Under the British educational system, Urdu spread across the entire country under the shadow of Arabic and Persian. The structural energies of Urdu literature began to awaken and strengthen the justification for an independent department. This baseline initiated from the University of Allahabad, and gradually, it became a common trend. The expanding Urdu educational movement pushed Persian back; wherever departmental faculties held a unified character regarding their teachers, the roots of Urdu flourished and overtook Persian, transforming the joint Persian-Urdu departments into pure Urdu departments. Under this very trend, a distinct Department of Urdu was established at our college in place of the joint Persian-Urdu framework. This historic milestone was achieved between the sixth and seventh decades of the twentieth century.

The profound spell and magic of Urdu literature over the literary society of Agra and the college environment can be deeply estimated from the fact that renowned literary icons, poets, and critics like Aal-e-Ahmad Suroor and Asrar-ul-Haq Majaz—despite being students of science in our college—emerged as the most brilliant and shining stars of Urdu literature. Our institutional roster does not end here; rather, this long list extends proudly to reach figures like Moin  Ahsan Jazbi, Saba Akbarabadi, Saqib Lakhnavi, Allama Rabbani Taban, Munshi Sheikh Hashmatullah, and Mushtaq Ahmed Yousufi. This historical lineage continues unbroken to this day. For the students interested in Urdu literature, a magazine named ‘Shafaq’ was also being published.

The college…Along with the structural progress of the college, Urdu education advanced and expanded its footsteps from a school desk up into the high-level domain of intensive research. After establishing its roots in the college, a joint Persian and Urdu department emerged as a visible entity.

Among the teachers of the college, the name of Professor Abid Hasan Faridi holds immense importance. Your ancestral lineage connected back to a highly respected, noble, and scholarly Sufi family of Moradabad. He rendered his dedicated services between the second decade and the fourth decade of the twentieth century. For the academic ease of the students, he also composed a highly specialized volume titled “An Outline History of Persian,” which was immensely praised across both scholarly and literary circles. Through the facilitation of his elder brother, Professor Hamid Hasan Qadri joined the combined Urdu and Persian faculty in 1925. Professor Qadri rendered his profound professional services to the Urdu-Persian wings until 1953. His scholarly output and services are spread across nearly fifty independent books, but his most critical and historic volume, “Dastan-e-Tareekh-e-Urdu,” was composed and structured directly amidst the scholarly atmosphere of St. John’s College.

The final teacher of the shared branches of Persian and Urdu was Professor Mughis-ud-Din. He remained with the college until 1962, after which he relocated to Delhi following his appointment at Delhi University. Following the departure of Professor Mughis-ud-Din, and due to the declining influence and presence of Persian studies, the joint department of the college transitioned into a specialized, pure Department of Urdu.

From time to time, the college continued to receive highly qualified and eminent scholars. Among them, the distinguished names of Professor Ali Ahmad Fatimi, former Head of the Department of Urdu, Allahabad University; Professor Muhammad Amin, former Head of the Department of Urdu, Aligarh Muslim University; and Professor Syed Shafiq Ahmad Ashrafi, former Head of the Department of Urdu, Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti Language University, Lucknow, are prominently included. Through the presence of these respected figures, the department’s status became highly elevated and filled with academic prestige, and following their departure, a vacuum was created which remained unfilled for a considerable period. Professor Shafiq Ahmad Ashrafi assumed the mantle of departmental leadership at KMC Language University in 2013, but his vacant seat at St. John’s College was eventually and formally filled in the year 2025. Another feather in the cap of Professor Shafiq Ahmad Ashrafi is that it was through his untiring efforts that M.A. Urdu was initiated at the college. Today, this department is moving steadily forward with modern educational methodologies while maintaining its glorious scholarly tradition.