Papers by Saadia Sumbal
Journal of Pakistan Vision Volume 20 No.2, 2019
This article explores the dynamics of politics in colonial Mianwali in the twentieth century. It ... more This article explores the dynamics of politics in colonial Mianwali in the twentieth century. It explains how religion played a central role as rhetoric for political mobilization. The support of the local elite to the British government was of cardinal importance for the establishment and the smooth functioning of administration in the colonial Punjab. The major task that the British administrators set for themselves after 1849 was to build an indigenous hierarchy by identifying and winning over local elite to effect and exercise the British control. Most of the landed elite were members of British patronized Unionist party. Like rest of the rural Punjab the politics in Mianwali had a strong pro-British orientation. The local landed elite worked as a bulwark as against various religio-political and nationalist movements particularly of Majlis-e-Ahrar. The Unionist Party dominated by the landed aristocrats was the sole political organization calling shots in the district until 1940. However, from 1943 onwards Muslim League won rural support in the district in 1945-46 elections and reduced Unionist Party to insignificance. I argue in this article that religion, a dominant ideology underpinning nationalism, provided an impetus for political shift from politics centered on the state agency towards the nationalist one.
Journal of Historical Studies Volume 5, No 2, 2019
The British rule in the Punjab had a utilitarian aspect. The development of infrastructure and co... more The British rule in the Punjab had a utilitarian aspect. The development of infrastructure and construction of canal colonies was the most profitable part of it. The colonial interests were served by the policy of patron-client
Journal of Research Society of Pakistan, 2021
This essay argues that Inayatullah Khan al-Mashriqi's anti-imperialist stance and contestation of... more This essay argues that Inayatullah Khan al-Mashriqi's anti-imperialist stance and contestation of religious orthodoxy with a modernist vision of Islam as a "Religion of Science,"challenged the traditional authority of religious ideologues and colonial state. This subsequently evoked a dualistic resistance against Khaksar. The anticleric stance prorogued Khaksar in Punjab's political landscape which was enriched with the socio-political influence of ulema and sufis. The article discusses the formation of Khaksar, a para military organization in the twentieth century Punjab in a particular context in which religious communities Muslims, as well as Hindus and Sikhs reformulated their respective religious ideologies to make them compatible with some measure of colonial modernity. Majlis-e-Ahrar was one example which espoused unitary nationalism with reformist bent, however Khaksar with an approach of anti-colonial nation-building, stood against the orthodox version of ulema and Sufi's Islam with a radical notion of reevaluation of Islam and developing an interlinkage with the truth of science. This modernist vision embraced exclusion of reformist ulema and traditional sajjada nashins who were instrumental in articulating religious symbols in the construction of anti-colonial nationalist ideas. Muslim discourse of religion came to be linked to discourse of nation state, as nation continued to be defined in terms of religion than in secular terms. 1 Khaksar's reformulated Islam did not contribute to the larger story of Muslim religio-nationalist discourse and decolonization in India and Pakistan.
Journal of social sciences and Humanities JSSH, 2021
This article discusses the origin of Ahl-al-Quran movement within the historical context of socio... more This article discusses the origin of Ahl-al-Quran movement within the historical context of socio-religious movements in the British Indian Punjab during the twentieth century. This movement was part of the process of identity formation and a significant contribution in the dynamic and diverse landscape of South Asian Islam. The movement revoked reaction when it was introduced in a small town of Chakrala where Sufis and shrine-based Islam was highly revered. The proponent of Ahl-al-Quran movement, Abdullah Chakralvi vehemently condemned the shrine-based practices and piri-muridi traditions. It specifically became highly controversial when he initiated a critical reassessment and questioning of texts especially Hadith literature. It also questioned the authority of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) and the authenticity of his words and actions and their relevance vis-à-vis Quran. However, the movement deconstructed the notion of singular Islamic tradition and helped to explore the plurality of religious traditions within South Asian Islam.
Pakistan Journal of History and Culture, 2021
This article discusses the British system of political and administrative control, based on colla... more This article discusses the British system of political and administrative control, based on collaboration and its fallout on rural agricultural society of SouthWest Punjab. Using archival documents, the article brings forward an elaborate plan of colonial administrative policy under which Punjab was sliced from North West Frontier and Mianwali's incorporation in the Punjab despite being part of Bannu district of North West Frontier with a predominantly Pathan population. The focus is on how with the support of local elite as colonial intermediaries created a social structure which led to the growth of parasitic class that became instrumental for the extraction and exploitation at the cost of rural poor. These collaborating elite assisted the British in maintaining stability and peace, helped in recruitment in army with pro-British political orientations. British considered it crucial to sustain indigenous institutions and tribal structure, manipulated and controlled by colonial hierarchy to work for colonial interests. The nexus of state and colonial elite precluded all prospects of development.
