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Sects Within Sect: The Case of

Deobandi–Barelvi Encounter in Pakistan
a
Ashok K. Behuria
a
IDSA ,
Published online: 27 Feb 2008.
To cite this article: Ashok K. Behuria (2008) Sects Within Sect: The Case of Deobandi–Barelvi
Encounter in Pakistan, Strategic Analysis, 32:1, 57-80, DOI: 10.1080/09700160801886330
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Strategic Analysis, Vol. 32, No. 1, January 2008
Sects Within Sect: The Case of Deobandi–Barelvi

Encounter in Pakistan
Ashok K. Behuria
Downloaded by [Universitat Politècnica de València] at 22:43 27 October 2014
Abstract
The Sunni Muslims of South Asia are divided into two major sub-sects,
i.e. Deobandi and Barelvi, named after their places of origin in India in
the 19th century. Because of abiding differences between them, these two
sub-sects have built up walls of hatred and mistrust between them over
time. The faultline between them has erupted violently in Pakistan since
the late 1970s. While there are some pioneering works available on their
separate worldviews, no study has yet been attempted to critically analyse
the nature of their interaction at the political level. This article discusses
the pattern of interaction between the sub-sects since the colonial days,
during the movement for Partition, and later in Pakistani politics.
Pakistan is an Islamic state. As per the last census in 1998, Muslims

constitute 96.28 per cent of its population.1 Such an overwhelming majority
would, on the face of it, lead to an abiding sense of cohesion among the
people, ensuring ‘asabiya’ (social solidarity) that the well-known Muslim
sociologist Ibn Khaldun2 (1132–1406) emphasised as the hallmark of a state.
But the fact remains that Muslims of Pakistan, as Muslims elsewhere, are
divided along sectarian lines. By some estimates, as per broad sectarian di-
visions, there are 77 per cent Sunnis and 20 per cent Shias in Pakistan.3 This
gives Sunnis an impressive lead in Pakistan and would imply a majoritar-
ian Sunni plank for the Islamic state of Pakistan. However, the Sunni sect
again subdivides into sub-sects (which are regarded as independent sects
by some analysts) reducing the ability of the Sunnis to evolve a consensus
on the nature of Islamic state that each of them would seek to impose on the
State of Pakistan. Some estimates suggest that there are 50 per cent Barelvis,
20 per cent Deobandis and 4 per cent Ahl-e-Hadith within the Sunni fold.4
These intra-sectarian differences within the Sunni fold effectively pluralise
ISSN 0970-0161 print / ISSN 1754-0054 online

DOI: 10.1080/09700160801886330
C 2008 Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses
58 Strategic Analysis
the dominant Islamic discourse in Pakistan and reduce the impact of Islam
on the statecraft.
In the aftermath of the Afghan jihad, an even more divisive strain of
‘militantism’5 has entered the sectarian world of religion and politics in
Pakistan. ‘Militantism’ or the temptation to use violence to weaken the
competing ideology is a virus that has gripped society. While the domi-
nant form of interaction among different schools of thought of Islam was
through ‘munazara’ (debate) and ‘radd’ (disavowal through argumentation)

in the subcontinent, this dangerous trait of violence has threatened to stifle
the spirit of enquiry and independent approaches to Islam. At the politi-
cal level, this has the capacity to assume disastrous proportions and may
spell havoc for the Pakistan State unless the state recognises the trend early
and repositions itself vis-a-vis the sectarian monster that it has itself inad-
vertently created like Frankenstein. The suicide attack on a congregation6
celebrating Milad-un-Nabi (birthday of the Prophet) at Nishtar Park on April
11, 2006, demonstrated the extent of damage that such radicalisation can
cause to the state and society of Pakistan.
This article explores the encounter between the Deobandis and the
Barelvis in Pakistan and traces the evolution of the militancy within their
folds. It goes on to analyse the impact of such radical confrontation on the
state and society of Pakistan and the Muslim societies in the neighbouring
states. The article seeks to argue that even if the leaders of the two groups
might have come together at the political level, the seeds of distrust continue
to divide them at the ground level. Thus the intra-sectarian faultline is likely
to widen further and add to the internal security problems of the Pakistan
State in the days to come.
The Two Sunni Schools: Deobandi and Barelvi

It is useful to study the evolution of these two separate schools of
thought within the Sunni sect and trace the commonalities as well as differ-
ences between them. The two schools—Deobandi and Barelvi, named after
their places of their origin—do not signify the rise of any fresh, unique and
innovative strands within Islam. They were in fact names given to already-
existing trends in Islam at the turn of 18th century in India. Both these
schools were influenced by the reformist school of thinking that emerged
out of the concern for the future of the Dehlavi ulema (scholars in Islam
from Delhi) as well as Islam in India in the face of declining power of the
Deobandi–Barelvi Encounter in Pakistan 59
Mughals. The foremost among them was Shah Waliullah (1702–1763) of

Delhi, who, through his Madrassa-i-Rahimiyya, sought to revive Islamic
learning and reform Islam by purging it of its eclectic influences (bid’a
or innovations). A contemporary of Abdul Wahab (1703–1792) of Arabia,
Waliullah shared the former’s concern for extraneous accretions (bid’a) into
Islam but, unlike him, he was uncritical of the mystical order of the sufis.
In fact, he had claimed that he was instructed by the Prophet to take
upon himself the task of uniting the different fiqhs (schools of jurisprudence
by leading Islamic jurists), i.e. Hanafi, Maliki, Shafei and Hanbali. He em-
phasised the need of all Muslims to access the knowledge contained in the
Quran and held that it was the responsibility of the learned to interpret
the Quran without the assistance of the different schools of jurisprudence.
He had to face tough criticism for his efforts at translating the Quran into
Persian.
He also argued that the road to ijtihad (independent interpretation of
Islam) was not closed, and one could interpret the Quran in light of hadith
(traditions relating to the words and deeds of the Prophet Muhammad)
rather than solely bank on the opinion of the Islamic jurists (fiqhs). However,
at the same time, he urged Muslims of India to follow Hanafi School because
a divine revelation had instructed him so. It needs brief mention here that
Waliullah believed strongly in a powerful Islamic state and deplored the
decline and disintegration of the Mughal rule, which he attributed to the
lackadaisical attitude of the later rulers towards Islam. He, in fact, went to
the extent of inviting the then Afghan ruler Ahmad Shah Abdali to invade
Delhi and re-establish the rule of Islam in India.7
Waliullah’s tradition was continued by his three children, his
grandchildren,8 and his or their disciples. The inherent contradictions in
Waliullah’s philosophy in due course of time matured into four separate
schools of thought in Islam in India – the Deobandi, the Ahl-e-Hadith, the
Tablighi and the Barelvi. Each of these schools drew upon the Waliullah
tradition and borrowed from its strands according to its needs. In the
subsequent days, all these schools have sought to re-adapt themselves to
the changing times and demonstrated an inclination to swing between one
extreme and another.
There was another parallel stream of Islamic learning, if not reform,
flowing at the same time from the Sihalvi family based in Sihala (Uttar
Pradesh or UP, India), which later shifted to Lucknow upon the murder
of Maulana Qutubudin Sahid Sihalvi during the reign of Aurangzeb in

