Jump to content

Kashmiri Muslims

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Muslim Kashmiris)

Kashmiri Muslims
Languages
Kashmiri, Urdu, English
Religion
Islam
(Sunni majority)
(Shia minority)
Related ethnic groups
Kashmiris, Kashmiri Hindus

Kashmiri Muslims are ethnic Kashmiris who practice Islam and are native to the Kashmir Valley of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir.[1][2][3] They refer to themselves as "Koshur" in the Kashmiri language.[4][5][6][7][8]

Presently, the Kashmiri Muslim population is predominantly found in Kashmir Valley. Smaller Kashmiri Muslim communities also live in other regions of Jammu and Kashmir. Kashmiri Muslims are of the same stock as the Kashmiri Hindu community.[9][10] Both Kashmiri Hindus and Muslims trace their descent patrilineally. Certain property and titles may be inherited through the male line, but certain inheritances may accrue through the female line. After Kashmiri Hindus had converted to Islam they largely retained their family names (kram) which indicated their original profession, locality or community.[11]

In the Jammu region, sizeable population of Kashmiri Muslims lives in the Doda, Ramban and Kishtwar districts, sometimes collectively referred to as the Chenab valley. There are also ethnic Kashmiri Muslim populations inhabiting Neelum and Leepa Valleys of Pakistani-administrated Kashmir. Since 1947, many ethnic Kashmiri Muslims have also lived in Punjab, Pakistan.[12] Many ethnic Kashmiri Muslims from the Kashmir Valley also migrated to the Punjab region during Dogra and Sikh rule.[13][14][15]

The Kashmiri language is the mother tongue of majority of Kashmiri Muslims.[16][17]

History

[edit]

Islam started making inroads in the 12th and 13th centuries. The earliest copy of Quran in Kashmir dates back to 1237 AD and was calligraphed by Fateh Ullah Kashmiri who is believed to be a then Kashmiri Islamic scholar.[18]

The first Muslim missionary in Kashmir was Syed Sharaf-ud-Din Abdur Rahman Suhrawardi, popularly known as Bulbul Shah.

He was an extensively traveled preacher and came to Kashmir during the reign of Raja Suhadeva (1301–20) the king of Lohara dynasty. After Suhadeva was killed by Rinchan & became the ruler, married suhadeva's daughter Kota Rani and appointed his son as chief and later he adopted Islam on advice of Shah Mir.[19] In 1339 Kashmir throne was captured by Sultan Shahmir who founded Shah Mir dynasty in Kashmir.

Subsequently, according to some traditions ten thousand Kashmiris converted to Islam and hence the seeds of Islam in Kashmir were sown.[20] The spread of Islam among Kashmiris was further boosted by arrival of a host of other Sayyids, most prominent among them being Sayyid Jalal-ud-Din, Sayyid Taj-ud-Din and Sayyid Hussain Simanani.[21]

However, the greatest missionary whose personality wielded the most extraordinary influence in the spread of Islam in Kashmir was Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani of Hamadan (Persia) popularly known as Shah-i-Hamadan. He belonged to the Kubrawi order of Sufis and came to Kashmir along with seven hundred disciples and helpers. His emphasis was on the Islamization of royal family and the court as a pre-requisite for Islamizing people. This was an important modus operandi adopted by Syed Ali and his disciples. He was of the firm belief that the common masses followed the conduct and culture of their rulers. His disciples established shrines with lodging and langar at many places in Kashmir which served as centers for propagation of Islam. His preaching resulted in a large number of people, including priests of Hinduism and Buddhism and their followers converting to Islam, which became the vastly dominant religion of the Kashmiri masses by the fourteenth century. A greater part of the population converted during the reign of Sultan Sikandar Shah Miri.[22] Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani's impact in Kashmir was not only confined to religion but had a great say on culture, industry and economy of Kashmir. Spread of shawl making, carpet manufacturing, cloth weaving, etc. gained great prominence by his efforts.[23][24]

Sikh Empire

[edit]

In 1819 Kashmir came under Maharajah Ranjit Singh's Sikh Empire and Sikh rule over Kashmir lasted for 27 years till 1846. These 27 years of Sikh rule saw 10 Governors in Kashmir. Of these 10 Governors five were Hindus, three were Sikhs and two were Muslims. Due to the fact that Kashmiris had suffered under the Afghan rulers, they initially welcomed the Sikh rule. However the Sikhs turned out to be hard taskmasters and their rule was generally considered oppressive.[25] Scholar Christopher Snedden states that the Sikhs exploited Kashmiris regardless of religion.[26]

The Sikhs enacted a number of anti-Muslim policies, subjecting the Muslim majority population of the Valley to a number of hardships in the practice of their religion. The central mosque, Jama Masjid, was closed for 20 years and Muslims were prohibited from issuing the azan (call to prayer). If a Sikh murdered a Hindu the compensation amount allowed was four rupees. However, if a Sikh murdered a Muslim the compensation amount allowed was only two rupees.[25][27]

