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Jat Muslim or Musalman Jat (Punjabi: جٹ مسلمان; Sindhi: مسلمان جاٽ), also spelled Jatt or Jutt (Punjabi pronunciation: [d͡ʒəʈːᵊ]), are an elastic and diverse ethno-social subgroup of the Jat people, who are composed of followers of Islam and are native to the northern regions of the Indian subcontinent. They are found primarily throughout the Sindh and Punjab regions of Pakistan. Jats began converting to Islam from the early Medieval era onward and constitute a distinct subgroup within the diverse community of Jat people.

History

Jats were earliest people in the Indian subcontinent to have interacted with the Muslims as multiple trading communities of Jats already existed in the pre-Islamic Arabia. Jats were referred as Zuṭṭ (Arabic: الزُّطِّ, romanized: Az-Zutt) in early Arab writings and Jat-an in Persian. They were present in Mesopotamia and Syria since the time of Sassanid emperor Bahram V (420–438), where they acted as mercenary soldiers for caliphate. They produced prominent people such as Abu Hanifa, Al-Sari ibn al Hakam al-Zutti, the emir of Egypt, and Abu Hatim al-Zutti, the founder of Baqliyya sub-sect of Qarmatians. Their power in lower Iraq broke down after the failed Zutt Rebellion and Jats lost their distinct identity in Mesopotamia that they had previously, probably merging with the Marsh Arabs of Iraq.

When Arabs entered Sindh and southern Punjab regions of Pakistan in the seventh century, the chief tribal groupings they found were the Jats and the Med people. Most Jats clans of western Punjab have traditions that they accepted Islam at the hands of Sufi saints of Punjab. Critically, the process of conversion was said to have been a much slower process.

During the era of Mughals there appears to be a little change in their position, with one Nawab Sa'adullah Khan even serving as the Grand Vizier from 1645 to 1656. After the decline of Mughal empire, many communities rose to into revolt. One of them were Afghan Rohillas, who had settled into Rohilkhand by then in large numbers. Their dynasty, the Rohilla dynasty (1714–1774) descended from Nawab Ali Muhammed Khan, who was a Jat boy of age eight when he was adopted by the chief of the Pashtun Barech tribe, Sardar Daud Khan Rohilla. Due to the role he played in the establishment of Rohilkhand and in the general history of Rohillas, he gained recognition as a Rohilla chief, however, he was not Afghan by birth. Although the Rohillas lost their kingdom after the first Rohilla War in 1774, Faizullah Khan, son of Ali Mohammed Khan, managed to become Nawab of princely state of Rampur. The Kalhoras (1701–1783) of Sindh were also probably from Channa tribe, a sub-division of Jats.

Social organization

In the plains of Punjab, there are many communities of Jat, some of whom had converted to Islam by the 18th century. Those clans that converted to Islam remained in what is now Pakistani Punjab after Partition. In Pakistan, most Jats are land-owning agriculturalists, and they form one of the numerous ethnic group in Sindh.

Jats had a strong presence in Balochistan before the Baloch migrations in the medieval ages. The modern Baloch tribes of Babbar, Gurchani, Lanjwani, Kolachi, Zardari and Dodai descend directly from the Jats of Balochistan.

Jats, together with the Rajputs and Gujjars, are the dominant ethnically-Punjabi and religiously-Islamic communities settled in the regions comprising eastern Pakistan.

Demographics

British Punjab

In the British province of Punjab, encompassing more than modern-day West Punjab in Pakistan and East Punjab in India, as per the 1921 census 47,3% of the Jats followed Islam, 33,4% were Sikhs and 19,3% were Hindus.

At the time of the 1931 census, the total Jat Muslim population in Punjab was 2,941,395 out of the Punjab province's Muslim population of 28,490,857, Jat Muslims thus contituting the single largest Muslim group of the province, at around 20%, followed by Rajputs (12%) and Arain (10%).

Pakistan

In Pakistan, the Jat population is estimated to number around 21 million compared to 12 million in India.