South Asian Studies (BASAS), 2024
This article examines a genre of Punjabi poetry, as a voice from the periphery, a powerful vehicl... more This article examines a genre of Punjabi poetry, as a voice from the periphery, a powerful vehicle of the marginalised for the performance of collective expression and resistance against the hegemonic nature of colonial rule, charting a strong relationship between language and articulation of political imagination. The images of rich tribal culture, warriors as sons of the soil, Punjabi valour and mystical symbols were used to portray the punjab's plural landscape. The socioeconomic marginality of disenfranchised individuals, created by a vertically structured patron-client network, operating in a coercive administrative framework, forged a sense of community identity along religious lines. Using religious rhetorics, community identity was converged into Islamic identity to construct nationhood. Anti-colonial nationalism became the language of a meta-project for the attainment of political independence.
Journal of Punjab and Sikh Studies, 2023
This article argues, to legitimize a distinct Parsi identity and to avoid submergence under major... more This article argues, to legitimize a distinct Parsi identity and to avoid submergence under majoritarianism of Muslims and Hindus, living within the constraints of anglo-legalism, provided a possibility to protect Parsi community interests tied up with patriarchal structure. It explores, instead of maintaining collective autonomy and integrity by avoiding interaction with the colonial state, the Parsi community sagged deep into the colonial legal system. They de-Anglicized the law by incorporating legal amendments and clauses to adjudicate issues related to marriage, divorce, inheritance, and religious trusts, which were in consonance with their own distinctive models of the family and community. The reform minded Parsi middle class used the discourse of legality to build walls between the sexuality of women in the familial and extra familial domains. The terms of discourse on male and female sexuality reflected middle class aspirations to ideological hegemony, underpinned by bureaucracy of colonial Punjab which aligned colonial authorities with the nationalist patriarchy.
This article explores the expansion of Pakistan-based transnational Sufi-inspired Deobandi silsil... more This article explores the expansion of Pakistan-based transnational Sufi-inspired Deobandi silsila, Naqshbandia Awaisia in Britain. I argue that “Sufi networking is practicing in the transnational space without breaking the boundaries of nation state and has integrated various strands of Islam to acculturate to west in a South Asian milieu” A true „transglobal‟ phenomenon occurs, when a religious tradition transcends its geographical confines, disseminates its message across the world and acculturates variant strands of religious, social and cultural formations to create a niche in western secular milieu. The change of location to a non-Muslim environment has resulted in an important adaptation taking place in silsila. The focus of attention in the place of origin, was the shrine itself, however in the new location, and changing context the priority has shifted to protecting and maintaining Islam itself.
European Scientific Journal, Sep 10, 2014
This paper brings into focus the military traditions in Mianwali District in Colonial era. Due to... more This paper brings into focus the military traditions in Mianwali District in Colonial era. Due to its proximity to Salt Range areas of Jhelum, chakwal, and Shahpur districts, the recruits in this region were considered ideally suited for the harsh military conditions, primarily owing to their physique. An increasingly large number of recruits served in the colonial army in order to supplement their agricultural income derived from haphazard cultivation. Mianwali is a region inhabited by various tribes, kinship or biradaries as it is put in local parlance. The district had overwhelmingly Pathan population along with other communities including Jats, Baluch, Rajputs and Khattaks. Tribes and castes not only symbolized strength and power but also served as the identity marker. Ethnic prejudices and sense of superiority of one clan over another were the defining features among Pathan clans. Economic interests and ethnic prejudices had fostered inter-tribal rivalries and stunted mutual harmony and social cohesion. Tribes lie at the heart of rural identity. Tribal identity itself served as a wedge, precluding unity among the tribes. The British recognized the social and political importance of this tribal structure to strengthen colonial rule in this region. Colonial interests were served by the policy of cooption of rural elite, who served as intermediaries in the colonial hierarchy of power. A class of landowners was created in the district to serve as a nexus between state and people by means of lucrative grants. Hence a tribally based local administration was conjured up. The rural leaders legitimized their authority through their lands, an insignia of power and prestige and their connection with the British officials. The local leaders emerged from the Khawanins of Isa Khel, Nawabs of Kalabagh, landed aristocrats of Piplan,Wan Bhachran, Bhakkar, Where as other tribes faced economic marginalization. This gap subsequently exacerbated the inter-tribal misgivings. The colonial state and rural elite developed a nexus to relegate the district to economic marginalization, as a result enlistment in army was left as the only alternative for subsistence.
