Nation for PeaceReligion for PeaceSpirituality for Peace

Was Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi a freedom fighter of India? Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi on Khushtar Noorani’s Book

Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi (1700-1850) is known in the Indian subcontinent as one of the early Muslim freedom fighters of India and a great reviver and thinker of Islam.

Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi (1700-1850) is known in the Indian subcontinent as one of the early Muslim freedom fighters of India and a great reviver and thinker of Islam. Among the Indo-Pak Islamic clergy and ulema, he is popularly regarded as a ‘shaheed’ (a martyr of Islam) who led the Mujahideen movement in India.

Was Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi a freedom fighter of India?

But it is interesting to note that a number of scholars of Indian Islam have recently observed that Maulvi Syed Ahmad ‘Shaheed’ Rai Barelvi was not a freedom fighter. In reality, he was India’s chief exponent of Wahhabism, an adherent and fervent supporter of puritanical fundamentalism and physical jihadism instead of theological jihad against basic instincts and carnal desires (jihad al-nafs). Interestingly, Sufi orders and silsilahs like Naqshbandiyah, Chishtiyah and Qadriyah influenced him in the beginning. But during his pilgrimage to Mecca in 1821, after meeting the Wahhabi patrons in Saudi Arabia, he became fascinated by Wahhabism and became a puritanical fundamentalist and a jihadist cleric.

The conversion of Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi from Sufism to Wahhabism is clearly evident from his own book, Sirat e Mustaqeem (straight path), in which he devoted the entire third chapter to Sufism, but with the same line of thought set out in the ‘kitab al-tawheed’ of Ibn Abd Al-Wahhab (book on monotheism).

In much the same way, he declared Mushrik to all mystically inclined Muslims (polytheists) and all Sufi beliefs and practices as antithetical to the pristine and puritanical Islam and thus called for a radical reform in Sufism. A great many Wahhabi madrasas, in their text books, depict Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi along with Ismail Dehlvi as the leading religious ideologues and teach their books in their syllabi under the subject of islami aqaid (Islamic beliefs).

Besides his stern attempts to purge the inclusive, pluralistic and composite traditions of Indian Muslims and Islam, his tahrik-e-jihad or Mujahidin movement against the Punjab Sikhs was the most conspicuous job he did. Sheikh Muhammad Ikram, a noted Islamic historian in India, writes in a detailed and descriptive way about Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi’s jihadism under the sub-title “Jihad.” He notes: “He [Rai Barelvi] began his full preparation for the jihad against the Sikh community when he reached his hometown and sent Maulana Ismail Shaheed and Maulana Abdul Hayy across the country to preach the cause of the jihad.”… “Maulana left Rai Bareli on 17 January (1826) for his trip to Jihad. He had 5-7 thousand Indians with him at that time who were fully prepared for the jihad for the religious freedom of the Muslims in Punjab. For this reason, they were well-determined to give up their lives. The Maulana reached Kabul, passing via Gawaliyar, Tonk, Ajmer, Marwar, Hyderabad, Sindh, Shikar Pur and Qandhar, from where he entered Peshawar via Khaibar”. (Mauj-e-Kausar, by Sheikh Muhammad Ikram, pp. 24-25, published by Adabi Duniya, Matia Mahal, Delhi).

Almost all Deobandi and even Ahle Hadisi schools of thought adherents glorify Maulvi Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi as ‘Shaheed’ (Islamic martyr), since he was killed in the undivided India, while carrying out the militant jihad against non-Muslims. This has been persuasively argued in a classical Islamic reference book in Urdu, ‘Mauj-e-Kausar, Musalmanon Ki Mazhabi Aur Ilmi Tarikh Ka Daur-e-Jadid‘, a history text book included in many Deobandi madrassas, written by Sheikh Muhammad Ikram, himself inspired by Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi.

Maulvi Rai Barelvi continued to be very vigorous and active in his call for Islamic Puritanism in the whole subcontinent of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh throughout his entire life. In fact, he is a relevant example of how many Sufi Sunni thinkers, who were basically egalitarian at some point because of their adherence to the Sufi orders, changed their worldview drastically and supported exclusivist religious ideas. More interestingly, this community of Islamist scholars in India left ideology in the subcontinent more active, impacting and prevailing than even the inclusive Sufis who had originally introduced Islam to their people. Their followers are much more enthusiastic and realistic than those who preserve the all-embracing cause of Indian Sufi saints by making high claims.

