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92-486: The term Gujarati Muslim is usually used to signify an Indian Muslim from the state of Gujarat on the western coast of India . Most Gujarati Muslims have the Gujarati language as their mother tongue, but some communities have Urdu as their mother tongue. The majority of Gujarati Muslims are Sunni , with a minority of Shia groups. Gujarati Muslims are very prominent in industry and medium-sized businesses and there

184-417: A gross state domestic product (GSDP) of ₹ 16.55 trillion (equivalent to ₹ 19 trillion or US$ 220 billion in 2023) and has the country's 10th-highest GSDP per capita of ₹ 215,000 (US$ 2,600). Gujarat has the highest exports of all states , accounting for around one-third of national exports. It ranks 21st among Indian states and union territories in human development index . Gujarat

276-636: A schism occurred among the Bohras and a new community of Patani Sunni Bohras was created. Some of the dominant South Gujarat landowning communities were also converted to Islam and along with the settled Middle Eastern merchants they formed the Bharuchi and Surti Sunni Vohra community. In the sixteenth century, the Memon community immigrated from Sindh and settled in Kutch and Kathiawar . Another Muslim sect,

368-722: A companion of Muhammad travelled to Gujarat in 918 C.E. and bore written witness account that more than 10,000 Middle Eastern Muslims from Siraf in Persia, Madha in Oman, Hadhramaut in Yemen , Basra and Baghdad in Iraq, and other cities in the Middle East, had settled in the Lata region , the present day South Gujarat-Konkan coast. The Chinchani copper plate inscriptions of Śaka Samvat show

460-521: A group that included Arab theologian Ibn Suwaid , several Sayyid Sufi members of the Aydarus family of Tarim in Yemen , Iberian court interpreter Ali al-Andalusi from Granada , and the Arab jurist Bahraq from Hadramaut who was appointed a tutor of the prince. Among the illustrious names who arrived during the reign of Mahmud Begada was the philosopher Haibatullah Shah Mir from Shiraz , and

552-486: A letter to his eldest son, Muhammad Azam Shah , asking him to be kind and considerate to the people of Dahod as it was his birthplace. Muhammad Azam was then the Subedar (governor) of Gujarat. In his letter, Aurangzeb wrote: My son of exalted rank, the town of Dahod, one of the dependencies of Gujarat, is the birthplace of this sinner. Please consider a regard for the inhabitants of that town as incumbent on you. When

644-590: A lion might indicate that the port city described is in Gujarat. For nearly 300 years from the start of the 1st century CE, Saka rulers played a prominent part in Gujarat's history. The weather-beaten rock at Junagadh gives a glimpse of the ruler Rudradaman I (100 CE) of the Saka satraps known as Western Satraps , or Kshatraps. Mahakshatrap Rudradaman I founded the Kardamaka dynasty which ruled from Anupa on

736-527: A mosque during the times of Muhammad in Gujarat and other parts of the western coast of India as early as the 8th century C.E, spreading Islam soon as the religion gained a foothold in the Arabian peninsula. Some of these early merchants were Ismaili Shia , both Mustaali and Nizari . They laid the foundation of the Dawoodi Bohra and Khoja communities. In the early era however Gujarat was ruled by

828-591: A number of earlier states in what is now Gujarat. Pushyagupta, a Vaishya , was appointed the governor of Saurashtra by the Mauryan regime. He ruled Girinagar (modern-day Junagadh ) (322 BCE to 294 BCE) and built a dam on the Sudarshan lake. Emperor Ashoka the Great , the grandson of Chandragupta Maurya , not only ordered his edicts engraved in the rock at Junagadh, but also asked Governor Tusherpha to cut canals from

920-651: A par with contemporary Venice and Beijing , great mercantile cities of Europe and Asia, and earned the distinguished title, Bab al-Makkah (Gate of Mecca). Drawn by the religious renaissance taking place under Akbar, Mohammed Ghaus moved to Gujarat and established spiritual centers for the Shattari Sufi order from Iran, founding the Ek Toda Mosque and producing such devotees as Wajihuddin Alvi of Ahmedabad whose many successors moved to Bijapur during

1012-578: A prominent military figure in Indian history at large, remains a figure of veneration to the Siddis of Gujarat. There is historical evidence of Persians and Arabs, both Muslim and Zoroastrian ( Parsi ) settling along the Konkan -Gujarat coast as early as the 9th, 8th and perhaps 7th century. Middle Eastern traders landed at Ghogha (located just across the narrow Gulf of Cambay from Bharuch / Surat ) around

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1104-465: Is a state along the western coast of India . Its coastline of about 1,600 km (990 mi) is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the fifth-largest Indian state by area , covering some 196,024 km (75,685 sq mi); and the ninth-most populous state , with a population of 60.4 million in 2011. It is bordered by Rajasthan to

