The Intersection of Faith and Country: Islam in India
By
Rosemary Abraham, New Age Islam
31 May 2022
Islam in
South Asia Has Had a Complicated, Colourful, and Oftentimes Tumultuous History
Main
Points:
1. Throughout
the region’s history, the relationship between Islam and Hinduism has been
fraught with strife.
2. Muslim
merchants were permitted to settle down in South India, build mosques, and
marry Indian women.
3. Indians that
converted to Islam were largely peasants from ethnic and religious minorities,
not Hindu elites.
4. Indians of
all faiths coexist with a passion for religious diversity and pride in cultural
and national identity.
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1.0. Introduction
From the
beginning, Islam in South Asia has had a complicated, colourful, and oftentimes
tumultuous history. As of 2010, the subcontinent is home to 507.3
million Muslims, dwarfing
the population of Muslims in other regions (such as the Middle East and
South-East Asia) significantly. This research article will focus upon evolving
perceptions of Islam in India across three eras: early, classical, and
contemporary. In discussing the changing perceptions of Islam (primarily by
Hindus) across these periods, this article will also emphasise the significance
of Islam in Indian history. Muslims comprise the most populous religious
minority in India (14.2% of
the population).
Throughout the region’s history, the relationship between Islam and Hinduism
(the dominant faith in the region) has been fraught with strife. Nowhere is
this more evident than in contemporary India, decades after the partition which
divided the subcontinent into a majority-Muslim north (Pakistan, and later
Bangladesh) and a majority-Hindu – albeit constitutionally secular – south
(India), with tensions rising due to the Islamophobic
policies of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
2.0. Discussion
2.1. Early Islam in India: Arab Merchants and
Northern Invaders
The first
mosques in India were built within the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad, in the
early days of Islam. The oldest functional mosque in India, the Cheraman Juma
Mosque in Kerala, is believed
to have been built in 629 CE – according to legend, the mosque
was constructed at the behest of a Hindu king who witnessed the splitting of
the moon. He asked visiting Arab merchants about the nature of the event and
journeyed to Mecca to meet the Prophet Muhammad and convert to Islam; however,
he died in Oman, before he could make the journey home. Though many
scholars contest the credibility of this oral tradition due
to disagreements about the identity of the king and the time during which he
lived, the Muslims of the region continue to attribute the roots of their faith
to this historic event. One element of the legend which resonates with
historical evidence is the presence of Arab traders on the Malabar coast– whether the legend of the Muslim
convert king was true or not, it is irrefutable that Arab traders who settled
on India’s western coast were significant vehicles of cultural exchange in the
region. They were well-regarded by Indians on the Malabar Coast for their
annual visits during the monsoon, when they would bring dates and
other exotic goods.Later, as Islam spread throughout
the Arab world, Muslim merchants were permitted to settle
down in South India,
build mosques, and marry Indian women.
However, in
the north of the subcontinent, the perception of Muslims shifted dramatically
from merchant to invader in 712 CE, when Sindh (the region for which India came
to be named) was conquered by Muhammad
ibn Qasim, a
military commander from the Umayyad Caliphate. The desire of the caliphate to
expand into India may have been based in hadith, as was referred to in the Book of Jihad. Thawban, the liberated slave of
Muhammad, claimed: "The Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) said: 'there are two groups
of my Ummah whom Allah will free from the Fire: The group that invades India,
and the group that will be with 'Isa bin Maryam, peace be upon him.'"
Hindu resistance to forceful conversion was strong, and in the following
centuries perceptions of Muslims became overwhelmingly negative as rulers such
as Mahmud of
Ghazni (971-1030
CE) expanded their territory – destroying temples, cities, and idols.
Islamophobic arguments made by Hindu nationalists in contemporary India call back to some of these historical
events, citing
them as evidence of the ‘invasive’ nature of Islam in contrast to native
Hinduism.