During the Sikh rule Kashmir had begun to attract European visitors, several of whom wrote of the abject poverty of the Muslim peasantry and the exorbitant taxes under the Sikhs. According to some contemporary accounts, high taxes had depopulated large tracts of the countryside.[25] Kashmiri histories emphasize the wretchedness of life for common Kashmiris during the Sikh rule. According to them, the peasantry became mired in poverty and migrations of Kashmiri peasants to the plains of Punjab reached high proportions. Several European travelers' accounts from the period testify to and provide evidence for such assertions.[13]

The Sikhs lost their independence with the Battle of Subraon. In 1846 Kashmir came under the rule of Gulab Singh, a Hindu Dogra Maharajah under the British suzerainty.[26][27][clarification needed]

Dogra Regime

[edit]

The 100 year Dogra regime turned out to be a disaster for the Muslim peasantry of Kashmir Valley.[28] Walter Lawrence described the conditions of the Kashmir Valley's peasantry as being 'desperate' and noted that the valley's peasantry attributed their miseries to the Maharajah's deputies rather than the rulers themselves. The state officials apparently kept the rulers from knowing the conditions of the Muslim peasantry in the Kashmir Valley.[28]

Lawrence in particular criticized the state officials who belonged to the Kashmiri Pandit community.[28] Lawrence provided evidence that while many of the Kashmiri Pandit officials may have been ''individually gentle and intelligent, as a body they were cruel and oppressive.'' Scholar Ayesha Jalal states that the Maharajahs nurtured ties with Kashmiri Pandits and their Dogra kinsfolk in Jammu to trample on the rights of their subjects.[29] Christopher Snedden also states that the Kashmiri Muslims were often exploited by the Kashmiri Pandit officials.[30]

Wingate and Lawrence spent many months in the rural hinterland of Kashmir and in an unprecedented manner brought to the fore the tensions that underlay Kashmiri society between the interests of the Hindu Kashmiri Pandit community and the numerically preponderant Kashmiri Muslim cultivators. However, while both acknowledged the oppression of Kashmiri Muslims, the solutions offered by Lawrence and Wingate differed from each other. While both acknowledged the responsibility of the Kashmiri Pandit community in exacerbating the situation of the Muslim cultivating classes, Wingate was far more uncompromising in demanding that the privileges of the Pandit community be eliminated. However, Lawrence proposed to provide relief to Kashmir's cultivating class without eliminating the privileges of the Kashmiri Pandits.[31]

Gawasha Nath Kaul described the poor conditions of the Kashmir Valley's Muslim population in his book Kashmir Then And Now and in it he wrote that 90 percent of Muslim households were mortgaged to Hindu moneylenders.[32] Muslims were non-existent in the State's civil administration and were barred from officer positions in the military.[32]

Prem Nath Bazaz, one of the few Kashmiri Pandits who joined the movement for change, described the poor conditions of the Valley's Muslim population as such:[32]

The poverty of the Muslim masses is appalling. Dressed in rags and barefoot, a Muslim peasant presents the appearance of a starved beggar...Most are landless laborers, working as serfs for absentee landlords.

There was a famine in Kashmir between 1877-9 and the death toll from this famine was overwhelming by any standards. Some authorities suggested that the population of Srinagar had been reduced by half while others estimated a diminution by three-fifths of the entire population of the Kashmir Valley.[33] During the famine of 1877-9 not a single Pandit died of starvation during these annihilative years for the Muslim cultivators, according to reports received by Walter Roper Lawrence. During the famine the office of Prime Minister was held by a Kashmiri Pandit, Wazir Punnu, who is said to have declared that there ''was no real distress and that he wished that no Musulman might be left alive from Srinagar to Rambhan (in Jammu).''[34]

When lands fell fallow temporarily during the famine, Kashmiri Pandits took over substantial tracts of them claiming that they were uncultivated waste. Numerous Kashmiri Muslim cultivators who had left the Kashmir Valley for Punjab to escape the devastation of those years found upon their return that they had been ousted from lands that they had cultivated over generations.[35]

A large number of Muslim Kashmiris migrated from the Kashmir Valley[14] to the Punjab due to conditions in the princely state[14] such as famine, extreme poverty[36] and harsh treatment by the Dogra Hindu regime (according to Prem Nath Bazaz the Kashmiri Muslims faced this harsh treatment because of their religion).[37] According to the 1911 Census there were 177,549 Kashmiri Muslims in the Punjab. With the inclusion of Kashmiri settlements in NWFP this figure rose to 206,180.[38]

Population

[edit]

The 1921 Census report stated that Kashmiri Muslims formed 31% of the Muslim population of the entire princely state of Jammu and Kashmir.[39] The 1921 Census report also stated that Kashmiri Muslims are sub-divided into numerous sub-castes such as Bhatt, Dhar, Wani etc.[40] The Kashmiri Muslim population in the 1921 Census was recorded as 796,804.[39]