1196-598: Is a good town of the Moors , built of very pretty houses and squares. It is a rich and agreeable place ...... the Moors of the town trade with Malacca , Bengal , Tawasery (Tannasserim), Pegu, Martaban, and Sumatra in all sort of spices, drugs, silks, musk, benzoin and porcelain. They possess very large and fine ships and those who wish Chinese articles will find them there very completely. The Moors of this place are white and well dressed and very rich they have pretty wives, and in

1288-689: Is a very large Gujarati Muslim community in Mumbai and Karachi . Having earned a formidable accolade as India's greatest seafaring merchants, the centuries-old Gujarati diaspora is found scattered throughout the Near East, Indian Ocean and Southern Hemisphere regions everywhere in between Africa and Japan with a notable presence in: Hong Kong , Britain , Portugal , Canada , Réunion , Oman , Yemen , Mozambique , Zanzibar , United Arab Emirates , Burma , Madagascar , South Africa , Sri Lanka , Mauritius , Pakistan , Zambia and East Africa . Throughout

1380-638: Is also prominent .At the same time, the Muslims from various provinces such as Hyderabad Deccan , Kerala , Balochistan, Sindh, Punjab , Gujarat, Kashmir and other parts of South Asia also moved to capitals of Muslim empire in Delhi and Agra . After the death of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb , in 1707, Mughal rule began weaken after ruling for a century. Most of Gujarat fell to the Marathas , and this period saw

1472-587: Is home to Urdu speaking communities such as those of Hansot and Olpad . The Gujarat coastline is also home to significant numbers of Siddi , otherwise known as Zanji or Habshi , descendants of Africans e.g. Royal Habshis (Abyssinian aristocracy e.g. Siddi Sayyid ) or Bantu peoples from Southeast Africa that were brought to the Indian subcontinent as slaves by the Portuguese and Arab merchants. Siddis are primarily Sufi Muslims , although some are Hindus and others Roman Catholic Christians. Malik Ambar ,

1564-468: Is pardonable. There are Gujaratees settled everywhere. They work some for some and others for others. They are diligent, quick men in trade. They do their accounts with fingers like ours and with our very writings. Gujarat was one of the twelve original subahs (imperial top-level provinces) established by Mughal Emperor ( Badshah ) Akbar , with a seat at Ahmedabad, bordering on Thatta (Sindh), Ajmer , Malwa and later Ahmadnagar subahs. Aurangzeb ,

1656-533: Is regarded as one of the most industrialised states and has a low unemployment rate , but the state ranks poorly on some social indicators and is at times affected by religious violence . Gujarat is derived from the Gurjaras , who ruled Gujarat in the 8th and 9th centuries CE. Parts of modern Rajasthan and Gujarat were known as Gurjarat or Gurjarabhumi for centuries before the Mughal period. Gujarat

1748-921: The Akbari mystics Abd al-Razzaq Kāshānī (died 1329), Sa'id al-Din Farghani (died 1300), and the Persian poet Saadi Shirazi (died 1292). Today, most orders have dissolved in Middle Eastern countries such as Syria . However, the order is still active in Iraq , where it recruits new members. The presence of the Suhrawardi order in India was established by three disciples of S̲h̲ihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar Suhrawardī , who established branches in Delhi , Bengal , and Multan . The most successful proselytizer of

1840-655: The Ghoris had assumed a position of Muslim supremacy over North India, Qutbuddin Aibak attempted to conquer Gujarat and annexe it to his empire in 1197, but failed in his ambitions. An independent Muslim community continued to flourish in Gujarat for the next hundred years, championed by Arab merchants settling along the western coast. From 1297 to 1300, Alauddin Khalji , the Turko-Afghan Sultan of Delhi , destroyed

1932-585: The Gujarat Sultanate . Prominent and well respected Sāda who claimed noble descent through Abu Bakr al-Aydarus ("Patron Saint of Aden"), were held in high esteem among the people and became established as Arab religious leaderships of local Muslims. Intermarriages with Indian Muslim women were highly sought which led to a creole Hadhrami-Indian community to flourish in Gujarat by the 17th century. The 19th century European Gazetteer by George Newenham Wright, corroborates this cultural exchange through

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2024-648: The Gurjara-Pratihara dynasty, Vikramaditya II of the Chalukya dynasty and Bappa Rawal of the Guhila dynasty . After this victory, the Arab invaders were driven out of Gujarat. General Pulakeshin , a Chalukya prince of Lata , received the title Avanijanashraya (refuge of the people of the earth) and honorific of "Repeller of the unrepellable" by the Chalukya emperor Vikramaditya II for his victory at