South Asia Research, 2022
Usha Sanyal, Scholars of Faith: South Asian Muslim Women and the Embodiment of Religious Knowledg... more Usha Sanyal, Scholars of Faith: South Asian Muslim Women and the Embodiment of Religious Knowledge (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2020), xiv + 410 pp.
South Asia : Journal of South Asian Studies, Oct 2021
This article argues that in Pakistan, intra-Islamic differences and the contested field of Islami... more This article argues that in Pakistan, intra-Islamic differences and the contested field of Islamic identity politics affected and moulded the country's integrated and overlapping religious identities into distinct and disparate categories at the micro level. The article discusses the process of formation of the jamaat of the Sufi-inspired silsila, the Naqshbandia Awaisia, by Major Ghulam Muhammad among the military and an urban middle-class constituency. It shows how the jamaat conceptualised and imbued Sufism with an exclusivist approach, positioning Sufism and Sharia within an Islamic discourse that categorically rejected the religion's ritual and devotional aspects. This embroiled these mutually constitutive and intersecting dimensions, Sharia, esoteric Sufi doctrine and the devotional and ritual aspects in an ambivalent relationship. The exclusion of the devotional and ritual aspects became a boundary-setting label of difference between the 'proper' Muslim and the 'other' along a matrix of knowledge and power.
Collaborating elite of Kalabagh and patterns of control in colonial Punjab, 1849–1939, 2021
This article discusses the local dynamics of control by the rural elite in colonial Punjab over a... more This article discusses the local dynamics of control by the rural elite in colonial Punjab over agricultural land, the informal credit market and labour supply. I argue, the landed elite in collaboration with bureaucratic patronage, developed linkages between indigenous institutions and imperial ideology, controlled and manipulated the means of power and wealth. This led to a one-dimensional flow of capital and profit, towards elite and state, causing a serious check on social mobility and economic development. In a local study of a rural town, Kalabagh, in the northwest of Pakistani Punjab, the article brings forward an understudied aspect of colonial policies which followed a different trajectory from the rest of the Punjab. The colonial state, instead of development, maintained the structure of society under feudal setup. Rais, the ruling elite of the town, as colonial collaborator, managed the moneylending system in his estate and trapped the wage labourers in complex debt bonda...
IJASOS- International E-journal of Advances in Social Sciences, 2016
This paper discusses the relationship between sufis and local tribal and kinship structures in th... more This paper discusses the relationship between sufis and local tribal and kinship structures in the last half of eighteenth century to the end of nineteenth century Mianwali, a district in the southwest of Punjab. The study shows how tribal identities and local forms of religious organizations were closely associated. Attention is paid to the conditions in society which grounded the power of sufi and shrine in heterodox beliefs regarding saint"s ability of intercession between man and God. Sufi"s role as mediator between tribes is discussed in the context of changed social and economic structures. Their role as mediator was essentially depended on their genealogical link with the migrants. This shows how tribal genealogy was given precedence over religiously based meta-genealogy of the sufi-order. The focus is also on politics shaped by ideology of British imperial state which created sufis as intermediary rural elite. The intrusion of state power in sufi institutions through land grants brought sufis into more formal relations with the government as well as the general population. The state patronage reinforced their social authority and personal wealth and became invested with the authority of colonial state. Using hagiographical sources, factors which integrated pir and disciples in a spiritual bond are also discussed. This relationship is discussed in two main contexts, one the hyper-corporeality of pir, which includes his power and ability to move through time and space and multilocate himself to protect his disciples. The other is through dreams and visions, as an important aspect of Muslim religiosity.
Article, 2021
This article discusses the local dynamics of control by the rural elite in colonial Punjab over a... more This article discusses the local dynamics of control by the rural elite in colonial Punjab over agricultural land, the informal credit market and labour supply. I argue, the landed elite in collaboration with bureaucratic patronage, developed linkages between indigenous institutions and imperial ideology, controlled and manipulated the means of power and wealth. This led to a one-dimensional flow of capital and profit, towards elite and state, causing a serious check on social mobility and economic development. In a local study of a rural town, Kalabagh, in the northwest of Pakistani Punjab, the article brings forward an understudied aspect of colonial policies which followed a different trajectory from the rest of the Punjab. The colonial state, instead of development, maintained the structure of society under feudal setup. Rais, the ruling elite of the town, as colonial collaborator, managed the moneylending system in his estate and trapped the wage labourers in complex debt bondage, perpetuating jajmani type relationship in the twentieth century. At one level this arrangement invigorated hierarchical differentiation and dispossession of rural proletariat, at another level, the social differentiation acted as an instrument to mobilize the community for collective action towards nationalist discourse.