the late 17th century AD. Qutubudin Sahid’s son, Maulvi Nizamuddin
Muhammad Sihalvi, was the founder of the famous Firangi Mahal
madrassa in Lucknow.9 He is also credited with the development of
the Nizamia Education System, modelled after the 11th century state-
sponsored madrassa curriculum in Baghdad. This curriculum—known in
the Indian subcontinent as Dars-i-Nizami—is being followed by almost all
madrassas of different sectarian persuasions with revisions over time. The

reformist/revivalist stream flowing from the Waliullah legacy had to run
into this stream of Islamic learning one day or the other, as is seen later.
Dar-ul-Ulum, Deoband
The decline of the Mughal Empire since early 18th century and the
subsequent rise of British power in India were regarded by Islamic scholars
of the time as indications of the final loss of power of the Muslims. In fact,
the defeat of the 1857 uprising by both Muslims and Hindus to resurrect
Mughal rule left the ulema bewildered and dejected. They attributed the
eventual decline of Muslim rule to a moral crisis visiting the Muslims of
the subcontinent. It was thus felt that there was an urgent need to reform
and revive the Islamic faith, and the only way out in front of the religious
scholars was to teach a version of Islam that they thought was unsullied and
pure. The reassertion of Muslim orthodoxy assumed different shapes for
different schools. If it was intensely reactive, vis-a-vis the western culture
on the one hand, it was also imitative as far as adopting the instrumentalities
of the western culture was concerned, on the other. There were modernists
also who shared the concerns of their fellow Muslim clerics but sought
power and influence through secular means of administration introduced
by the colonialists.10 Their approach to Islam was academic and scholastic,
and they tried their best to reinterpret Islam according to the need of the
times. There was, indeed, a modernist, pragmatic response from Sir Syed
Ahmad Khan (1817–1898), who went on to establish the Aligarh University,
but the ulema dismissed such a prescription as un-Islamic and even called
Sir Syed a kafir (infidel or non-believer).
In 1866, the setting up of the Islamic madrassa at Deoband, a small
town in the present-day Uttar Pradesh, India, signalled the confluence of
the two streams of reformism (Shah Waliullah tradition) and Islamic learn-
ing (the Firangi Mahal Tradition). Maulana Qasim Nanautwi (1832–1879)
and Maulana Rasheed Ahmad Gangohi (1829–1908) were the founders of
the madrassa. Both were disciples of Imdadullah Muhajir Makki (1817–

1899), who was a great Muslim saint of the Chishti Order in 19th century
India and had the reputation of leading the ulema during the 1857 War of
Independence. The failure of the 1857 rising forced the ulema to come to the
conclusion that, rather than taking up the sword against the British, it was
more important to take steps to protect the Islamic faith. Out of this con-
cern, the madrassa came up at Deoband—Dar-ul-Ulum Deoband11 —in May
1866. As a pall-bearer of the Waliullah tradition, the Deobandi madrassa

laid emphasis on Sha’ria (Islamic law based on Quran, Sunnah and Hadith)
as well as Tariqa (‘path’, born out of religious experience or Tassawwuf). In
as much as it accommodated Sufism, it sought to purify Islamic mysticism
and rescue it from all influences from other local faiths and cultures.
The Barelvis12
Imam Ahmed Raza Khan (1856–1921) of Bareilly (also in UP) countered
the approach adopted by the Deobandis. He repudiated the stance of the
Deobandi ulema that visiting of shrines or graves of religious saints was
bi’da and held that the practices by the pirs (holy men) and sufi (a mystical
order) saints were well in line with Islamic principles. A venerable alim him-
self, he stood by the sufi tradition of intercession between man and God and
found nothing objectionable in the play of music (qawali) for invoking reli-
gious experience. He also emphasised the infallibility of Prophet Muham-
mad unlike the Deobandis. Deobandis would regard Prophet Muhammad
as Insaan-i-Kamil (or a perfect human being), but followers of Raza Khan
would regard Muhammad as a superhuman entity, always hazir (present)
and even if he is not in flesh and blood, he is all-pervasive as noor (light).
Ahmad Raza Khan’s approach was closer to the tolerant, subcontinental
approach to Islam and was received well among the lay and the uninitiated
common folk. The entire Barelvi tradition was built up on the scholarly
works of Ahmad Raza Khan. The first madrassa of the Barelvis came up in
1905, which was known as Jamait-i-Manzir-i-Islam.
Each of the two schools sought to spread its version of pure Islam
through a proliferation of madrassas, which taught, through the works of
their advocates, two separate worldviews. There were many commonali-
ties between them, yet they differed from each other in practice. The two
siblings of the Walliullah tradition have fought a battle of one-upmanship
ever since, and in Pakistan today, these two streams are increasingly seek-
ing recourse to violence to prevail over each other.
Approach to Politics During the Colonial Period

It would be useful to see how the above-mentioned theological or
philosophical traditions/principles translated into political practices dur-
ing the colonial period (see Table 1). The Deobandis captured the political
space early, by opposing the colonial penetration in West Asia, regarded

as the cradle of Islam. Anjuman-i-Khuddam-i-Kaaba, which spearheaded the
movement against British manipulation of political power in the region,
was founded in 1913. With the signs of the British power disregarding the
Ottoman Caliphate during the war, the Muslims of India expressed their
anxiety over the issue and very soon an alliance between the ulema and
the Indian National Congress materialised to launch the famous Khilafat
Movement. The response of the All India Muslim League (AIML)—the
political group founded in 1906 that sought to safeguard the interests of
the Muslim community—was rather lukewarm to the Khilafat movement
during this time.
In 1919, the first-ever ulema-led political group took shape in the
form of Jamiat-ul-Ulema-i-Hind (JUH). The JUH displayed a reflexive
anti-colonial bias, which made its tie-up with the Congress Party easier,
which was, till then, being viewed by the Muslim elite in India as a Hindu-
dominated political movement. In fact, when the Deobandi ulema were
tying up with the Congress, the Muslims of Barelvi persuasion advocated
that such an alliance with Hindus was unnecessary, unprofitable and
un-Islamic. As the Deoband establishment chose to side with the Congress,
in spite of the steady build-up of the separatist movement in favour of
Pakistan, there was a steady migration of pro-separation ulema out of JUH
into the movement for Pakistan subsequently. Throughout the 1920s and
1930s, when the Muslim League hardened its stance in favour of separate
electorates and a separate state for the Muslims of British India, the JUH
was increasingly viewed by a substantial section of the Muslim elite,
especially in the Muslim minority provinces, as a political grouping acting
against the interests of the community. The elections of 1937, in which
the League lost out to the Congress party, came as a stark reminder to the
AIML leadership that the League lacked mass support. It was then that the
League pooled the support of the forces opposed to the Deobandis, who
had aligned themselves with the Indian National Congress.
Table 1 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches During Colonial Period
Deobandi Barelvi
Concerns Common concerns about decline of Muslim rule, need
to revive Islam
Madrassas The madrassa founded in Founded by Imam Ahmed
May 1866 by Maulana Raza Khan (1856–1921)
Qasim Nanautwi of Bareilly, first madrassa

