Sindhi Culture and values - Hindu & Muslims living in peaceful co-existence.

[Guest guest]

A fascinating insight into the life of Sindhis pre-partition. It

gives a nice insight into the Sindhi Spirit. Some portions of the

write-up can be considered controversial. But the insight into

Sindhi culture is worth the reading.

 

FYI: KR Malkani was a Lt. Governer of Pondicherry and died a few

years back. the entire book can be found at

http://yangtze.cs.uiuc.edu/~jamali/sindh/story/

 

An Excerpt from " The Sindh Story " by K. R. Malkani

---

 

Sindhi Society & Culture

 

 

SlNDHI SOCIETY is an integral part of the great Indian society. And

Sindhi culture is an integral part of the great Indian culture. And

yet, because of local factors, it has a flavour of its own. The

people are eclectic: not very profound, but very practical. As a wit

put it: ``The Sindhi rule of the thumb is to do whatever is

convenient and profitable.'' Their varied experience over the ages

has given them a certain flexibility that makes for survival, even

if not for glory. Added to the profundities of their ancestral

faith, they have faced waves of foreigners and they themselves have

travelled far and wide for trade. This has made them easy citizens

of the world. All fanaticism becomes foreign to their nature. As

H.T. Lambrick, ICS, has observed: ``There is something in the air of

Sindh which blurs the frontiers of ordinarily opposed creeds.''

 

When Islam came to India, it had staged the usual scene of murder,

loot and rape. However, before long, the mischief had been

contained. The new Muslims adorned their graves with the old lingas

and yonis and offered them incense and flowers. ``The day of

wedlock,'' they said, ``is more important than a thousand years of

roza and namaz.'' They dispensed with the Arab practice of female

circumcision. They even moderated the harsh Muslim law. For example,

they decided that saying 'Talaq, Talaq'' twice together would be

counted as one and not two. Even the Arabs visiting Sindh --- which

is about all the Hind that they knew --- were so Sindhized that, on

return home, they were told: ``O returner from Hind, renew thy

faith.'' The Sammas and the Soomras, who were native chiefs, ruled

for 500 years. Even when converted, they remained more Sindhi than

Muslim. No wonder Capt. Hamilton, who visited Sindh in the

eighteenth century, recorded that until a century earlier, the Hindu

population had been ten times the Muslim population. Today Sindhi

intellectuals like G.M. Syed reject the ``Arab Chhaap Islam''; they

would obviously like to have the ``Sindhi-Chhaap Islam'' that very

much prevailed until the late Mughal times.

 

Ironically enough, this pro-Hindu situation changed during the

Mughal period. Akbar initiated the policy of religious toleration.

He gave more and more top jobs to the Hindus. This antagonized many

Muslims, who now lost their monopoly of top jobs. Those who thus got

left out, joined hands with the fanatical mullahs. It was this

unholy alliance that helped Aurangzeb prevail over Dara. And so even

while Akbar's policy brought the Hindus into their own, the Muslim

reaction to that policy strengthened the forces of fanaticism and

launched a wave of mass conversions It was obviously this tidal wave

that overwhelmed Sindh and converted it into a Muslim-majority

province full thousand years after the Arab invasion. Al-Ghazali,

the fanatic, who had attacked the liberal al-Farabi and Ibn Sina in

the eleventh century, and who had abjured reason and divorced

religion from science, now prevailed in the Muslim courts with a

vengeance.

 

The exponent of this new policy in Sindh was Mohammed Hashim

Thattwi. His fatwa was duly issued as a firman of the Kalhora ruler

Ghulam Shah. It read: ``Let all functionaries of the state note that

they have to make all efforts to implement the religious directives

issued from time to time by Janab Makhdoom Mohammed Hashim. They

should forbid the (Shia practice of) mourning and Tazias during

Moharram. Women should he stopped from visiting gardens and

graveyards. People should be prevented from mourning for the dead.

