HistoriCity: History of Nizari Ismailis stretches from Iran to India
The more concrete evidence of the formation of a distinct community can be traced back to the British colonial period
The death of Karim Al-Hussaini Aga Khan IV, the 49th Imam of Ismaili Muslims, known for his philanthropic work and heritage conservation projects in India, is an occasion to revisit the fascinating history of the Nizari Ismailis, the Khojas and how the first Aga Khan came to be recognised by the British as a ruler in India.
The Aga Khan, a hereditary position, is the head of the Nizari Ismaili sect, the largest branch of the Ismaili sect. Both are Shia sects that trace their origins back to the time of Prophet Mohammad and the succession crisis that followed his passing in the 7th century.
The Ismailis acquired political power through the formation of the Fatimid Caliphate in the 10th century and conquered large areas between the Red Sea and the western Mediterranean as well parts of North Africa and West Asia. At their peak, this empire included Egypt, and even Sicily in today’s Italy. Around the 12th century, Saladin deposed the last Fatimid emperor and installed a new Sunni sultanate.
The Nizari Ismaili sect’s roots go back to another succession dispute within the Fatimid empire. Their connection with India may go back to trade along India’s western coast. However, the more concrete evidence of the formation of a distinct community can be traced back to the British colonial period. They believe in monism that is the oneness of God and stand out for acceptance of diverse religions and beliefs, a hallmark of the sect.
From Iran to India via Afghanistan
It was during the first Anglo-Afghan war (1841-42) when Hasan Ali Shah, the first Aga Khan, and governor of Kerman province emerged as a prominent sectarian ruler with the help of the British. Having been routed by Iranian king Muhammad Shah Qajar in 1841 escaped to Kandahar and gradually formed a mutually beneficial alliance with the British. Hasan Ali shah helped them in the conquest of Sindh in lieu of which he received an annual pension of 2,000 pounds. General Charles Napier, the conqueror of Sindh and Governor-General of India wrote in 1843 about the usefulness of Shah, “He is a God—his income immense. He lets none of his sect kiss his hand under twenty rupees, and is the greatest rascal possible, that is, a clever brave man, but being a God makes a virtue of any sin he likes to commit. I speak truly when saying that his followers do not and dare not refuse him any favour he asks; wives, daughters, slaves, money, houses, furniture, are all his, and he doesn’t let the privilege grow rusty. He could kill me if he pleased, he has only to say the word and one of his people would do the job in a twinkling and go straight to heaven for the same. He is too shrewd for that however, and they all have a great fear of me since the battles.”
Aga Khan I remained mired in a political struggle to regain prominence at the Iranian court but didn’t achieve much success. However, in Bombay (now Mumbai) and other parts of western India, the Aga Khan I’s influence and the Nizari Ismaili community continued to grow.
Farhad Daftary wrote in “The Isma’ilis: Their History and Doctrines”: “Agha Khan’s settlement in Bombay in effect initiated the modern period in the history of Nizari Ismailism. The Nizari Imamate was now transferred, after almost seven centuries, from Persia to India, and henceforth Bombay became the seat of the Qasim-Shahi Nizari Imams. Agha Khan I was the first Imam of his line to set foot in India and his presence there was greatly rejoiced by the Nizari Khojas who gathered enthusiastically to his side to pay their homage and receive his blessings”. Due to this support the Aga Khan established branches and residences in Bombay, Poona and Bangalore.
Teena Purohit, author of “The Aga Khan Case: Religion and Identity in Colonial India” wrote, “…prior to the Aga Khan Case of 1866, Isma‘ilism was neither a unified religious tradition nor was the Aga Khan the official imam of the Isma‘ilis. Isma‘ilis were dispersed throughout Africa, India, and Iran, and over the medieval period, they developed local practices and lived in isolation without the guidance of an imam. When the Aga Khan moved to Bombay, all of this changed, as he and his sons used the mercantile and administrative resources of Bombay to convince the various groups that had some remote or distant connection to Isma‘ili history that he was the true imam to whom they should devote themselves and pay tithes”.
The Khojas: A Journey of Finding an Identity
The Khoja community moved to Bombay from Gujarat, Sindh, Kutch and Kathiawad where they were small farmers. It was in the 18th and 19th centuries that they took up trade in Bombay and gradually became prosperous. They were Hindus as well as Muslims and were identified more by their caste i.e Khoja rather than religion. Like other castes, they had their own self-governance systems like Jamaats, the first of which was established in Bombay in the 1740s; the leaders among them were known as Shetias. The Jamaat mediated commercial as well as familial disputes in line with ancient Indian traditions. Today, the Khojas are largely identified as Ismaili Muslims and recognise the Aga Khan as their spiritual leader. However, the title of the Imam of Nizari Ismailis was itself the consequence of a legal dispute over property and control over caste affairs known as the Aga Khan Case, 1866.
During the trial, both sides relied on a holy Gujarati text or Gina called Dasavatar, which recounts the ten incarnations of Vishnu, but interestingly in this text, the final incarnation is that of Ali, the first Imam of the Shias.
Purohit wrote, “…prior to the nineteenth century, the Indian Ismailis defined themselves primarily in terms of their caste identification, as Khojas. Moreover, they were practitioners of the Satpanth tradition, which defies Hindu and Muslim the identity labels. After 1866, however, this changed. In the famous Aga Khan Case of 1866, the Khojas were redefined as “Ismaili Muslim” and so too were Satpanth religious practices. The terms of modern Muslim identity decided by the colonial state work against the more capacious identifications of an earlier moment in the life of the Ismaili community.”
The 1857 rebellion had scarred the British and shaped their policy in subsequent years wherein they sought to build and strengthen new and old allies. The British policy to accord the Aga Khan a ruler’s status and grant him the prestige of 11-and-19 gun salutes as well as ruling favourably in the Aga Khan case was certainly influenced by post-1857 anxieties.
In his judgement delivered in 1866, Sir Justice Arnould of the High Court of Bombay wrote, “the Court is now in a position to give an adequate description of the Khoja sect: it is a sect of people whose ancestors were Hindus in origin, which was converted to and has throughout abided in the faith of the Shia Imami Ismailis, and which has always been and still is bound by ties of spiritual allegiance to the hereditary Imams of the Ismailis”.
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HistoriCity is a column by author Valay Singh that narrates the story of a city that is in the news, by going back to its documented history, mythology and archaeological digs. The views expressed are personal.