(1832–1879) and Maulana came up in 1905
Rasheed Ahmad
Gangohi (1829–1908)
Shirk Favoured some sufi orders Favoured Bida’at
No to innovations (innovations)
Against shirk parasti
Visit of graves, Visits to graves and Urs
participation of Urs not un-Islamic
Against the idea of In favour of intercession
intercession by dead or by pirs and saints
alive saints
Colonialism Virulently anti-colonial Neutral
Khilafat In the interest of Islam, Any alliance with Hindus
there was a need to join is counter-productive
hands with Congress and against Islam
Political Necessary
Participation Deobandis formed Barelvis formed
Jamiat-ul-Ulema-i-Hind Jamiaat-i-Aliyah
(1919) al-Markaziah (All India
Sunni Conference) in
1925
Pakistan Counter-productive for Islam Enthusiastic about Pakistan
Movement Kept away from Pakistan Took a blind plunge
movement A breakaway
group headed by S.A.
Usmani supports Pakistan
The first rival ulema body that sought to counter the influence of the
Deobandis at the political level was formed by the Barelvis in Kanpur in
the year 1921. This was named Jamiat-ul-Ulema-i-Kanpur, which advocated
contact with the AIML. One of the most vocal dissidents among the De-
obandi scholars, Maulana Ali Ahmad Thanwi (1863–1943), widely known
as Hakim al-Ummat (sage of the Muslim community), was the first to resign
from the rectorship of Dar-ul-Ulum Deoband and came out openly in sup-
port of the AIML. The next to defect was Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani
(1885–1949). He engaged the ulema over the issue of whether it was in the
interest of the Muslims to join the AIML or not. In the aftermath of passing
of the Pakistan Resolution in 1940, Usmani organised a four-day conference
on October 26, 1945, in Calcutta, and echoed Jinnah’s position that the 100
million Muslims of South Asia were a separate nation. This conference led
to the birth of a pro-Pakistan outfit by the ulema, which was known as the
All India Jamiat-ul-Ulema-i-Islam (AIJUI) or All India Assembly of Islamic
Clergy,13 with Usmani as its elected president. It was also around this time
that the chief Mufti of Deoband, Maulana Muhammad Shafi (1897–1976),
ruled that the demand of the AIML for the separate State of Pakistan for
the Muslims was the only Islamic course open at that point of time. It was
natural for him to migrate to Pakistan later in 1949. The naib (deputy) Mufti
Ahmad Ali (who later added Lahori to his name, upon his migration and set-
tlement in Lahore after Partition) also supported the 1940 Lahore resolution.
All this was happening when the leading Deobandi scholar Maulana
Hussain Ahmad Madani (1874–1957) was advocating cooperation with
Congress. In fact, Madani had coined the term Muttahida Quamiyat (com-
posite nationalism) based on territorial nationalism rather than religious
nationalism to support his stance. In a desperate bid to demonstrate unity
in Deobandi ranks, a JUH delegation led by Maulana Madani approached
Maulana Usmani immediately after the Calcutta conference on December
1, 1945. But Maulana Usmani and Maulana Zafar Ahmad Thanwi, who
played a major role in the campaign for Pakistan in Sylhet, refused to yield
and joined the election campaign of the League with increased enthusiasm
and devotion.
While Deobandis were divided over the issue of a separate state for the
Muslims, the Barelvis were wedded to the cause of Pakistan right from the
start. The Barelvi ulema gathered in Muradabad during March 16–19, 1925,
and formed Jamiaat-i-Aliyah al-Markaziah or All India Sunni Conference
(AISC). It opened its membership only to Sunni orthodox Muslims and
decided to work towards uniting all Sunnis in India. Pir Jamaat Ali Shah
was its first president and Maulana Naimuddin Muradabadi was elected as
its first Nizam-i-Ala (the chief leader). AISC started holding annual meetings
in different parts of India and started running down the Deobandi JUH.
The presidentship went to Maulana Hamid Riza Khan and came back to
Pir Jamaaat Ali Shah again in 1935. In its Badayun annual meet, the AISC
expressed its concern at the way Ibn Saud (1880–1953) of Saudi Arabia was
treating the sacred places of the Muslims. The pir declared, on the day the
Congress ministries resigned (which was celebrated as ‘Day of Deliverance’
as per Jinnah’s appeal on December 22, 1939), from the AISC platform, ‘the
flag of Muslim League is the flag of Islam’ and ‘all Muslims must join the
League’.14
In fact, the different branches of AISC worked enthusiastically towards
the making of Pakistan. The zeal for Pakistan was visible in the AISC weekly
publication from Amritsar, Al-Fiqh. From 1942, the weekly started adding
Pakistan after Amritsar to connote that the state had almost come into being.
On October 19, 1945, the pir of Manki Sharif, Aminul Hasnat, convened a
three-day meeting of pirs and sajjada nashins and organised the Jamiat-ul-
Asfiah to support the cause of the League. In an early demonstration of
its emphasis on an Islamic State of Pakistan, the pir of Manki Sharif had
extracted an assurance from Jinnah as early as in November 1945 that
the Constituent Assembly of the new State of Pakistan would ‘enact laws
not inconsistent with the Sharia’.15 The dominance of the Barelvi ulema
in the Pakistan movement can be gauged from the fact that out of the 35
ulema members of Masaikh Committee appointed by the League to utilise
the support of pirs for the Pakistan movement, as many as 30 were of
Barelvi persuasion.16 The Barelvis were prepared to rope in Muslims of
other persuasions, with the exception perhaps of the Deobandis, into the
movement. The Barelvi leaders such as Maulana Abdul Hamid Badayuni
held that Pakistan was a matter of life and death for the Muslims and went
to the extent of suggesting a merger of AISC with the AIML.17
One major reason for Deobandi disapproval of the idea of Pakistan was
its expanding support base among the Shias, the Ahmadis or Mirzais and
the Barelvis. Deobandis could not take such a heterodox movement as an Is-
lamic movement and were rather alarmed by its populist overtones, which
through the slogan of an Islamic state at the grassroots level by the Barelvi
pirs and sajjada nashins (guardians of the shrines), overwhelmed their overly
puritanical Islamic concerns. The Barelvis had earlier demonstrated their
aversion to Deobandi approach to politics by refusing to join them in the
Khilafat movement, for they had held that any alliance with the Hindus
would not yield any positive dividend in the long run. The AIML’s strategy
of employing local-level Barelvi saints and sajjada nashins also exhibited the
latter’s susceptibility to the Pakistan movement.18 It is an irony of history

that a majority of the central leadership of the Barelvi AISC chose to stay
back in India after Partition and the creation of Pakistan in 1947.
Enter Pakistan: Deobandi–Barelvi Encounter in Politics