Apparently, the Mujahidin movement of Syed Ahmad is now an age-old history for Indian Muslims, but many are still influenced by his religious exhortations to jihad as “an act of worship greater in value and rewards than spiritual prayer”. Therefore, as a host of militant jihadist outfits proclaim, a restoration project of Rai Barelvi’s Mujahidin movement is on the rails in the subcontinent. For instance, in February 2011, Maulvi Samiul Haq, emir of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-S) party, stressed ‘the need to revive Syed Ahmed Shaheed Rai Barelvi’s Mujahidin movement’ against a religious minority in Pakistan, the Sikh community. “The objectives of the jihad launched by our Islamic leader Syed Ahmed Shaheed against British rule and the Sikhs in the 19th century have yet to be achieved,” Maulvi Samiul Haq argued.

Similarly, Syed Ahmed Rai Barelvi is frequently depicted as a jihadi role model for the Tahrik-e-Taliban Pakistan militants in many Taliban videos. Not only this, even after the 1857 revolt against British rule, the hardcore doctrines of Rai Barelvi and their poisonous tentacles spread by Shah Ismail Barelvi had a huge impact on Muslims in India. Countless Islamic seminaries, madrassas, maktabs, mosques, Islamic associations and outfits that were established later in India, fell in the cauldron of the Wahhabi impact.

Given all this the question arises whether the Mujahidin movement of Rai Barelvi in India was a fight against British imperialism or a militancy against the Indian Sikh community that was religiously and politically motivated? Intellectual curiosity among classical Islamic scholars was caused by the increased historical and ideological implications of the Mujahidin movement of Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi. Most of them however, did not study it in an objective and critical way and thus ended up in a hollow glorification of the so-called “Shaheed”  (martyr of Islam). A few of them, on the other hand, ventured into a critical analysis of India’s first jihadist movement. A remarkable research work in this direction was produced by a contemporary classical Islamic scholar, Maulana Khushtar Noorani who rendered a complete book to this research question, entitled, “tahreek-e-jihad aur British government: ek tahqeeqi mutala”. The title of this book in Urdu ( تحریک مطالعہ تحقیقی ایک گورنمنٹ:جہاداوربرٹش) can be loosely translated as — The jihad movement and the British government: A research study.

Mr Noorani came up with an entirely different perspective on the Mujahidin movement of Rai Barelvi. Much against the canonical statements and writings of mainstream Islamic historians and scholars of Darul Uloom Nadwa, Deoband and Ahl-e-Hadith, he arrives at the conclusion that Rai Barelvi’s movement was not aimed at challenging the British imperialism; rather it was an armed militancy against the Sikh community of Punjab. He clearly states in this book that Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi or his jihadi faction did not contribute to the freedom movement of India at all.

The conclusion of Maulana Noorani crashed the consensus of authoritative Indian Islamic scholars such as the renowned Islamic historian Maulana Ghulam Rasool Mahr, Maulana Abul Hasan Ali Nadwi, Maulana Masood Alam Nadwi, Maulvi Syed Muhammad Ali and several others. ” Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi engaged in an armed jihad against the Sikh adherents, Maulana Noorani avers. He had the support of India’s hundreds of Mujahideen, including numerous Muslim Sarhad [border] tribes, who came to join his movement in large numbers. All of them actively participated with great zeal and fervour in the jihad led by Syed Ahmad Rai Barelvi.”

A very fascinating story in one place has been enumerated by Maulana Noorani. He wrote that Syed Ahmad Sahib’s close disciples once asked him why he had changed his focus from his spiritual activities and prayers to physical jihad. Upon this, Rai Barelvi replied to them with full conviction: “There is no prayer greater than jihad. Therefore I am fully prepared for the jihad. You too please get ready for that.”

The Mujahidin movement of Rai Barelvi against the Sikh community was initiated, according to the Pakistani Studies textbook that is taught in Class Nine. In 1826, he arrived in Sindh and tried to assist Syed Sibghatullah Shah, who sent a strong contingent of staunch followers called “Hurs”.

The book continues: “Syed Ahmed Shaheed left his family under the protection of Pir Pagara and continued without any regard for his family towards Jihad. After passing through Afghanistan, the Khyber Pass and Peshawar in December 1826, he reached Nowshehra, making it his headquarter. The first battle against the Sikhs was fought near Akora on December 21, 1826. The Sikhs were defeated.  At Hazro, the second battle was fought. It was won by the Muslims as well. These successes encouraged the Jihad Movement to join a number of Pathan tribes. The Mujahideen number increased to 80,000. The status of ‘Amir-ul-Momineen’ was granted to Syed Ahmed Shaheed Barelvi. In the region that Syed Ahmed Shaheed Barelvi governed, Islamic laws were enforced”.

The author is a writer and scholar of comparative religion. Write to him at grdehlavi@gmail.com

Show More

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CAPTCHA ImageChange Image

Back to top button
Translate »