The 1931 Census report also reiterated that the 'Kashmiri Muslim' population occupied the foremost position in the State (other communities in the princely State being Gujjars, Jats, Sudhans, Rajputs and Arains etc.).[41] It recorded the Kashmiri Muslim population as 1,352,822.[42] The 1931 Census report explains that the 'phenomenal' increase in the number of Kashmiri Muslims by 556,018 was due to several castes such as Hajjam, Hanji, Sayed and Sheikh being merged into the community.[43][44]

The 1931 Census report stated that the Bhat, Dar, Ganai, Khan, Lone, Malik, Mir, Pare, Rather, Sheikh, Varrier and Wani were the most major tribes among Kashmiri Muslims.[41] Below are the population figures for the various sub-castes among the Kashmiri Muslim population according to the 1931 Census.[45]

Ailo Akhoon Bhat Chaupan Dar Ganai Hajam Hanji Khan Khawaja Lone Magrey Malik
Population in entire Jammu and Kashmir State
Male 5807 2715 90477 6045 64446 32441 10371 2334 18195 3236 34312 4523 31211
Female 4622 2383 77751 5208 53906 26800 8504 1780 15770 2669 30055 4145 26743
Population in Kashmir Province
Male 4934 2608 80444 5758 61512 31327 10010 2165 18017 2227 29593 4806 17458
Female 4280 2211 69286 5025 51418 25957 8154 1648 15672 1679 25870 3788 15604
Mir Pandit Parray Pirzada Raina Rather Rishi Syed Sheikh Tantrei Varrier Wani Others
Population in entire Jammu and Kashmir State
Male 55092 1911 8317 4452 2111 21765 5672 6756 40264 6158 10333 39670 222655
Female 47155 1673 7180 3995 1762 17960 4626 5821 34711 6095 9027 32443 189269
Population in Kashmir Province
Male 49586 1902 7852 4444 2105 19643 5374 6059 37320 4875 10289 34080 196596
Female 42285 1670 6739 8995 1755 16572 4469 5298 31787 4790 9014 28622 164986

Diaspora

[edit]
Further information: Kashmiri diaspora

In the early twentieth century, famines and the policies of the Dogra rulers drove many Kashmiri Muslims to flee their native land to Punjab. Kashmiri Muslims constituted an important segment of several Punjabi cities such as Gujranwala, Sialkot, Gujrat, Lahore, Amritsar and Ludhiana.[15] Kashmiris who migrated from Amritsar in 1947 have had a big influence on Lahore's contemporary cuisine and culture.[46] The Kashmiris of Amritsar were more steeped in their Kashmiri culture than the Kashmiris of Lahore.[47] An exclusive research conducted by the "Jang Group and Geo Television Network" showed that the Kashmiri community had been involved in spearheading the power politics of Lahore district since 1947.[48]

Notable members of the Kashmiri Muslim diaspora in Punjab include Pakistan's former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (paternal ancestry from Anantnag), Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, politician Khawaja Asif, and former Chief Justice Lahore High Court Khawaja Muhammad Sharif .[49] Another notable member of the Kashmiri Muslim diaspora in Punjab was Muhammad Iqbal (who took pride in his Brahman ancestry[50] and whose poetry displayed a keen sense of belonging to the Kashmir Valley).[51] Another famous proud Kashmiri writer from Punjab was Saadat Hasan Manto.[52][53]

According to the 1921 Census the total Kashmiri population in Punjab was 169,761. However, the Census report stated that only 3% of Kashmiris settled in Punjab retained their Kashmiri language. The number of people speaking Kashmiri in 1901 was 8,523 but had decreased to 7,190 in 1911. By 1921 the number of people speaking Kashmiri in Punjab had fallen to 4,690. The 1921 Census report stated that this fact showed that the Kashmiris who had settled in Punjab had adopted the Punjabi language of their neighbors.[54] In contrast, the 1881 Census of Punjab had shown that there were 49,534 speakers of the Kashmiri language in the Punjab.[55] The 1881 Census had recorded the number of Kashmiris in the Punjab as 179,020[56] while the 1891 Census recorded the Kashmiri population as 225,307[57] but the number of Kashmiri speakers recorded in the 1891 Census was 28,415.[58]