See also

• Sindhi Jats
• Punjabi Muslims
• List of Punjabi Muslims

References

1. Bayly, Susan (2001). Caste, society and politics in India from the eighteenth century to the modern age. The new Cambridge history of India / general ed. Gordon Johnson 4, The evolution of contemporary South Asia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-79842-6.
2. Jairath, Vinod K. (3 April 2013). Frontiers of Embedded Muslim Communities in India. Routledge. p. 1. ISBN 978-1-136-19680-5.
3. Jat caste on Encyclopedia Britannica website Retrieved 9 November 2020
4. ^ Jaffrelot, Christophe, ed. (2002). A History of Pakistan and Its Origins. Translated by Gillian Beaumont. London: Anthem Press. pp. 205–206. ISBN 978-1-84331-030-3. OCLC 61512448.
5. Khanna, Sunil K. (2004). "Jat". In Ember, Carol R.; Ember, Melvin (eds.). Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology: Health and Illness in the World's Cultures. Vol. 2. Dordrecht: Springer Science+Business Media. pp. 777–783. ISBN 978-0-387-29905-1. OCLC 473757308.
6. Wink, A. (2002). Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World. Early medieval India and the expansion of Islam 7th-11th centuries. Vol. 1. Brill Academic Publishers. p. 156. ISBN 978-0-391-04125-7. Retrieved 2 August 2022.
7. Wink, André (1991). Al-hind: The Making of the Indo-islamic World. BRILL. p. 161. ISBN 978-90-04-09249-5. Some Jat freemen became famous in the Islamic world , as for instance Abu Hanifa ( 699-767 ? )
8. Malik, Jamal (6 April 2020). Islam in South Asia: Revised, Enlarged and Updated Second Edition. BRILL. p. 44. ISBN 978-90-04-42271-1. ...Abu Hanifa (699–767), the founder of the Hanafi school of law, who was of Jat stock, most likely descending from those early prisoners sent to Iraq.
9. Beg, Muhammad Abdul Jabbar (1981). Social Mobility in Islamic Civilization: The Classical Period: Y Muhammad Abdul Jabbar Beg. University of Malaya Press. p. 171. For instance , al - Sari b . alHakam b . Yusuf al - Zutti " was a governor of Egypt in 200-205 H./815-820 A.D. There were two other reported cases of social mobility among the Zutt people .
10. Maclean, Derryl N. (1984). Religion and Society in Arab Sind. McGill University. p. 132. ISBN 978-0-315-20821-6.
11. The History of al-Ṭabarī Vol. 33: Storm and Stress along the Northern Frontiers of the ʿAbbasid Caliphate: The Caliphate of al-Muʿtaṣim A.D. 833-842/A.H. 218-227. State University of New York Press. 1 July 2015. p. 7–10. ISBN 978-0-7914-9721-0.
12. Wink, André (1991). Al-hind: The Making of the Indo-islamic World. BRILL. p. 157. ISBN 978-90-04-09249-5.
13. Wink, André (2002). Al-Hind, The Making of the Indo-Islamic World: Slave Kings and the Islamic Conquest, 11th-13th Centuries. Vol. 2. Boston: Brill. pp. 241–242. ISBN 978-0-391-04174-5. OCLC 48837811.
14. Journal of Central Asia. Centre for the Study of the Civilizations of Central Asia, Quaid-i-Azam University. 1992. p. 84. Retrieved 30 July 2022. Sadullah Khan was the son of Amir Bakhsh, a cultivator of Chiniot. He belonged to a Jat family. He was born on Thursday, the 10th Safar 1000 A.H./1591 A.C.
15. ^ Irvine, W. (1971). Later Mughal. Atlantic Publishers & Distri. p. 118. Retrieved 30 July 2022. Once Daud was sent against the village of Bankauli, in pargana Chaumahla, with which his employer was at feud. Along with the plunder taken on this occasion Daud obtained possession of a Jat boy seven or eight years of age, whom he caused to be circumcised and then adopted under the name of Ali Muhammad Khan.
16. ^ Ḥusain, M.; Pakistan Historical Society (1957). A History of the Freedom Movement: 1707-1831. A History of the Freedom Movement: Being the Story of Muslim Struggle for the Freedom of Hind-Pakistan, 1707-1947. Pakistan Historical Society. p. 304. Retrieved 30 July 2022. Amongst other prisoners he obtained a young Jat boy of eight years . Daud took a fancy to him and adopted him as his son and named him ' Ali Muhammad Khan.
17. Gommans, Jos J. L. (1995). The Rise of the Indo-Afghan Empire: C. 1710-1780. BRILL. p. 120. ISBN 978-90-04-10109-8. Most of the contemporary sources, however, call him a Jat or an Ahir.
18. Brohī, ʻAlī Aḥmad (1998). The Temple of Sun God: Relics of the Past. Sangam Publications. p. 175. Kalhoras a local Sindhi tribe of Channa origin...
19. Wink, A. (2002). Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World. Early medieval India and the expansion of Islam 7th-11th centuries. Vol. 1. Brill Academic Publishers. p. 158-159. ISBN 978-0-391-04125-7. Retrieved 2 August 2022. Samma, Sahtah, Chand(Channa)....which appear, at least in the Muslim sources, to be subdivisions of the Jats or to be put on a par with the Jats.
20. Sumaira Jajja (29 December 2013). "When it comes to 'I do', the cult of clans matter". Dawn (newspaper). Retrieved 9 November 2020.
21. Christophe Jaffrelot, ed. (2004). A history of Pakistan and its origins. London: Anthem Press. ISBN 1-84331-149-6. OCLC 56646546.
22. “Census of India 1921. Vol. 15, Punjab and Delhi. Pt. 1, Report.” Census Reports - 1921, 1923., 1923. JSTOR. Accessed 8 Apr. 2024. Page 345.
23. “Census of India 1931. Vol. 17, Punjab. Pt. 2, Tables.” Census Reports - 1931, 1933., 1933. JSTOR. Accessed 8 Apr. 2024. Page 290.
24. Lodrick, Deryck O. (2009). "JATS". In Gallagher, Timothy L.; Hobby, Jeneen (eds.). Worldmark Encyclopedia of Cultures and Daily Life. Volume 3: Asia & Oceania (2nd ed.). Gale. pp. 418–419. ISBN 978-1414448916. Retrieved 8 April 2024.

• Jat
• Jat clans of Punjab
• Jat clans of Jammu and Kashmir
• Jat clans of India
• Jat clans of Pakistan