Though
stories of forced conversion and invasion dominate the cultural consciousness
in recollections of early Islam in India, so too exist positive experiences – a
significant example of this is the intellectual and spiritual dimension of
Hindu-Muslim relations in the early years of Islam. Under the rule of the Abbasid
caliph al-Mansur in the 8th century CE, Sanskrit texts written
by Hindu scholars concerning science, mathematics and astronomy were translated
to Arabic and housed in Baghdad. The translation of Sanskrit texts heralded the
beginning of a mass
migration of scholars from Muslim-ruled regions (Persia, Afghanistan, Western and Central
Asia) to India, among whom were the Sufi mystics who contributed greatly to the
peaceful conversion of many Indians to Islam.
2.2. Classical Islam in India: Caste,
Eclecticism, and Religious Tolerance
One major
motivator for conversion was caste. Social mobility in Hindu societies was
greatly restricted by the caste system, under which many Hindus were considered
Dalits, or Untouchables – shunned by the rest of society, they were allocated the lowliest tasks, such as handling corpses,
butchering animals, and tanning leather. Islam, to many, was an egalitarian
faith which promised the opportunity to escape from the grim reality of the
caste system. Even as many Hindus (oftentimes upper caste) shunned the new
faith, others turned to it for liberation from the system. However, conversion
did not free Muslims from caste-based discrimination; it instead added another dimension to the existing system. As a result,
caste and compulsion (the typical theories put forth in discussions of
conversion to Islam during the classical era) cannot be considered the sole
motivators of conversion.
The theory
of Islam as the “religion of the sword”, as was explored previously, is deeply
flawed – rate of
conversion to Islam in Indiawas far more significant at the outermost regions of Muslim India, where
military influence was weaker (Eastern Bengal and Western Punjab). This
conflicts with the theory that the prospect of death (or the appeal of
political patronage) was the primary motivator for conversion, for the
likelihood of these consequences was greatly diminished given the distance of
these regions from the heart of the empire, Delhi. Moreover, those that
converted were largely peasants
from ethnic and religious minorities, not Hindu elites. These communities, which
were not affected by caste, and who absorbed elements of Islam into their
existing spiritual practices, were drawn to the faith by the teachings of local
saints – Sufi mystics, who made their teachings more accessible to the wider
populace by using
local faiths and traditions.
The
willingness of Sufi saints to adapt themselves to their new environment and
intermingle with people of different backgrounds played a significant role in
encouraging Indians to embrace Islam. Sufis went on to establish Dargahs in
India – these shrines were built in honour of revered figures in the Sufi
community, such as saints or dervishes, and as places they continue to be
respected to the current day not for the people that they commemorate, but the
people that they unite. In India, Dargahs have become unique locations of interfaith connections,
visited during pilgrimages by both Muslims and Hindus. One of the most famous
of these is the Ajmer
Sharif Dargah, where a 13th-century Iranian saint and
philosopher, Moinuddin Chishti, is entombed.
Beyond Sufi
mysticism, there were various other elements of Islam which served to
consolidate its position as a major faith in India during the classical era.
The lengthy reign of the Mughal Empire, the most well-known example of Muslim
rule in India, has long been attributed to a policy of religious tolerance which
enabled Hindus and people of other faiths to participate in the empire on an
equal basis with Muslims. The most famously liberal of these Muslim rulers was
Akbar the Great, who not only expanded the empire as a military commander but
also acted as a patron of the arts and furthered his cause of religious unity
through the propagation of a syncretic religion, Dīn-i-Ilāhī, the “Religion of God”, which merged what he considered to be the ‘best’
elements of Islam, Hinduism, and even Zoroastrianism and Christianity. The
longevity of the Mughal Empire is often attributed to the foundation he
established with his pluralistic policies and his willingness to connect with the
empire’s non-Muslim subjects, similarly to the Sufi saints.