2116-879: The Mahdawi also settled in Gujarat and led to the creation of the Tai community. In 1593, the Mughal Emperor Akbar conquered Gujarat and incorporated Gujarat in the Mughal Empire. This period led to the settlement of the Mughal community. A good many Sayyid and Shaikh families also are said to have arrived during the period of Mughal rule. With the establishment of the Sufi Suhrawardi and Chishti orders in Multan , Sind and Gujarat, pirs enjoyed state patronage. Saiyed from Gujarat in sidhpur ganvada

2208-586: The Maurya and Gupta empires and during the succession of royal Saka dynasties in the Western Satraps era. Along with Bihar , Mizoram and Nagaland , Gujarat is one of four Indian states to prohibit the sale of alcohol . The Gir Forest National Park in Gujarat is home to the only wild population of the Asiatic lion in the world. The economy of Gujarat is the fourth-largest in India , with

2300-646: The Ottoman state . Humayun also briefly occupied the province in 1536, but fled due to the threat Bahadur Shah , the Gujarat king, imposed. The Sultanate of Gujarat remained independent until 1572, when the Mughal emperor Akbar conquered it and annexed it to the Mughal Empire . The Surat port (the only Indian port facing west) then became the principal port of India during Mughal rule, gaining widespread international repute. The city of Surat, famous for its exports of silk and diamonds , had reached

2392-575: The Ottomans and Egyptian Mamluks naval fleets led by governor-generals Malik Ayyaz and Amir Husain Al-Kurdi , vanquished the Portuguese in the 1508 Battle of Chaul resulting in the first Portuguese defeat at sea in the Indian Ocean . To 16th-century European observers, Gujarat was a fabulously wealthy country. The customs revenue of Gujarat alone in the early 1570s was nearly three times

2484-713: The Republic of India on 19 December 1961 by military conquest. The British East India Company established a factory in Surat in 1614 following the commercial treaty made with Mughal Emperor Nuruddin Salim Jahangir , which formed their first base in India, but it was eclipsed by Bombay after the English received it from Portugal in 1668 as part of the marriage treaty of Charles II of England and Catherine of Braganza , daughter of King John IV of Portugal . The state

2576-527: The Sunni Vohra/Bohra , Gujarati Shaikh , Khoja , Dawoodi Bohra , Memon , Pathan people / Hansotis , and many others, each with their own customs and traditions. The region of Kutch has always been historically distinct, with the Muslims there accounting for about twenty per cent of the population. This region is characterised by salt deserts, such as the Rann of Kutch . Because of this landscape,

2668-732: The Vaghela chiefs of Dholka came to rule the Kingdom of Gujarat . In 1292, the Vaghelas became tributaries of the Yadava dynasty of Devagiri in the Deccan . Karandev of the Vaghela dynasty was the last Hindu ruler of Gujarat. He was defeated and overthrown by the superior forces of Alauddin Khalji from Delhi in 1297. With his defeat, Gujarat became part of the Delhi Sultanate , and

2760-699: The Valabhi dynasty. In the thirteenth century, the Hindu ruler Karna, was defeated by Alauddin Khalji , the Turkic Sultan of Delhi . This episode ushered a period of five centuries of Muslim Turkic and Mughal rule, leading to a conversion of a number of Hindu Gujarati people to Islam and the creation of many new converted communities such as the Molesalam and Miyana . During Sunni Muslim rule in Patan ,

2852-516: The 5th century, the Gupta empire went into decline. Senapati Bhatarka, the general of the Guptas, took advantage of the situation and in 470 set up the Kingdom of Valabhi . He shifted his capital from Giringer to Valabhi , near Bhavnagar , on Saurashtra's east coast. The Maitrakas of Vallabhi became very powerful with their rule prevailing over large parts of Gujarat and adjoining Malwa . A university

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2944-611: The Dutch, French, English and Portuguese all established bases along the western coast of the region. Portugal was the first European power to arrive in Gujarat, and after the Battle of Diu , acquired several enclaves along the Gujarati coast, including Daman and Diu as well as Dadra and Nagar Haveli . These enclaves were administered by Portuguese India under a single union territory for over 450 years, only to be later incorporated into

3036-790: The European Middle Ages . The oldest written record of Gujarat's 2,000-year maritime history is documented in a Greek book titled The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea : Travel and Trade in the Indian Ocean by a Merchant of the First Century . In the early 8th century, the Arabs of the Umayyad Caliphate established an empire in the name of the rising religion of Islam , which stretched from Spain in

3128-585: The Hindu metropolis of Anhilwara and incorporated Gujarat into the Delhi Sultanate . After Timur sacked Delhi at the end of the 14th century, weakening the Sultanate, Gujarat's Muslim Khatri governor Zafar Khan Muzaffar ( Muzaffar Shah I ) asserted his independence, and his son, Sultan Ahmed Shah (ruled 1411–1442), established Ahmedabad as the capital. Khambhat eclipsed Bharuch as Gujarat's most important trade port. Gujarat's relations with Egypt , which