Immediately after Pakistan came into being, the two schools shed their
aversion to worldly issues and tried to make their presence felt in the po-
litical scenario of the country (for a cursory view, refer to Table 2 ). The
Deobandi AIJUI led by Maulana Usmani reorganised itself as Markaji JUI
(MJUI) in 1947 with its head office at Karachi and the Barelvi AISC renamed
itself as Markazi Jamaat-i-ul-Ulema-i-Pakistan (MJUP) in March 1948. How-
ever, the dissident Deobandi ulema, who supported the cause of Pakistan,
played a more influential role than the Barelvi MJUP in the politics of Pak-
istan after 1947, even after the death of the most vocal Deobandi leader,
Maulana Usmani, in 1949. Immediately after Partition, the Muslim League
selected Maulana Usmani as one of the members of the Constituent Assem-
bly of Pakistan (CAP), while there was no representation from MJUP. The
Barelvi Sunni ulema were not quite comfortable with the close relationship
between AIML and JUI, in spite of the fact that the Barelvis had almost
offered to merge themselves with the AIML once upon a time. In fact, the
sense of displeasure had expressed itself in the top leadership of the MJUP
for the official patronage of Deobandis quite early in 1947–48. The Deobandi
ulema claimed their role in influencing the framing of the ‘Objective Resolu-
tion’ of Pakistan, which was presented in March 1949. The Barelvis, on their
part, sought membership for its leader Maulana Abdul Hamid Badayuni
in the CAP, but the League leadership was not too keen on this offer.
Since the modernists—if not secularists—among the Muslim elites
dominated the politics of the immediate post-Partition period, the Deoban-
dis and Barelvis along with other groups like Jamaat-i-Islami, Jamaat-i-Ahl-e-
Hadith, Tahaffuz-i-Huquq-i-Shia Pakistan and many others came together and
started their campaign for an Islamic state. In a show of solidarity, which
was not unusual in the early days of Partition, ulema of all groups gathered
in Karachi on January 21, 1951, and evolved a consensus on 22 fundamental
principles on which the Islamic state of Pakistan would be established. The
initiative for this coming together was taken by the Deobandi ulema, and
the recommendations were sent to the Nishtar committee for incorpora-
tion in the upcoming Constitution. These 22 fundamental principles were
to form the basis for JUI demand for Islamisation for quite a long time.
Table 2 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches: Post-Colonical Politics in

Pakistan
Issues Deobandi Barelvi

Kashmir Urged the government to use force
Constituent Found representation Nominated one
Assembly of representative, turned
Pakistan down
Came together in their campaign for an Islamic state
(1951), initiative taken by Deobandis
Ahmadiya Started the movement Reluctant entrants
Issue against Qadianis Enthusiasm at the
margins
Dissolution of Opposed the move Supported the move
Constituent
Assembly of
Pakistan
(1954)
Ayub’s Rule Fell out of official favour Cosied up to Ayub
Supported 1962
Constitution
Fatima Ready to support with Opposed to the idea of a
Jinnah’s conditions woman president
Candidature
1965 War Ayub let the winning army Supported Ayub
down
East Pakistan Supported the idea of Supported armed
dialogue intervention
Issue of Supported talks Alliance Saw it as divisive and
Regionalism with regional parties opposed to Islam
Rise of Bhutto Did not see any Held it anti-Islamic
contradiction between
Islam and socialism
Anti-Qadiani Participated in the
Movement movement
of 1974 enthusiastically Forced
Bhutto to declare them
non-Muslims
Anti-Bhutto Joined hands
Alliance
(Continued on next page)
Table 2 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches: Post-Colonical Politics in

Pakistan (Continued)
Issues Deobandi Barelvi

Nizam-e- Joined hands
Mustafa
Zia-ul-Haq Jamiat-ul-Ulema-i-Islam Largely undecided
Rule Supported and then

retracted Split when
Fazlur joins MRD
Afghan Jihad Supported jihad. Joined the Participated but did not
US–Pak–Saudi efforts enjoy official patronage
Wahabisation and sectarian Jealously guarded their
traits emerged anti-Wahabi tenor
Madrassa Saudi funds poured in Barelvis seek to defend
Growth in geometric their turf. Rise in number
proportion of madrassas
Taliban Received governmental At the receiving end
attention and patronage Defensive militantisation
Offensive militantisation
Post-Taliban Mainstream political groups from both the sub-sects
joined hands as a political force, Muttahida Majlis-e-
Amal; however, militant groups from both the groups
continue to engage in violence
It is also important to mention here that the Deobandis were the first
to start the anti-Qadiani movement in the wake of the oft-cited speech by
Sir Zafarullah Khan on May 18, 1952, at Jahangir Park in Karachi, where
he emphasised on the finality of the Prophet and called the founder of the
Ahmadiya movement, as a person commissioned by God for tajdid-i-din
(revival of true religion). The Deobandis were particularly incensed about
his assertion that ‘that Ahmadiyyat was a plant implanted by God Himself,
that this plant had taken root to provide a guarantee for the preservation of
Islam in fulfillment of the promise contained in the Qur’an, that if this plant
were removed, Islam would no longer be a live religion but would be like
a dried up tree having no demonstrable superiority over other religions’.19
Barelvis were reluctant entrants into the anti-Qadiani movement, but
once they joined the movement, they left their mark. It should also be
mentioned here that in spite of the popular demonstrations on the streets

by Barelvis, their leader Maulana Abul Hasnat Qadri was opposed to direct
action against the Qadianis. The Barelvi MJUP all this while demanded an
official ecclesiastical role for the ulema, and demanded that the Consti-
tution ought to have a provision for ulema membership in the different
organs of administration and judiciary. Barelvi ulema were not quite com-
fortable with the Deobandi influence in the process of the drafting of the
Constitution and even hailed Governor General Ghulam Muhammad for

dissolving the Assembly on October 24, 1954. As soon as the new Con-
stituent Assembly was formed, the Barelvis made yet another unsuccessful
attempt in 1955–1956 to make their presence felt until they, like the ulema
of other schools, were swept away by the military rule by Ayub Khan.
Both the MJUI and MJUP suffered divisions because of first Partition
and then the regional divide between the two parts of Pakistan, and the
West Pakistan (WP) branches of JUI and JUP were formed in the mid-1950s.
The JUP considered Ayub Khan’s rule an opportunity for itself to grow and
seek official patronage, and, thus, its leadership welcomed Ayub Khan’s
1962 Constitution, whereas other Islamic parties opposed it. Ayub was
particularly uncomfortable with the Deobandi JUI leadership and started
cultivating the Barelvi JUP. Shahibzada Fazial Hassan—the Sajjada nashin
(descendant of a sufi saint) of Alo Nahar Sharif—and leader of WPJUP after
the death of Maulana Qadri—was particularly amenable to Ayub’s concil-
iatory approach towards the Barelvi group. In the presidential elections
of 1965, the Barelvi WPJUP opposed Fatima Jinnah’s candidature on the
ground that it was not Islamic to have a woman as a president of an Islamic
country and supported Ayub Khan. On the contrary, the WPJUI led by
Mufti Mahmud (1919–1980) and Ghulam Ghous Hazarvi was inclined to
offer conditional support to Ms. Jinnah—the Combined Opposition Parties
(COP) candidate. However, she was not prepared to accept the conditions
to secure JUI’s support.
Despite the official support it received during the rule of Ayub Khan,
the Barelvi WPJUP was weakened by divisions. There were many groups
within the party who opposed JUP’s support to Ayub Khan, but still the
central leaders were pro-Ayub and basked under official patronage. Dur-
ing the post-Ayub Khan period, it was the turn of the MJUI to side with the
party most likely to come to power, the PPP, led by the charismatic Zulfikar
Ali Bhutto. MJUI led by Mufti Mahmud supported Bhutto’s idea of Islamic
socialism. The Barelvi JUP along with Jamaat-i-Islami of Maulana Maududi
opposed the very idea of socialism and held it anti-Islamic. The JUI later fell
out with Bhutto and the latter’s policy of meddling with the provincial gov-
ernments led by JUI and its alliance partner National Awami Party (NAP)—
the left-wing Pakhtun nationalist party led by Badshah Khan’s son Khan
Abdul Wali Khan (1917–2006)—drove a wedge into its relationship with
PPP. The anti-Qadiani movement in 1974 and the Nizam-e-Mustafa move-
ment (Movement for the establishment of Mohammad’s law) launched by
the religious parties in the wake of the elections in 1977 saw the JUI and
JUP coming closer. During this period, it was observed that the JUI led by
Mufti Mahmud (1919–1980) consolidated its position in the North-Western
Frontier Province (NWFP) and Balochistan, whereas JUP under the lead-
ership of Maulana Shah Ahmad Noorani (1926–2003) sought to bring the
Barelvi Ahl-e-Sunnat groups together under one umbrella in rural Punjab
and Sindh.
Afghan Jihad and Militantisation20 of Sectarian Divide