2.3. Islam in Contemporary India: Partition,
Hindutva, and Identity
The most
significant event in modern historical recounts of India is oftentimes not
independence from the British Raj, but Partition – the division of the
subcontinent into a Muslim north and a majority-Hindu (but constitutionally
secular) south. Partition is a source of both trauma and animosity amongst
Indians and Pakistanis, with the experience itself having displaced 14.5 million people within four years. The ensuing violence and chaos
killed between 0.5 and 2
million people, from a
range of backgrounds and identities. The Pew Research Centre found that many
Muslims in India view Partition as being detrimental to their relationships with Hindus,
whereas a similar percentage of Hindus claims the opposite. This religious
divide in perceptions of the past is a significant element that influences
attitudes towards Islam in India.
The lines
between religious and national tensions have blurred in the years following
independence, particularly as the BJP (a right-wing political party centred
around Hindutva ideology) ascended to power in India’s central government.
Politicians from the BJP are known to appeal to a sense of Hindu nationalism by
characterising Pakistanis
and Bangladeshis as terrorists and Indian
Muslims as inherently anti-Indian and prone to radicalisation. The Hindutva political ideology
espouses a united identity – a singular cultural, religious, and national
identity – to which ‘true’ Indians adhere. This ideology necessitates the
imagining of an ‘Other’, an antithesis to the ‘true Indian’.
In most
cases this other is an ‘Islamic invader’, as characterised by many proponents
of the Hindutva ideology. Oftentimes this image of Islam as an invading, alien
faith is perpetuated by right-wing Indian media – the public outcry over the
Hindutva conspiracy of ‘love jihad’ is
just one example amongst many in modern India, further entrenched by the
Islamophobic actions and policies of the dominant BJP. This is a fear commonly
used to justify extra-legal acts of violence and aggression towards Muslims,
and to enact controlling policies which deliberately target Muslim communities
– take, for instance, banning of
hijab in Karnataka colleges, or the exclusion of Muslims from the
Citizenship Amendment Act 2019.The latter incited significant
protests amongst Indians (primarily Muslim), who feared that they would be stripped
of their citizenship and disenfranchised – resulting in violent backlash from
the government and right-wing nationalists. The political unrest in the wake of
the Act created an environment especially hostile to Muslims, and many BJP
leaders spoke out
against the protesters; decrying them as “Pakistani
hooligans” and, in one instance, leading a chant urging people to “shoot the
traitors”.
Fear of the
religious ‘other’ and the conflation of religious identity with national
identity are two major factors in negative impressions of Muslims in India, as
has been explored so far. Such sentiments are deeply entrenched in Indian
society, and impact even elements as mundane as peoples’ preferences for
neighbours (36% of
Hindus would not be willing to accept a Muslim as a neighbour).
However, as with any other era in history, there exist several sides to
perceptions of Muslims in modern India.
There
appears to be a unique intermingling in modern Indian society, where a desire
for religious segregation (expressed amongst Indians of all faiths) coexists
with a passion for religious diversity and pride in cultural and national
identity. Take, for instance, the Hindu and Sikh inhabitants of
Massanian, who continue to maintain the mosque and
graveyard left behind by fleeing Muslims during Partition, and the shared
cultural practices and beliefs of Indians across faith (77% of
Muslims in India believe in karma, and 7% of Hindus celebrate Eid). These examples simultaneously consolidate and
defy the predominant ideals of religious tolerance and segregation.
3.0. Conclusion
It is
beyond evident that the interaction of place, time, and faith has had a
significant influence on the rise and spread of Islam in India. The identities
and experiences of Indian Muslims are multi-dimensional, with a long history of
conflict and connection with the hegemonic faith in the region, Hinduism. Where
a desire for religious segregation exists, it is often mutual – and yet, those
who strive to achieve this vision simultaneously devote themselves to the
ideals of religious pluralism and freedom that were expressed by Akbar the
Great centuries ago. Though there are many who consider ‘Indian’ and ‘Muslim’
to be mutually exclusive identities, history suggests that the two are deeply
intertwined.
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Rosemary
Abraham is an Education student currently aspiring to teach English and History
to secondary school students. She is especially passionate about the potential
of education to bridge divides and empower students of diverse backgrounds and
identities.
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-politics/intersection-faith-country-india/d/127140
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