Animals should not be painted. Hindus should be forbidden from

wearing 'choti' or `dhoti', or sitting in their shops with bare

knees. Muslims should be told not to keep.moustache --- and not to

grow their beard long. The beard should not exceed the size of a

fist. Hindus should not be allowed to play Holi or sing with sarod,

shehnai, drum or bugle. Hindus should also be stopped from bowing to

the idols or to the river. Government staff must enforce the above

orders strictly. Violation of any of these orders must be visited

with deterrent punishment so that nobody dares indulge in these

practices. In addition, people should be told to observe roza, namaz

and other religious practices. Let there be no failure in the

implementation of the above rules. Shaban 2, 1072 H.''

 

The liberal religious policy of Abar, followed by fanaticism like

this, led to the Hindus getting more jobs; but it also led to more

and more Hindus at lower levels getting converted under official

pressure. And thus one could see the two opposing developments at

the same time. Gidumal and many other Amils became ministers in the

court of Sindh. They were allowed to dress like Muslim aristocracy,

charged no taxes, and addressed as ``Dewan''. But Hindus could

neither keep an idol nor ring a bell, in what passed for their

``mandirs''. From Thursday evening till Saturday morning, they kept

indoors --- for fear of some Muslim saying they had heard them say

``Allah'' or''Mohammed'' on the holy day of Friday and that,

therefore, they were now deemed Muslims. The Hindus would not touch

any Arabic book --- for fear it might turn out to be the Koran,

whose touch would make them Muslim in the eyes of fanatics. British

visitors such as Richard Burton noted that the Hindus would never

use the word rasso or rassi, for rope --- for fear somebody might

say that they had uttered the word ``rasul'' (prophet); they would

always call it ``nori''. A Sindhi prince gave his watch to an

Englishman for repair in Bombay, with instruction that it should not

be touched by any idol-worshipper. This Englishman was presented

with a sword with the Persian inscription: ``I am light of weight,

but l am heavy on the enemy. Warriors have used me to slaughter one

lakh Hindus.'' Even a veteran statesman like Gidumal, who had served

the state with distinction, like a Cardinal Wolsey, was murdered in

the open court when his daughter Draupadi ended her life rather than

agree to marry a Muslim prince.

 

British observers, therefore, wondered why the Hindus stayed on in a

place like that. Dr. James Burton wrote: ``It is really difficult to

conceive how many Hindus should have continued to reside in the

country; and the fact can only be accounted for by that attachment

which man shares with the vegetable, to 'the soil in which he is

reared.''

 

That was one side of the picture. Another side was what E. B.

Eastwick noted: ``When we arrived in Shikarpur and Hyderabad we

found Hindu merchants as wealthy, almost as numerous, as in the most

prosperous towns under our own government.'' He added: ``As we

entered Karachi, we met pilgrims returning from Hinglaj...lt is the

farthest western limit to which Indian polytheism extends.''

 

Hamilton reported in 1699 the celebration of Holi in Sindh from

morning till evening. ``In this mad feast people of all ages and

sexes dance through the streets to pipes, drums and cymbals.''

 

Eastwick even saw a remarkable sight of Diwali, on 5 November 1839,

four years before the British conquest of Sindh. He noted: ``The

Diwali happening to fall on this day, the whole river was bright

with lamps. The scene was really enchanting. The mosques and ruined

tombs, illumined by myriads of lights, and the broad current

sweeping by them in all sombre majesty --- the palm-groves and the

island fortress of Bakhar in mid-stream, made up a wondrous picture.

Ever and anon some votary would offer up his prayers to Lakshmi and

launch a tiny craft bearing a cluster of lamps into the water.''

 

Here were Sindhi Muslims celebrating Diwali along with the Hindus.

Obviously the Sindhis had evolved a Sindhi version of Islam. A

certain good humoured co-existence prevailed. When Mir Sarfaraz Khan

made fun of Gidumal's short stature, the latter retorted in Persian:

``Manhood is tested in war; the thumb, though small, is more

important than the fingers.''