Scholar Ayesha Jalal states that Kashmiris faced discrimination in the Punjab as well.[59] Kashmiris settled for generations in the Punjab were unable to own land,[59] including the family of Muhammad Iqbal.[60] Scholar Chitralekha Zutshi states that Kashmiri Muslims settled in the Punjab retained emotional and familial links to Kashmir and felt obliged to struggle for the freedom of their brethren in the Valley.[61]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Ling, Huping (2008). Emerging Voices: Experiences of Underrepresented Asian Americans. Rutgers University Press. p. 126. ISBN 9780813543420. Kashmiri Muslims represent the majority population in Kashmir Valley, while Kashmiri Hindus represent a small but significant minority community.
  2. ^ Osmańczyk, Edmund Jan (2003), Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements: G to M, Taylor & Francis, pp. 1191–, ISBN 978-0-415-93922-5 Quote: "Jammu and Kashmir: Territory in northwestern India, subject to a dispute between India and Pakistan. It has borders with Pakistan and China."
  3. ^ Snedden, Christopher (2015). Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris. Oxford University Press. p. 7. ISBN 9781849046220. As in Pakistan, Sunni Muslims comprise the majority population of Kashmir, whereas they are a minority in Jammu, while almost all Muslims in Ladakh are Shias.
  4. ^ Census of India, 1941. Vol. 22. p. 9. Retrieved 30 December 2016. The Muslims living in the southern part of the Kashmir Province are of the same stock as the Kashmiri Pandit community and are usually designated Kashmiri Muslims; those of the Muzaffarabad District are partly Kashmiri Muslims, partly Gujjar and the rest are of the same stock as the tribes of the neighboring Punjab and North \Vest Frontier Province districts.
  5. ^ Kashmiri Pandits: Looking to the Future. APH Publishing. 2001. ISBN 9788176482363. The Kashmiri Pandits are the precursors of Kashmiri Muslims who now form a majority in the valley of Kashmir...Whereas Kashmiri Pandits are of the same ethnic stock as the Kashmiri Muslims, both sharing their habitat, language, dress, food and other habits, Kashmiri Pandits form a constituent part of the Hindu society of India on the religious plane.
  6. ^ Bhasin, M.K.; Nag, Shampa (2002). "A Demographic Profile of the People of Jammu and Kashmir" (PDF). Journal of Human Ecology. Kamla-Raj Enterprises: 15. Retrieved 1 January 2017. Thus the two population groups, Kashmiri Pandits and Kashmiri Muslims though at the time constituted ethnically homogenous population, came to differ from each other in faith and customs.
  7. ^ Bhasin, M.K.; Nag, Shampa (2002). "A Demographic Profile of the People of Jammu and Kashmir" (PDF). Journal of Human Ecology: 16. Retrieved 1 January 2017. The Sheikhs,but,dar,lone are descendants of Hindus and the pure Kashmiri Muslims, professing Sunni faith, the major part of the population of Srinagar district and the Kashmir state.
  8. ^ Ahmed, Ishtiaq (1998), State, Nation and Ethnicity in Contemporary South Asia, A&C Black, p. 139, ISBN 978-1-85567-578-0
  9. ^ Kaw, M. K. (2001). Kashmiri Pandits: Looking to the Future. APH Publishing. p. 223. ISBN 978-81-7648-236-3. The Kashmiri Pandits are the precursors of Kashmiri Muslims who now form a majority in the valley of Kashmir...Whereas Kashmiri Pandits are of the same ethnic stock as the Kashmiri Muslims, both sharing their habitat, language, dress, food and other habits, Kashmiri Pandits form a constituent part of the Hindu society of India on the religious plane.
  10. ^ Bhasin, M.K.; Nag, Shampa (2002). "A Demographic Profile of the People of Jammu and Kashmir" (PDF). Journal of Human Ecology. Kamla-Raj Enterprises: 15. Retrieved 1 January 2017. Thus the two population groups, Kashmiri Pandits and Kashmiri Muslims though at the time constituted ethnically homogenous population, came to differ from each other in faith and customs.
  11. ^ Brower, Barbara; Johnston, Barbara Rose (17 September 2016). Disappearing Peoples?: Indigenous Groups and Ethnic Minorities in South and Central Asia. Routledge. p. 130. ISBN 978-1-315-43039-3.
  12. ^ Snedden, Christopher (2015). Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9781849046220. Small numbers of ethnic Kashmiris also live in other parts of J&K. There are Kashmiris who live in areas that border the Kashmir Valley, including Kishtwar (Kishtawar), Bhadarwah, Doda and Ramban, in Jammu in Indian J&K, and in the Neelum and Leepa Valleys of northern Azad Kashmir. Since 1947, many ethnic Kashmiris and their descendants also can be found in Pakistan. Invariably, Kashmiris in Azad Kashmir and Pakistan are Muslims.
  13. ^ a b Zutshi, Chitralekha (2004). Languages of Belonging: Islam, Regional Identity, and the Making of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. p. 40. ISBN 9781850656944. Kashmiri histories emphasize the wretchedness of life for the common Kashmiri during Sikh rule. According to these, the peasantry became mired in poverty and migrations of Kashmiri peasants to the plains of the Punjab reached high proportions. Several European travelers' accounts from the period testify to and provide evidence for such assertions.
