The Life and Work of Ömer Faik Numanzade ın the Soviet Era

The life and work of Ömer Faik Numanzade in the Soviet era (1922-1937)[1]

Dr. Ridvan Chitilov[2]

The fate of man in critical times is one of the fundamental problems of world historiography. Why does he make this or that choice in an extreme situation? What are his motives? What factors influence it? In my report, I will try to characterize one of the representatives of the intellectual elite of the Caucasus in the late 19th century – early 20th century – Ömer Faik Numanzade.

He was born in 1872 in Azgur village of Ahıska district. He completed his primary education in the madrasah in his village. His father wanted to send him to the Gori Seminary, but his mother sent Ömer to study in Istanbul. After returning to his hometown, Ömer worked as a teacher in various schools between 1894-1902. He worked also as a correspondent for the Terdjiman (Translator) newspaper which in Bakhchisaray. In 1903 he came to Tbilisi. Here he started to write in Şark-i Rus (Russian East) newspaper between 1903-1905, which was the first political and social daily in the Caucasus in Turkic.

In this newspaper, he made a very important statement in a couplet in an article entitled “We too will work according to the time”:

“Millet! Yeter bu sabır, bu cevr ü tahammülat
Hiç olmasın cehalete bağlı olan hayat.”

(People! Enough of this patience, this attitude, and endurance. No life depends on ignorance.)

In the article “The Oppressed is the Greatest Cruel” in the Irshad newspaper in 1906 he says that “Enough is so patience, enough is so insulting! It’s time for us all to unite and demand.” Of course, he was a revolutionary-minded person, who fought against Russian power in the Caucasus.

Numanzade founded and co-directed the journal Molla Nasreddin (1906), which has a unique place in the intellectual and artistic life of the Caucasus. His articles were published in many newspapers. As a journalist, he gained the appreciation of the people with his writings revealing the national colonial policy of tsarism and his liberal thoughts and behaviours.

In 1918, he came to Istanbul as the Ahıska representative and met with the politicians of the Ottoman Empire. In fact, he wanted the annexation of Ahıska to the Ottoman Empire. He also wanted Azerbaijan to gain independence. He received a positive response from the Ottoman state officials. In 1918, Ahıska was transferred to Ottoman control. He was elected as the head of the Ahıska Government Consensus. However, Georgians occupied Ahıska with the withdrawal of the Ottomans from the region according to the Armistice of Mudros. Ömer requested the autonomy of Ahıska from the Georgian administration. He was arrested at this time. However, Ömer was released when the public opposed it.

He took administrative duties in 1919 in the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic and served as a Property Inspector. After the Bolsheviks occupied the region, he became a member of the Georgian Revolutionary Committee in 1921. Ahıska, Adjara and Borchali were assigned to him. The Muslim population lived in these regions densely. The Georgian Revolutionary Committee established the Muslim Affairs Council for Muslims under the administration of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic on August 1, 1921, and appointed Omar to head it. Omar visited the regions where Muslims lived and worked for the establishment of a socialist society in the region. During these trips, he prepared extensive reports on the situation of the Muslim people and presented them to Maharadze, the head of the Georgian Revolutionary Committee. In 1922, he was dismissed from this duty on the pretext of being old and sick. Later, he was appointed to the management of the Yeni Fikir (New Idea) newspaper published in Tbilisi.

He went to Azerbaijan in 1923 and worked as a literature teacher at the Teachers School in Ganja until 1927 and as the director of the Technical Agricultural School and retired from there. In 1924, he worked in the Administration of the Azerbaijan People’s Commissariat of Education in Baku. He helped to organize the curriculum of the schools according to the new system. He worked at the Azerbaijan Printing House between 1926 and 1927, and in 1927 he prepared a book called The Third Year for schools. After retiring in 1927 due to health problems, he stayed away from printing and writing.

The situation in the South Caucasus was very dangerous for the Soviet government. In April 1929, the Muslim inhabitants of mountainous Adjara raised an armed uprising against forced collectivization and religious persecution. Soviet troops were called in and the uprising was quickly put down. Thousands of Adjarians were deported from the republic.

Undoubtedly, this event affected the fate of Numanzade. After all, he was directly related to the policy that the Bolsheviks pursued against the Muslims of Georgia. It must be assumed that the Chekists began to suspect him in connection with the rebels.

He was arrested in Baku in 1933 and was imprisoned for one and a half months. He spent the last years of his life in his hometown, Ahıska. Meanwhile, he wrote his Memoirs. He was arrested and shouted in 1937. That’s why his memories are uncompleted.

On 16 July 1937, by the order of the Ahıska District Prosecutor Odabashiyan, the Head of the District Militia Branch Vaso Inasaridze, arrested and accused Omar Faik of being the head of the “Nationalist counter-revolution organization” established against the Soviets. The public officials who tried Omar were former Menshevik members, whom Numanzade mentioned in his reports when he was a member of the Georgia Revolution Committee in 1921-22 and complained to the central government about their unlawfulness. Most of these people who were imprisoned were those who were against the Bolsheviks in the first years of the establishment of the Soviet Union in Georgia and prevented the establishment of the new regime in the region. One of them was Kabulov, instead of Insiradze, in the Ahıska Militia Branch.