3220-426: The Indus Valley civilisation. The most recent discovery was Gola Dhoro. Altogether, about fifty Indus Valley settlement ruins have been discovered in Gujarat. The ancient history of Gujarat was enriched by the commercial activities of its inhabitants. There is clear historical evidence of trade and commerce ties with Egypt , Bahrain and Sumer in the Persian Gulf during the time period of 1000 to 750 BCE. There

3312-412: The Islamic elite among them by the noble title of adhirajas. The Sufi trader, Shaikh Randeri was responsible for spreading Islam to Acheh in Indonesia . Surti Sunni Vohra merchants in particular also pioneered the use of scientific concepts and invented structural and mechanical advances in technology for the nation building of Mauritius , such as Major Atchia introducing hydro-electric power to

3404-425: The Islamic world. Early 14th-century Maghrebi adventurer, Ibn Batuta , visited India with his entourage and recognised the powerful merchant presence on the Gujarat shores. He met Nakhuda Vohras trading in the Bharuch district and controlling multiple ships. He also recalls in his memoirs about Cambay, one of the great emporia of the Indian Ocean that indeed: Cambay is one of the most beautiful cities as regards

3496-492: The Jamat Bandi level varies from community to community. In some communities, the Jamat simply runs a mosque and attached rest house and a madrasah . Some larger communities, such as the Khoja and Memon have developed elaborate and highly formalised systems with written and registered constitutions. Their organisations own large properties, undertake housing projects and schools, dispensaries and weekly newspapers. The Gujarati Muslims are further sub-divided into groups, such as

3588-473: The Kutch Muslims are Maldhari pastoral nomads found in the Banni region of Kutch. Most of them are said to have originated in Sindh and speak a dialect of Kutchi which has many Sindhi loanwords. Major Maldhari communities include the Soomra , Sandhai Muslims , Rajputs , Jats, Halaypotra , Hingora , Hingorja , Juneja . The other important Muslim community is the Khatiawari Memon community, that migrated and resettled beyond Gujarat. Coastal Gujarat

3680-400: The Marathas was fully exploited by the British, who interfered in the affairs of both Gaekwads and the Peshwas. In Saurashtra , as elsewhere, the Marathas were met with resistance. The decline of the Mughal Empire helped form larger peripheral states in Saurashtra, including Junagadh , Jamnagar , Bhavnagar and a few others, which largely resisted the Maratha incursions. In the 1600s,

3772-402: The Mughal Empire free access to the Arabian sea and control over the rich commerce that passed through its ports. The territory and income of the empire were vastly increased. For the best part of two centuries, the independent Khatri Sultanate of Gujarat was the cynosure of its neighbours on account of its wealth and prosperity, which had long made the Gujarati merchant a familiar figure in

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3864-443: The Portuguese, and followed by the Dutch and the English. The Peshwas had established sovereignty over parts of Gujarat and collected taxes and tributes through their representatives. Damaji Rao Gaekwad and Kadam Bande divided the Peshwa territory between them, with Damaji establishing the sway of Gaekwad over Gujarat and making Baroda (present day Vadodara in southern Gujarat) his capital. The ensuing internecine war among

3956-414: The Rajput hold over Gujarat would never be restored. Fragments of printed cotton from Gujarat have been discovered in Egypt, providing evidence for medieval trade in the western Indian Ocean. These fragments represent the Indian cotton traded in Egypt during the Fatimid , Ayyubid and Mamluk periods, from the tenth to sixteenth centuries. Similar cotton was also traded as far east as Indonesia. After

4048-409: The ages as he points out that the Arab inhabitants of Mukalla , capital city of the Hadhramaut coastal region in Yemen , were known to intermarry with the Muslims of Kathiawar and those resident from other areas of Gujarat. In the 17th century, the eminent city of Surat, famous for its cargo export of silk and diamonds had come on a par with contemporary Venice and Beijing which were some of

4140-400: The ancient Indus Valley civilisation (more than any other state). The most important sites are Lothal (the world's first dry dock), Dholavira (the fifth largest site), and Gola Dhoro (where 5 uncommon seals were found). Lothal is believed to have been one of the world's first seaports . Gujarat's coastal cities, chiefly Bharuch and Khambhat , served as ports and trading centres in

4232-410: The artistic architecture of its houses and the construction of its mosques. The reason is that the majority of its inhabitants are foreign merchants, who continually build their beautiful houses and wonderful mosques - an achievement in which they endeavor to surpass each other. In the 16th Century, Barbosa visited Rander , a town currently inhabited by the Surti Sunni Vohras and noted Ranel (Rander)