 

Once the poet-saint Shah Abdul Latif teased his Hindu friend Madan

with the question: ``How will you Kafirs fare on the day of

judgement?'' (``Hashar vela hissab mein, kafir kanda keina?'') Madan

did not reply at the time. Later, when they reached a ferry point,

the boat had just started off. Madan took out extra money and showed

it to the boatman, who stopped to pick them up. Madan now turned to

Shah and answered his earlier query thus: ``Those who have an open

hand will cross over ahead of all others.'' (``Hath jineen jo heean,

se pahrein pattan paar pya.'')

 

Most of the Sindhi Hindus had always been there. When Mohammed Bin

Qasim sacked Aror, the capital of Sindh, many of them migrated north

to the Punjab. They are still known as Aroras. For the rest, the

Hindus shifted to Multan, Jaisalmir, and Kutch for safety --- and

many of them came back when conditions improved. A good number of

them returned during Mughal-Kalhora period. And so we have Miss

Vimla Sindhi, a Punjabi lady, who assists Mrs. Indira Gandhi. And we

had a Sindhi ICS man called K. L. Punjabi. The Advanis came from

Multan, the Malkanis, Thadhanis and Ramchandanis from Jaisalmir; the

Kripalanis from far-away Prayag, and the Bhagchandanis all the way

from Ayodhya. They are all known -after their great ancestor, a

dozen generations earlier. The only exception are the Shahanis, who

are so called after Shah Baharo, a chieftain of Larkana. He was so

popular that his relations, friends and even employees called

themselves ``Shahani''. The Bhag-naris were late arrivals in

Shikarpur from Baluchistan. Contrary to popular impression, the

Amils and the Bhaibunds come from the same group of families. Those

who took to service became known as Amils (for `amal', to execute)

and those who took to business became Bhai-bandhus (Bhaibunds).

 

A sociological study by Bherumal Mehrchand shows that the Mukhis,

the Nagranis, the Sagranis, the Jethmalanis, the Lakhanis, the

Lullas, the Mattas, and the Chabrias are cousins. So, too, are the

Advanis, the Sitlanis, the Sadhwanis and the Shamdasanis. The

Chandiramanis, the Bhambhanis, the Karnanis and the Kripalanis are

all ``Chugh''. The Thadhanis, the Raisinghanis, and the Gehanis are

all ``Khangar''. The Chainanis, the Hingoranis, and the Jhangianis

are ``Pahuja'' . The Keswanis, the Ambwanis, the Mulchandanis, and

the Bhagwananis are ``Kukreja''. The Ajwanis, the Bhavnanis, the

Gidwanis, and the Jagtianis are kin. And so are the Mirchandanis,

the Mahtanis, the Moorjanis, the Sadaranganis and the Makhijas. The

Balwanis, the Malkanis, the Ramchandanis, and the Ramrakhianis are

all ``Darari''.

 

The Sindhi Muslim society is more varied than the Hindu society. The

ancient mass is Koli and Santhal. And so we still have some Munda

words in Sindh. For the same reason many Sindhis still have the

vigesimal system of counting by twenties. When a Sindhi boy plays

gilli-danda, he does not count ``hik-ba- tay'', Sindhi for ``one-two-

three''; he counts by the South Indian numerals --- ``vikat, laine,

moon, naar `!

 

Then came the Jats and the Medes. Later still, the Arabs, the Turks,

and the Afghans. Today the Syeds are the religious leaders. The

Sheikhs are upper-caste converts. The Sammats represent the Samma

and Soomra Rajputs. There are more Baluchis in Sindh than in all

Baluchistan --- just as there are more Gurkhas in India than in

Nepal. And then there are the commoners --- Maru and Sanghar,

Panhwar, Malah, Mangta, Sodha, Dhati, Gandra, Rebra, Kaachi,

Kohyara, Muhana, Oda, Makrani, Shidi (Abyssinian). We even have the

``Lunds'' in Matli --- a very funny tribe --- who are believed to be

third-century Hun settlers. All of them are conscious of their

caste. When Richard Burton asked an ``Ashraf'' who were the other

high castes, he was told: ``We are one; Syeds are another; half of

Fateh Ali's family: the rest are all riff-raff''!

