Boundaries and Identities: Muslims, Work and Status in Aligarh [First ed.] 9780803994225

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BOUNDARIES AND IDENTITIES

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BOUNDARIES AND IDENTITIES Muslims, Work and Status in Aligarh

E.A. MANN

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SAGE Publications

New Delhi/Newbury Park/London

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Copyright

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E.A. Mann, 1992

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photo¬ copying, recording or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

First published in 1992 by

Sage Publications India Pvt Ltd M-32, Greater Kailash Market I New Delhi 110 048 Sage Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Newbury Park, California 91320

Sage Publications Ltd 6 Bonhill Street London EC2A 4PU

Published by Tejeshwar Singh for Sage Publications India Pvt Ltd, phototypeset by Jayigee Enterprises, and printed at Chaman Enterprises.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Mann, E.A., 1952Boundaries and identities: Muslims, work and status in Aligarh/ E.A. Mann, p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Muslims—India—Aligarh. 2. Aligarh (India)—Social conditions. I. Title. DS486.A485M36 1992 954'.2—dc20 92-3334

ISBN 0-8039-9422-2 (US hbk) 81-7036-274-1 (India hbk)

Contents List of Maps, Figures and Tables Preface

7 8

INTRODUCTION

11

1

Aligarh: Background and Setting Historical Background Geography and Population Aligarh Town Uper Kot

19 19 25 27 33

2

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups The Qasbah Elite The Meaning of Baradari and Zat Baradari Ranking and Composition Zat Endogamy and Hypergamy Baradari Endogamy

37 38 43 54 58 65

3

The Organisation of Work Urban Industry and Business The Firm and the Family Lending, Cheating, and the Value of Reputation The Work Ethic, Elite Values and Status Categories

75 75 86 99 108

4

Business, Occupation, and Identity Islam and Occupational Status Status Group and Occupation

116 117 123

5

Power, Prestige, and Formal Associations

133

Baradari Names and Social Status Baradari and Non-baradari Associations Baradaris, Social Control and Moral Authority

135 140 152

6 • Contents 6

The Collectivity of Islam Maintaining the Boundaries: Ritual, Charity, and Festivals Muslims and Hindus: Contrast and Communalism Hindu-Muslim Riots

158 158 168 173

CONCLUSION

182

Bibliography Glossary Index

186 200 203

List of Maps, Figures and Tables Maps 1 2 3 4

Figures 1 2 3 4 to 6

Tables 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Map of India, Locating Uttar Pradesh (UP), and Map of UP, Locating Aligarh District Aligarh District, and its Component Tehsils Aligarh Town Area of Fieldwork, giving Baradari Distribution in Mohallas

32

Status Pyramid Sheikh Marriage Pattern Saifi Marriage Pattern Structure of Business Partnerships in Three Households: Household A Household B Household C

56 63 68 89 89 91 97

Rural and Urban Population of Aligarh in 1981 Aligarh Town Population according to Religion (1931) Voting Populations of Mohallas in the Fieldwork Area Muslim Baradari Hierarchy according to Respondents, 1984-86 Muslims in Aligarh District in 1931, by Baradari Marriage Choices among High and Low Status Muslims Muslim-owned DIC Registered Units Location of Muslim-owned Factories in Fieldwork Area Occupational Patterns in the Saifi Baradari

26 27 33

20 21 29

48 52 66 79 80 131

Preface This book is a revised version of my Ph.D thesis presented to the University of London in 1987, for which the basic fieldwork was carried out in Aligarh City over a period of 16 months, between December 1984 and March 1986. The choice of Aligarh as the location of fieldwork was determined by several factors. Initially, I was interested to see how, or whether, religious identity affected people’s everyday lives. Work began in Lucknow in 1982, but the diffuseness of such a large city made this type of research less manageable. I decided instead to concentrate on a smaller town, where Muslims formed a significant part of the popu¬ lation, with easily defined localities and more spatially compact. At the same time the town should possess a clearly defined economy in which Muslims were substantially involved. I felt such a place would bridge the gap between rural/urban perceptions and provide an appropriate ‘middle ground’ between the extremes of a high Islamic tradition and total homogenisation with a predominantly Hindu population. The choice came down to one of the Uttar Pradesh qasbah towns known for production of a particular item, such as Moradabad, Meerut, Faizabad or Aligarh. I finally chose Aligarh because it had all the required characteristics, and, with the presence of the Aligarh Muslim University, provided the more practical consideration of being 'able to find accommodation relatively easily. Even so, the fluidity of Aligarh's social and economic structure, and the intricacy of circumstances encountered, led to some diffi¬ culty in focusing research. Muslims tended to converge in certain localities for work and residence, so that choice was not a problem. What did create conceptual problems was the nature of Aligarh’s economy and of the Muslims' involvement in it. I worked with businessmen and labourers, ranging from the small-scale worker who could barely be described as an entrepreneur but rather as an independent operator, to daily wage labour, to the highly successful

Preface • 9 and prosperous businessman. Due to the small-scale and diffuse nature of the economic structure, much time was spent moving backwards and forwards between localities in an attempt to pin down highly mobile informants whose work was often some distance from their homes. It became increasingly clear I was being guided by the nature of the economy and the restraints it imposed on my access to people in terms of availability. Conversation naturally tended to focus on locally important subjects, namely business, and relationships with other people, both Hindu and Muslim. Very quickly it became obvious I too would have to concentrate on these aspects if I was to understand the social environment. Such realisation shaped my research strategy, in turn influencing the theme of this book. Three major issues persistently surfaced in the course of research: relative styles of occupation; status dif¬ ferences; and being a Muslim in India. Linking these was the re¬ curring theme of identities. Hence my work, and subsequently this book, became concerned with the nature of such identities and their influence on social and economic activities. During the period of my original fieldwork, I lived in Aligarh town and worked with residents of the old city, Uper Kot. Every day was spent in factories, offices and in people’s homes, participating in the routine of daily life. Many people spared much of their time to talk to me and patiently answer what must have seemed at times impertinent and ignorant questions. I conducted almost 200 inter¬ views in Urdu and English, all of which were tape-recorded with the permission of interviewees. Evenings were spent transcribing and translating these tapes, and in writing-up field notes. Research material was also obtained by studying records of the local District Industries Centre, national and state census recoids, and electoral registers, all of which were kindly made available to me by officers of the district administration. I was also given access to informal census material and reports privately carried out by several groups in Aligarh, and to printed literature of caste and baradari associations. Before starting my fieldwork, I completed a course in Urdu language at the School of Oriental and African Studies under the guidance of Ralph Russell and David Mathews. All subsequent fieldwork interviews and surveys I conducted personally in Urdu and English, with frequent help from local assistants, particularly from Waris Ahmad and Sayyid Zainuddin, whose patience, courtesy, interest and guidance made my work much easier.

10 • Boundaries and Identities

All Hindi and Urdu words in the text have been italicised in the first instance, except those absorbed into the English language and thus familiar to English readers. I have included in the Glossary details on transliteration. I have also abbreviated kinship terms in familiar anthropological style. Thus the following letters indicate: M/Mother; F/Father; S/Son; D/Daughter; Z/'Sister; W/Wife; H/Husband. In order to preserve the confidentiality of the interviewer/inter¬ viewee relationship, all personal names and some location names in the book have been altered. Throughout fieldwork, completion of the original thesis, and revision of this book, I have received encouragement, advice, help and hospitality from many people, both in India and the UK. Although they are too many to list here, the following deserve special mention: Aligarh: Prof. A.F. Usmani and family; Dr. Mrs. Shadbano Ahmed and family; Mr. and Mrs. Fasiul Hajsan Khan Khalil; Sayyid Zainuddin; Mr. and Mrs. Idris Siddiqui; Abdul Qayyum; Rafi Ahmed; Waris Ahmed; Sri P.L. Punia and Sri S.K. Jha, District Magistrates; Mrs, Sushila Tandon. Delhi: Prof. Imtiaz Ahmad; Capt. and Mrs. W.M. Howard; Dr. and Mrs. W. Beasley; Sri Banmali Tandon. London: Dr. Jonathan Parry; Dr. Christopher Fuller; Prof. Andre Beteille; Dr. Angela Hobart; Ralph Russell; Prof. Christopher Shackle; members of the Department of Anthropology at the London School of Economics; Lyn and Hugh Homan. USA: Prof. Barbara Metcalf; Prof. Paul Brass. I owe much to my supervisor, Jonathan Parry, who kept my nose to the grindstone and encouraged me during the process of writing-up. Also to Barbara Metcalf, Paul Brass, Imtiaz Ahmad, and the publishers, who re-read the manuscript of the book and contributed their very valuable comments. I would also like to thank the Department of Sociology at the Aligarh Muslim University and the Department of Anthropology at the London School of Economics for giving me numerous oppor¬ tunities to present versions and extracts from the thesis in seminars, and for offering criticism or advice which I found constructive and helpful, and some of which I followed. Lastly, I wish to thank my parents, who, despite all odds, gave me constant moral and practical support. It is to them this book is dedicated.

Introduction This book is a study of Aligarh, a town in west Uttar Pradesh, and of the Muslims who live there. It is not a study of Islam or of an Islamic’ city through assuming a unity of belief and practice, since such a unity proved not to exist. Nor is it an attempt to balance empirical practice against Islamic injunc¬ tions, or emphasise features of ‘indigenisation’. Instead, it is a view of a specific cultural context—the qasbah town—concentrating on dynamics between individuals and groups. I examine the claim made by some scholars (viz. Robinson, 1983) that Muslim societies have tended to move towards a high Islamic tradition, since I found this not to be the case in Uttar Pradesh. Instead, the opposite is true; boundaries other than Islamic have persisted and been reinforced by their members, creating identities of sub-group (baradari) and of class which are more important to Muslims than Islam. This work explores how such boundaries are defined and main¬ tained, linking them to a more encompassing concept of Islam which has salience under certain circumstances. This is a study of Muslims in a local context, using the word ‘local’ with the same meaning as Geertz (1966) and as elaborated by Eickelmann in a much needed review of theoretical and ethno¬ graphic research on Islam and Muslims (1982). As Eickelmann says, what is needed is a ‘middle ground’ of analytical context, ‘wider than earlier anthropological concerns with specific village locales and more narrow than the Islam of all times and places sometimes invoked by scholars and believers with non-sociological views of religious experience’ (1982: 11). It is this middle ground I seek to explore.1 1 For a comprehensive discussion of the study of Islam in local contexts both in South Asia and elsewhere, and an analysis of scholastic and theoretical approaches, see Imtiaz Ahmad (1973a, 1976, 1981b); Eickelmann (1982); Rothermund (1975); Waardenburg (nd).