The JUI, JUP and other religious groups welcomed the military coup
and the subsequent rule of General Zia-ul-Haq. They expected Zia to im-
pose an Islamic rule in Pakistan. But it was the Jamaat-i-Islami led by
Maulana Maududi that emerged as the party Zia-ul-Haq was comfortable
with. The JUP disillusionment with Zia came early when it became clear
that he had no intention of holding elections. It was the first among re-
ligious groups to disassociate itself from the Pakistan National Alliance
(PNA)—which was formed with the avowed aim of ousting Bhutto from
power. The PNA went on to join the National Government during the early
days of Zia’s rule, without the JUP. The JUI also discovered the same some
time later and withdrew its support. Both JUP and JUI were condemned
to political wilderness with the rising fortunes of Jamaat-i-Islami during
the days of the Pakistan-backed Afghan jihad (1979–1989). However, this
was the period when JUI, more than JUP, consolidated its hold in NWFP
and northern Balochistan through a network of madrassas, under indirect
official patronage. The Deobandi madrassas, which were being run under
the leadership of Maulana Fazlur Rahman, Maulana Sami-ul-Haq and Sufi
Muhammad, provided the personnel for jihad. Maulana Sami later came
to be known as the ‘Father of the Taliban’.
In fact, during the Afghan jihad years, the Zia-ul-Haq regime en-
couraged the Deobandi madrassa system and, very soon, there was a
proliferation of madrassas all over Pakistan. The jihad in Afghanistan al-

tered the country’s political landscape entirely. With the flow of funds
from outside, madrassas grew in geometrical progression. By some esti-
mates, the growth has been phenomenal since then.21 The official statistics
regarding the number of Madrassas have been revised from time to time,
and more and more madrassas have been forced to register themselves with
the government. The Pakistani Minister for Religious Affairs, Mr. Ejaz-ul-
Haq (Late Zia-ul-Haq’s son), had recently informed Washington during

his trip to the United States that there were 11,882 madrassas being run
under the topmost Madrassa oversight board, Ittehad-e-Tanzimat-e-Madaris-
e-Dinya (ITMD), and, of them, more than 11,000 had been registered.22
With the flow of funds into Deobandi and Wahabi organisations and
the adoption of militancy as a legitimate strategy by the government of
Pakistan since the Afghan jihad, there was an increasing trend towards
militancy within the sectarian groups in Pakistan. The emergence of
Deobandi sectarian groups like Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Sipah-i-Sahaba
Pakistan and their subsequent nexus with militant jihadi outfits such as
Harkat-ul-Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Tayiba during this period (and later
with Jaish-e-Muhammad, a splinter group of Harkat) signalled a major
transformation of the political realm in Pakistan. These militant outfits
have since sought to change the sectarian landscape by force. The surge in
inter-sectarian and intra-sectarian violence in Pakistan in the aftermath of
the Afghan jihad proves this point.
During this period, another important development took place—the
internal fragmentation of the JUI and JUP, the two mainstream political
parties representing Deobandi and Barelvi views, respectively. The frag-
mentation has been ascribed to the electoral politics on non-party basis
introduced by Zia-ul-Haq in 1985. It is also known that Fazlur Rahman’s
decision to join the anti-Zia pro-democracy movement in the late 1980s had
created differences between him and other leaders within the JUI. During
the 1985 elections, several groups from within JUI and JUP splintered away
unofficially and contested the elections. In the early 1990s, the divisions be-
came sharper.
The JUI got divided into different factions named after their leaders,
i.e. Maulana Sami-ul-Haq (Akora Khattak, NWFP), Maulana Abdullah
Darkhwasti (Rahim Yaar Khan, Punjab), Maulana Ajmal Qadri (Lahore,
Punjab) and Maulana Fazlur Rahman (Dera Ismail Khan, NWFP). The
division was more political than ideological. These factions of JUI ap-
peared moderate in comparison with militant sectarian groups such as
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Sipah-i-Sahaba, which were also founded during
this period. But it did not stop here. The political support base of JUI
was further divided into Tablighi Jamaat led by Maulana Abdul Wahab,
and Tahaffuz-i-Khatam-i-Nabuwwat under Maulana Khan Muhammad
of Kundian Sharif. There were other Deobandi factions such as Tahaffuz-
i-Ahal-i-Sunnat under Syed Abdul Majeed Nadeem and Harkat-ul-Ansar

led by Maulana Saadat Ullah Khan. Harkat-ul-Ansar became infamous
later for its involvement in terrorist attacks in Jammu and Kashmir
and Afghanistan. Another pan-Deobandi group was Sufi Muhammad’s
Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (Movement for the Enforcement
of Islamic Law), which gained influence in Malakand and Swat.
The JUP also got divided into several groups. Sunni Tehrik was founded
in the mid-1990s by Maulana Saleem Qadri of Karachi. Its followers wear
dark brown turbans. Dawat-i-Islami was led by Maulana Ilyas Qadri, who
had been president of the Anjuman Tulaba-i-Islam, Punjab, the youth wing
of JUP. The Dawat-i-Islami built a huge campus at Kahna, in the suburb
of Lahore. Its followers wear green turbans. Tahir-ul-Qadri, known for
his institution, Minhaj-ul-Quran, which emphasises on preaching of Islam,
heads two factions of the JUP, i.e. Jamaat Ahl-e-Sunnat and the Tehrik-i-
Tahaffuz-i-Namoos-i-Risalat. The fragmentation of the Barelvi groups into
regional and local groups was perhaps due to the weakening of the pulls
of cohesive politics among the Barelvis at the national level. They were
also divided on their approaches to politics and their views on how to
defend their sectarian interests. Some of them advocated pacifist measures,
whereas others like Sunni Tehrik advocated the use of force and violence
in self-defence.
Aftermath of Afghan Jihad

