2 - Laldas and Religious Duality of Pīr and Sant

Summary

Folk stories in Mewat narrate how, in the sixteenth century, Sahab Khan, the Mughal governor of Tijara, near the present-day Alwar district in eastern Rajasthan in north India, summoned Laldas (1540–1648 CE) to account for not practising Islam, despite being born into a Muslim family. Sahab Khan offered him meat, saying it was Muslim food that a Muslim should willingly eat. This move was intended to symbolise the saint's Muslim identity and to reintroduce him to the Islamic fold from which he had strayed. The meeting with Sahab Khan is documented in a hagiography—compiled and written in rhyming verses by a Laldas devotee called Dungarisi Sadh:

tabaī mughal ne svāgat karī, baitho pīr dayā tum karī,

rotī-khānā karo kabāb, bhūkhā khāyā badā śabāb,

dān yār to badā ajīj, upar musalmān ki cīj

musalmān hove khāye khulāye, to vah rāh khudā kī pāve. (Dungarisi

n.d.: 26; see Appendix A.1)

Then the Mughal welcomed him saying, sit pīr and bestow your blessings on me

Eat a meal of bread and kebab, it is really tasty when you are hungry

Serving you is a matter of immense joy, this is also a Muslim practice

If a Muslim eats it himself and feeds others, then he attains the path of God.

Although the Mughal officer's invitation for Laldas to consume kebab might seem like a respectful act, it was, in fact, a deliberate tactic aimed to ascertain the saint's religious standing. By depicting Laldas's religious conduct as transgressing Islamic boundaries in these hagiographic narratives, the text seeks to establish his identity as a Hindu saint. According to the verses, Sahab Khan heard reports that Laldas did not pray as a Muslim: he neither performed ablution nor invoked the name of the Prophet, despite being a member of the Meo Muslim caste and the ‘Islam’ religion. In another set of stanzas, Dungarisi Sadh goes on to narrate the doctrine taught by the saint to both Hindus and Muslims, which got him in trouble:

śīlvant santan sukhdāī, satjug kī sī rāh calāī

daurī khabar tijāre gayī, sahib khan sū jā kahī

jāt meo arū musalmān, hindū rāh calāī ān

rojā bang nivāj nā pathe, īd-bakrīd kū man nahī dhare

rojā rakhe nā kalmā kahe, hindū turak sū nyārā rahe

nabī-rasūl kahe nā kahāve, rām-rām mukh setī gāve