INTRODUCTION
By 14th century when waves of Muslim settlers first moved into the Bijapur plateau, both the Marathi and Kannada core areas had already begun to crystallize. As these areas had developed on either side of the central Bijapur plateau, Islam was able to flourish along the resulting cultural fault line. Linguistically, this meant that the Dakhni language was able to flourish more brilliantly at Bijapur than anywhere else, for this area had previously experienced little linguistic integration. Politically it meant that Muslims were able to rule the area until the chaotic eighteenth century. Unlike the warrior Sufis, the later Sufis of Bijapur were very liberal and humane and open. This is its real strength.
The growth of Bijapur as an important Islamic center was doubtlessly important in attracting the city urban-oriented Sufis as well as other Muslims having cultivated skills. The Adil Shahi kingdom’s change from shia to sunni state in 1583 and was also a factor Qadri Sufis attached to Sunni orthodoxy as shattari Sufis were opposed to Shi’sm to Bijapur. “Push factors also played a part in the migration of Sufies to Bijapur finally one can note an important difference between the chisti and non-chisti patterns of settlement in Bijapur. Followers of the chistipath generally come to Bijapur to study with Burahan-al-Din janam and later with his son Amin-al-din, all well established and founded khankhas. Chisti pattern of settlement thus center outside the city walls, while the Quadari and shattari pattern created a host of lesser khanna has within the walls.
''SUFIS AS REFORMERS AND WRITERS:
Most of the Sufis arrived in the reign of Ibrahim II & Mohmmad either from other Islamic centers within India or increasingly, directly from the Arab middle-East. As non-Deccanis they did not participate in the movement towards Hindu Muslim syncretism in Bijapur presided over by sultan Ibrahim II except Shah Hashim pir Alawi, who developed important contacts with various non-elite Muslim & non-muslim groups in Bijapur. since Hashim pir Alawi was perhaps the only Bijapur sufi to develop close contacts both the court and the general population. While the literati played a leading role in propagating and giving respectability to written Dakhani, the vernacular of the Decanni class, their achievements in the religious history of the Deccan were probably more significant. By blending the simplest teaching of Islam and the terminology of the Sufi tradition with the imagery of an existing literary form they were able to reach non-elite commoners that their spiritual ancestors had apparently never tried to reach. Sufi literature thus contributed to the gradual acculturation of many commoners to variety of folk Islam more oriented around tombs than mosques, an on-going process still plainly visible on the Bijapur plateau today. The folk poetry written by Sufis were sung by village woman as they did various house hold chores.
The most common types included the chakki-nama, sung while grinding food grains at the grind stone or chakki, the charka-nama, sung while spinning thread at the spinning wheel, other types of such folk poetry included the Lori-nama or Luilaby, the Shadi-nama or wedding song, the sugham-nama or married women's song, and the suhaila or eulogistic song. It is evident that most of the poetic form appealed especially village women, for centuries singing songs became of its content, manifestation with message were meaningful to them. Sufis use of this vehicle may be said to represent a major development in the cultural history of the Deccan. Most of the folk poetry was originated with Bijapur Sufis of the chishti order. The work of Sufis, devotion to God & respect for one's peer, the folk Islamic songs most of them were originated in Bijapur either of resident chishtis of Shahpur Hillock or of lay members of the followers who had studied these & migrated else where in the Deccan. Shah Mirajun Shamsul-ushaq, shah Burahan al-din janam, Ameen-Al-din A’la, Mahmmad Kush Dahan & their immediate of half of seventeenth & early eighteenth century made the literature very popular.
The most important Sufis of Bijapur having large Khanaquas generally had two or three circles of Murids who had pledged themselves to undertake spiritual studies & disciplines under the direction of a pir, formally initiated by the pir into the silsila as heirs to a spiritual path. The inner circle of murids is to be distinguished from the still smaller circles of Khalifas who were given not only the spiritual instructions of the murids but also (the right to succeed the pir in his capacity of indicating murids. There is also an out circles to lay persons affiliated to peers both Muslim & non-Muslims. While most murid were probably born Muslims, there is ample evidence in both the chisthi & shattari traditions that non-Muslims of Bijapur were converted to Islam and that time if their initiation into the orders as murids. Burhan-ul din janam hinted this when he wrote, "If you have the patience, I will tell you what-Zikr-i Jali is the follower whatever his religion, will become purified if he understands this Zikr-i-Jali is the spiritual exercise corresponding to the first stage of chisti path (Shariat), which enjoys the murid to master and obey the Islamic law.
Another instant of a non-Muslim being converted to Islam during induction to the chisti order is found in the narrative poem shajaratal-Atqiyq. The relevant passage concerns the relation between Burhan al-din's, son Amin-al-din A'la (d.1675) and a certain Hindu sanyasi. This account written by one of Amin-al-din's murids, records that the sanyasi presented a philosophers stone to Amin-al-din after having just demonstrated the stones gold producing qualities. But Amin-al-din merely threw the stone into Shahpur tank, a large reservoir that was in those times located near his Khanaqah on shapur Hillock. Distraught, the sanyasi wept for his lost philosopher’s stone, but Amin-al-din only smiled and said. "Go in the water and find the stone and if you find it take it" The sanyasi went there and discovered that many philosophers’ stones were in water. These upon he became a believer in Amin, and having said the Kalima, he became his murid."
The most persuasive evidence that the initiation process into the inner circle was used also for making muslim is found in the literature on Shah Hashim pir 'Alawi (d.1646). a prospective murid would face Mecca while holding Hashim pirs hand. He would then recite the Islamic confection of faith and several prescribed verses from the Koran, followed by a pledge of spiritual lovability to Hashim pir, who would remain his mediator with God.
Shah Hashim pir's Khanaqah was perhaps the only Sufi center in Bijapur, a part from that of Shah Mirnji & his successor on shahpur Hillock, that had an observable impact on the non-Muslim population of the seventeenth century. The Khanaqhas of famous Sufis & the darghas that grew upon, built by their murids, these tombs derived the importance in Indo-Muslim history from being the carriers of the barakat of the Sufis buried beneath them.
(Abdul Aziz Rajput)
(Abdul Aziz Rajput)