4324-408: The banks of the Narmada up to the Aparanta region bordering Punjab. In Gujarat, several battles were fought between the Indian dynasties such as the Satavahana dynasty and the Western Satraps. The greatest and the mightiest ruler of the Satavahana dynasty was Gautamiputra Satakarni who defeated the Western Satraps and conquered some parts of Gujarat in the 2nd century CE. The Kshatrapa dynasty

4416-402: The battle at Navsari , where the Arab troops suffered a crushing defeat. In the late 8th century, the Kannauj Triangle period started. The three major Indian dynasties – the northwestern Indian Gurjara-Pratihara dynasty, the southern Indian Rashtrakuta dynasty and the eastern Indian Pala Empire – dominated India from the 8th to 10th centuries. During this period the northern part of Gujarat

4508-448: The cracks had started to develop in the edifice of the Mughal Empire in the mid-17th century, the Marathas were consolidating their power in the west, Chatrapati Shivaji , the great Maratha ruler, attacked Surat in southern Gujarat twice first in 1664 and again in 1672. These attacks marked the entry of the Marathas into Gujarat. However, before the Maratha had made inroads into Gujarat, the Europeans had made their presence felt, led by

4600-409: The discovery of tombstones of personages from Siraf , at the time one of the most important ports on the Iranian coast in the Persian Gulf, suggests altogether that the Muslim community of Junagadh had a strong and established link with Iran through the commercial sea routes. After the Muslim conquest of Gujarat by Alauddin Khalji and its annexation to the Delhi Sultanate in the 13th century,

4692-446: The dispersal of further Pathans and Baluchis, who came as mercenaries and were destroyed or defeated by the Marathas . Gujarat fell to British in the late 19th century. Gujarati Muslim merchants played an historically important role in facilitating the Portuguese discovery of " the East Indies ", in spreading and propagating Islam to the Far East and in promoting the British discovery of Africa . In Southeast Asia, Malays referred to

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4784-503: The early seventh century and built a masjid there facing Jerusalem . Thus Gujarat has the oldest mosque in India built between 624 and 626 C.E. by the Arabs who traded and stayed there. These Middle Easterners who came to Bharuch and Surat along the Maritime Silk Road were sailors, merchants and nakhudas . Many belonged to mercantile communities from the Persian Gulf , while others were from Mediterranean and South Arabian coastal tribes, and large numbers married local women adopting

4876-642: The fame and reputation of illustrious Islamic scholars, Sufi-saints, merchants and intellectuals from all over the world: Ranel (Rander) is a good town of the Moors , built of very pretty houses and squares. It is a rich and agreeable place ... the Moors of the town trade with Malacca , Bengal , Tawasery (Tannasserim), Pegu , Martaban , and Sumatra in all sort of spices, drugs, silks, musk, benzoin and porcelain. They possess very large and fine ships and those who wish Chinese articles will find them there very completely. The Moors of this place are white and well dressed and very rich they have pretty wives, and in

4968-414: The furniture of these houses have china vases of many kinds, kept in glass cupboards well arranged. Their women are not secluded like other Moors, but go about the city in the day time, attending to their business with their faces uncovered as in other parts. Arabic sources speak of the warm reception of the significant immigration of Hadhrami sāda (descendants of Muhammed ) who settled in Surat during

5060-432: The furniture of these houses have china vases of many kinds, kept in glass cupboards well arranged. Their women are not secluded like other Moors, but go about the city in the day time, attending to their business with their faces uncovered as in other parts. The conquest of the Kingdom of Gujarat marked a significant event of Akbar's reign. Being the major trade gateway and departure harbour of pilgrim ships to Mecca, it gave

5152-537: The great emporia of the Indian Ocean that indeed: Cambay is one of the most beautiful cities as regards the artistic architecture of its houses and the construction of its mosques. The reason is that the majority of its inhabitants are foreign merchants, who continually build their beautiful houses and wonderful mosques – an achievement in which they endeavor to surpass each other. Many of these "foreign merchants" were transient visitors, men of South Arabian and Persian Gulf ports, who migrated in and out of Cambay with

5244-404: The great mercantile cities of Europe and Asia, and earned the distinguished title, Bab al-Makkah (Gate of Mecca) because it is one of the great places of the subcontinent where ancient Hindus welcomed Islam and it flourished as time went on. Gujarat Gujarat ( / ˌ ɡ ʊ dʒ ə ˈ r ɑː t / GUUJ -ə- RAHT ; ISO : Gujarāt , Gujarati: [ˈɡudʒəɾat̪] )

5336-448: The height of the Adil Shahi dynasty . At the same time, Zoroastrian high priest Azar Kayvan who was a native of Fars , immigrated to Gujarat founding the Zoroastrian school of illuminationists which attracted key Shi'ite Muslim admirers of the Safavid philosophical revival from Isfahan . Early 14th-century Maghrebi adventurer, Ibn Batuta , who famously visited India with his entourage, recalls in his memoirs about Cambay, one of