  14. ^ a b c Bose, Sumantra (2013). Transforming India. Harvard University Press. p. 211. ISBN 9780674728202. From the late nineteenth century, conditions in the princely state led to a significant migration of people from the Kashmir Valley to the neighboring Punjab province of British-as distinct from princely-India.
  15. ^ a b Sevea, Iqbal Singh (2012). The Political Philosophy of Muhammad Iqbal: Islam and Nationalism in Late Colonial India. Cambridge University Press. p. 16. ISBN 9781139536394. In the early twentieth century, famine and the policies of the Dogra rulers drove many Kashmiri Muslims to flee their native land and further augment the number of their brethren already resident in the Punjab. Kashmiri Muslims constituted an important segment of the populace in a number of Punjabi cities, especially Sialkot, Lahore, Amritsar and Ludhiana.
  16. ^ "Introduction". 21 May 2023.
  17. ^ "Introduction".
  18. ^ IANS (21 July 2012). "HRD Ministry To Preserve Kashmir's Manuscripts, Paintings". jammu-kashmir.com.
  19. ^ "Origins of Islam in Kashmir: Valley's saga of conflict in search of identity".
  20. ^ Sufi, G. M. D. (1974), Kashīr, being a history of Kashmīr from the earliest times to our own, Vol. 1, Light & Life Publishers, p. 83, After the conversion of Rinchan, his brother-in- law and commander-in-chief, and several others - according to one tradition ten thousand - embraced the creed of Bulbul Shāh.
  21. ^ Abida Quansar (22 February 2012). "Role of Mysticism in Unification and Peaceful Coexistence of People in India with Special Focus on Islam". IslamiCity.
  22. ^ Wink, Andre (2004). Al-Hind-The making of Indo-Islamic world. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill. p. 162. ISBN 9004135618. Retrieved 19 October 2019. To variable degrees the greater part of population of Kashmir valley converted in the reign of Sikander Butshikan (1389-1413)
  23. ^ "Hazrat Amir-e-Kabir Shah-e-Hamdan". myasa.net. 1997.
  24. ^ Mohammad Ashraf (20 May 2007). "Shah-i-Hamadan, the "Apostle of Kashmir"". kashmirfirst.com. Archived from the original on 25 September 2010.
  25. ^ a b c Hauptman, Robert; V. Hartemann, Frederic (2016). Deadly Peaks: Mountaineering's Greatest Triumphs and Tragedies. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 149. ISBN 9781589798427. As the Kashmiris had suffered under the Afghans, they initially welcomed the new Sikh rulers. However, the Sikh governors turned out to be hard taskmasters and the local Sikh rule was generally considered oppressive, protected perhaps by the remoteness of Kashmir from the capital of the Sikh Empire in Lahore. The Sikhs enacted a number of anti-Muslim laws, which included handing out death sentences for cow slaughter, closing down the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar, and banning the azaan, the public Muslim call to prayer. Kashmir had also now begum to attract European visitors, several of whom wrote of the abject poverty of the vast Muslim peasantry and of the exorbitant taxes under the Sikhs. High taxes, according to some contemporary accounts, had depopulated large tracts of the countryside, allowing only one-sixteenth of the cultivable land to be cultivated.
  26. ^ a b Snedden, Christopher (2015). Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9781849046220.
  27. ^ a b Fahim, Farukh (2011). "Centuries' Subjugation Kicks off a Bitter Struggle". In Harsh Dobhal (ed.). Writings on Human Rights, Law, and Society in India: A Combat Law Anthology : Selections from Combat Law, 2002-2010. Socio Legal Information Cent. p. 259. ISBN 9788189479787. Sikh army entered Kashmir on 4th July, 1819, starting a new phase of tyranny and oppression...Describing the Sikh rule, Moorcraft, an English traveler reflected, 'Sikhs looked at Kashmiris 'a little better than the cattle. The murder of a native Sikh was punished with a fine to the government ranging from 16 to 20 rupees, of which four were paid to the family of the deceased if a Hindu, and two if he was a Mohammedan;. During this dark phase in Kashmir's history, people were in a most abject condition 'subjected to every kind of extortion and oppression'. Under Sikh rule Kashmir was ruled by 10 governors. Out of these, five were Hindus, three Sikhs, and two Muslims. Sikhs consistently followed anti-Muslim policies in Kashmir, subjecting the majority population of the Kashmir valley to severe hardship in relation to the practice of religion. It was also during this phase that the central mosque of Srinagar, the Jama Masjid was ordered to be closed and Muslims of Kashmir were not allowed to say azan (call to prayer). Sikhs tried to establish a 'Hindu' state where cow slaughter was declared a crime and a complete ban was passed against cow slaughter, lands attached to several shrines were also resumed on state orders...With the battle of Subraon, the Sikhs lost their independence. The treaty of Amritsar between British and Dogras signed on 16th of March 1846, gave way to Dogra rule in Kashmir.