12 * Boundaries and Identities

The result is a study of a highly stratified society, characterised by a web of shifting social, political and economic alliances which find expression through a series of different identities. The language of ‘identity’ is used because it most closely parallels concepts central to Muslim life in Aligarh. It is, however, a difficult lang¬ uage, containing a range of complex meanings, many of which are implied and sensed rather than articulated and expressed. Ewing suggests groups of Muslims tend to define boundaries when placed under stress (1988b: 1). While certain types of identity are definitely emphasised during times of stress, which I shall discuss in Chapter 6, it is not simply necessary for circumstances of tension to prevail in order for Muslims to examine and define boundaries. Muslims repeatedly describe their vision of the world and their role in it in terms of different identities which juxtapose with those of others. Throughout this book, ‘identity’ is used to mean perception of self in relation to others. Perception of self is examined through the four social institutions of religion, kinship group, economic class and status group. Each determines relationships between individuals and between groups, and each becomes a source of solidarity under different conditions. There is no elaborate analytical discus¬ sion of these institutions; instead, each is explained in relation to a wider network of social, political and economic relations important to Aligarh. From this, two main questions arise: where do concepts of identity become a focus for solidarity and what forms do they take; how does identity influence (if at all) participation in more general areas of Aligarh society? It became clear to me early on that Muslims in Aligarh are by no means a united and homogeneous community expressing solidarity through Islamic identity. This point is not new to students of Indian society or of Muslim societies elsewhere (cf. I. Ahmad, 1973b; Barth, 1960; Geertz, 1968; Gilmartin, 1984; et al.). Instead, they live in a grid of cross-cutting loyalties which inherently contain conflict. In Aligarh this has created a loose-knit society with tightly-knit enclaves. Each enclave projects a self image which is adjusted according to the audience at which it is aimed. In turn, the signific¬ ance of each image is related to wider, more general features of Aligarh’s social structure. Part of the definition of identity and solidarity among Aligarh Muslims is thus created not only out of a desire to distinguish themselves in relation to non-Muslims, but more importantly, to distinguish themselves from those they claim oppressed

Introduction • 13

and misrepresented them in the past, namely, members of a Muslim elite. Although elites gave Aligarh its meaning as a qasbah town in the past, its contemporary meaning is more focused on its industrial production and on the moral image of a Muslim centre. A moral image does not, however, constitute the basis-of Aligarh’s social structure, which is centred instead on status groups, in particular on the baradari. The tension between status groups, particularly between the qasbah elite and the rest of the population, is what distinguishes qasbah life, above all else. Historically, these tensions characterised the limited social intercourse that existed between status groups; today it is a feature of economic and political life as well. Scholarly emphasis has been on value schemes which highlight similarities between religious groups in the Indian subcontinent rather than differences, calling these the effects of ‘indigenisation’ (I. Ahmad, 1973b; Dumont, 1970; Gaborieau, 1972, 1982). When Muslims or Christians, for example, are discussed in broader terms, or in relation to Hindus, the tendency seems to be to concentrate on common themes rather than on differences (Parry, 1974). Parry suggests this has led to a perpetuation of stereotypes whereby, for example, ‘the Muslim community is often characterised as it were a single undifferentiated unit, though in fact it would seem to be deeply fragmented’ (1974: 118). He wonders whether this is the result of a general bias in Indian anthropology towards studies of caste hierarchy and the ideology of caste stratification, exemplified by Dumont’s Homo Hierarchicus. Although Parry suggests independent value systems have been neglected, he does not comment on an alternative emphasis of some scholars to deny completely the effect of indigenous society on Muslim social structure, leading to assertions that the ideology of Islam is paramount. This view is voiced in the cliches that ‘Islam is not a religion but a way of life’, or ‘Islam does not admit caste, therefore it does not exist among Muslims’ (Green, 1985: 314). There do seem, however, to have been changes over- the past 100 years or so in the way in which Muslims and Hindus view con¬ cepts of religious identity. Aligarh’s Muslims appeared to show much more cultural and social cohesiveness with Hindus in the past. Part of this was the influence of Hindu caste through ‘indigenisation’ of migrants to the subcontinent and the retention of many caste practices by converts to Islam. Part was also due to the separation between elite and non-elite practices, and the mutual

14 • Boundaries and Identities

participation of Hindu and Muslim elites in the same political and economic framework (Bayly, 1980, 1983; Hardy, 1972). Yet there is a marked insistence by Aligarh Muslims on a theme of historical events which is related to determining their role in the present. Solidarity through religious identity has tended to be explained in terms of political processes, specifically in the development of the Muslim League and the demand for Pakistan (Alavi, 1986; Robinson, 1974; et al.), or in the sort of pan-Islamism popular with reformists. While social identity for some Muslims is expressed through religious membership, it is not for most, and then only in very specific circumstances, which will be described in Chapter 6. Social meaning is barely displayed through Islam at all. Being a Muslim is an encompassing identity subsuming other identities, such as class and status group, only under certain conditions. In Aligarh, conditions are such that the extent to which the en¬ compassing aspect of ‘Muslimness’ exerts influence has, however, acquired a new salience. Events in the historical past and more recently have polarised religious identities to the extent that minority status in India is now an important social and political factor. In this context, it is important to understand Muslim urban society in Aligarh as part of a continuing historical process, a point made by Lapidus (1973) and Robinson (1983). One aspect of identity has polarised in an opposition between Muslim and non-Muslim, which in Aligarh means between Muslim and Hindu. Chauvinistic elements from both communities attribute a corporate solidarity of Islam which, is claimed, transcends any other loyalty. Symbols are adopted to externally project an image of self (cf. Benson, 1983; Brass, 1974, 1979) which foi Muslims draw heavily from an ideology of equality which plays down facts of hierarchy and stratification thought to be more closely associated with the Hindu caste system. As a consequence, Aligarh Muslims have developed a sense of ‘being a Muslim’ which has less to do with Islam and more to do with local understandings of Muslims’ place in India as a religious minority. Being a Muslim is, therefore, simultaneously an internally contrived and an externally imposed identity, increasingly defined in opposition to that of a Hindu. Over the past 50 years, cultural cohesiveness in Aligarh has gradually disintegrated, leading to a style of religious identity which increasingly finds expression in outbreaks of violence between Hindu and Muslim. Syncretism still persists in its most popular form,

Introduction • 15

namely the patronage of Muslim shrines (dargahs) by the general population (Mann, 1989). It also appears in the urban economy, particularly in industry, which depends on the mutual participation of all communities. By contrast, syncretism at other levels has dwindled or disappeared altogether, conspicuously in the dominance of a landed gentry, in a mutual observance of each other’s festivals, in cultural values, and even in some areas of social intercourse. At the same time, religious cohesiveness (if it ever existed) finds itself under new pressures of class identification which is gaining strength daily as a consequence of rapid economic and industrial growth. This has led to considerable factionalism within the Muslim population and internal polarisation of interest groups. Chapter 1 establishes the urban setting with a brief historical outline and geographical description of the town. Chapter 2 begins by identifying the division between elites and non-elites, and goes on to describe the most important units of Muslim identity—zat and baradari. I show how promotion of each category emphasises a solidarity based on status, important cross-cutting divisions which have not been taken into serious consideration in previous studies of Muslim social hierarchy, leading to considerable confusion and theoretical contradictions in the study of Muslim stratification. Scholars have traditionally termed the Muslim elite in India the Ashraf and the non-elite the Ajlaf.2 Both words are Arabic and emphasise birth and lineage as criteria for membership. The signi¬ ficance of lineage and marriage as boundary markers are examined, but the lack of uniformity in marriage patterns illustrates the problems in using these terms as conclusive definitions for Muslim social hierarchy. Although the distinctions discussed in this chapter are important, it should be emphasised that the Ashraf in Aligarh do not, as a group, constitute the Muslim social elite. Lineage is an important, but not exclusive criterion of elite membership, and other measure¬ ments are more significant, including education and occupation. The distinction is far more central to everyday Muslim life than dif¬ ferences between Hindu and Muslim. It colours routine behaviour and attitudes, it is expressed through different patterns of social and economic structure as well as social behaviour, and it prompts non-uniform reactions over challenges to symbols of religious identity. 2 See I. Ahmad (1973a, 1973b: 171-206, 1966: 268-78), and Ansari (1960).

16 * Boundaries and Identities

The result is a social and economic environment of a highly complex nature. The second part of the book relates the urban order to these dif¬ ferent layers of identify, one by one. Chapter 3 looks at the organ¬ isation of urban business, particularly the lock industry for which Aligarh is famous. The purpose of this is twofold: to analyse per¬ ception of self in the workplace—is the meaning of ‘work’ the same for all, or is it different? It is also to locate the core of primary loyalty and identity, the family group. Preference for including kin in business dealings reflects the need for trust in the urban economy and links the concept of the family to the concept of work. Relation¬ ships of trust become an essential economic commodity in the contemporary context. The implications of these relationships are analysed through the structure of the firm, which is described in some detail. Chapter 4 takes the theme of the occupational world further, seeing how it is relevant to sub-groups. It examines patterns of work, and the baradari as an occupational category. Chapter 5 illustrates how identity based on birth and ancestry affects social and political action. Many baradaris seek to change social status through name changing, and promotion of a new, corporate identity. In particular, the role of the baradari association is analysed, a semi-formal organisation which attempts to play an active part in the lives of its members. I suggest that while asso¬ ciations have gained national recognition, they still lack local support in any field other than the political. By understanding where the baradari can maintain social control and where it is less influential, we can better understand the limits of status solidarity and the limits of power wielded by corporate action. The final chapter draws together the fragmentation of the Muslim population by examining some of the wider relevances of being a Muslim in Aligarh. It shows how Islam is collectively expressed through ritual, festivals and charity. It also looks at the ultimate point of polarised religious identity through examples of violent confrontation between Muslim and Hindu. It might be supposed under the pressures of urban living, of economic change, of the influence of social movements and the politicisation of minority identity, that boundaries of small-scale or internalised identities would have crumbled and disappeared. This would conform with Gellner’s notion of the ‘re-homogenisation’ of Islam through industrialisation, reformism and nationalism (1985),

Introduction • 17

and claims of a move towards a common Islamic tradition. I hope to show that this has not happened, that boundaries of baradari and class remain powerful determinants of social and economic action. Simultaneously, it is important not to ignore the relevance of a corporate Muslim identity, but equally important to locate it in its proper context.