 

A significant factor in Hindu survival in Sindh during the Muslim

period, in reasonably good shape, was the rise of Sikhism in the

Punjab. Sanatan Dharma having gone moribund under prolonged Muslim

rule, Sikhism came as a fresh breeze in the stale Sindhi atmosphere.

The fact that the two provinces were neighbours, their people, kin

and their languages allied, made Sikhism tick very well in Sindh. lt

is believed that Guru Nanak Dev had visited Shikarpur in his wide-

ranging travels. One Kanayalal of Sindh joined Guru Govind Singh,

who made it his duty to serve water to the wounded on the battle-

field. Kanayalal gave water not only to the Hindu wounded but also

to thc Muslim wounded. Some Sikhs thought it wrong to revive enemy

soldiers. They took Kanayalal to the Guru, who appre- ciated his

action and asked him to go and preach Sikh Dharma in Sindh. He came

to be known as ``Khat Waro Bao'' (Khaat wala Bawa) because he gave

his sermon while sitting on a cot.

 

When Bhai Dayal Singh grew old in the service of the Guru's army, he

was given a sword, a kirpan, a chakra, and a spear to go and infuse

some courage in the Sindhis.

 

Maharaja Ranjit Singh sent one Manik Singh with a copy of Guru

Granth Saheb on elephant-back to be installed in Hyderabad. The Mirs

gave land for the purpose and the well-known Akal Bhoonga was built

there. When the Gurdwara used drums and bugles, the Muslims were

scandalised. They objected to music before a mosque, which stood

next door. At first the Mirs asked the Akal Bhoonga to shift from

there. But realizing that it might displease the mighty Lahore

Durbar, they let it remain --- and, instead, converted the old

mosque into one ``for women only''. Of course no woman ever went to

offer namaz there. It remained locked.

 

Guru Nanak's two sons Baba Lakhmichand and Baba Srichand, gave rise

to the Jagiasu and Udasi schools of preachers. They also established

many temples. Chief of them was Bawa Gurpat Saheb, the twelfth-

generation descendant of Guru Nanak. He played a notable role in

Sindhi society. No wonder the Sindhis are very familiar with Sikh

scriptures. Today even important Sindhi Muslim leaders such as G.M.

Syed feel that the teachings of Guru Nanak would be good for all

Sindhis and Punjabis.

 

British rule ended the preferential treatment of Muslims under

Muslim rule, and held the scales of justice even between the Hindus

and the Muslims. Given equal opportunities, the Hindus forged far

ahead of the Muslims, because of their traditional interest in

education and business. Soon they dominated the services, the

professions, trade and industry. The Muslim was confined to land and

crafts. So much so that when partition took place and refugees

arrived in Sindh, they wondered how Pakistan could be established in

Sindh. They said: ``There are more Muslims in Lucknow and Patna than

in Hyderabad and Karachi in Sindh.''

 

The Sindhis had always traded with foreign lands. Their slogan was:

``Service is lowly; agriculture is noble; but trade alone is

profitable.'' Thousands of years ago they had traded with, and even

settled down in, eastern Mediterranean, as Phoenicians. Shah Latif

has a whole lovely ``Sur Samundi'' on the annual trading expeditions

to Lanka, Java and China. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 gave

a tremendous impetus to this trade. Beginning with Sindhi arts and

crafts --- hence the name ``Sindh- worki'' for them --- they soon

ranged all the way from textiles to curios to diamonds.