  28. ^ a b c Bose, Sumantra (2013). Transforming India. Harvard University Press. pp. 233–4. ISBN 9780674728202. The hundred-year reign of the tinpot monarchy appointed as subcontractors of the Raj was an unmitigated disaster for the peasantry of Muslim faith who made up the overwhelming majority of the valley's population. Walter Lawrence wrote: when I first came to Kashmir in 1889, I found the people sullen, desperate and suspicious. They had been taught for many years that they were serfs without any rights....Pages might be written by me on facts which have come under my personal observation, but it will suffice to say that the system of administration had degraded the people and taken all heart out of them. Lawrence...was careful to absolve the ruler of personal culpability: the peasants, one and all, attributed their miseries to the deputies through which the Maharajas ruled, and they have always recognized that their rulers were sympathetic and anxious to ensure their prosperity. But the officials of Kashmir would never allow their master to know the real condition of the people. Who were these venal officials? Lawrence was particularly critical of princely state officials belonging to the Kashmiri Pandit community...
  29. ^ Jalal, Ayesha (2002). Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850. Routledge. p. 352. ISBN 9781134599387. A succession of maharajas, nurturing ties with a small group of Hindu pandits in the Kashmir valley and a more extensive network of Dogra kinsmen in Jammu, wilfully trampled on the rights of their subjects.
  30. ^ Snedden, Christopher (2015). Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris. Oxford University Press. p. 29. ISBN 9781849043427. Incongruously, "Kashmiriness" did not deter rivalry and antipathy between Hindu Pandits, who were influential in government for long periods, and Muslim artisan and peasants, who invariably were poorer, illiterate and often exploited by Pandit officials.
  31. ^ Rai, Mridu (2004). Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects: Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. pp. 148–149. ISBN 9781850657019. Wingate and Lawrence had spent many months in the rural hinterland of Kashmir. They brought to the fore, in an unprecedented manner, the tensions that underlay Kashmiri society, pitting the interests of the Hindu Pandit community against these of the numerically preponderant Kashmiri Muslim cultivators within the framework of the Dogra state. However, beyond agreeing about the nature and causesof the Kashmiri Muslims' oppression, the solutions offered by Wingate and Lawrence were at significant variance. While both acknowledged the responsibility of the Kashmiri Pandit community in exacerbating the situation of the Muslim cultivating classes, Wingate was far more uncompromising in demanding the elimination of the exemptions and privileges of the former. In contrast, while Lawrence's land settlement also sought to provide relief to the cultivating classes of Kashmir, it did so without entirely dismantling the privileges of the Kashmiri Pandit community.
  32. ^ a b c Bose, Sumantra (2013). Transforming India. Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674728202. Indeed, in a book titled Kashmir Then and Now, published in 1924, Gawasha Nath Kaul, a Kashmiri Pandit, painted a Dickensian picture of Srinagar: beggars, thieves, and prostitutes abounded along with disease and filth, and 90 percent of Muslim houses [were] mortgaged to Hindu sahukars [moneylenders]....local Muslims were barred from becoming officers in the princely state's military forces and were almost nonexistent in the civil administration. In 1941 Prem Nath Bazaz, one of a handful of Kashmiri Pandits who joined the popular movement for change that emerged during the 1930s and swept the Valley in the 1940s, wrote: the poverty of the Muslim masses is appalling. Dressed in rags and barefoot, a Muslim peasant presents the appearance of a starving beggar...Most are landless laborers, working as serfs for absentee landlords...
  33. ^ Rai, Mridu (2004). Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects: Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. p. 149. ISBN 9781850657019. The death toll from the famine had been overwhelming by any standards. Some authorities had suggested that the population of Srinagar had been reduced by half (from 127,400 to 60,000) while Indian Kashmiri officials estimate that the famine killed about three-fifths of the Kashmiri population.
  34. ^ Rai, Mridu (2004). Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects: Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. p. 151. ISBN 9781850657019. The fatal results for Muslim agriculturists of this capacity for combination among the Hindu Kashmiris was demonstrated most clearly during the famine of 1877-9 when the office of prime minister was also held by a Kashmiri Pandit, Wazir Punnu. According to reports received by Lawrence, not a Pandit died of starvation during these annihilative years for the Muslim cultivators. Undoubtedly reflecting a selective Pandit view of the famine, Wazir Punnu is said to have declared that there 'was no real distress and that he wished that no Mussulman might be left alive from Srinagar to Rambhan [in Jammu].'
