The Kabikaj Foundation

The Kabikaj Foundation is dedicated to the preservation and promotion of rare books and manuscripts of literary, cultural, historical, academic, religious, and traditional significance.

What began in 2019 as a personal initiative by the founder to preserve his family’s collections — particularly the works and collections of Hazrat Riasat Ali Taaj (1930-1999) — took formal shape as The Kabikaj Foundation.

The foundation takes its name from the traditional practice of inscribing “Ya Kabikaj” (یا کبیکج) on the opening and closing folios of manuscripts as a talismanic invocation for protection. In the same spirit, our mission is to safeguard not only the physical materiality of these invaluable works, but also their intellectual and cultural content—from deterioration, neglect, and loss.

Our efforts span physical, digital, and intellectual preservation methods. By assisting and collaborating with researchers, scholars, institutes, organisations and enthusiasts — whether for academic purposes, personal interests or public engagement — we strive to preserve not just the books themselves, but also the knowledge, traditions, and histories they embody.

We are humbled to introduce our growing collection of over a 1000 works – ranging from handwritten folios to printed volumes, spanning the 19th to the 21st centuries, and reflecting a rich diversity of themes, languages, and formats. It includes Dakhni Urdu and Persian poetry, treatises on Islamic sciences and history, as well as folklore, lexicons, dictionaries, textbooks, manuals, and catalogues.

Our collection is also the foundation of an ongoing initiative called Dakhni-pedia — an evolving repository of Dakhni literature. We regularly collaborate with independent scholars and researchers, as well as organisations such as The Deccan Archives Foundation and Dar-al-Isnad. These collaborations often take the form of various projects of preservations, translations, research, training (specially interns and student volunteers) and programs (academic as well as public engagement). We also organise workshops, lectures, and exhibitions centred on themes related to our mission — most usually, Urdu and Dakhni literature. These events explore the literary and historical contexts of these languages, as well as studying prosody and poetics of these literature.

We are formally registered as Anjuman Kabikaj & Associates under Registration No. 219 of 2025. Our work is sustained through personal contributions, sales, and donations from well-wishers. You can support our mission by purchasing our merchandise—including posters, postcards, notebooks, and other collectibles—all of which directly fund our preservation efforts.
We invite you to join us in safeguarding these cultural treasures—whether by supporting our work, collaborating on research, or simply spreading the word. Together, we can ensure that this rich and diverse heritage remains accessible for generations to come.

Email us at kabikajfoundation@gmail.com or connect us via instagram @kabikaj55