 

When the British took over, the Hindus did not hold any land. The

British gave land to the retiring officers, most of them Hindu. The

wealthy began to buy lands at market price. The improvident Muslim

landlords began to mortgage lands to the Hindu money-lenders, who

gradually acquired the same on default. In one century of British

rule, the Hindus had come to, acquire about 40 per cent of the land.

Another 20 per cent was believed to have been mortgaged to them.

Some Muslim League leaders --- particularly Sir Abdullah Haroon ---

made this into a big issue. Here was a gentleman who started life as

a cycle-repair assistant on four annas a day, and ended up as a

crore-pati, who grudged 30 per cent of the population .(Hindus)

owning 40 per cent of the land! He could never see the initial

iniquity of the Hindus (30 per cent of the population) holding zero

land under the Muslim rule. However, many other Muslim leaders noted

that the peasants were happier with the Hindu zamindars than with

the Muslim zamindars. They also noted that many Muslim zamindars did

not want education to spread --- for fear the next generation of

educated tenants might ask for more rights.

 

The real reasons for this shift of land-ownership were two: the

Hindus who had been starved of land for centuries, felt the natural

human urge for land --- and now they went in for it. Secondly, the

impecunious Muslim habits stood in sharp contrast with Hindu

prudence. A Muslim tended to spend beyond his means; a Hindu tended

to save and invest. A popular saying was that when a Hindu had

money, he would buy or build more and more houses (Jaye Mathan

Jaye); when a Muslim had money, he would marry more and more wives (

Joye Mathan Joye).

 

And Muslim backwardness in the field of business is traditional.

Both the Mughlas and the British recognized the Hindu superiority in

trade. As the ``Mirza Namah'' of Aziz Ahmed advis- ed the Muslim

aristocracy in the sixteenth century: ``If he needs to borrow money,

he should borrow it from a Hindu Mahajan, whom he should prefer to a

Muslim Mughal merchant, e-en though the latter lends money free of

interest. He should totally avoid purchasing from the shop of a

Mughal, as it means paying four times the cost of the thing

purchased and suffering great loss, and in the end it means

listening to fourfold harangues of these merchants in the market-

place. On the other hand, a Hindu is content even if he reduces the

interest, considers the little he gets as plenty and is thankful for

it.''

 

Robert Clive had the same experience. He wrote: ``These fat

expensive Moormen (Muslims) spend Government's revenue in luxury and

assuagements. Indeed in my opinion none but Gentoos (Gentiles, that

is Hindus) ought to be renters of counters who always spend less

than their income and can, when called upon, make good any

deficiency in the revenues.''

 

Some leaders did try to mend the Muslim matters. G.M. Syed told them

not to overspend on wedding ceremonies. He advised them to reduce

the size of salwar and patko (turban) from 20 yards to 3-4 yards. He

even begged of them not to bathe just once a year. As president of

the Sindh Provincial Muslim League he conducted a regular campaign

for the Muslims to take to trade. But all this takes a long time. As

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad put it, ``lt takes a whole generation even

to learn how to wear a shoe properly.''

 

Pir Husamuddin Rashdi ridiculed the extremes of puritanism and

profligacy in Muslim society. On the one hand they observed such

strict purdah that even a pregnant woman was not allowed into the

zenana --- for fear she might be carrying a male child, who might

cast a glance on the secluded beauties. On the other hand, one could

see any number of them twirl their moustache with one hand and feel

their private parts with the other hand, on seeing a winsome lady.

 

The major responsibility for the backwardness of Muslim society lay

with the mullahs. Too many of them were as ignorant as they were

fanatical. Knowing nothing about religion, they often divided over

non-issues. One would pronounce the hooka un-Islamic, another would

declare snuff Islamic. They would argue endlessly whether red or

black would be Islamic for dyeing a greying beard. Others would

discuss whether hands should be folded or separated at namaz time ---

and if folded, should they be held above the navel or,below it.

