Suhrawardi

• Suhrawardi silsilah was founded by Sheikh Shihabuddin Suhrawardi.
• It was established in India by Sheikh Bahauddin Zakariya (1182-1262).
• He set up a leading khanqah in Multan, which was visited by rulers, high government officials and rich merchants.
• Sheikh Bahauddin Zakariya openly took Iltutmisht‘s side in his struggle against Qabacha and received from him the title Shaikhul Islam (Leader of Islam).
• It must be noted that, unlike the Chishti saints, the Suhrawardis maintained close contact with the state. They accepted gifts, jagirs, and even government posts in the ecclesiastical department.
• The Suhrawardi silsilah was firmly established in Punjab and Sind.
• Besides these two silsilahs there were others such as the Firdawsi Silsilah, Shattari Silsilah, Qadiri Silsilah, Naqshbandi Silsilah.

 

Chishti

• The Chishti order was founded in a village called Khwaja Chishti (near Herat).
• In India, the Chishti silsilah was founded by Khwaja Muinuddin Chishti (born c. 1142) who came to India around 1192.
• He made Ajmer the main centre for his teaching.
• He believed that serving mankind was the best form of devotion and therefore he worked amongst the downtrodden.

 

Qalandars

• Qalandars are a loosely organized group of wandering Muslim dervishes who form an irregular (bī-shar’) or antinomian Ṣūfī mystical order.
• The Qalandarīyah seem to have arisen from the earlier Malāmatīyah in Central Asia and exhibited Buddhist and perhaps Hindu influences.
• The adherents of the order were notorious for their contempt for the norms of Muslim society, their use of drugs, and their coarse behaviour.
• They shaved their heads, faces, and eyebrows, dressed only in blankets or in hip-length hairshirts, led a wandering, nomadic life, and regarded all acts as lawful.

 

Naqshbandi

• The Sihilah-i-Khwajgan known as the Naqshbandi Sufi Silsilah in India originated in Transoxiana (Turkey) under the foundership of Khwajah Abu Yousuf Hamdani (d.c.e. *f14G), Khwajah Bau’d-din Naqshband (c. e. 1318) was the seventh in the Naqshbandi series.
• He was adopted by Khwajah Muhammad Shamsi, the fifth descendent of Hamdani.
• Akbar’s reign brought a flourishing period of the Naqshbandi order in India.
• A number of scholars of the order migrated to India and settled here.