The investigation of Numanzade ended on October 7, 1937, and the murder of six people, including Numanzade, was decided by the decision of the Georgia SSB Internal Affairs Commissioner on October 19, 1937. Ömer was shot dead in Tbilisi in October.

In the document given to Numanzade’s family by the Georgian SSR Ahıska Citizenship Transactions Registry, after the Georgian SSR Supreme Court’s extradition decision on Ömer Faik Numanzade on April 10, 1958, it is written that he died in prison in 1941 due to heart disease. However, it should be noted that this document does not reflect the truth.

Thus, Numanzade’s work, in my opinion, is extremely relevant for the modern Caucasus, especially for Azerbaijan and Georgia. His works reliably reflect what the situation of citizens of Muslim origin was under the autocracy and the prevailing conservative ideology and great-power psychology. Therefore, the change of order in the former Russian Empire in 1917 was perceived among Caucasian Muslims with great joy. Their various representatives, including Numanzade, led the struggle for the self-determination of their people. Having come to power, the Bolsheviks, recognizing Muslims as allies in the fight against the “imperialist bourgeoisie”, were ready to make temporary concessions, and began to use educated representatives of non-Russian peoples for their own purposes, including propaganda. Numanzade was a well-educated, popular, and well-known publicist, journalist, writer, and politician among the Muslim population of the Caucasus, who was well aware of the problems, and moods of the local peoples and their dreams. Numanzade, proceeding from his own motives, took part in the Bolshevik movement in the Caucasus, in the Soviet propaganda, which the Bolsheviks deployed here in their own interests. However, he soon saw in practice the real national and religious policy of the Bolsheviks, who did not really consider the interests of the peoples of the Caucasus. He ceased to cooperate with the Soviet authorities, so as not to be a tool in their hands, so as not to participate in their propaganda. Despite the obvious pathos rhetoric, which reliably conveys the flavour of those times, various archival documents express his personal attitude to the time he experienced and is experiencing, showing that he, as a writer and journalist, did not begin to adapt to new socio-political conditions. Of course, as an artist, Numanzade subtly captured the questions that arose in the Caucasian society, which was under the Bolsheviks, he understood that his people were waiting for any answers from him, especially representatives of the younger generation. But he stopped writing for Soviet newspapers and magazines, retired, and began to write memoirs, which means his internal protest against the Bolshevik policy that was pursued in the Caucasus.

During the Soviet era, many intellectuals and notables of the people were either exiled or killed for fabricated crimes. And among them was Numanzade. Many facts from his Soviet biography are still unknown, it is necessary to continue the search for reliable data, to continue the analysis of his activities. In conclusion, we can say that Ömer Faik Numanzade worked for the benefit of the people even in Soviet era.

References:

Akpınar, Y. (2023). Ömer Faik Numanzade – Kafkasya Türklüğünden Azerbaycan Türklüğüne. Çapar dergisi, Özel Ömer Faik Numanzade sayısı.

Akpınar, Y. (2017). İsmail Gaspıralı, Seçilmiş Eserleri: 1-4. Ötüken Yayınevi.

Akpınar, Y. (1994). Azerî Edebiyatı Araştırmaları. Dergâh Yayınları.

Çitil, R. (2012-2023). Ahıskalı Ömer Faik Numanzade’nin Matbuat Hayatı I-XXX. Bizim Ahıska dergisi ve Eğitişim dergisi, Çapar dergisi.

Devellioğlu, F. (1978). Osmanlıca-Türkçe Ansiklopedik Lügat. Doğuş Ltd. Şti. Matbaası.

Гурбанов, Ш. (1992). Ɵмер Фаиг Не‘манзадə. Сечилмиш əсəрлери. Jазычы.

Sami, Ş. (2006) Kâmûs-ı Türkî. Çağrı Yayınları.

www.bizimahiska.org Bizim Ahıska dergisi, Sayılar: 31-55.

Eğitişim Dergisi, Sayılar: 68-70, 78.

_____

[1] Bu çalışma, Varşova Üniversitesi Doğu Avrupa Çalışmaları Merkezi ve “Nowy Prometheusz” dergisi tarafından 26-27 Ekim 2022 tarihlerinde düzenlenen “İmparatorluktan Ulus Devletlere – Sovyet Sosyalist Cumhuriyetler Birliği ve Ulus İnşası Süreçleri” başlıklı 18. Uluslararası Promethean Konferansında sunulan bildiri metninin gözden geçirilmiş halidir. (This work is a revised version of the text which was presented at the 18th International Promethean Conference titled “From empire towards nation states – the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the processes of nation-building”, organized by the Centre for East European Studies of the University of Warsaw and the journal “Nowy Prometheusz” on October 26-27, 2022.)

[2] Dr. Araştırmacı, yazar. ridvanchitil@gmail.com