Professor Hotchand Gurbuxani had edited an excellent edition of

Shah's works. To this day it is recognized as a classic. But Maulana

Nizamani rejected it --- on the ground that no Hindu (polytheist)

could possibly enter the spirit of a monotheistic Muslim poet!

 

It was this stupidity and ignorance of many mullahs that roused Shah

and Sachal, the two greatest poets of Sindh, to denounce them in no

uncertain terms. Said Shah: ``Don't call the mullahs: they are

stooges. They would barter pearls for a pot of flesh. . . With open

eyes they would dive in a sea of sand.'' (Sujani Allah, tubbi

dinaoon dhoor mein.)

 

Sachal had only one solution for the unreasonable mullahs. ``Beat

the mullah on his head'' (``Kutt mian ji thorh''). G.M. Syed now has

suggested a legal ban on mullahs issuing fatwas, doing communal

propaganda, or taking part in politics.

 

The progress of the Hindus during the British rule was dramatic. To

begin with, the upper castes of Brahmins, Banias and Kayasthas had

remained Hindu, only landlords, peasants, artisans, soldiers had

become Muslim. So the earlier caste differentiation was now

compounded by creedal differentiation. With modernization, the caste-

community difference was reinforced by class differentiation. The

fact that the ``higher'' caste-class Hindu was also urban, only

further heightened the difference --- and widened the gulf. This

irked many Muslims. Leaving aside the mullahs, who were congenitally

anti-Hindu, even Khuhro once said: ``Today Muslim women are washing.

dishes in Hindu homes. I look for the day when Hindu women will be

washing dishes in Muslim homes.'' But G.M. Syed, after his

experience in the Muslim League --- which made him sadder but wiser

said: ``Why blame the Hindus for Muslim backwardness? Every morning

when the Hindu child takes his bath and goes to school, the unwashed

Muslim child is seen playing marbles in the dirty by-lane.'' Syed

once even suggested that all government jobs should be given only to

the Amils; he found them so good.

 

While Premier Allah Bux was positively nationalist, even Premier Sir

Ghulam Hussian Hidayatullah was non-communal. He was the son of

Duhlanomal of Shikarpur, who had married Hur Bibi, a Pathan girl.

The two wanted to live in peace, but the shortsighted Hindu society

would not let them. They, therefore, shifted to the holy peace of

Hardwar. After some time, however, the pull of the home-town brought

them back to Shikarpur, But once again the Hindu society would not

let them live in peace. Duhlanomal, therefore, became Muslim --- to

escape the Hindu taunts.

 

Although Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto made himself infamous as Dewan of

Junagadh in 1947, when that state acceded to Pakistan, he had never

been communal in Sindh. Indeed the communalists thought him so much

pro-Hindu that they used to say he must have been fathered by a

Hindu. While this statement seems malicious, Sir Bhutto's wife, who

bore him ``Zulfy'', was certainly Hindu. She was Lakhan Bai before

she became Khurshid. Poet Sheikh Ayaz's mother was Dadan Bai, a

Hindu lady of Shikarpur.

 

Hindus and Muslims, Shias and Sunnis, lived in peace. Outside of the

Sukkur district, communal violence was almost unknown. The Sindhi

Muslims heard the fighting slogan ``Nara-i- Taqdir', `Allah-o-Akbar'

only after the Khilafat movement The slogan at t he Battle of Miani

in 1843 was not ``Allah-o-Akbar'' but the Baluchi ``Marsaan,

Marsaan, Sindh na dhesaan'' (``We will die but we will not surrender

Sindh''). Fighting was considered bad. There was a saying: ``Give a

threat, make some noise. If even then the other fellow does not run

away, then better you run away!'' The typical Sindhi response to

tyranny will not be violence but Bhoondo or Bujo, accompanied by the

choicest epithets.