Cambridge University press, 2020
This article discusses a Sufi-inspired reformist movement that was set up in Chakrala (Pakistani ... more This article discusses a Sufi-inspired reformist movement that was set up in Chakrala (Pakistani Punjab) by Maulana Allahyar during the second half of the twentieth century. Attention is paid to the polemical religious context in which this movement arose, in part linked to the proselytising activities of local Shias and Ahmadis. Allahyar's preaching in the town created sectarian divisions within Chak-rala's syncretic religious traditions. His reformist ideas also were articulated through a tablighi jamaat (missionary movement), which penetrated the armed forces of Pakistan during the military rule of Ayub Khan. Against this backdrop, the article also discusses the interface between Islam and the army, as this relationship played out in Indian prisoner-of-war camps holding captured Pakistani soldiers in the wake of the war, and so points to ways in which the mutual performance of mystical practices by Allahyar's Jamaat created a cohesive moral community.
Books by Saadia Sumbal
Routledge Taylor & Francis, London, NewYork, 2022
This book examines the history of, and the contestations on, Islam and the
nature of religious ch... more This book examines the history of, and the contestations on, Islam and the
nature of religious change in 20th century Pakistan, focusing in particular on
movements of Islamic reform and revival.
This book is the first to bring the different facets of Islam, particularly
Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented traditions, together within the confines
of a single study ranging from the colonial to post-colonial era. Using a rich
corpus of Urdu and Arabic material including biographical accounts, Sufi
discourses (malfuzat), letter collections, polemics and unexplored archival
sources, the author investigates how Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented
religiosity interacted with one another in the post-colonial state of Pakistan.
Focusing on the district of Mianwali in Pakistani northwestern Punjab, the
book demonstrates how reformist ideas could only effectively find space to
permeate after accommodating Sufi thoughts and practices; the text-based
religious identity coalesced with overlapped traditional religious rituals and
practices. The book proceeds to show how reformist Islam became the principal
determinant of Islamic identity in the post-colonial state of Pakistan
and how one of its defining effects was the hardening of religious boundaries.
Challenging the approach of viewing the contestation between reformist
and shrine-oriented Islam through the lens of the binaries modern/traditional
and moderate/extremist, this book makes an important contribution to the
field of South Asian religion and Islam in modern South Asia.
Book Reviews by Saadia Sumbal
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Papers by Saadia Sumbal
Books by Saadia Sumbal
nature of religious change in 20th century Pakistan, focusing in particular on
movements of Islamic reform and revival.
This book is the first to bring the different facets of Islam, particularly
Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented traditions, together within the confines
of a single study ranging from the colonial to post-colonial era. Using a rich
corpus of Urdu and Arabic material including biographical accounts, Sufi
discourses (malfuzat), letter collections, polemics and unexplored archival
sources, the author investigates how Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented
religiosity interacted with one another in the post-colonial state of Pakistan.
Focusing on the district of Mianwali in Pakistani northwestern Punjab, the
book demonstrates how reformist ideas could only effectively find space to
permeate after accommodating Sufi thoughts and practices; the text-based
religious identity coalesced with overlapped traditional religious rituals and
practices. The book proceeds to show how reformist Islam became the principal
determinant of Islamic identity in the post-colonial state of Pakistan
and how one of its defining effects was the hardening of religious boundaries.
Challenging the approach of viewing the contestation between reformist
and shrine-oriented Islam through the lens of the binaries modern/traditional
and moderate/extremist, this book makes an important contribution to the
field of South Asian religion and Islam in modern South Asia.
Book Reviews by Saadia Sumbal
nature of religious change in 20th century Pakistan, focusing in particular on
movements of Islamic reform and revival.
This book is the first to bring the different facets of Islam, particularly
Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented traditions, together within the confines
of a single study ranging from the colonial to post-colonial era. Using a rich
corpus of Urdu and Arabic material including biographical accounts, Sufi
discourses (malfuzat), letter collections, polemics and unexplored archival
sources, the author investigates how Islamic reformism and shrine-oriented
religiosity interacted with one another in the post-colonial state of Pakistan.
Focusing on the district of Mianwali in Pakistani northwestern Punjab, the
book demonstrates how reformist ideas could only effectively find space to
permeate after accommodating Sufi thoughts and practices; the text-based
religious identity coalesced with overlapped traditional religious rituals and
practices. The book proceeds to show how reformist Islam became the principal
determinant of Islamic identity in the post-colonial state of Pakistan
and how one of its defining effects was the hardening of religious boundaries.
Challenging the approach of viewing the contestation between reformist
and shrine-oriented Islam through the lens of the binaries modern/traditional
and moderate/extremist, this book makes an important contribution to the
field of South Asian religion and Islam in modern South Asia.