Also, one of the features that most people do not know, even Mohammed Ali Jinnah – creator of Pakistan – was not in favour of Khilafat movement. He had opposed association of Indian National Congress ( INC ),which had fallen under the spell of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Jinnah’s stand stemmed from the fact that Caliphate was a religious issue and INC being a political organisation, concerned with political sovereignty for India must not associate with religious issues.

However, the most horrendous impact of the Khilafat movement was the so called Moplah rebellion in Malabar, Kerala in south India. Movement ostensibly started as a protest against British and a rebellious Khilafat Kingdom was established in a few towns and villages as a mark of protest. However,it soon acquired the shape of religious pogrom against the Hindu landlords. With over 3000 Hindus killed, maimed and raped, it was the darkest chapter and possibly the weakest link in the Hindu – Muslim unity spoken about by MK Gandhi.

The atrocities were noted across political spectrum. Even M K Gandhi was forced to acknowledge these in his paper New India. B R Ambedkar, the legal luminary who went on to draft Indian Constitution wrote that if this was the price to be paid for Hindu-Muslim Unity, it was not worth it. Mrs Annie Besant, the leading Home Rule activist in India had gone on to write that hopefully, never again will there be another experiment with the Khilafat Kingdoms.

The Khilafat movement and Moplah rebellion ( sic ) need to be seen in proper perspective and not glorified to wish away the warts that grew on the glowing face of Indian Freedom Movement.

There is a growing need on part of The Muslim Ummah to butress, both the Saudis and western imperialism and other extremists. Regardless of the errors that were committed by the Ottoman Empire, we must as Muslims work towards the return of of central authority in Islam.

Correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t the Mopillah rebellion in Kerala have to do with the demise of the Ottoman Empire (naturally it also had to do with the class dynamics of Keralan society where the Syrian Christians and Hindus-two sects in particular- dominated the population to the ire of the Muslim peasants).

The “Khilafat” movement, a disgrace to Sub-continental Muslims, led to the thousands of middle class Sindhis and Punjabis being unfortunately duped into making the hijrah (I believe that when a land is no longer safe for Muslims, they must either wage jihah or emigrate to a more friendly locale) to Turkey to restore the Khilafat. These families sold all of their possessions and were mired in Afghanistan, when the Emir barred further emigration. A good example pan-Islamism again took a back seat in favour of more parochial interests.

Interestingly Gandhi was in favour of the Khilafat movement and held it to be a signal that India Muslims had a greater “Muslim” consciousness than their co-adherents of the West.

I am very grateful that the Muslim League managed to avoid contamination from the Islamic movements of the early 20th century.

This is definitely true. Every Naqshbandi silsilah or chain of transmission that I have seen passes through Shaykh Ahmed Sirhindi, the mujaddid of the first milennium.

Interesting. I am looking forward to this post from you, Jonathan (like all your other posts.)

Ah I have some stories about that. Soon, I promise!

By grandmother still tells me how the female members of her family gave up their gold (which, for South Asian women, is very important) for the Khilafat movement, and support of the Khalifa. (As Zack said, Khilafat was very important in the broader freedom struggle — but’s that s a separate story)

I think Ubaid is right that it may not be taught in schools — but that may be becuase the movement failed. The ‘71 war is not really taught in Pakistani schools, for obvious reasons.

(I agree with Thebit, Razib, that your split between common Muslims and Ulema is too simplistic. Traditional Ulema have no truck with modern political Islamism. And non-Ulema ‘ordinary’ Muslims are sometimes big supporters of Islamism e.g university student support of Jamaat-i-Islaami).