5428-412: The lake where an earlier Indian governor had built a dam. Between the decline of Mauryan power and Saurashtra coming under the sway of the Samprati Mauryas of Ujjain , there was an Indo-Greek defeat in Gujarat of Demetrius . In 16th century manuscripts, there is an apocryphal story of a merchant of King Gondophares landing in Gujarat with Apostle Thomas . The incident of the cup-bearer torn apart by

5520-440: The local Gujarati Indian language and customs over time. Over the course of history, a number of famous Arab travellers, scholars, Sufi-saints and geographers who visited India, have described the presence of thriving Middle Eastern Muslim communities scattered along the Konkan-Gujarat coast. Suleiman of Basra who reached Thana in 841 AD, observed that the Rashtrakuta empire which extended from Bharuch to Chaul during his time,

5612-418: The local milieu of medieval Gujarati societies. He also notices a large Jama Mosque at Sanjan . His well-known Iranian contemporary Estakhri , the Persian medieval geographer who travelled to Cambay and other regions of Gujarat during the same period, echoed the words spoken by his predecessors alongside his itineraries. Al-Masudi , an Arab historian from Baghdad who was a descendant of Abdullah Ibn Mas'ud ,

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5704-559: The manners and customs of the Portuguese ; yet do they regularly learn their manufactures and workmanship, being all very curious and desirous of learning. In fact, the Portuguese take and learn more from them than they from the Portuguese . Suhrawardiyya Under the Ilkhanate (1256–1335), the Suhrawardi was one of the three leading Sufi orders and was based in western Iran. The order had its own khanqahs (Sufi lodges), which helped them spread their influence throughout Persianate society . The order included prominent members such as

5796-428: The medieval period, Gujarati Muslim merchants played a pivotal role in establishing Islam in Indonesia , Malaysia and other parts of Southeast Asia . Located in the westernmost portion of India, Gujarat includes the region of Kutch , Saurashtra and the territories between the rivers Banas and Damanganga . Islam came early to Gujarat, with immigrant communities of Arab and Persian traders. The traders built

5888-437: The northeast, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu to the south, Maharashtra to the southeast, Madhya Pradesh to the east, and the Arabian Sea and the Pakistani province of Sindh to the west. Gujarat's capital city is Gandhinagar , while its largest city is Ahmedabad . The Gujaratis are indigenous to the state and their language, Gujarati , is the state's official language. The state encompasses 23 sites of

5980-407: The order was Bahāʾ al-Dīn Zakariyyāʾ Multānī . One of his disciples, Sayyid D̲j̲alāl Buk̲h̲ārī aka D̲j̲alāl Surk̲h̲ founded the Jalali branch of the order. Bahāʾ al-Dīn’s most notable disciple was the poet Fak̲h̲r al-Dīn Ibrāhīm ʿIrāḳī . Bahāʾ al-Dīn's descendants remained in Multān, such as his grandson Rukn al-Dīn Abu ’l-Fatḥ . The line ended with the execution of Rukn al-Dīn's successor, Hūd, by

6072-439: The outside world had created the legacy of an international transoceanic empire which had a vast commercial network of permanent agents stationed at all the great port cities across the Indian Ocean . These networks extended to the Philippines in the east, East Africa in the west, and via maritime and the inland caravan route to Russia in the north. Tomé Pires , a Portuguese official at Malacca , wrote of conditions during

6164-513: The people of Mauritius . Gujarati speaking Muslim society has a unique custom known as Jamat Bandi , literally meaning communal solidarity. This system is the traditional expression of communal solidarity. It is designed to regulate the affairs of the community and apply sanctions against infractions of the communal code. Almost all the main Gujarat communities, such as the Ismāʿīlī , Khoja , Dawoodi Bohra , Chhipa and Sunni Bohra have caste associations, known as Jamats. Social organisation at

6256-425: The ports of the Indian Ocean. Gujaratis, including Hindus and Muslims as well as the enterprising Parsi class of Zoroastrians , had been specialising in the organisation of overseas trade for many centuries, and had moved into various branches of commerce such as commodity trade , brokerage , money-changing , money-lending and banking . By the 17th century, Chavuse and Baghdadi Jews had assimilated into

6348-453: The region of Sanjan being ruled by a Persian Muslim governor in the 10th Century. Bi-lingual Indian inscriptions from Somnath in Sanskrit and Arabic, make reference to the Arab and Iranian shipowners who constructed mosques in Gujarat from the grants given to Muslims by the Vaghela rajput ruler, Arjunadeva. Similar epitaphs mention the arrival of pious Muslim Nakhudas from Hormuz as well as families from Bam residing in Cambay, and from