 

Contrary to orthodox Sunni directives, the Shias and the Sunnis in

Sindh jointly mourned the martyrdom of Hassan and Hussain and took

out Tazias, inspired by the Rath of Puri Jagannath. These Tazias

were huge affairs which were not immersed or buried, but moth-balled-

and renovated every year. The Hindus offered coconuts and

``patashas'' at the Tazias. Moharram was something of a spectacle to

which the Hindus and Muslims looked forward, as we do now to

Republic Day tableau.

 

Typical of this harmoniously philosophical attitude of life was one

Ram Dularay at Keamari, the harbour of Karachi. He was so good at

setting bones that even Col. Johnson, the civil surgeon of Karachi,

took his son to him, when the boy fractured three bones. Ram Dularay

charged no fees and attended to the rich and the poor alike in

strict order. When Johnson's son recovered in two months, the

surprised doctor offered him a 150 rupees job in the hospital. But

Ram Dularay preferred to stay on as a harbour chowkidar on 30 rupees

a month.

 

One day Pir Ali Mohammed Rashdi took Rai Bahadur Hotchand of

Nawabshah to Ram Dularay for his bone-setting. When Rai Bahadur's

turn came, Ram Dularay set his fractured bones, recognized Rashdi,

then a rabid Muslim Leaguer. Ram Dularay turned to him and said:

``My son, you will be happy if you remember that life is like a

piece of paper in a stream. It can only melt away. If not today,

then tomorrow.'' Obviously Rashdi felt touched by it and so he has

mentioned it in his memoirs.

 

Thanks to the storm that shook all India, Sindh had become part of

Pakistan. Most of the Hindus left the province. But it is a matter

of satisfaction that by and large there were no hard feelings. Many

Sindhi refugees brought ``Sindhu-jal'' and/ or some earth, as sacred

mementos. Pir Husamuddin Rashdi, noted Sindhi journalist, wrote

recently: ``In fact it was the Hindus who had built Sindh. They

adorned it. They brought to it wealth from the four corners of the

earth. They built great houses. Today we cannot even maintain

them.'' He added: ``The real masters of Sindh were the Hindus. They

had the education, the jobs, the trade, the land.'' He thinks that

the Hindus made the mistake of not acting as helpful elder brother

to the Muslims. He could be right; maybe the Hindus should have done

more for the Muslims. However, the schools, the colleges the

hospitals, and other institutions set up by the Hindus were open to

the Muslims. On the other hand, the rich Muslim zamindars never did

anything for anybody, Hindu or Muslim.

 

G.M. Syed has three complaints against the Sindhi Hindus: they

always thought in all-lndia terms; they inserted many Sanskrit words

in Sindhi; and they called the Sindhi Muslims derisively as ``Jhat''

(corrupt form of Jat).

 

Syed is at once right --- and wrong. All Sindhis thought in all-

India terms, whether the terms were Hindu or Muslim. It is true some

second-line Hindu writers did insert some Sanskrit words in Sindhi.

But adding two per cent more Sanskrit to a language that was already

seventy per cent Sanskrit, was hardly a sin; on the other hand many

frant-rank Muslim writers loaded Sindhi with more Persian and Arabic

words than our sweet language could bear. As for using the word

``Jhat'' for all Sindhi Muslims --- including Sir Ghulam Hussain! ---

it was certainly unfortunate. But it was the casual habit of

centuries, which did not mean offense. Funnily enough, it was the

Baluchis --- themselves very illiterate --- who first dubbed all

Sindhi Muslims, as ``Jhat'', meaning illiterate. And even a Hindu

child, poor at studies, would be told: ``Are you a Jhat?''

 

It will thus be seen that inspite of the wide educational and

economic gulf between the Hindu and the Muslim segments of Sindhi

society, there was no bitterness in their relations. The Muslims had

transformed old gods into new Pirs. Many Hindus visited Muslim

durgahs which, in turn, had adopted Hindu-style morning and evening

drum-beats. The common Muslims were known as Kando (thorn) Kauro

(bitter one) Mitho (sweet one), Bacho (saved), Waryo (returned),

Soomar (monday), Ambo (mango) --- and not by those Arab names. The

Muslims continued with the same good old talismans as are to be

found in Mooanjo-daro.