  35. ^ Rai, Mridu (2004). Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects: Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. p. 157. ISBN 9781850657019. When lands fell fallow temporarily during the Kashmir famine of 1877-9, Pandits took over substantial tracts of them claiming that they constituted uncultivated waste. Numerous Kashmiri Muslim cultivators who had left the valley for Punjab, to escape the devastation of those years, found upon their return that they had been ousted from lands they had cultivated over generations.
  36. ^ Jalal, Ayesha (2002). Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850. Routledge. p. 352. ISBN 9781134599387. Extreme poverty, exacerbated by a series of famines in the second half of the nineteenth century, had seen many Kashmiris fleeing to neighboring Punjab.
  37. ^ Chowdhary, Rekha (2015). Jammu and Kashmir: Politics of Identity and Separatism. Routledge. p. 8. ISBN 9781317414056. Prem Nath Bazaz, for instance, noted that 'the Dogra rule has been Hindu. Muslims have not been treated fairly, by which I mean as fairly as Hindus'. In his opinion, the Muslims faced harsh treatment 'only because they were Muslims' (Bazaz, 1941: 250).
  38. ^ Jalal, Ayesha (2002). Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850. Routledge. ISBN 9781134599387. According to the 1911 census there were 177, 549 Kashmiri Muslims in the Punjab; the figure went up to 206, 180 with the inclusion of settlements in the NWFP.
  39. ^ a b Mohamed, C K. Census of India, 1921. Vol. XXII: Kashmir. Part I: Report. p. 147. Retrieved 9 January 2017. The bulk of the population in Group I is furnished by the Kashmiri Musalmans (796,804), who form more than 31 per cent of the total Musalman population of the State. The Kashmiri Musalman is essentially an agriculturist by profession, but his contribution to the trade and industry of the Kashmir Province is by no means negligible.
  40. ^ Mohamed, C K. Census of India, 1921. Vol. XXII: Kashmir. Part I: Report. p. 150. Retrieved 9 January 2017. The Kashmiri Musalmans are sub-divided into numerous sub-castes such as Dar, Bat, Wain, etc.
  41. ^ a b Anant, Ram; Raina, Hira Nand (1933). Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXIV: Jammu and Kashmir State. Part I: Report. p. 316. Retrieved 12 January 2017. Kashmiri Muslim.-The community occupies the fore-most position in the State having 1,352,822 members. The various sub-castes that are labelled under the general head Kashmiri Muslim are given in the Imperial Table. The most important sub-castes from the statistical point of view are the Bat, the Dar, the Ganai, the Khan, the Lon, the Malik, the Mir, the Pare, the Rather, Shah, Sheikh and Wain. They are mostly found in the Kashmir Province and Udhampur district of the Jammu Province.
  42. ^ Ram, Anant; Raina, Hira Nand. Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXIV: Jammu and Kashmir State. Part II: Imperial and State Tables. p. 206. Retrieved 9 January 2017.
  43. ^ Ram, Anant; Raina, Hira Nand (1933). Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXIV: Jammu and Kashmir State. Part II: Imperial and State Tables. p. 205. Retrieved 9 January 2017. The decrease in some of the Muslim castes is counterbalanced by the abnormal increase under Kashmiri Muslims which include a large number of castes.
  44. ^ Ram, Anant; Raina, Hira Nand (1933). Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXIV: Jammu and Kashmir State. Part I: Report. p. 318. Retrieved 12 January 2017. The Kashmiri Muslim shows a phenomenal increase of 556,018 which is due to several castes having been merged in the community. The Hajjam, Hanji, Sayed, Sheikh afford some instances of the process of amalgamation which while adding to the Kashmiri Muslim community in such vast numbers has reduced the strength of other communities who show a decrease.
  45. ^ Ram, Anant; Raina, Hira Nand (1933). Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXIV: Jammu and Kashmir State. Part II: Imperial and State Tables. pp. 281–283. Retrieved 9 January 2017.
  46. ^ "Lahore, Amritsar: Once sisters, now strangers". Rediff News. 26 October 2012. Retrieved 29 December 2016. The biggest influence on Lahore's contemporary culture and cuisine are the Kashmiris who migrated from Amritsar in 1947.
  47. ^ Hamid, A. (11 February 2007). "Lahore Lahore Aye: Lahore's wedding bands". Academy of the Punjab in North America. Retrieved 12 January 2017. The Kashmiris of Lahore were not as steeped in their Kashmiri culture and heritage as the Kashmiris of Amritsar, which was why the Kashmiri Band did not last long.
  48. ^ Shah, Sabir (12 October 2015). "Ayaz Sadiq: Yet another Arain legislator wins from Lahore". The News International. Retrieved 29 December 2016. An exclusive research conducted by the "Jang Group and Geo Television Network" shows that the Arain and Kashmiri communities have spearheaded the power politics in Lahore district since independence.
