Art and Culture with Devdutt Pattanaik | Five ways Islam entered India

The political answer is violence and invasion. But the academic answer is not so singular. There was the mercantile route, the military route, the missionary route, the lesser known agricultural route, and the immigrant route.

Early footprints of Islam in India

Cheraman Juma Mosque of Kerala, Palaiya Jumma Palli of Tamil Nadu, and Barwada Mosque in Ghogha of Gujarat (whose Qibla faces Jerusalem) are all dated to the 7th century. These were built by sailors and merchants from Arabia, with the support of local Hindu kings. Naturally, these were the first people to bring Islamic lore to Indian shores.

A 13th century Persian text tells the story of the Arab invasions of Sindh in the 7th and 8th centuries to places like Thana, near Mumbai, to conquer the land. However, they were successfully repelled by then kings, such as the Pratiharas. Islam clearly spread through merchant routes but it also reached the subcontinent via military expeditions in the 7th century, arriving in the Sindh regions.

Around the 10th century, raiders from Central Asia, such as Mahmud of Ghazni, crossed the Hindu Kush mountains and raided North Indian temples for their wealth. From the 12th century onwards, they began establishing settler colonies, extracting India’s vast agrarian resources. These invaders were not Arabs; these were Turks from Central Asia. From the 15th century, the Turks and Afghans were overshadowed by the Mughals.

Sultans and Sufis

These sultans introduced a new Persian court culture to India and replaced the older Sanskritic traditions. Their warhorses made them a formidable military force. This is why in Rajasthan one finds many horse-riding folk gods known as ‘pir’ and ‘vir’ worshipped by both Hindus and Muslims. 

In South Indian temples, Muslim horse-riding warriors like Vavar and Ravuttan are depicted guarding Hindu gods and goddesses, reflecting the syncretism of the time. Vishnu temples of the South like Srirangam refer to Bibi-Nachiyar, the Muslim princess and devotee who became the wife of the deity. This indicates intermingling of cultures. 

From the 12th century onwards, Sufis entered India. These were Islamic mystics from Central Asia, who became popular especially following the Mongol invasion which destroyed the old Arabic empire. These holy men travelled to every corner of India, along trade routes. Some were soldiers or ghazis. Others were preachers, who offered emotional comfort, legal services, knowledge of medicine and agriculture, and so became popular wherever they settled down. 

When they died their ‘dargahs’ or mausoleums became spiritual centres visited by people of the neighbourhood seeking divine grace from their spirits. These Muslim ‘pirs’ merged with Hindu ‘virs’ and became part of the folk landscape. 

Agricultural route of Islam’s spread 

What is often overlooked is that Islam also spread through agricultural innovations. From the 10th century onwards, Sufis who came to India introduced new farming technologies, like underground water canals and water wheels, which had been developed in Persia and Spain. This allowed farming in relatively dry regions. These technologies were brought to Sindh and Punjab creating new arable lands. Here, local landless peasants, such as the Jat tribes, became landowners and benefited economically.

It is these regions that had the largest Muslim populations and which eventually broke away from India to become Pakistan. 

During Mughal rule in eastern India, a shift in the course of the Ganga River exposed new agricultural lands. The Mughal state encouraged farming in these regions to increase its revenue base. Frontier communities, previously outside the mainstream, took advantage of this opportunity. With the support of Sufi scholars – many of whom were sidelined in Delhi – they built settlements in what would eventually give rise to Bangladesh. 

Here one finds the worship of Panch Pir (five Muslim holy men) who are also identified with Five Pandavas, and local agricultural Muslim holy figures like Bon Bibi, unique to the Sunderbans. There are terracotta mosques resembling Bengali huts, very different from Arabic-Persian structures.

Immigrant Muslim elites

Then there was the arrival of numerous migrants from Central Asia and Persia, especially after the Mongol onslaught of the 13th century and due to many job opportunities in the Delhi and Bahmani sultanates. Some came with wives, while some others married local women. Some were naukars (paid soldiers) and chakars (paid accountants). Islam came with them too. They were the elite in courts who spoke Persian. They built Persian style mosques in the Deccan region such as the Gawan madarsa in Bidar. 

Local Indian Muslim elites resented the immigrant Muslim elites. The elite Muslims looked down on Muslim converts from ‘lower’ castes. So Islam in India came to mimic the caste system with Sayyids (descendants of the Prophet) being seen as upper caste, and Pasmandas (a Persian word used to describe the marginalised classes among Muslims) being seen as lower caste. In between were those, who claimed their descent from Arab merchants and Persian noblemen. 

The story of Islam’s entry into India is thus complex – a story over seven centuries – involving trade, war, missionaries, agriculturalists and migrants. 

Post Read Questions

What are the different routes through which Islam reached India?

How did trade routes contribute to the spread of Sufism across different regions of India?

What farming technologies did Sufis introduce, and how did they impact agriculture in Sindh and Punjab?

How do terracotta mosques in Bengal differ from traditional Arabic-Persian structures?

How did Islam in India come to mimic the caste system?

(Devdutt Pattanaik is a renowned mythologist who writes on art, culture and heritage.)

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