamal Mohamed College’s Computerised Calligraphy Training Centre is teaching students multilingual desktop publishing. It is one of four centres in Tamil Nadu offering certificate courses in Arabic and Urdu digital typing, skills that will help promote calligraphy to Gen Next.

Published – March 13, 2026 03:26 pm IST