The success of the Afghan jihad boosted the confidence of the Deobandi
groups. Deobandi Maulanas—Fazlur Rahman, Maulana Sami-ul-Haq and
Maulana Sufi Muhammad—gained a lot of prominence at the local level
for their able participation in the Afghan jihad. In the context of state-
sponsored militancy in the 1980s, Deobandi groups had taken to armed
politics and asserted their presence in the internal politics of Pakistan. This
had perhaps led to disenchantment among the Barelvi groups, and many
of the leaders took to militancy while groups such as Sunni Tehrik were set
up to defend Barelvis against any possible attack by Deobandis and others.
After Zia’s death in August 1988, Pakistan reverted to multi-party
democracy. As Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) gained strong
popular support, Zia’s military successors fashioned out a pro-Islamic al-
liance called Islamic Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI or Islamic Democratic Alliance).
Fazlur Rahman’s softness towards Benazir Bhutto and his disinclination to
join the army-backed alliance created further rift within the JUI. Among
the several JUI factions, JUI-Fazlur (JUI-F) emerged as the major Deobandi
political party and the principal successor to the old JUI. Rival JUI leader
Abdullah Darkhwasti issued a fatwa declaring that a woman ruler was
haram (heresy) in Islam. The Barelvi JUP joined IJI and hoped to benefit
from its links with the army. However, the PPP led by Benazir came to
power and JUI-F enjoyed her government’s patronage. Benazir’s removal
and subsequent success of IJI in 1990 elections pushed JUI-F to the oppo-
sition again. During this period (1990–1993), the differences between the
Deobandis and Barelvis were glossed over as the compulsions of compet-
itive electoral politics-engendered political alliances among the Deobandi
and Barelvi groups at the political level.
In the elections of 1993, there were three different Islamic alliances:
Pakistan Islamic Front (PIF) led by Jamiat-i-Islami (JI), the Islami Jamhoori
Mahaz (IJM) led by JUI-F and the Muttahida Deeni Mahaz (MDM), including
the Sipah-i-Sahaba. Together, these fronts could secure just 6.7 per cent of
the total votes.23 Benazir’s return to power in 1993 and the PPP’s subsequent
alliance with JUI-F led to the marginalisation of most of the other religious
political groups. This was the period when out of all Deobandi factions,
JUI-F played a major role in Benazir’s efforts to bring Taliban into the
centrestage in Afghanistan.
Deobandi extremist groups operating in Punjab and Sindh also began
to be drawn into sectarian attacks on Shias during the early 1990s. The
mainstream religious parties did seek to bridge the sectarian differences by
forming a coalition dominated by the religious parties of all persuasions on
March 24, 1995. This was named Milli Yakjehati Council (MYC), a coalition
of more than 15 religious parties. The council, however, could not resolve
internal differences amongst different factions of JUI. In the subsequent
elections in 1997, after Benazir’s second term was cut short by presiden-
tial intervention, JI’s leader Qazi Hussain made an effort to bring several
religious parties together and convert MYC into an electoral alliance. He

failed in his effort and JI finally boycotted the 1997 elections. The only party
that survived through all this political permutation and combination was
the JUI-F. Nawaz Sharif’s party (PML-Nawaz) swept the 1997 polls as JUI-F
could win two seats in the National Assembly. During Nawaz Sharif’s sec-
ond term, the faultline between Deobandi and Barelvis became wider with
militants targeting leaders of both the groups on a regular basis.
Ever since the days of the Afghan jihad, the Deobandi–Barelvi com-
petition at the political field has been transferred to the competition at
the grassroots level. The Deobandis took maximum advantage of the jihad
funds pouring in from outside and sought to expand their area of influ-
ence, while the Barelvis struggled to keep pace with them. It was around
this time that the close nexus between the Pakistan State agencies and the
Deobandi groups emerged. It was also interesting to find a larger Deobandi
consensus emerging among other sister movements such as Ahl-e-Hadith
and Tablighi Jamaat.24
Intra-Sectarian Faultline Erupts: The Deobandi Militancy

and Barelvi Response
If Afghan jihad radicalised approaches to Islam and militantised them,
the withdrawal of Soviet troops left them with no other excuse for united
action. During the jihad days, the Deobandis and Barelvis came together
in Afghanistan and Pakistan to take on the enemy. But in the absence of a
common enemy in the post-1989 period, these two groups started fighting
between themselves. While, on the one hand, the nature of democratic pol-
itics between 1988 and 1999 de-emphasised the role of religion in politics,
on the other, the government actively backed the Taliban in Afghanistan
and the armed militant groups unleashed into Jammu and Kashmir. Politi-
cians like Nawaz Sharif proved smarter than religious leaders and co-opted
the Islamist agenda by coming out with the Sharia bill in 1998. Ironically,
political marginalisation of the religious elements coincided with the rise
of Islamic radicalism in Afghanistan actively patronised by the Pakistani
State. The radical approach adopted by the Taliban had to have its impact
in Pakistani society.
With the rise of the Taliban and its Deobandi outlook, the Wahabi
incursion as a result of the co-option of Deobandi madrassas by the Saudi
charitable organisations such as Al Hamrain and Al Rasheed trusts, as
well as the active support of the Pakistani State, the sectarian elements
in Pakistan received a huge fillip, and the rising incidence of sectarian
incidents since the 1990s proves this point.25
The basic aim of the Barelvis in this context was initially to guard their
turf and protect themselves against what they saw as a state-sponsored ef-
fort to wean away their following and weaken their influence. The Barelvi
organisations thus responded to this Deobandi radicalisation by their ef-
forts to weave different factions of Barelvi groups together and forge unity
among them. In fact, unlike factions of Deobandi JUI, the Barelvi JUP had
been a less assertive political outfit, and it was a loose and amorphous
organisation, unable to bring disparate groups together as an effective po-
litical force in Pakistan. But, in recent years, there have been efforts to pool
their strengths and establish themselves as a major political force.
Several Barelvi organisations have sought to take up the interest of the
Barelvis in recent years. Some of them were Jamaat Ahl-e-Sunnat led by
Syed Riaz Hussain Shah, Pakistani Awami Tehrik (PAT) led by Allama
Tahir-ul-Qadri, Dawat-i-Islami led by Maulana Illyas Qadri and Allami
Tanzim Ahl-e-Sunnat led by Maulana Afzal Qadri. In fact, in response to
the Deobandi militancy targeting Barelvi mosques and leaders, the late
Salim Qadri, a former member of Barelvi Dawat-i-Islami, had founded
the militant Sunni Tehrik in 1990. Among several demands that the Tehrik
placed on the state, the most important one was that the state should ensure
adequate Barelvi representation in government services and armed forces
as well, which the Tehrik viewed as grossly tilted towards the Deobandis.
The sway of the jihadi Deobandi ulema has radicalised Pakistan society
during the past two decades. The militantisation of one sect has led to
militantisation of others. The most disturbing factor for Pakistan in all
this was the intra-Sunni divide that has surfaced in the last few years.
This showed that the roots of sectarian conflict had gone deeper than it
appeared at the surface level. The murder of a Deobandi cleric, Maulana
Yusuf Ludhianvi on May 18, 2000, and the murder of Sunni Tehrik Chief
Maulana Saleem Qadri on May 18, 2001, exactly a year later, showed the
way the intra-sectarian divide has opened up in the post-Afghan jihad
years. The fact that in spite of the Musharraf regime’s best efforts, the
Deobandis could successfully attack the Milad un Nabi congregation and
wipe out the top leadership of the Tehrik on April 11, 2006, at Nishtar Park,
further proves the point that the Deobandi–Barelvi intra-sectarian divide is
likely to erupt more ominously in the days to come. It is also true that intra-
sectarian violence has assumed a dynamics of its own and pan-sectarian
political alliances like Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA or United Council
of Action), which brought together the mainstream Deobandi and Barelvi
groups, may not be able to preclude the possibility of continuing bloody
encounters between the two groups in future.
Conclusion
The basic differences between the two Sunni sub-sects, Deobandi and
Barelvi, have remained unreconciled as the separate theological and philo-
sophical traditions have congealed over time through their enthusiastic
propagation by separate madrassa education systems. As the lines of di-
vision have hardened over time, their separate responses to the external
stimuli have thrown up interesting patterns. At times, the two Sunni schools
have come together to take on a common enemy while jealously guarding
the sacred frontiers of their separate worldviews and their theosophical
principles.
The two schools of thought came together in the anti-Qadiani move-
ment in the 1950s and then in 1970s. But they tried their best to outbid
each other in the anti-Qadiani movement for Khatm-e-Nabuwat as well as
the movement for Nizam-e-Mustafa, which was effectively co-opted by Zia-
ul-Haq, to their disadvantage. They were (and still are) quite vociferous
about the Islamisation of the Constitution and law in Pakistan. But, these
commonalities apart, they competed with each other for following and
influence, each claiming to be more Islamic than the other.
Till the advent of the Afghan jihad, the history of their interaction
showed that while the differences could be visceral, they would rather
choose the weapons of ‘munazara’ (debate) and competitive propagation of
their line of thinking through scholarly articulations in their publications
to take on each other. However, in the post-Taliban period, the most effec-
tive strategy has been to decimate the opponent through targeted violent
attacks.
Although proliferation of madrassas is not a full indicator of the grow-
ing militancy in Pakistan, it is true that they have contributed to the sus-
tenance of a conservative environment that can host violence. In fact, the
experience of Afghan jihad and the purported success of the strategy of
employing religiously inspired mujahideen against the Soviet Union has