Aligarh: Background and Setting

Historical Background Aligarh lies in western Uttar Pradesh (UP), one of the most populous states of northern India, in the fertile area between the rivers Ganges and Yamuna known as the Doab. Aligarh town is the largest urban centre and administrative headquarters of Aligarh district (zilah). The district is further divided into six sub-districts (tehsils), each with its own divisional headquarters (see Maps 1 and 2). Five tehsils are administered by minor officials, while any policies or activities affecting the zilah as a whole are regulated by government administrators in Aligarh town. Until the 18th century, the town and district were known as Koil. The name changed under the British, and Koil town is now part of Aligarh urban agglomeration (a census definition). Textual references to the district begin with the appearance of Muslim his¬ torians.1 Indeed, the later known history of Koil/Aligarh is the history of Muslim social, political and economic development in the Indian subcontinent. In looking at Aligarh's historical past, we need to be cautious with the sources which tend to concentrate on what the elite thought and did rather than on the social groups with whom this work is mainly concerned. As Gilsenan comments, 1 For a recent review of the early historical background of Aligarh district, see Siddiqui (1981). Other useful references are Hutchinson (1856) and Nevill (1926).

Uttar Pradesh

s

a a

• Hathras Town

Utrauli Town

22 • Boundaries and Identities

‘historical documents give only inadequate and scattered accounts of what ordinary people are supposed to believe, and then only as seen through the eyes of literate specialists whose own position often includes the tacit or overt proposition that this cannot be true Islam’ and whose views ‘are far too limited and partial’ (1982: 13). However, since we are left with little alternative information, we must draw some general conclusions from such sources. Koil first gained importance as a Muslim military garrison, one of several in the region. There appears to have been some form of fortress at the site during the early 12th century, which is mentioned as featuring in the campaign of the Ghorid, Qutbuddin Aibek (ad 1194). The historian Hasan Nizami described Koil as ‘one of the most celebrated fortresses in India’. From this period on, Koil was a Muslim garrison for succeeding Delhi-based powers up to and including the Mughals. The traveller Ibn Battuta visited the area in ad 1342 and mentions a corps of soldiers billeted on Koil. During the reign of Ibrahim Lodi (ad 1524), a permanent fortress known as Ramgarh was constructed, and is still standing. Subsequent historical references to Koil are frequent, though unsystematic, witness to its limited importance as a military and administrative centre. Being both fertile and strategically important, and thanks to its proximity to Delhi, Koil was a valuable zamindari2 for Muslim, Maratha and British (Siddiqui, 1981). The uncertain times and need for a perpetual readiness to fight created a cadre of local zamindars powerful in their own right. It was necessary for each major successive power to separately negotiate support in order to gain control over the region as a whole. Many zamindars were Muslims from high status groups, or converts from castes of equal status. ’ A zamindar was a part of the early Muslim administrative machinery, being a person granted a tract of land by the central government, over which he had certain rights of cultivation and revenue. In exchange for these rights, he was supposed to render loyalty to the government, keep local law and order, pay a proportion of his revenue in taxes, and provide an annual contingent of men on demand from the government. Ostensibly a zamindari grant was not hereditary, although it became so over time, and the zamindar implicitly acquired inalienable rights to ‘his’ land. The title of zamindar can refer to a very minor tiller of the soil, or to an important and powerful landowner, wielding rights over thousands of acres and those living off them. Similarly, the title taluqdar (ta'alluqdar) came to mean a similar rank, though literally it means a connection, in this case to property or land.

Aligarh: Background and Setting • 23

Until the end of the 19th century, Aligarh was typical of qasbah towns scattered throughout north India. A qasbah is a small town distinguished by the presence of ‘decent people or families of some rank’ (Platts, 1974). Bayly is more specific in defining the import¬ ance of a qasbah. He describes it as a country town with a population of usually not more than 3,000 people, whose social, legal and economic status were of some importance in relation to the district and to national issues. A qasbah was ‘the residence of gentry who served as soldiers or administrators for the regional states’, and which ‘also supported bodies of artisans paying varieties of ground rent and “professional” tax’ (Bayly, 1983: 111). The town had local markets and acted as a regional centre of commercial and political activity. Its population of Hindus and Muslims, though distinct, displayed a great deal of homogeneity in social, political and economic life, as well as much religious syncretism. Tombs of holy men (pirs) formed a ‘moral centre’ for the town, and their death anniver¬ saries (’urs) were celebrated by both Hindus and Muslims alike. In Aligarh, there are two such tombs (dargahs), of Shah Jamal and Pir Bahadur, now known as Baba Barchi Bahadur (Mann, 1989). Koil had grown in importance through conquest and colonisation. Its base was in its military significance, but what gave the qasbah its meaning was the local elite, a political force centred on land tenure revolving round zamindars. A culture peculiar to the qasbah evolved, characterised by: literacy, agrarian dependence and Islam. Families of Muslim service people from ashraf (gentry) families were bound together by tight marriage alliances, which often became cross-cousin arrangements.... People from less grand families even converted Hindu Kayasths and Khattris—could reinforce the community by building up connections of culture and client¬ age with the elite. Though there always remained lines of social difference between the landholding Muslim gentry and their Hindu cultivators,...gentry patronage and Hindu veneration for the shrines of Muslim holy men significantly diminished the scope for conflict and enhanced the solidarity of the qasbah as a society until well into the colonial period. Gentry families, both Hindu and Muslim, communed in Indo-Persian literary culture, while peasants and craftsmen participated in the same festivals and feast days (Bayly, 1983: 192-23).

24 • Boundaries and Identities

The apparently greater homogeneity in everyday life between Hindu and Muslim and in the political and economic life of the district, contrasts dramatically with the subsequent polarisation of identities during the British colonial period. During this latter period, the qasbah declined in importance, an important factor in the later development of Aligarh’s economic and social structure. Aligarh was to become a town with a predominantly Muslim image (though not with a majority Muslim population) through the existence of a powerful Muslim landed gentry and the influence of elite qasbah culture. This background lent itself to Aligarh becoming the focus of political attention during the first half of the 20th century. Its transformation from a small, but important, military qasbah town notable as a fort and trading centre, to a major politi¬ cal and administrative centre, came with the growth of separatist politics and a rising spirit of nationalism. Events up to Independence in 1947 influenced the way in which opinions and attitudes were formed, and which are Aligarh’s uncomfortable legacy today. From 1870, an institution was founded and developed which was to have a profound effect on the region and on Muslim attitudes in north India. This was the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College, now called Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) The AMU started life as a primary school in 1875 but quickly altered its status to a college in 1877. By 1881 it had developed into an institute of further education where BA and intermediate classes were held, as well as preparatory classes for Civil Service exami¬ nations. It was founded by prominent local Muslim landholders (taluqdars and zamindars) and inspired by the driving force of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan. The emphasis at the AMU was to educate Muslims in a Westernised curriculum to enable them to com¬ pete in a society which was felt no longer to favour Muslims for employment and patronage. As Hardy describes it, ‘what Aligarh did was to produce a class of Muslim leaders with a footing in both Western and Islamic culture, at ease both in British and Muslim society, and endowed with a consciousness of their claims to be the aristocracy of the country’ (Hardy, 1972: 103-4). Moving into the 20th century, Aligarh underwent its most dra¬ matic transformation from a small country town with a respected educational institution, to a political force. As Brass notes, the AMU was ‘not merely an educational institution, but a “move¬ ment"’ (1965: 99). The AMU played a prominent role in providing

Aligarh: Background and Setting • 25

an articulate and educated elite which appointed itself spokesman for the Muslim population in north India. Bitterness culminated in Partition in 1947, and many Aligarh Muslims shifted to West Pakistan. Those who remained and who did not join the stream of migrants in the 20 years following India’s Independence, were obliged to live with a formidable and difficult historical and political legacy. Few of these Muslims are drawn from the elite, most of whom (and in parti¬ cular almost all those connected with AMU) left Aligarh at Partition. Although the role of the AMU has been fully covered elsewhere (Brass, 1965; Hardy,'1972; Lelyveld, 1978; et al.) and is not cen¬ tral to this work, it is important to note that its symbolic value has had a strong impact on the thinking and behaviour of the Aligarh Muslim population, particularly in evaluating relationships between its elite and non-elite. Aligarh’s association with the past has created a divide, not only between Hindus and Muslims, but within the Muslim population, which is further exaggerated by the urban environment, the natural divide between townspeople and University, and the expansion of industrialisation in Aligarh’s City. It has led to a division between religiously identified communities, as well as to a recognition of the importance of differences between the educated Muslim elite and the non-elite (Mann, forthcoming). These are exemplified in different residential and working localities, forms of occupation, patterns of marriage and kinship, levels of education, and attitudes towards religious and social values. Many Aligarh Muslims believe, through their past experiences, that its elite represented its own inter¬ ests as zamindars and taluqdars, rather than those of the populace.

Geography and Population Modern Aligarh town is set in a depression in the midst of flat, open country. The climate is harsh, with cold winters and hot summers. It tends to suffer from inadequate rainfall, and experiences serious water shortages. The surrounding countryside is dotted with villages depending on agriculture to produce crops for local consumption and for sale in local towns. Considerable cash cropping of indigo and cotton look place under the British, leading to the development of the town as an important commercial crossroads. Cotton is still grown in small amounts, but not as a major cash crop. Aligarh town has now become a notable centre of light industry and of commerce, best known for its manufacture of locks and building fittings.

26 * Boundaries and Identities

The population density of the district is high, at 788 persons per square kilometre. Villages abound, and the roads and tracks between village and town see a constant movement of people and goods. In Aligarh town the density is even higher, at 9,423 persons per square kilometre. Table 1 Rural and Urban Population of Aligarh in 1981

Aligarh district (ziiah) Aligarh sub-district (tehsil) Aligarh town

Rural

Urban

Total

1,982,781 365,807 —

592,144 356,077 320,861

2,574,915 721,884 320,861

Source: Census of India, 1981, Series 22, Uttar Pradesh, Part II-B, District Primary Census Abstract, pp. 108-9.

The town’s population is also growing from the influx of mig¬ rants from the surrounding countryside, and there is a surprisingly high proportion of first generation residents in Aligarh.* * 3 Apart from local migration, there is considerable itinerant, though regular, interaction between the town and villages. Both are useful to each other, not so much in a ‘parasitical’ relationship (Wrigley, 1978), but as sources of labour, foodstuffs and some raw materials in one direction, and cash and consumer products in the other. Aligarh is also a target for the rural poor, who have quit the village because of famine, poverty, or oppression, seeking urban employment as labourers, servants, or craftsmen. This trend was commented upon by the 17th century traveller, Francois Bernier, and con¬ tinues to this day. Muslims today constitute nearly one-third of Aligarh’s population. Of these, the majority are of the Sunni branch of Islam following 3 1 had access to an informal census carried out in May 1967 within the Saifi baradari. It was said to have included every Saifi in Aligarh and to have numbered approximately 20,000 persons. I am grateful to the Hadad Educational and Welfare Society for allowing me free access to the census material. S5dly, many of the com¬ pleted forms had been destroyed by damp and white ants. The information available is, therefore, incomplete. It did, however, provide a guide to other statistical material drawn both from the Census of India and my own fieldwork, and the figures also tended to confirm information from interviews with respondents. The Saifi Census clearly indicated that a high proportion of baradari members were first generation migrants from the country to the town.