 

Births were celebrated. Like the Hindu ``mundan'' (shaving of head)

they had ``Akiko''. At about age eight, when the Hindu normally had

his ``Janeo,'' (sacred thread ceremony), the Muslim boy was

circumcised and given a saffron-coloured lungi to wear. Wedding

songs were similar --- and in chaste Sindhi. The Hindu bridegroom

proved his manhood by breaking a coconut; the Muslim bridegroom did

so by breaking an earthen pot. Like the Hindu couple, the Muslim

couple also touched foreheads. In both communities the couple

exchanged fistfuls of sesame seeds back and forth seven times, for

amity and an abundant brood. The Muslims believed that marriages

solemnised before dawn --- ``bhej-bhini'' --- as per ancient custom,

were more successful. The ceremonial wedding articles were known to

both the Hindus and the Muslims as ``Deva''. They had the same post-

wedding feast of the two families in ``Satavaro''. As Tarikh-e-

Tahiri moaned long ago: ``Each month has several Ids for them.''

Even the first Monday and the first Friday of each month were turned

into festivals, complete with fairs and feasts.

 

Normally the Sindhi Muslims did not eat beef; nor the Sindhi Hindus,

pork. When the Rashdi brothers of Sukkur were short of money which

was very often --- they got their meals from the langar (community

kitchen) of Sadhbela, the leading Hindu temple in Sindh. The menu,

they write, consisted of ``Daal, Poori, Halwa, Khichri, Aachar,

Papad, Basar (onion) and Kanah Prasad.''

 

Important as these external unities were, even more important was

the unity of their philosophy The Hindu and the dominant Muslim

views of life were the same. The Hindu saw God in everything,

everywhere. And so did the great Sufi poet-saints of Sindh. They

were all ``Wujudis'' who saw no difference between the Creator and

His creation and not ``Shahudis'', who distinguished between God and

his creation --- and between `god and god' and `man and man'.

 

In the words of Annemarie Schimmel: ``In Sindh, the borders between

Hinduism and Islam were not hermetically closed. A classical example

of this close connection is `Sur Ramkali' in Shah Abdul Latif's

`Risalo', a poem in which this mystic praises the wandering yogis in

terms taken from Quran and Hadith. Sachal Sarmast and his followers

have not hesitated to sing the essential Unity of Being that

manifests itself now in Abu Hanifa, now in Hanuman, now in the

Vedas, now in the Quran.''

 

The Islamic ``la ilah ilallah'', (which literally means there is no

God but Allah) was re-interpreted by poet Shah Abdul Karim thus:

``One who takes the seller, the buyer and the wares to be one and

the same, will know its meaning.'' ``This world,'' said Shah Latif,

``is a mansion with a million doors and windows; whichever way you

look, you will see God.''

 

No wonder the Hindu-Muslim relations were not half as bad in Sindh

as in many other provinces. To this day, the Sindhi Hindus remember

Sindh with misty eyes -and the Sindhi Muslims remember the Sindhi

Hindus in lndia with fond affection. Says Pir Husamuddin of Sukkur

with anguish: ``That Sukkur is gone. Those Sakhroos are gone too.

Our compatriots are gone. Their place has been taken by strangers.''

Says Sheikh Ayaz of Sindh:

 

 

 

Poesy is a river

On whose banks today

I have seen

Saraswati and Mahakali;

The two together

Were drinking moonlight;

They have come together

After long ages,

No doubt today will be born

A great Maha Kavi.

 

 

 

The great poet has no doubt been born. It is the youth of Sindh. And

its poetry is ``Jye Sindh!'' ``Jai Sindhu Desh!''