6440-589: The reigns of Mahmud I and Mozaffar II: " Cambay stretches out two arms; with her right arm she reaches toward Aden and with the other towards Malacca" He also described Gujarat's active trade with Goa , the Deccan Plateau and the Malabar . His contemporary, Duarte Barbosa , describing Gujarat's maritime trade, recorded the import of horses from the Middle East and elephants from Malabar, and lists exports which included muslins, chintzes and silks, carnelian, ginger and other spices, aromatics, opium, indigo and other substances for dyeing, cereals and legumes. Persia

6532-420: The rhythm of the monsoons. But others were men with Arab or Persian patronyms whose families had settled in the town generations, even centuries earlier, intermarrying with Gujarati women, and assimilating everyday customs of the Hindu hinterland. The Age of Discovery heralded the dawn of pioneer Portuguese and Spanish long-distance travel in search of alternative trade routes to " the East Indies ", moved by

6624-615: The scholar intellectual Abu Fazl Ghazaruni from Persia who tutored and adopted Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak , author of the Akbarnama . Later, a close alliance between the Ottoman Turks and Gujarati sultans to effectively safeguard Jeddah and the Red Sea trade from Portuguese imperialism , encouraged the existence of powerful Rumi elites within the kingdom who took the post of viziers in Gujarat keen to maintain ties with

6716-649: The sixth Mughal Emperor, was born in Dahod , Gujarat. He was the third son and sixth child of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal . At the time of his birth, his father, Shah Jahan, was then the Subahdar (governor) of Gujarat, and his grandfather, Jehangir , was the Mughal Emperor. Before he became emperor, Aurangzeb was made Subahdar of Gujarat subah as part of his training and was stationed at Ahmedabad. Aurangzeb had great love for his place of birth. In 1704, he wrote

6808-618: The social world of the Surat province, later on their descendants would give rise to the Sassoons of Bombay and the Ezras of Calcutta, and other influential Indian-Jewish figures who went on to play a philanthropical role in the commercial development of 19th-century British Crown Colony of Shanghai . Spearheaded by Khoja , Bohra , Bhatiya shahbandars and Moorish nakhudas who dominated sea navigation and shipping, Gujarat's transactions with

6900-486: The subsequent˙five centuries of Muslim rule saw many Gujarati Parsi and Hindu communities being converted to Islam and forming separate Gujarati Muslim Jamats or mixing into other Muslim communities, especially in the large economic centers under direct Muslim control such as Bharuch and Surat. The period of Muslim rule also saw continued migrations of Middle Eastern Muslims including seafaring Larestani Persians who would participate in international trade with merchants across

6992-518: The sultans of Gujarat possessed ample means to sustain lavish patronage of religion and the arts, to build madrasas and ḵānaqāhs, and to provide douceurs for the literati, mainly poets and historians, whose presence and praise enhanced the fame of the dynasty. Even at the time of Tomé Pires ' travel to the East Indies in the early 16th century, Gujarati merchants had earned an international reputation for their commercial acumen and this encouraged

7084-642: The sultān due to embezzlement charges. In Uččh , D̲j̲alāl al-Dīn Buk̲h̲ārī “Mak̲h̲dūm-i D̲j̲ahāniyān" , became the most notable figure of the Multān branch, who was also a member of the Chishti order and was notably puritanical. The descendants and disciples of the Mak̲h̲dūm spread to Kalpī, Gujarat , and notably Delhi. The greatest presence of the Suhrawardi order in India was in Kashmir . The king of Kashmir, Rinchana ,

7176-551: The total revenue of the whole Portuguese empire in Asia in 1586–87, when it was at its height. Indeed, when the British arrived on the coast of Gujarat, houses in Surat already had windows of Venetian glass imported from Constantinople through the Ottoman empire . In 1514, the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa described the cosmopolitan atmosphere of Rander known otherwise as City of Mosques in Surat province, which gained

7268-647: The trade of gold , silver and spices . In 1497, Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama is said to have discovered the Europe-to-India sea route which changed the course of history, thanks to Kutchi sailor Kanji Malam, who showed him the route from the East African coasts of Mozambique sailing onwards to Calicut off the Malabar coast in India. Later, the Gujarat Sultanate allied with

7360-496: The visit of merchants from Cairo , Armenia , Abyssinia , Khorasan , Shiraz , Turkestan and Guilans from Aden and Hormuz. Pires noted in his Suma Orientale : These [people] are [like] Italians in their knowledge of and dealings in merchandise ... they are men who understand merchandise; they are so properly steeped in the sound and harmony of it, that the Gujaratees say that any offence connected with merchandise