Aligarh: Background and Setting • 27

the Hanafi code, while there is a very small population of Shi’as. The sense of separate identity that is reflected in the spatial distri¬ bution of the population demands a local knowledge of mohallas, without which it can be difficult to superficially distinguish Muslim from non-Muslim. Women are identifiable because of their obser¬ vance of purdah in wearing the concealing burqa, but women do not go out in public as often as men. Some men wear styles of dress or headgear peculiar to Muslims, or may grow beards leaving the upper lip shaven, a Muslim trait, and, in conversation, certain styles of language or choice of words are more characteristic of Muslims and others of Hindus. Table 2 Aligarh Town Population according to Religion (1931) Hindus 1931 1941 1951 1961 1971 1981

Other

Total

% of Muslims

35,938 2,081 51,712 4,723 figures not collected

83,878 112,655 141,618

42.8 45.9 —

figures not collected 5,396 163.462 83,456 5,604 204,605 110,572

185,020 252,314 320,781

33.00 34.40

45,859 56,220

Muslims

—

Sources: Census of India, 1931, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Vol. XVIII, Part II, Imperial and Provincial Tables, by A.C. Turner (Allahabad; 1933, pp. 520-33). Census of India, 1941, Vol. V, Tables by B. Sahay (Government of India Press, Simla; 1941, Table VA, pp 34-35). Census of India, 1951, Uttar Pradesh, Vol. II, Part II C, Age and Social Tables, by Rajeshwari Prasad (Government of India Press, Allahabad; 1953). Census of India, 1961, Vol. XV, Part II C (ii), Cultural and Migration Tables, Table C-VII, pp. 518-19. Census of India, 1971, Part II (i and ii), Social and Cultural Tables, by D.M. Sinha (Central Government Publications, New Delhi; 1971, State¬ ment VII, p. 172). Census of India, 1981, Series 22, Part II B (i). Primary Census Abstract, General Population Tables, by Ravindra Gupta (nd). Table 15.

Aligarh Town Aligarh is the nexus for delivery and distribution of goods manu¬ factured locally, and is connected to major cities via the Grand Trunk Road and through good rail links. Although not a major production

.i

28 • Boundaries and Identities

centre in the past, Koil was an important staging post for merchants. They and their pack animals stayed in caravansarais which were owned by Muslims of the Bhathiara baradari. There are still many mohallas in Aligarh whose names testify to this past, such as Sarai Vrindaban, Sarai Bhuki and Sarai Mian. Today Aligarh markets locally-made industrial items to big cities such as Delhi, Bombay and Kanpur, as well as acts as a dispersal centre for the inflow and outflow of foodstuffs and other consumer goods. Merchants living in Aligarh store incoming products in godowns (warehouses) and sub-contract to petty traders who in turn travel throughout the district selling to the village shopkeepers. Because of its proximity to major retail, wholesale and cultural centres, the constant movement of goods, services and people through trade, district administration and the AMU, Aligarh has a rather more cosmopolitan air than other qasbah towns. It might have remained a minor entrepot town but for three factors: the founding of the AMU; the growth of trade first through indigo and subsequently through light industry; and its appointment as zilah headquarters. These factors not only affected the character of Aligarh, but its spatial layout (see Map 3). Aligarh really consists of two adjacent towns which grew up independently of the old Ramgarh. They contrast dramatically with each other in appearance, occupational distribution, and social and living conditions. This contrast is typical of qasbahs founded well before the impact of British colonialism (see Brush, 1962). One section is the Old City with satellite growth radiating out, the other is the Civil Lines. They are divided by the railway line which not only marks physical divisions, but economic and social divisions as well. The Civil Lines houses the AMU campus, the main government offices such as the kachehri (government administrative offices), the law courts, the main post office, the railway station, and residences of the ex-zamindari elite and wealthier businessmen. Although not strictly speaking part of the Civil Lines, since it falls west of the town, the Industrial Estate harbours factories and government offices dealing with industrial development, such as the District Industries Centre (DIC) and Small-Scale Industries Centre (SSIC). The Old City’s central point is the main Friday mosque, or Jama Masjid, set on the highest elevation in the area. Nearby is the shrine of Shah Jamal, while the newer shrine of Baba Barchi is adjacent

TO THE INDUSTRIAL ESTATE \

30 * Boundaries and Identities

to the railway line (Mann, 1989). Close to Shah Jamal are the old and new ‘Idgahs where Muslims gather at the Id festival. The Jama Masjid and local mosques are integrated into Aligarh’s social and economic space in a way that the shrines are not. Radiating outwards and downhill from the Jama Masjid towards the Civil Lines to the north and east and to the countryside in the west and south, are the urban mohallas separated by narrow lanes. These are just broad enough to allow access to pedestrians and rickshaws, and, in some cases, to cars. They are choked with traffic in the daytime, with labourers pushing handcarts and rickshaws piled high with goods sent to other mohallas for processing, assembly and packaging. The main roads leading in and out of the City are pukka and metalled, while mohalla lanes are either of semi-pukka brick or kachcha dirt tracks. During the monsoon these lanes become virtually impassable in some places, being churned into thick mud by rain and overflowing drains. Aligarhians say the town is character¬ ised by four things, ‘makkhi, macchar, tale, nale'\ flies, mosquitoes, locks and drains. Water-related diseases are endemic, as are industrial and urban health problems such as TB. All mohallas house shops, factories and residences, but retail and wholesale outlets are concentrated on main roads leading in and out of the City. Through the heart of the City* Muhammad Ali Road runs from east to west, stretching from the bus stand and running past the Jama Masjid to the dual crossroads of Sabzi Mandi (vegetable market) and Chauraha Abdul Karim. From the centre of Muhammad Ali Road and past the Jama Masjid from north to south, is Chandan Shaheed Road. These two roads form the commercial arteries of the City’s heart known as Uper Kot (Upper Fort). They are lined with small shops selling a variety of goods ranging from cloth, biscuits and meat, to locks and clay pots. These shops meet the immediate needs of Uper Kot’s residents, but for more choice and variety the larger and better stocked shops are in the Railway Road (or Subash Road) and Rasalganj, which link Uper Kot to the railway line. Lastly, there is a large wholesale grain market to the west of the City. There are permanent markets in consumer goods and foodstuffs, and periodic markets in bulk commodities. Different commercial activities are located in different parts of the city, and this, together with the high density of small industrial

Aligarh: Background and Setting *31

units in Uper Kot, and the siting of government offices in the Civil Lines, ensures a constant flow of goods, services and people back and forth. Scrap metal merchants in Madar Gate make routine visits to manufacturers in the Industrial Estate and City, while business¬ men pass to and fro to visit banks, petition government officers, meet colleagues or consult lawyers. Housewives walk to Kanwariganj and Railway Road to purchase household goods or jewellery from Rasalganj and Sarrafa, and small children are sent out to buy fruit and vegetables from Sabzi Mandi. Despite the constant movement in and between localities, there tends to be a marked feeling of ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’; Aligarhians, mohalle-walle or those who belong, those of one’s mohalla, as opposed to bahar-walle log, ghair qaum, those who do not belong. Yet, even those claiming ancient ties with the City do not necessarily live there and are often described by City dwellers as ‘nonAligarhians’. Perceptions of ‘belonging’ (mohalle-walle) and ‘not belonging’ (ghair qaum) among Muslims of the City do not neces¬ sarily lie in historical attachment or genealogies, but on moral qualities and an association with a group identity, a concept explored further in Chapter 2. The nature of ‘belonging’ is also clear in the pattern of neighbour¬ hood networks and the structure of mohaila life. If you belong, you are owed a loyalty which crosses religious boundaries. Social ties are consolidated by women exchanging visits with neighbours, children running in and out of houses, men visiting factories and friends. Neighbours are invited to celebrations of all kinds, but in mixed Hindu/Muslim mohallas, visits are made to share in personal events, such as weddings and funerals, rather than to celebrate religious festivals. Indeed, not to be invited to a social event in the mohalla indicates exclusion from neighbourhood net¬ works, in turn reflecting some underlying corporate expression of disapproval. Despite symbiosis on several levels, including social life and work, differentiation between mohalla populations does mean there is a marked tendency for people to maintain their closest ties with peers from the caste or status group. Although there is a neces¬ sarily high degree of mobility between mohallas, the tendency to socially polarise is reflected in the preference of both Muslims and Hindus to dwell in mohallas where ties of status equality can be maintained. This preference is expressed in terms of ‘living in a

Aligarh: Background and Setting • 33

better area’ or in a ‘more healthy atmosphere’, where living and hygiene standards are related to locality, religion and social status.

Uper Kot The majority of Aligarh’s permanent Muslim population lives in the heart of the City in and around the area known as Uper Kot (see Map 4). It is bounded in the north and east by two important commercial areas, Kanwariganj and Jaiganj, and forms the main location for small-scale industries. Uper Kot is almost entirely populated by Muslims, while encircling it are mostly Hindu mohallas, with some of mixed Hindu/Muslim populations. It is so densely populated that it is impossible to accurately judge its population density, and census figures according to mohalla were unavailable. An approximation (see Table 3) was drawn from the electoral Table 3

Voting Populations of Mohallas in the Fieldwork Area Mohalla Tantanpara and Koudia Buzurg Galli Hajjam and Atish Bazan Sabzi Mandi and Muhammad Ali Rd. Chowk Bundu Khan Sheikhan Sheikh Daoud Sunhat Bani Israilan Delhi Gate Sarai Mian Kale ki Sarai Ataeyan Galli Bahiman Usmanpara Baniapara Balai Qila Chiragh Chian Masjid Bu Ali Teela Chandan Shaheed Road Sayedwara Parkatan Kala Mahal Mohalla Ghosian Total:

Total Voters Registered

% Muslims

1,043 601 274

81 90 85 94 96

589 497 Not available 208 967 4,063 2,273 Not available 209 Not available 854 963 200 492 Not available 1,360 209 494 Not available 219 Not available 15,515