convinced the orthodox constituency in Pakistan that the traditional meth-
ods of keeping and preaching faith through forceful argumentation would
need to be supplemented by new means of coercion. The easy availability
of small arms in the country has made the matters worse.
The Nishtar Park tragedy, as well as the case of encounter between the
two clerics in the Bara Tehsil of the Khyber agency in NWFP, is suggestive of
their reconcilability of the two worldviews. In fact, the Nishtar Park incident
is being analysed as an extrapolation of the struggle for power between the
Deobandi Mufti Munir Shakir and the Barelvi Afghan Pir Saifur Rehman
in Bara, which went on for almost two years before the administration
asked both the clerics to leave Bara. While Pir Saif left immediately, Munir
was forced to leave Bara. Munir landed up in the Tirah valley and was
reported to be sowing his brand of sectarianism there. His disciple Mangal
Bagh, who heads the militant outfit, Lashkar-i-Islam, has kept the Pakistani
security forces on high alert since April 2006.
At the moment, different Sunnni Barelvi organisations—there are as
many as 45 of them in Pakistan today26 —are trying to come together ever
since the Bara encounter between the followers of Mufti Munir and Pir
Saif claimed nearly 13 lives, mostly Barelvis. The April 11, Nishtar Park
tragedy has awakened the Barelvi leadership who are now seriously think-
ing of coming out with a Grand Sunni Party (GSP) led by Pir Pagaro. Given
Pir Pagaro’s mercurial character, such an alliance may not be politically
influential but the fact that the Barelvi community is now aware of its
weaknesses and working towards overcoming them is a sign of changes
taking place. Such a political formulation may consolidate Barelvi con-
stituency vis-a-vis the Deobandis and others and could also radicalise their
politics.
A leading commentator and close observer of the sectarian politics
in Pakistan, Khaled Ahmed argued in the beginning of 2000 that if 1996
marked the shift to militant Deobandism with the rushing of Pakistani
recruits to defend the Taliban in Afghanistan, then from 2000, Pakistan
‘promised to revert to the non-Deobandi track’. He argued that the Pakistani
society had already reacted to ‘the puritanism and extremism of Deoban-
dism by inclining to the popular Islam of the Barelvis’27 and ‘charismatic
organiser-mystics’ like Illyas Qadri, Shah Raiz Hussain and Tahir-ul-Qadri,
who had started tapping the expatriate Pakistani community unsullied by
jihad for fiscal support in nourishing Barelvi constituencies in Pakistan.

The Barelvis, according to Khaled Ahmed, had also adopted a very accom-
modative posture vis-a-vis the Shias with the hope of bringing them on
board in their struggle against the Deobandis.
In the coming days, the sectarian situation in Pakistan is expected to
worsen. The aim of the Deobandi–Barelvi sectarian organisations has been
to acquire mosques, wipe out rival faith or belief systems by force, and
employ all possible means to protect their separate constituencies. It is ex-

pected that such an unremitting bloody struggle for power and influence at
the local levels between a highly organised network of Deobandi militants
and a loose but increasingly self-conscious community of Barelvis is not
going to abate easily. This is likely to further worsen the internal security
problems of the Pakistani State. At another level, such militancy at the sub-
sectarian level has the potential to influence intra-sectarian divides among
Muslims in neighbouring states and societies.
Notes
1
As per the statistics provided in the 1998 Census of Pakistan. See http://www.
statpak.gov.pk/depts/pco/statistics/other tables/pop by religion. pdf (Accessed
November 11, 2007).
2
Ibn Khaldun was born in present-day Tunisia. He is well known for his work,
Muqaddimah (translated into Latin as Prolegomenon), which is regarded as the
first-ever work on the philosophy of history. He is also considered as the first
philosopher in the medieval period who dealt with a wide variety of subjects like
historiography, mathematics, economics, sociology, theology and cultural studies.
3
As per the estimates of CIA World Factbook, 2005, at http://www.cia.gov (Accessed
October 1, 2007).
4
As per the estimates of globalsecurity.org based in Alexandria, Virginia,
at http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/intro/islam-barelvi.htm (Accessed
October 1, 2007).
5
I have deliberately introduced this jargon to differentiate it from its variant ‘mili-
tarisation’ and would suggest that there is an ideological drive/orientation guiding
militancy, which could be an important point of difference between the two.
6
See Dawn (Karachi), April 12, 2007.
7
In his letter to the Abdali, he wrote, ‘. . . All control of power is with the Hindus
because they are the only people who are industrious and adaptable. Riches and
prosperity are theirs, while Muslims have nothing but poverty and misery. At
this juncture you are the only person, who has the initiative, the foresight, the
power and capability to defeat the enemy and free the Muslims from the clutches
of the infidels. God forbid if their domination continues, Muslims will even forget
Islam and become undistinguishable from the non-Muslims’. Translation from his
original letter in Sayed Riaz Ahmad, Maulana Maududi and Islamic State, People’s
Publishing House, Lahore, 1976, p. 15.
8
Prominent among them were his son Shah Abdul Aziz (1746–1823), Shah Waliullah
Rafi-uddin (1749–1818), Shah Abdul Qadir (1751–1816) and Abdul Ghani, whose
son was the famous alim Shah Ismail Shaheed.
9
For details, see Francis Robinson, The Ulema of Firangi Mahal and Islamic Culture in
South Asia, Permanent Black, Delhi, 2001.

