The Rise of Deobandi Islam in the North-West Frontier Province and its Implications in Colonial India and Pakistan 1914–1996

Abstract

The commitment of North-West Frontier Province Pakhtun religious politics towards the quest for a society and state governed by religious leaders was directed through the colonial period, and into the national period, predominantly by the ulama known as Deobandis. These ulama took their title from the madrasa Darul Ulum Deoband in the United Provinces in north-India and came to prominence through championing Muslim interests in colonial NWFP. After the partition of the Indian subcontinent and the creation of Pakistan in 1947, the United Provinces remained in India, separating Pakistani scholars trained in Deoband from Indian Deobandi theologians, and indeed from the school itself. But these ulama continued to call themselves Deobandis and were central to the successful demand for the constitutional declaration of Pakistan as an Islamic state; and brought Islam to bear on national and provincial legislation from positions in parliament. Increasingly well-organised and well-funded, NWFP Deobandi ulama established madrasas and mosques in the province, strengthening the preserve of religion and their own authority. When the Afghan resistance to the Soviet occupation began in 1978, a section of the resistance organisation working in exile in Peshawar gravitated towards these Deobandi institutions, drawing the Deobandi ulama of the NWFP into the jihad. Sustaining links to the Afghan fighters even after the withdrawal of the Soviets, the NWFP Deobandis contributed to and encouraged the emerging organisation of the Taliban, becoming champions of their reactionary brand of Islam.