J00 100 73 52 82 99 10 66 96 100 100 56 93

34 • Boundaries and Identities

register. The register gives a basic indication of population density, but remains unreliable partly because it does not take into account the itinerant labour force, and partly because voters were not accurately registered.4 What the register did usefully show, how¬ ever, was the residential density of mohallas in relation to each other, and the proportion of Muslims to non-Muslims. In Uper Kot, Muslims and Hindus are fairly distinctively settled in different mohallas and both stated a preference to live where their co-religionists, and preferably their co-castes, lived. According to older people, exclusivity had been partly affected by Partition, which, with the shift of many Muslims to Pakistan, meant that nonMuslims moved into previously Muslim mohallas. Some mohallas have changed their population for different reasons. Manik Chowk, near Chauraha Abdul Karim, was formerly Muslim, but is now almost entirely inhabited by Hindus of the Varshney and Aggarwal Bania caste. Tantanpara used to be a Hindu mohalla, which residents told me was called Tandonpara in keeping with the then dominant Hindu caste. It is now exclusively Muslim. Mohalla exclusivity is reflected in their names, such as Bani Israilan, Pathanan, Baniapara and Atish Bazan. There are still some Bani Israil living and owning property in their namesake mohalla, as well as Sheikhs in Sheikhan and Pathans in Pathanan, but on the whole, names do not necessarily reflect the majority population. Despite this, there remains a tendency forbaradaris and castes to stick to specific localities, such as the Momin Ansar who dominate Bani Israilan, Chiragh Chian and Teela, while Pathans may be found largely in Usmanpara and Qureshis in Sarai Mian and Qazipara. Even if a baradari is not numerically superior, the mohalla may have the reputation of being ‘Pathan’ or ‘Momin Ansar’, simply because of the dominant role played by that group in its internal affairs. Uper Kot’s restrictions on space and a fundamentally stable population (in contrast to the Civil Lines) have created tightly-knit social enclaves within each mohalla, whose residents demonstrate a strong loyalty to each other. Some even describe the environment in terms familiar to sociologists, such as ‘urban villages’. Although this description conjures up a useful image of solidarity, it is not 4 This became apparent when I tried cross-checking registered voters against householders on a house-to*house basis. Again and again 1 found residents who had been left out of the official voting register.

Aligarh: Background and Setting • 35

quite accurate as it awards more autonomy to the mohalla than in fact exists. People move in and out of the ‘village’ to other ‘villages’ more frequently than in rural villages. Some mohallas are char¬ acterised as purely residential, while others are predominantly industrial though with a fair proportion of dwellings. Yet, loyalty to mohalle-walle is extremely important in Aligarh, often over¬ riding considerations of religious identity, baradari, or economic inequalities. Clearly, people are more comfortable with neighbours with whom they can draw more similarities. As one Muslim manufacturer pointed out: Our religion tells us that our neighbour is more than our relation. We have to look after them, to see what is their condition, what problems they are passing through. So it is very necessary for us to mix up with our neighbours. If we are going to help someone, or if someone comes for help, it is in our religion that first we help our neighbour if it is needed, then afterwards mohallewalle, then other people. If our neighbours.’ way doesn’t fit in with ours, then we don’t visit them, but on certain occasions we have to go even if we don’t like them, such as a death in the family, or a marriage.5 Neighbours are considered more important because they usually form the immediate social network, particularly for women. They provide commensality, advice, and material and moral help in times of need. Neighbourly opinion also establishes criteria of what is correct social behaviour. Opinions about people or house¬ holds may be expressed by those living at some distance, but will not significantly affect their targets unless neighbours living in the same mohalla share those opinions. Relationships with neighbours contrast strongly with other relationships. In Aligarh’s highly complex, stratified and sectarian society, the similarities are based on perceptions of who will and who will not share commensality, loyalty, personal relations and religious beliefs. According to respondents, the largest baradaris in the Citytoday are the Momin Ansar (Julaha), Abbasis (Bahishti), Saifis (Lohar), Qureshi (Qasai), Pathans and Telis, in that order. If we compare these estimates with figures in the 1931 Census, they seem reasonably consistent (see Table 5). While other baradaris, such 5 Interview no. 153.

36 • Boundaries and Identities

as Saiyyids, Sheikhs, Muslim Rajputs and Faqirs, appear pro¬ minently in the same Census, this does not mean they were neces¬ sarily important in the City. With the exception of Faqirs, the largest baradaris in 1931 were all from high status groups which tended to be spread out throughout the district as zamindars, peasants and cultivators, rather than concentrated in the City. Muslim Rajputs, for example, are extremely numerous in Aligarh district’s villages, but few in the town. Furthermore, the Census was a popular means of claiming a higher status, a point discussed more fully in Chapter 5. The most significant point to be drawn from looking at the spatial distribution of Aligarh’s population is a marked preference for distinct groupings to live together — not only Muslim and Hindu, but sub-groups within each religious grouping. This point is emphasised when we look at the movement of migrants to the town. Migrants do not create separate mohallas as such, but in¬ evitably converge on the poorer areas. The.collective nature of the baradari in particular is very marked when seen as a network of support and hospitality for migrants to the City. Rowe noted a similar pattern in his study of UP migrant workers settled in Bombay, where workers from one UP village lived in ‘tightly controlled kinship groups’ (Rowe, 1973: 228). In Aligarh, the baradari as well as kin networks act as a poten¬ tial source of information about job opportunities in the town, which is then channelled to villages nearby. This is not to say there is some sort of urban network designed to relay information to the countryside, nor that other networks, such as kin or village ties, fail to perform the same service. Nevertheless, there are indications that the baradari does play an important role. Much of Aligarh's mazdoori (itinerant, piecework) labour is drawn from villages of the surrounding countryside who travel daily or weekly to the City to work, returning to the village at weekends and harvest times for the rabilspring and kharif/winter crops. Over a period of time and as job prospects become clearer for the mazdoor he may shift his residence, permanently to the City, and subsequently-his family. The regularity and high degree of mobility from the country to the City and back mean that close ties between the two can be maintained.

2 Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups

While Muslims acknowledge the existence of a primary religious identity in Islam, there is a wide range of reaction as to what is the most important source of identity and how it is expressed. Agreement among Muslims cannot even be reached with regard to what should be a corporate reaction to the perceived external threat that religious communities are believed to pose to each other. This has led to considerable contradictions among Muslims on what constitutes sources of solidarity for the community. This lack of uniformity is directly related to internal social distinctions as well as to increasing perceptions of class as a consequence of upward social mobility. This chapter examines the nature of these social distinctions, which are centred on the differ¬ entiation between qasbah elite and non-elite, and on the baradari as the core identity. The concepts of elite, baradari, and zat, form the three single most important expressions of identity among Aligarh Muslims. To understand how they have meaning, this chapter analyses how boundaries are formed and where they constitute the basis for solidarity. First I examine the nature of an elite which Bayly des¬ cribes as characteristic of a qasbah culture (Bayly, 1983: 111). This is followed by a discussion of the meaning of baradari and zat as Aligarhians describe it, concentrating on those features which combine to make them the most significant units of social

38 • Boundaries and Identities

identity for Muslims, the basis of Aligarh’s social order, and a blue¬ print for subsequent social action.

The Qasbah Elite Aligarh Muslims live in a society that is highly stratified in a dual system of hierarchy. On the one hand it is ranked according to class—where each is classified according, to his position in the organisation of production, and where wealth and upward mobi¬ lity are important criteria of such ranking. This will be examined further in Chapter 3. On the other hand there is a hierarchy of status, which is further sub-divided into a status category (zat) and a status group (baradari). Neither zat nor baradari represent the dichotomy described as Ashraf and Ajlaf (Ansari, 1960; I. Ahmad, 1966); in¬ deed, I suggest these terms are inadequate for an understanding of ranking among Muslims, and that hierarchy is based on more subtle and complicated principles related to perceptions of elite values. The importance of the qasbah culture has been greatly under¬ estimated in the study of social ranking and hierarchy among Muslims in north India, which has tended to concentrate on a binary opposi¬ tion of Ashraf (gentry) with Ajlaf (non-gentry). This dichotomy is based on the concept of lineage and ancestry and the value of ethnic origin as the basis of social categories. In the literature on Muslims in India, descent is a primary means of defining social status, i.e., who can trace their lineage back to an ancestry close to the sources of Islam and who cannot. High status Muslims ostensibly trace their heritage to immigrants into the Indian subcontinent from countries associated with the sources of Islam and the earliest contact with its spreading message. These are the Ashraf, com¬ posed of groups conceptualised as descent categories, as distinct from descent groups which are embodied in the baradari. The Ajlaf are generally said to constitute the remaining bulk of the Muslim population, descendants of local converts, who follow customs and practices owing more to Hindu caste than to Islam. Yet the elite of qasbah towns brought into prominence criteria other than an Ashraf/Ajlaf distinction when determining who should belong to its ranks. These criteria included levels of learning and literacy (Mann, forthcoming), styles of address and lexicology, knowledge of English and Urdu, attitudes towards certain forms of employment (particularly towards manual labour), leisure pursuits,

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 39

traditional political alignments, and land ownership. The elite was, and remains, a status category consisting of an ‘Islamic service gentry' (Bayly, 1983), comprising families who dominated local cultural and political activities, and who perpetuated this domi¬ nance through selective intermarriage. It is not, as some suggest, a religious elite whose authority is founded in religious knowledge or in piety and holiness. Religious figures of pir and ’ulema (saints and scholars) provide a different reference point which bears little relation to most aspects of Muslim daily life (Mann, 1989). The elite in Aligarh by and large live and work in the Civil Lines, rarely visiting the City beyond infrequent forays to Rasalganj and Railway Road for household purchases. The AMU acts as a magnet in terms of employment, cultural activities and poli¬ tical life, and has perhaps allowed Aligarh’s qasbah elite to survive to an extent not found in other qasbah towns. However, the influence and importance of the Islamic service gentry’s role as part of the qasbah elite in Aligarh has tended to diminish with the systematic decline of the traditional role of the qasbah town itself, with the decay of the zamindars, and with the polarisation of Hindus and Muslims into separate communities with separate social lives. Moreover, a counter culture has also arisen which is based on com¬ merce and industry, and is largely the consequence of the growth of industrial production. Other towns in UP have experienced similar growth from the exploitation of a localised and specialised skill, such as in Meerut (knives and scissors), Faizabad (bangles), Moradabad (brassware) and Saharanpur (wood). As Bayly points out, the two cultures of the elite and commerce represent ‘almost a mirror image’ of each other. Behaviour and manners associated with the qasbah culture, parti¬ cularly those related to education, do remain an ideal social model to which upwardly mobile Muslims in the City aspire (Mann, forth¬ coming). For example, business success can lead to shifting residence from the City to the Civil Lines, to educating both sons and daughters, and to attempts to join elite clubs and associations. Vreede de Stuers has called the process one of ‘Ashrafisation’ (1968). This term is misleading for two reasons: first, not all Ashraf are members of the qasbah elite; thus, ‘Ashraf’ in itself does not constitute a status category. In Aligarh, there are extremely poor Muslims of Ashraf lineage, often illiterate, working as labourers and emulating prac¬ tices more often associated with Hindu caste. Second, there are