10
The argument here is influenced by the position taken by Mumtaz Ahamad in his
article ‘Islamic Fundamentalism in South Asia: The Jamaat-i-Islami and Tablighi
Jamaat of South Asia,’ in Martin E. Marty and R. Scot Appleby (eds.), Fundamen-
talism Observed, The Fundamentalism Project, I, paperback edition, University of
Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1994, pp. 457–529.
11
For details regarding the Deoband madrassa and Deobandi world view, see
Barbara D. Metcalf, Revival in British India: Deoband, 1860–1900, Oxford Univer-
sity Press, New Delhi, 2002.
12
For details about Barelvi interpretation of Islam, see Usha Sanyal, Devotional Islam
and Politics in British India. Ahmad Riza Khan Barelwi and His Movement, 1870–1920,
Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 1996.
13
For a detailed discussion of the formation of the JUI and its participation in
Pakistani politics, see Sayyid A.S. Pirzada, The Politics of the Jamiat-Ulema-i-Islam
Pakistan 1971–1977, Oxford University Press, Karachi, 2000.
14
Quoted in Mujeeb Ahmad, Jam’iyyat ‘Ulama-i-Pakistan 1948–1979, National Insti-
tute of Historical and Cultural Research, Islamabad, 1993, p. xxi.
15
See Khalid Bin Sayeed, Pakistan: The Formative Years: 1857–1948, Oxford University
Press, London and New York, 1968, p. 19.
16
Ian Talbot, Provincial Politics and the Pakistan Movement: The Growth of Muslim League
in North–West and North–East India (1937–1947), Oxford University Press, Karachi,
1988, pp. 23–24.
17
This is not to suggest, however, that there was absolutely no opposition to the idea
of Pakistan from the Barelvi ranks. There were some Barelvi Sunni leaders like
Maulana Qari Muhammad Tayyib, Pir Muhammad Sirajul Huda Qadiri, Maulana
Hashmat Ali Khan and Shah Aulad-i-Rasul Muhammad Mian Marahrawi (1892–
1052), who formed their own branch of Jamaat-i-Ahle Sunnat in 1935, and many
others who adopted a line close to the central leadership of the Deobandis and
argued that if support for the Congress was kufr then support for League led by
apostates, hypocrites and Shias like Jinnah was haram.
18
For a detailed discussion on the way the popular support for Pakistan was gener-
ated, see Ian Talbot, Freedom’s Cry: The Popular Dimension in the Pakistan Movement
and Partition Experience in Northwest India, Oxford University Press, Karachi, 1996,
and David Gilmartin, Empire and Islam: Punjab and the Making of Pakistan, Oxford
University Press, London, 1988.
19
Report of the Court of Enquiry constituted under Punjab Act II of 1954 to enquire
into the Punjab Disturbances of 1953, Government Printing Press, Lahore, Punjab,
1954, p. 75.
20
I have used this word, for want of a better alternative, to connote the onset of mil-
itancy during this period when the society was radicalised at both the ideological
and operational levels. There were many groups in Pakistan who thought they
could impose their brand of Islam through militant means.

21
As per the report of the International Crisis Group, titled ‘Pakistan: Madrasas,
Extremism and the Military’ of July 29, 2002 (Islamabad, Brussels): “In the first
years of Zia’s Islamisation (1979–82), only 151 new seminaries were established.
During the next six years, as the Afghan jihad gained momentum, 1,000 more
opened. According to the last (1995) official update, 2,010 new madrasas had been
registered since 1979, raising the total number registered to 3,906.”
22
India Abroad News Service, July 25, 2006.
23
Data taken from Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) website,
http://www.hrcpelectoralwatch.org/partyprofiles.cfm (Accessed November 11,
2007).
24
Khaled Ahmad, ‘The Grand Deobandi Consensus,’ The Friday Times, Lahore,
February 4–10, 2000, p. 4.
25
See for a detailed discussion, ‘The State of Sectarianism in Pakistan,’ Asia Report
No. 95, Report of the International Crisis Group, Islamabad, Brussels, April 18,
2005.
26
For details on Barelvi and Deobandi organisations, see Muhammad Amir Rana,
Gateway to Terrorism, New Millennium Publication, London, 2003.
27
Khaled Ahmed, ‘Re-assertion of the Barelvis in Pakistan,’ The Friday Times, Lahore,
September 8, 2000, p. 3.
Ashok K. Behuria is a Research Fellow at IDSA.

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Sects Within Sect: The Case of

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Sects Within Sect: The Case of Deobandi–Barelvi

Pakistan is an Islamic state. As per the last census in 1998, Muslims

ISSN 0970-0161 print / ISSN 1754-0054 online

through ‘munazara’ (debate) and ‘radd’ (disavowal through argumentation)

The Two Sunni Schools: Deobandi and Barelvi

Mughals. The foremost among them was Shah Waliullah (1702–1763) of

of Maulana Qutubudin Sahid Sihalvi during the reign of Aurangzeb in

madrassas of different sectarian persuasions with revisions over time. The

the madrassa. Both were disciples of Imdadullah Muhajir Makki (1817–

1866. As a pall-bearer of the Waliullah tradition, the Deobandi madrassa

Approach to Politics During the Colonial Period

space early, by opposing the colonial penetration in West Asia, regarded

Table 1 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches During Colonial Period

Qasim Nanautwi of Bareilly, first madrassa

latter’s susceptibility to the Pakistan movement.18 It is an irony of history

Enter Pakistan: Deobandi–Barelvi Encounter in Politics

Table 2 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches: Post-Colonical Politics in

Issues Deobandi Barelvi

Table 2 Deobandi–Barelvi Approaches: Post-Colonical Politics in

Issues Deobandi Barelvi

Rule Supported and then

mentioned here that in spite of the popular demonstrations on the streets

Constitution and even hailed Governor General Ghulam Muhammad for

Afghan Jihad and Militantisation20 of Sectarian Divide

proliferation of madrassas all over Pakistan. The jihad in Afghanistan al-

Haq (Late Zia-ul-Haq’s son), had recently informed Washington during

i-Ahal-i-Sunnat under Syed Abdul Majeed Nadeem and Harkat-ul-Ansar

Aftermath of Afghan Jihad

religious parties together and convert MYC into an electoral alliance. He

Intra-Sectarian Faultline Erupts: The Deobandi Militancy

employing religiously inspired mujahideen against the Soviet Union has

jihad for fiscal support in nourishing Barelvi constituencies in Pakistan.

employ all possible means to protect their separate constituencies. It is ex-

South Asia, Permanent Black, Delhi, 2001.

could impose their brand of Islam through militant means.

Ashok K. Behuria is a Research Fellow at IDSA.

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