Throughout his life, Zardabi fought for the enlightenment of
Muslims in the
Caucasus. Zardabi was a proponent of
secularism and education among Muslim population in the
South Caucasus. Initially, he supported the
Russian rule but later re-evaluated his estimation of Russia and the benefits of imperial rule. The emerging Azerbaijani
intelligentsia regarded Russia as a channel to the
European
Enlightenment, criticized Islamic practices, and promoted the use of Azerbaijani as a vehicle of local cultural expression. In their struggle for change and transformation, as
Audrey Altstadt explains, the Azerbaijani intelligentsia grew to understand that it need not, indeed could not, reject its own cultural heritage. Zardabi came to such a conclusion as a result of his long years in exile in the small village of Zardab. In 1873 Zardabi with another intelligentsia activist
Najaf bey Vazirov staged the first Azerbaijani theatrical production based on the play by
Mirza Fatali Akhundov,
The Adventure of a Miser. According to Zardabi, theatre was not merely a form of entertainment but a powerful educational tool used to improve public morality, criticize ignorance, and convey social lessons. By collaborating with young intellectuals such as
Najaf Bey Vezirov, he contributed to the staging of European-style plays. Naming itself as Akinchi (ploughman), this paper addressed itself primarily to the peasant reader in accordance with Zardabi's
Narodnik(Populist) ideas, that was dominant in universities of Russia in that era .The preferred language of expression among literate people was
Persian and they reacted with hostility to using "unprintable idiom of common folk" (
Azeri). The circle of its contributors consisted mainly of
Sunnis like Zardabi, whose innuendos that Persia was a backward and inhuman country provoked widespread indignation. This newspaper was shut down several times by the Russian authorities as "harmful and politically unreliable". "In Azerbaijan in the fall of 1877 the police were busy arresting a large number of educated "
Tatars" (Russian administration referred to Azeris as "Tatars") for such activities as forming circles and distributing anti-government propaganda." During the 1877–1878 Ottoman–Russian War, the Russian authorities accused Zardabi of supporting the Ottoman side, which played a role in the closure of the newspaper. After the closure of
Akinchi in 1877 Zardabi was exiled to his native village. Zardabi argued that traditional
mekteb and
madrasa institutions had become outdated and supported educational modernization through the Usul-i
Jadid movement. He considered learning Russian essential for
Muslims to access modern professions, while emphasizing that this should not serve policies of “
Russification.” In 1887, together with H. Mahmudbeyov, he established the first
Russian Azerbaijani school in
Baku, a model later adopted in cities such as
Ganja,
Shusha, and
Nakhchivan. He also advocated for the education of
Muslim girls and collaborated with philanthropists such as
H.Z. Taghiyev to promote this cause. Zardabi served as a member of the Baku City Duma, where he promoted public rights and contributed to projects for the city’s social and cultural development. He also participated, together with
H.Z. Taghiyev and
M. Mukhtarov, in the establishment and administration of educational and charitable societies, including
Nashri-Maarif. In 1905, however, he resumed his cultural activities by becoming a reporter for the progressive
Hayat newspaper. In his articles, he called upon cultural unification of
Muslims in
Russia and the establishment of a unified
Turkic language that will ensure progress and social development by helping
Muslims move away from the tradition of writing in
Persian and
Arabic which, in Zardabi's view, were used by the power-hungry
Muslim clergy to spread
reactionism and
conservatism. ==References==