40 • Boundaries and Identities

divisions within the elite itself, namely, a split between progressives and conservatives, which generate a conflict of models—formal Islam or Westernisation.1 More accurately, the term ‘gentrification’ should describe this process of attempts at upward mobility. Membership of the gentry is closely allied to lineage and descent, though not exclusively based upon either. Attitudes reflect physi¬ cal and social differences—physical in the sense that the elite does not, on the whole, dwell in the City, and social in attitudes expressed. Elite Muslims sometimes speak pityingly or disparagingly of those in commerce and industry, or of the poverty of Muslims living in the City. They feel enlightened and progressive in comparison with City Muslims, who are seen as conservative and hidebound by un-Islamic traditions. This is partly expressed in spatial terms, whereby differences in physical environment are seen as characteri¬ stic of social differences. The level of hygiene in the City is a target, as well as the danger of living in Uper Kot because of the constant fear of riots between Hindus and Muslims. The City is perceived as a perilous and volatile place, entrenched in conservatism and poverty, and deeply resistant to any form of social, political or economic change. As one woman said: Civil Lines is more hygienic. It is well-developed. The society is also good here in comparison to the City. A number of riots take place in the City and it disturbs the life. Much safer in Civil Lines. And here I do not wear the burqa, but in the City I have to wear it because people there criticise the ladies if not. Persons who belong to good families do not like to go to the City. Fami¬ lies which are living in the City are not so good compared to the Civil Lines.2 The elite also feel superior because of their greater degree of literacy, more respectable social lineage, socially superior forms of occupation 1 Attitudes of the Muslim elite are further reflected in a split within the AMU between conservative and progressive factions, embodied in AMU internal politics, and locally termed ‘communalists’ and 'communists' (Brass, 1965: 100). These differ¬ ences are echoed elsewhere among both Muslims themselves and scholars of Islam. One school represents a Left tradition, and rejects those aspects of Islam applying to social issues. The opposing school represents the Islamic tradition, arguing it is impossible for Muslims to separate religion from social issues (A. S. Ahmed, 1984; El-Zein, 1977; Elkholy, 1984; Shariati, 1979). 2 Interview no. 157.

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 41

(though often worse paid), and most important of all, a greater familiarity with social etiquette, adab (Mann, forthcoming; Metcalf, 1984a). This is almost as important as lineage when deter¬ mining membership of the qasbah elite. The concept of adab is linked to hierarchical superiority as well as to what Lapidus describes as ‘the very core of the classical Islamic tradition’ (1984: 38). It refers to courtly etiquette, to lineage and to forms of knowledge which provide certain sets of cultural allusions which the educated recog¬ nise and respond to and which in turn reinforce levels of ‘belonging’ (Mann, forthcoming). Adab means the ‘norms of correct behaviour inherited from one’s ancestors. With the advent of Islam it came to apply to the ethical and practical norms that regulated the life of a good Muslim’ (Lapidus, 1984: 38). Attitudes of social superiority shown towards City Muslims are keenly felt and resented by their targets. Often they would des¬ cribe elite Muslims as ‘kothiwallas\ literally meaning those living in large kothis or mansions, but nowadays with the underlying meaning of those who created Pakistan and hence responsible for the situation of Muslims today. While conceding differences in environment and education, they point out that poverty and the needs of employment do not allow them to pursue elite ideals, even if they are unclear as to what these may be. Moreover, they feel by contrast that the Civil Lines is a morally dangerous place, where social values are no longer important. In particular, City Muslims stress the solidarity of Muslims in the City compared to those in Civil Lines, and the strength of mohalla networks (cf. Vatuk, 1972). They contrast this feeling with one of loneliness and isolation for Muslims in Civil Lines, where independence of action leads to withdrawal of social support: Mostly people in Civil Lines are not proper Aligarhians, they are mostly of different cities. In the City we feel much sympathy for each other; whether a person belongs to our farhily, or another family, or another baradari, it doesn’t matter, but we feel very much sympathy for each other. In the night, if some¬ thing happens, even if someone cries out at 2 or 3 in the morning, the whole mohalla will be united and come and see what is wrong. We will all sort out the problem together. In Civil Lines they won’t even know what is wrong with their neighbours. Some people feel in the City the atmosphere is not good for

42 • Boundaries and Identities

their families, with the riots and poor education, so they shifted to Civil Lines. But I found that most of the families who shifted there, they left and came back because the atmosphere there is so much worse than here. In the Civil Lines the hotels are open late at night, loafers sitting around until 10 or 11 at night, or even later. It is a bad atmosphere.3 Despite strong mutually opposing views, City Muslims do admit they are more conservative in their attitudes towards social hierarchy, behaviour of women, and in occupational expectations for both men and women. Fear of negative comments and criticisms from neighbours act as a means of social control to prevent people from behaving in a less inhibited manner. Lack of interaction between status groups and economic classes is reinforced by a growing gap between Hindus and Muslims of the same class. There are still some occasions for interaction, such as during seminars at the AMU, in mushairas (poetry gatherings), at the annual trade fair, and in continued patronage of shrines, but nowadays there is little cultural unity of the kind that existed in the 19th century as described by Bayly. Because there is a wide differ¬ ence in the way in which people spend their time and where they pass their working and social life, there is little opportunity for in¬ teraction between the elites and non-elites. As they do not live in the same part of the town, there are few opportunities for casual social intercourse; because they do not pursue the same occupa¬ tions, as we shall see in Chapter 3, there are few occasions to meet during work; the non-elite is increasingly independent of the elite for its livelihood or political representation; even during riots one part of the town is affected while another is not. There could have been opportunities in the political sphere, but increasing reifica¬ tion of baradari identity as a votebank as well as the observed inadequate (or even disastrous) past performance of the qasbah elite, have undermined opportunities for elites to politically re¬ present the masses. Instead, there is a tendency to emphasise cultural properties associated with religious identity, class properties asso¬ ciated with economic development, and social properties related to baradari. High status Muslims still emphasise the qasbah culture as the 3

Interview no. 127.

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 43

model for ideal social behaviour. On the other hand, low status Muslims prefer to emphasise formal Islam as the ideal pattern, claiming they are, in fact, better Muslims in practice than the elite. The point here is that as access to values of an elite qasbah culture is denied to low status Muslims, whether by ascription (being born into a certain baradari and thus to a certain fixed social position in life) or by circumstance (with no access to education or high in¬ come), low status Muslims desire to be judged by accessible standards. These standards are religious, Islamic ones, rather than cultural values they could never attain, even if they aspired to them. In¬ deed, the original choice of conversion to Islam in the historical past was often done on the basis of a corporate perception of in¬ equality on the part of a caste or tribe, and a desire to escape from that through the Islamic creed of equality. The problem with emphasising Islam as the unifying factor for Aligarh Muslims is that there is little consensus on what Islam means and how it can serve as a model for life. Religion is more frequently used as a tool to assert forms of identity, but does not seem to constitute an identity in its own right except where that identity has become marginalised and dangerous, as in communal confrontation. Islam is what Muslims say it is, rather than what reli¬ gious jurists, holy men or the qasbah elite say it is. Such confusion is felt in many areas of life; for example, there are two bodies of opinion over worship at the tombs of holy men: one against the practice of visiting and praying for intercession at shrines, the other in favour of it and emphasising the pir not only as a mediator between man and god, but as a symbol of oneness that transcends religious boundaries between Hindu and Muslim (Mann, 1989). Again, in matters of Muslim women’s legal rights according to the body of Islamic law, the S'hari'ah,4 these are either not known and understood by the majority of Muslims and thus not followed, or blatantly ignored (Mann, forthcoming).

The Meaning of Baradari and Zat The core unit of social organisation in the City is the baradari. In 4 The Shari’ah is the body of revealed law as put forth in the Qu'ran and Sunnah. Sunnah, literally ‘custom or usage', refers generally to the recorded example of the Prophet Mohammad. There are four remaining orthodox schools of Islamic law existing today. In Aligarh, as for the majority of Muslims in India, the prevailing code is Hanafi.

44 • Boundaries and Identities

Aligarh, the meaning of baradari is understood to be a named, endogamous status group associated with a specific occupation or lineage, from which it often, but not always, derives its name. Nowadays the correlation between occupation and baradari is not as systematic as in the past, but ancestral occupation pursues the individual when defining status in relation to other Muslims, and hence in relation to marriage and work prospects. A word of Persian origin literally meaning ‘brotherhood’, a bara¬ dari possesses an internalised sense of solidarity extended to its members, but denied to those outside its limits. It is imbued with a sense of honour (izzat), on the basis of which it is ranked higher or lower in relation to other baradaris. Its meaning, therefore, largely conforms to Weberis description of a status group, namely, that it expresses relative social honour through a specific lifestyle and can be open or closed in terms of descent (Weber, 1968). Baradari membership is ascriptive — that is, a person is born into a baradari which already possesses a fixed social identity. It is hard to avoid this identity, though efforts are made to do so. In this sense, a bara¬ dari holds the notion of ‘one body’ (Goodfriend, 1973: 121; Inden and Nicholas, 1977). The term baradari has currency not only among Muslims of west UP, but also among Hindus, and has been used interchangeably by scholars of both Hindu and Muslim society, depending on which caste, which community, and which part of the subcontinent is tar¬ geted. Parry has pointed out that in its most general sense, a baradari is premised on the assumption of the equality of its members which is expressed in the possibility of marriage on a reciprocal basis. Whom one can or cannot marry is also a primary boundary marker of baradari among Aligarh Muslims. Parry uses the term extensively in his study on caste and kinship among Hindu Rajputs in Kangra. He writes: clans of approximately equal status form a single baradari, and those girls who are not given to grooms of superior baradari are exchanged on a symmetrical basis within the baradari...each baradari is associated with a distinctive style of life and a distinc¬ tive set of customs, and interactions between baradaris are again ordered by a set of transactional rules governing the exchange of food, hookahs, greetings and—of course—women (Parry, 1979: 4). In Punjab, villagers call the baradari a group consisting of relatives