7452-585: The west to Afghanistan and modern-day Pakistan in the east. Al-Junaid, the successor of Qasim , finally subdued the Hindu resistance within Sindh and established a secure base. The Arab rulers tried to expand their empire southeast, which culminated in the Caliphate campaigns in India fought in 730; they were defeated and expelled west of the Indus river, probably by a coalition of the Indian rulers Nagabhata I of

7544-516: Was a succession of various polities such as the Mauryan dynasty , Satavahana dynasty , Gupta Empire , Gurjara-Pratihara Empire, as well as regional ones such as the Western Satraps , the Kingdom of Valabhi , the Kingdom of Gujarat , the Sultanate of Gujarat and finally the Kingdom of Baroda . The early history of Gujarat includes the imperial grandeur of Chandragupta Maurya who conquered

7636-749: Was an early point of contact with the west, and the first British commercial outpost in India was in Gujarat. 17th-century French explorer François Pyrard de Laval , who is remembered for his 10-year sojourn in South Asia, bears witness in his account that the Gujaratis were always prepared to learn workmanship from the Portuguese, and in turn imparted skills to the Portuguese: I have never seen men of wit so fine and polished as are these Indians: they have nothing barbarous or savage about them, as we are apt to suppose. They are unwilling indeed to adopt

7728-551: Was captured by the Indian ruler Tailapa II of the Western Chalukya Empire . Zoroastrians from Greater Iran migrated to the western borders of India (Gujarat and Sindh ) during the 8th or 10th century, to avoid persecution by Muslim invaders who were in the process of conquering Iran. The descendants of those Zoroastrian refugees came to be known as the Parsi . Subsequently, Lāṭa in southern Gujarat

7820-557: Was on friendly terms with the Arabs and Balhara kings appointed Arab merchant princes as governors and administrators in their vast kingdom. Ibn Hawqal , a 10th-century Muslim Arab geographer and chronicler while on his travels observed that mosques flourished in four cities of Gujarat that had Hindu kings , with mosques being found in Cambay , Kutch , Saymur and Patan , alluding to an atmosphere where Muslim foreigners were assimilated into

7912-538: Was one of the main central areas of the Indus Valley civilisation, which is centred primarily in modern Pakistan . It contains ancient metropolitan cities from the Indus Valley such as Lothal , Dholavira and Gola Dhoro . The ancient city of Lothal was where India's first port was established. The ancient city of Dholavira is one of the largest and most prominent archaeological sites in India, belonging to

8004-465: Was replaced by the Gupta Empire with the conquest of Gujarat by Chandragupta Vikramaditya . Vikramaditya's successor Skandagupta left an inscription (450 CE) on a rock at Junagadh which gives details of the governor's repairs to the embankment surrounding Sudarshan lake after it was damaged by floods. The Anarta and Saurashtra regions were both parts of the Gupta empire. Towards the middle of

8096-632: Was ruled by the Rashtrakuta dynasty until it was captured by the Western Chalukya ruler Tailapa II . The Chaulukya dynasty ruled the Kingdom of Gujarat from 960 to 1243. Gujarat was a major center of Indian Ocean trade, and their capital at Anhilwara ( Patan ) was one of the largest cities in India, with a population estimated at 100,000 in the year 1000. After 1243, the Solankis lost control of Gujarat to their feudatories, of whom

8188-604: Was ruled by the northern Indian Gurjara-Pratihara dynasty and the southern part of Gujarat was ruled by the southern Indian Rashtrakuta dynasty . However, the earliest epigraphical records of the Gurjars of Broach attest that the royal bloodline of the Gurjara-Pratihara dynasty of Dadda I, II and III (650–750) ruled south Gujarat. Southern Gujarat was ruled by the Indian Rashtrakuta dynasty until it

8280-522: Was set up by the Maitrakas, which came to be known far and wide for its scholastic pursuits and was compared with the noted Nalanda University . It was during the rule of Dhruvasena Maitrak that Chinese philosopher-traveler Xuanzang / I Tsing visited in 640 along the Silk Road . Gujarat was known to the ancient Greeks and was familiar with other Western centers of civilisation through the end of

8372-470: Was the destination for many of these commodities, and they were partly paid for in horses and pearls taken from Hormuz . The latter item, in particular, led Sultan Sikandar Lodi of Delhi , according to Ali-Muhammad Khan, author of the Mirat-i-Ahmadi, to complain that the support of the throne of Delhi is wheat and barley but the foundation of the realm of Gujarat is coral and pearls Hence,

8464-661: Was then the premier Arab power in the Middle East, remained friendly over the next century and the Egyptian scholar, Badruddin-ad-Damamimi , spent several years in Gujarat in the shade of the Sultan before proceeding to the Bahmani Sultanate on the Deccan Plateau. Shah e Alam , a famous Sufi saint of the Chishti order who was the descendant of Makhdoom Jahaniyan Jahangasht from Bukhara , soon arrived in

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