  49. ^ Jaleel, Muzamil (2013). "As Nawaz Sharif becomes PM, Kashmir gets voice in Pakistan power circuit". The Indian Express. Retrieved 29 December 2016. Kashmir may have been missing from the agenda of the elections in Pakistan, but the country's new government will have Kashmiris in vital positions — beginning with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif himself. Sharif, 63, who was sworn in for a historic third term on Wednesday, belongs to a family that migrated to Amritsar from South Kashmir's Anantnag district in the beginning of the last century. Sharif's close confidant Ishaq Dar, and influential PML (N) leader Khawaja Asif — both of whom are likely to get important positions in the new government — too have roots in Kashmir. 'My father would always tell me that we are from Anantnag. We had migrated to Amritsar from there for business', Sharif told this correspondent in his office in Lahore's Model Town last month where he sat with his key associates tracking the results of the election. 'And my mother's family came from Pulwama'.
  50. ^ Sevea, Iqbal Singh (2012). The Political Philosophy of Muhammad Iqbal: Islam and Nationalism in Late Colonial India. Cambridge University Press. p. 16. ISBN 9781139536394. Iqbal's attachment to his Kashmiri lineage is evident from his poetic references to himself as a descendant of Kashmiri Brahmins.
  51. ^ Jalal, Ayesha (2002). Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850. Routledge. ISBN 9781134599370. As one of the most highly educated Kashmiris in the Punjab, Muhammad Iqbal supported the Kashmiri cause through the Anjuman-i-Himayat-i-Islam and the lesser known Anjuman-i-Kashmiri Musalman. His poetry demonstrates a keen sense of belonging to Kashmir, the magnificent valley which the cruel hands of fate had allowed men of bestial disposition to reduce to abject slavery and benightedness.
  52. ^ Reeck, Matt; Ahmad, Aftab (2012). Bombay Stories. Random House India. ISBN 9788184003611. He claimed allegiance not only to his native Punjab but also to his ancestors' home in Kashmir. While raised speaking Punjabi, he was also proud of the remnants of Kashmiri culture that his family maintained-food customs, as well as intermarriage with families of Kashmiri origin-and throughout his life he assigned special importance to others who had Kashmiri roots. In a tongue-in-cheek letter addressed to Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru, he went so far as to suggest that being beautiful was the second meaning of being Kashmiri
  53. ^ Pandita, Rahul (2013). Our Moon Has Blood Clots: The Exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits. Random House India. ISBN 9788184003901. By virtue of his disposition, temperament, features and his spirit, Manto remains a Kashmiri Pandit.
  54. ^ "Chapter IX-Language". Census of India, 1921. Vol. 15. p. 309. Retrieved 30 December 2016. The only language belonging to the non-sanskritic sub-branch of the Indian branch of the Aryan sub-family spoken in the provinces is Kashmiri. The number of persons speaking this language was 8,523 in 1901 and 7,190 in 1911; but has now fallen to 4,690, a fact which shows that Kashmiris who have settled in these provinces have adopted the Punjabi language of their neighbors. This is amply proved if we compare the strength of Kashmiris returned in the caste Table XIII with that shown by the language table. Kashmiri now appears in the return as the language of 4,690 persons though Kashmiris themselves have a strength of 169, 761; in other words only about 3 out of every 100 Kashmiris still retain their own language.
  55. ^ Punjab Census Report 17 Feb 1881. 1883. p. 163. Retrieved 30 December 2016. Kashmiri is the language of the valley of Srinagar in Kashmir which nowhere touches our border. But famine and other causes, already fully discussed in the chapter on the Fluctuations of Famination, have driven a considerable number of immigrants at one time or another from Kashmir into the Panjab; and the language is now spoken by no fewer than 49,534 inhabitants of the Province.
  56. ^ Rose, H A (1902). Census of India, 1901. Vol. XVII: Punjab, its Feudatories, and the North West Frontier Province. Part I: The Report on the Census. p. 347. Retrieved 13 January 2017.
  57. ^ Census Of India - The Punjab And Its Feudatories, Volume xx, Part 2. 1891. p. 324. Retrieved 12 January 2017.
  58. ^ Census Of India - The Punjab And Its Feudatories, Volume xx, Part 2. 1891. p. 120. Retrieved 12 January 2017.
  59. ^ a b Jalal, Ayesha (2002). Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850. Routledge. p. 352. ISBN 9781134599370. ...Kashmiris engaged in agriculture were disqualified from taking advantage of the Punjab Land Alienation Act...Yet Kashmiris settled in the Punjab for centuries faced discrimination.
  60. ^ Sevea, Iqbal Singh (2012). The Political Philosophy of Muhammad Iqbal: Islam and Nationalism in Late Colonial India. Cambridge University Press. p. 16. ISBN 9781139536394. Like most Kashmiri families in Punjab, Iqbal's family did not own land.
  61. ^ Zutshi, Chitralekha (2004). Languages of Belonging: Islam, Regional Identity, and the Making of Kashmir. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. pp. 191–192. ISBN 9781850656944. Kashmiri Muslim expatriates in the Punjab had retained emotional and familial ties to their soil and felt compelled to raise the banner of freedom for Kashmir and their brethren in the Valley, thus launching bitter critiques of the Dogra administration.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kashmiri_Muslims&oldid=1258423520"