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 45

drawn from the male line of descent; in other words, members of a patrilineage tracing descent from a common ancestor (Eglar, 1960: 75-80). Ansari’s (1960) study of caste among Indian Muslims applies the term solely to the Ashraf, calling it ‘an association of kins¬ men’, a phrase originally coined by Hutton (1946). In his study of kin¬ ship in west Punjab, Alavi states the baradari is the basic institution of the kinship system ‘which emphasises horizontal fraternal ties between contemporaries rather than convergence of vertical lines of descent which is also implied’ 11972: 1-27). Alavi gives the term three gene¬ ral meanings: a common descent group traced through the paternal line and indefinite in size; following Mayer (1960), he also calls it a group of ‘mutual recognition’, limited by numbers and circumscribed by genealogies; and a more ideological concept of fraternal soli¬ darity (1972: 4-5). When I asked people in Aligarh to explain the meaning of bara¬ dari, several views were advanced. Some described it as a feature carried over from conversions some centuries earlier, when entire sub-divisions of castes (jati/got) would convert to Islam. Baradari was described as a Hindu phenomenon which Muslims had been unable to shake off, linked to historical events which tied it to an Ashraf/Ajlaf theme: The first thing you have to understand is how this baradari con¬ cept came into being. When Mughals came into India, they tried to maintain a distance from the local population. These immi¬ grants used to have higher status over others, over the local population who were converts. Some people had higher status on the basis of their religious merits, some people had higher status on the basis of special skills, and so on. And these people were not mixing up with the local population and the converts had to face many problems. They were not allowed in the marriage circle with immigrants, and these people in order to raise their status or in order to make their presence felt, they praised their genealogy, or they fictitiously borrowed the genealogy and title from the Arabs. Then people started using the names Faruqi, Usmani, and so on. When these converts came to Delhi, they were first given support by their own people. They formed a group where they can marry within itself, they can have their particular culture. And these things, although they are not found in Islam, at that

46 * Boundaries and Identities

time the need of the community was such that people should be organised along baradari lines. Since they came from a parti¬ cular region with a particular culture, they wanted to keep their culture intact, and in doing so, this sense of baradari became stronger. This is one thing, but some people feel that there is a kind of superiority or inferiority, and generally it is to keep their identity preserved in a pluralistic system.5 Some Muslims described baradari as a jati, claiming the same identity as a Hindu caste. The large Pathan population in Aligarh underlines the fact of conversion, reflecting a trait of converted Hindus to call themselves by the zat title closest to their own per¬ ceptions of where they used to fit into the Hindu caste system. The 1911 Census noted how the Lalkhani (Bhargujar) converts adopted the zat title of Pathan in this way.6 Others called it a qaum, meaning a tribe or clan, or a qabila, meaning people or nation. Still more called it a khandan or kunba, both words meaning a family, khandan signifying a patrilineal descent group, kunba being a wider term of incorporation to include affinal as well as agnatic kin. How¬ ever, whereas a khandan indicates ties of consanguinity and a kunba ties of affinity as well as consanguinity, baradari among Muslims does not necessarily imply genealogically traceable kin links. It only indicates a potential pool of marriage partners. The choice of words people used to describe a baradari depended on a number of factors, most significantly on the image respon¬ dents wished to present of themselves as Muslims or as individuals. It also depended on locality—where the mohalla was overwhel¬ mingly composed of members of the same baradari, forms of local social control and commensality were explained in terms of bara¬ dari bat (things to do with baradari). In mohallas where there was a mixture of baradaris, other emphases were used, such as honour¬ able behaviour (sharafat), or neighbourliness as a good Muslim. Those who called baradari a qaum or qabila tended to be those emphasising Muslim solidarity, who related its traditions of pride to Arabian sources of Islam, and who wanted to give an impres¬ sion of unity through religious identity. They justified the existence of baradaris by pointing out that tribes existed at the time of the 5 Interview no. 114. 6 Census of India, 1911, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Vol. XV, Part I, p. 141.

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 47

Prophet who himself belonged to the qaum of Qu’raish. Respon¬ dents choosing to describe baradari thus lived in tightly-knit kin groups, often dwelling in one large haveli or compound, where immediate and daily needs of life and social intercourse were ful¬ filled by affinal and consanguineal kin. On the other hand, those Muslims who interpreted baradari as a Hindu caste were those eager to remove caste influences and prominent in seeking to abo¬ lish ‘un-Islamic’ customs such as dowry. Still others denied the existence of baradaris altogether, claiming there are only Muslims. Zat, on the other hand, has a wider and more diffuse meaning. Although frequently used interchangeably with the word baradari, zat encompasses a status category rather than a status group. It normally refers to the higher status categories of Saiyyid, Sheikh, Pathan and Mughal. Within the zat are also baradaris, endogamous sub-units of the wider unit, whose principal criterion of member¬ ship is marriage. Thus, Sherwanis are a baradari of the Pathan zat, or the Shamsis of the Sheikh zat. However, quite often the meaning of zat and baradari were used interchangeably, particularly when judging where each was placed in local concepts of social hierarchy. Most importantly of all, the baradari’s internal values of equality to its members are not extended beyond baradari boundaries. In¬ deed, to know which baradari you belong to means to understand where you are placed in a social hierarchy in which other baradaris have more or less social status. Table 4 has been drawn up based on respondents’ perceptions of this social hierarchy. Several of the lower status baradaris attemp¬ ted to place themselves higher up on the scale, while higher status zats placed such baradaris even lower down than would normally be the case. In fact both claims and counter-claims over such attempts reflect action and counter-action by baradaris to assume the names and status of high ranking Muslims. On the whole, Muslims from registered Backward Classes were placed by themselves and other Muslims at the bottom of the hierarchy, while the four zats were universally agreed to be the highest. Middle-range baradaris had undergone considerable realignment among themselves because of economic mobility, but had not demonstrably moved up or down the hierarchical ladder in any significant way. The size of baradaris and zats varies; some are very large, and social and marriage ties between baradari members extend over long distances between village, town and state. These have been

48 * Boundaries and Identities

used in the past for trading links, or in the case of communal rioting, to support baradari members suffering from communal violence in other towns. Other baradaris and zats are quite small and highly Table 4 Muslim Baradari Hierarchy according to Respondents, 1984—86 Baradari

New Name

Traditional Occupation

Modern Name

Saiyyids: few in number, those living in the City are Shi’a Sheikh (including Shamsis and Bani Israil) Pathan (including Sherwani) Mughal (including Mirza, Baig and Khwaja) Bhargujar Punjabi Saudagar (Bisati) Lohar Qasai/Qassab (B)

landowners; education

business; service job

landowners; moneylenders

business; education; labourers manufacture; business; service jobs

Shamsi (Ahl-e-Hadith) Saifi (Hadad, Daudi) Qureshi

landowners; labourers business

landowners; labourers; gram parchers business

ironworker; labourer butchers

manufacturer; labourer

(Sheikh Qureshi) Bhathiara (B) Dhone/Dhunia (B) Julaha (B) Bahishti Teli (H) Mewati (H)

caravansarai owners Naddal, Mansuri cotton carders Momin Ansar, Ansari Saqqa, Abbasi

weavers water carriers oil pressers traders from Mewat washermen milkmen

Dhobi (B) Ghosi (B)

Malla Gaddi

Nai(B) Rangrez (B) Barhai (B) Kunjra

Hajjam, Salmani barbers

Mirasi (B) Mujawwar Tabalchi

dvers woodworkers vegetable sellers entertainers grave-diggers musicians

butchers; vegetable retailers; transport; manufacturers; labourers labourers; manufacturers cotton carders; labourers manufacturer; labourer water carriers; labourers labourers manufacturers labourers graziers; milkmen; labourers labourers; barbers labourers woodworker; labourer vegetable sellers; labourers labourers grave-digger; labourer labourers

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 49 (Table 4 Contd.) Baradari

Faqir (B)

New Name

Traditional

Modern

Occupation

Name

beggars; religious mendicants

rickshaw-pullers; labourers

B = Backward Classes among Muslims H = Backward Castes among Hindus, but not among Muslims

localised. It is difficult to give an accurate description of numbers for several reasons: first, Aligarh’s large population meant it was impossible to take an accurate count, and there are no supporting census figures breaking down population by caste or sub-group. Second, even if such a task were attempted it would be unreliable as many people, for a variety of reasons which will become obvious, refuse to admit to baradari identity. Third, the high proportion of itinerant migrant workers in the City adds bulk to the population, and contributes to the confusion over who is a permanent resi¬ dent in the City and who is not. To give some idea of the distri¬ bution of baradaris in the City, I have outlined the numerically dominant baradaris in each mohalla in Map 4. Significantly, no single baradari is large enough to completely dominate Aligarh’s social universe, unlike Kumar’s example of Banaras, where Ansaris form the bulk of the Muslim population (1989). Local estimates of baradari size varied considerably, but the general consensus was that there are more low status baradaris than high status zats, with the exception of Pathans. There was wide agreement that the largest grouping is Pathan, followed by Momin Ansar, Qureshi, Abbasi and Saifi, in that order. However, the actual number of Pathans may be smaller, as it is popular for upwardly mobile Muslims to assert Pathan status for first prefer¬ ence. Estimated population quotes fluctuated widely between 1,000 to 6,000 in each baradari. Smaller baradaris were more modest in their claims, ranging from approximately 50 people in the Shamsi baradari, 100 in the Bani Israil, and 250 (80 households) in the Punjabi Saudagars.7 The last census in which Muslims were classified 7 A baradari census in Delhi by the Punjabi Saudagars (Qaum-i-Panjabian) in 1976 put the figure for this baradari in Delhi at 3,200. Estimates for the same baradari

50 ® Boundaries and Identities

by baradari was in 1931. Table 5 alphabetically lists the distribution within Aligarh district, which reveals that the largest baradaris in the district at that time were the Sheikhs, followed by the Pathans, Bahishtis (Abbasi), Faqir, Teli and Rajput. Lagging behind these were the Saiyyid, Qassab/Qasai (Qureshi), Lohar (Saifi) and Julaha (Momin Ansar). There seems to be a wide gap between a natural population growth from the time of these census figures, and con¬ temporary estimates about the importance and strength of baradaris. There are several possible explanations for this: first, the 1931 figures pertain to the district and not the town. Some baradaris are certainly more prevalent in rural than urban areas, specifically Muslim Rajputs. Second, those currently cited as the largest bara¬ daris are engaged in traditional occupations more associated with urban rather than rural life. The high proportion of Sheikhs may also reflect efforts by Muslims to use the census as a means of upgrading their social status by claim¬ ing higher baradari status. This is reflected in a Persian proverb widely quoted locally: ‘Pesh a yin Qassab budem; bad azan gashtem Sheikh; ghalla chun arzan shawad, imsal Saiyyid meshawem'— ‘Yesterday our work was butchery (Qassab), then we became Sheikhs; having acquired a taste for that, tomorrow if the harvest is good, we shall with the grace of God become Saiyyids’—what Goodfriend calls the ‘Sheikh factor’ (1973: 123). The great propor¬ tion claiming Sheikh status in the census may well, therefore, not have been Sheikhs at all. This hypothesis was supported by discus¬ sions with respondents, and the implications of changing names are reviewed in Chapter 5. In addition, if we compare the 1931 Census figures with those of 1911, the Sheikh population was then 23,843,* * 8 suggesting a growth rate of one-third in 20 years. No other baradari expanded at such a pace in such a comparatively short period.9

in Kanpur were as high as 10,000. This gives some idea of the relative strength of baradaris in different parts of the country. 8 Census of India, 1911, Vol. XV, Part II, Imperial Tables, Table XIII pp. 272-99. 4 Pathans, by contrast, grew in number from 18,176 to 21,613 over the same period, while Muslim Rajputs declined in number from 11,212 to 10,316, as did Bahishtis (15,097 to 14,529), Qassab (7,452 to 4,860) and Teli (12,258 to 10,889). Ibid.

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups *51

A fourth suggestion is that zats were considerably depleted in 1947 with the migration to Pakistan. This may be an exaggeration, although the claim may have more foundation in Aligarh than in many other UP qasbah towns. A final point is that the three baradaris of Qureshi, Momin Ansar and Saifi in Aligarh have been prominent in attempts at upward mobility and have also become more prosperous, despite their low social status and comparative lack of education. They have thus become more assertive in baradari bat on an organised and systematic basis. When respondents refer to these baradaris, they may not be as accurate in judging their actual popu¬ lation as in reflecting local opinion as to which baradaris are socially and economically significant in today’s climate, or in reflec¬ ting individual views as to what their importance ought to be. A particular baradari may be powerful in one locality or town, but weak in another. Local power depends heavily on local economic and elite status, with important consequences for relative power internal to the status group. Where certain baradaris are numeri¬ cally larger and residentially tight, their identity is stronger, as is their ability to exercise internal social control. Where they are scattered and diffused, while the essential nature of baradari identity remains fixed, aspects of social control (such as economic boycot¬ ting) are less effective. Baradari and zat identity can thus be viewed from several angles: as they relate to the local situation in Aligarh and to interac¬ tion between local status groups; as part of a wider social concept which, as I will show, becomes increasingly politicised; and as a re¬ source network, which at both the local and national levels can be aimed in certain directions. Whichever the case, baradari bounda¬ ries are maintained by marriage patterns. High status Ashraf Muslims generally prefer a system of hypergamy between the four main zats, while low status Ajlaf Muslims pursue a system of baradari endogamy. Because of these preferential marriage systems, low status baradaris are more identifiable, more consolidated, and refer more frequently to their hierarchical status in the social struc¬ ture. High status zats have the confidence of status superiority not to have to do this; thus, commensality, endogamy and internal social regulation are features more related to low status baradaris than high status zats. It must be noted that marriage systems relating to baradari are different in Aligarh district and town. In the district there is a

52 • Boundaries and Identities Table 5 Muslims in Aligarh District in 1931, by Baradari

Male

Female

7 39 2

—

622 50 7,661

536

—

76 964 100 35 7,669 8

46 1 28 6,868 6 58 873 74 44 6,854

778 39 2,281 4 90

— 667 23 1,846 13 66

782 2,307 1,673 22 507

Total 1 85 3

Baradari Ahir Barhai Bhangi

1,158 78 14,529 6 134

Bharbhunja Bhat Bahishti Chamar Darzi

1,837 174 79 14,523 8

Dhobi Dhunia Dom Faqir Gadariya

1,445 62 4,127 17 156

Gaddi Halwai Julaha

583 1,895 1,209 16 350

1,365 4,202 2,882 38 857

Kunjra Lohar Manihar Meo Mughal

659

604

88 1,827 12,011 2,733

83 1,686 9,602 2,127

1,263 171 3,513 21,613 4,860

Nat Nau-Muslim Pathan Qassab

Kalwar Kumhar

Nai

5,505

4,811

3,833 19,360 8 9

2,898 15,291 8 5

10,316 6,731 34,651 16 14

Rajput Saiyyid Sheikh Sonar Tamboli

5,923

4,966

10,889

Teli

3 6,602 251

3 5,567 231

6 12,169 482

Turk Others Not specified

84,528

69,938

154,466

Total

Source: Census of India, 1931, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Vol. XVIII, Part II, by A. C. Turner (Allahabad; 1933).

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 53

much stronger relation to Hindu patterns, whereby exogamous patrilineal descent groups (gots) operate, and women cannot be given in marriage to men of the same got. Alavi describes a similar system in Punjab (1972: 25), and this offers an interesting contrast between urban and rural systems of Muslim social structure, even between those within reasonable proximity to each other. How¬ ever, since the got system was not the norm in Uper Kot, I do not refer to it hereafter. While the internal structure of a baradari is regulated by marriage, external boundaries are consolidated by residential locality, by an ascribed social identity, by restrictions on social intercourse and commensality, and by strongly held beliefs that certain forms of behaviour are associated with baradari identity (cf. Goodfriend, 1973: 121). Local forms of social control are exercised in order to maintain these boundaries. Baradari boundaries have, however, felt the influence of change, and to some extent been relaxed as a result. Change has come particularly because of population move¬ ments and fierce competition in industrial development, causing some breakdown of residential exclusivity in many localities, with consequences for social behaviour. Social movements such as the Tabliqh-i-Jama’at have also grown, seeking to promote the one¬ ness of Muslims in Islam and to eradicate attitudes and practices perpetuating a social hierarchy. One important area of change is in commensality, which has become more open. No longer is the situation as described in 1911, where ‘if two persons can inter¬ marry, they can eat, drink and smoke together in panchayat: if they cannot intermarry, they cannot meet in panchayat, nor can they eat kachcha food together’.10 These days Muslims claim that they interdine, socialise, share water and huqqa without a problem. This assertion removes the baradari further from a Hindu caste analogy. However, queries proved that commensal restrictions do remain, though the con¬ sensus of feeling was that no ritual or social rule justified this. In this context, Islam has reinforced the notion of equality between all. Change has not been entirely successful in abolishing some deep boundaries, but it has given certain baradaris the opportunity to assert claims formerly beyond their reach. The means of asser¬ tion and effect of claims will increasingly become clear. 10 Census of India, 1911, Vol. XV, Part I, Report by E. A. H. Blunt (Allahabad; 1912, p. 354).

54 • Boundaries and Identities

Baradari Ranking and Composition As ranked status groups, baradaris form a hierarchy based initially on descent and occupation. Those engaged in manual labour are ranked lower than those in business, who in turn are lower than those in service occupations. Ranking on the basis of ancestry raises a familiar debate among scholars on South Asia, the Ashraf/Ajlaf divide. The Ashraf are divided into four main zats, Saiyyid, Sheikh, Pathan and Mughal. Those with the highest social status, the Saiyyids, trace lineage directly to the Prophet himself or to a member of his family. The name Saiyyid is an Arabic honorific given to res¬ pected elders associated with religious knowledge, as is Sheikh. The term Sheikh is also a cultural category given to high status converts. The zats of Pathan and Mughal testify to ethnic origins in Afghanistan and Central Asia. Descendants of non-immigrants who have converted from local religions to Islam constitute the low status category of Ajlaf, or are even called ghair qaum ‘those outside the community’ (Metcalf, 1982b: 246). They are ranked in a segmentary fashion, and are said to exhibit many more customs and practices associated with Hindu caste. This is certainly true of Muslims in rural areas. By occupa¬ tion, marriage and patterns of commensality, the Ajlaf are differentiated from and excluded by Muslims of higher Ashraf status (I. Ahmad, 1966,1973b; Ansari, 1960; Dumont, 1970; Gaborieau, 1972,1982; Hutton, 1946; et al.). The emphasis on birth as a criterion for ranking among Muslims was important in the past. The 14th century commentator, Barani, urged court officials to guard against those disguising low social origins to obtain political appointments. He reveals how initially successful social climbers had been exposed, their crime punished by instant dismissal and public humiliation, or by more severe forms of retribution.11 Conflict between cultural representatives of Ashraf and Ajlaf echoed historical conflicts among Muslims, not only in the split between Sunni and Shi'a, but in movements such as the Shu'ubi, People’s Movement, during the 8th and 9th centuries. Martin describes this movement as a polarisation of Arabic and Persian cultural traditions: ‘In a battle of words, the Arabs praised generosity and the simpler versions of their tribal origins. Finding 11 Fatawa-i-Jahandari, by Ziauddin Barani, translated in Mohammad Habib and Afsar Umar Salim Khan. nd.

Social Structure: Hierarchy and Status Groups • 55

these qualities to be primitive, the Shu’ub literati esteemed high culture and courtly etiquette. Arabs viewed Persians as niggardly and haughty; Persians regarded Arabs as crude and uncultured’ (Martin, 1985: 60). The strong Persian influence in Indian qasbah towns echoed these feelings in the marked divide between the elite and the rest of the population, while the social superiority of the Ashraf, their prominence as zamindars in Uttar Pradesh, and their monopoly of economic and political power, served to perpetuate the notion that they would continue to constitute the qasbah elite, and that social ranking could be defined as ‘them and us’. Though descent is indeed one crucial element of contemporary Muslim social ranking, a complete understanding of status values depends upon considerations other than ancestry. While the terms Ashraf and Ajlaf form useful initial classificatory categories, they are inadequate in the qasbah context to describe prevailing social distinctions. The Ashraf themselves no longer provide the entire qasbah elite—those of Ashraf lineage can be found labouring as mazdoors in the lock industry, quite indistinct from their Ajlaf neighbour. Further contrasts are marked in educational terms, with differences in levels of learning, literacy and adab; in gender terms, through alternative expectations of female behaviour and dress; and in the domestic economy, with women exercising greater or lesser degrees of control over money and financial assets (Mann, forthcoming). Imtiaz Ahmad suggests the use of the words Ashraf and Ajlaf is, in fact, an artificial creation of the British census to describe a division only on the basis of ancestral origins. He points out that neither in historical literature nor in districts with substantial Muslim populations, such as rural Kashmir and Gujarat, are these words used (I. Ahmad, 1966). Certainly no one I spoke to in Aligarh used them. The predominance of other criteria for judging social ranking means that four principal status categories can be drawn (see Figure 1). The first category is the qasbah elite which lives in the Civil Lines. Members of the elite may have migrated out of Aligarh to live elsewhere, but may still own land and property in the town and district. The second category is the City Ashraf; they claim high status lineage, but have none of the additional qualities needed to allow them to use the title of qasbah elite. They may be rich or poor, but they live in the City and are involved in commerce

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