The Deobandi movement or Deobandism is a revivalist movement within Sunni Islam that adheres to the Hanafi school of law. It formed in the late 19th century around the Darul Uloom Madrassa in Deoband, India, from which the name derives, by Muhammad Qasim Nanautavi, Rashid Ahmad Gangohi, and several others, after the Indian Rebellion of 1857–58. They opposed influence of non-Muslim cultures on the Muslim of South Asia. The movement pioneered education in religious sciences through the Dars-i-Nizami associated with the Lucknow-based ulama of Firangi Mahal with the goal of preserving traditional Islamic teachings from the influx of modernist, secular ideas during British colonial rule. The Deobandi movement's Indian clerical wing, Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, was founded in 1919 and played a major role in the Indian independence movement through its participation in the Pan-Islamist Khilafat movement and propagation of the doctrine of composite nationalism.
The Darul Uloom Deoband is an Islamic seminary in India at which the Sunni Deobandi Islamic movement began. Uttar Pradesh-based Darul Uloom is one of the most important Islamic seminaries in India and the largest in the world. It is located in Deoband, a town in Saharanpur district, Uttar Pradesh. The seminary was established by Muhammad Qasim Nanautavi, Fazlur Rahman Usmani, Sayyid Muhammad Abid and others in 1866. Mahmud Deobandi was the first teacher and Mahmud Hasan Deobandi was the first student.
The Grand Mufti is the head of regional muftis, Islamic jurisconsults, of a state. The office originated in the early modern era in the Ottoman Empire and has been later adopted in a number of modern countries.
The Barelvi movement, also known as Ahl al-Sunnah wa'l-Jamaah is a Sunni revivalist movement that generally adheres to the Hanafi and Shafi'i schools of jurisprudence, and Maturidi and Ash'ari schools of theology with hundreds of millions of followers, and it encompasses a variety of Sufi orders, including the Chistis, Qadiris, Suhrawardis and Naqshbandis as well as many other orders of Sufism. They consider themselves to be the continuation of Sunni Islamic orthodoxy before the rise of Salafism and Deobandi movement.
Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi Qadri, known reverentially as A'la Hazrat, was an Indian Islamic scholar and polymath who is considered the eponymous founder of the Barelvi movement and the Razvi branch of the Qadri Sufi order.
The Islamic University of Madinah is a public Islamic university in Medina, Saudi Arabia. Established by King Saud bin Abdulaziz in 1961, the institute is said to have been associated with Salafism, while claiming to have exported Salafi-inclined theologians around the world. Others disagree and state that the institution is objective and scientific, being detached to any singular ideology. It received institutional academic accreditation without exceptions from the National Commission for Academic Accreditation and Assessment in April 2017.
Ali Gomaa is an Egyptian Islamic scholar, jurist, and public figure who has taken a number of controversial political stances. He specializes in Islamic Legal Theory. He follows the Shafi`i school of Islamic jurisprudence and the Ash'ari school of tenets of faith. Gomaa is a Sufi.
Mufti Mehmood was a Pakistani statesman and Islamic scholar who was one of the founding members of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI); widely regarded as one of the greatest politicians in the history of Pakistan - known for his political acumen. He served as the first elected Chief Minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and later on as the Leader of the Opposition in National Assembly. He led the opposition movement Pakistan National Alliance against Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, which eventually led to Bhutto's downfall. He was among the principal architects of the 1973 Constitution of Pakistan.
Fazal-ur-Rehman is a Pakistani politician who is the president of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F). He is also the president of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), a coalition of political parties which ousted then prime minister Imran Khan through a no-confidence motion in 2022. He has been a member of the National Assembly since February 2024 and previously served in that position between 1988 and 2018. He was also the Leader of the Opposition from 2004 to 2007. He is a supporter of the Taliban government in Afghanistan and has demanded for its international recognition. In the 1980s, he was part of the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy (MRD), which was formed to end the military regime of General Zia-ul-Haq.
Zimbabwe is a Christian majority country, with adherents of Islam being a small minority. Due to the secular nature of Zimbabwe's constitution, Muslims are free to proselytize and build places of worship in the country. Islam is the religion of less than 1 percent of the population of Zimbabwe.
Ebrahim Desai was a South African Muslim scholar and jurist who established the Darul Iftaa Mahmudiyyah, the Askimam fatawa portal and served as the senior professor of hadith at Madrasah In'aamiyyah. He was an alumnus of Jamiah Islamiah Talimuddin Dabhel and ranked among The 500 Most Influential Muslims. He authored books including Commentary on Qaseedah Burdah, Introduction to Hadīth and Introduction to Islamic Commerce.
Sectarian violence in Pakistan refers to violence directed against people and places in Pakistan motivated by antagonism toward the target's religious sect. As many as 4,000 Shia are estimated to have been killed in sectarian attacks in Pakistan between 1987 and 2007, and thousands more Shia have been killed by Salafi extremists from 2008 to 2014, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW). Sunni Sufis and Barelvis have also suffered from some sectarian violence, with attacks on religious shrines killing hundreds of worshippers, and some Deobandi leaders assassinated. Pakistan minority religious groups, including Hindus, Ahmadis, and Christians, have "faced unprecedented insecurity and persecution" in at least two recent years, according to Human Rights Watch. One significant aspect of the attacks in Pakistan is that militants often target their victims places of worship during prayers or religious services in order to maximize fatalities and to "emphasize the religious dimensions of their attack".
Freedom of religion in Singapore is a guaranteed constitutionally protected right.
Muhammad Qasim Nanawtawi was an Indian Sunni Hanafi Maturidi Islamic Scholar, theologian and a Sufi who was one of the main founders of the Deobandi Movement, starting from the Darul Uloom Deoband.
Salafi–Sufi relations refer to the religious, social and political relations between Salafis and Sufis, who represent two major scholarly movements which have been influential within Sunni Muslim societies. The debates between Salafi and Sufi schools of thought dominated the Sunni world since the classical era, splitting their influence across religious communities and cultures, with each school competing for scholarly authority via official and unofficial religious institutions. The relationship between Salafism and Sufism – two movements of Islam with different interpretations of Islam – is historically diverse and reflects some of the changes and conflicts in the Muslim world today.
Tauqeer Raza Khan is an Indian politician and Islamic cleric. He is a religious leader of the Bareilvi Sunni Muslims and founder of the Ittehad-e-Millat Council, a political party based in Uttar Pradesh. He is a great grandson of Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi, who was the founder of the Barelvi movement of Sunni Islam. He also heads the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (Jadeed) after he cut ties with the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, claiming discrimination by the Deobandis.
Persecution of Sufis over the course of centuries has included acts of religious discrimination, persecution, and violence both by Sunni and Shia Muslims, such as destruction of Sufi shrines, tombs and mosques, suppression of Sufi orders, murder, and terrorism against adherents of Sufism in a number of Muslim-majority countries. The Republic of Turkey banned all Sufi orders and abolished their institutions in 1925, after Sufis opposed the new secular order. The Islamic Republic of Iran has harassed Sufis, reportedly for their lack of support for the government doctrine of "governance of the jurist".
The 2016 conference on Sunni Islam in Grozny was convened to define the term "Ahl al-Sunnah wa al-Jama'ah", i.e. who are "the people of Sunnah and majority Muslim community", and oppose Takfiri groups. The conference was held in the Chechen Republic capital of Grozny from 25 to 27 August 2016, sponsored by the president of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, and attended by approximately 200 Muslim scholars from 30 countries, especially from Russia, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Kuwait, Sudan, Jordan, etc. at the invitation of Yemeni Sufi preacher, Ali al-Jifri.
Taha Karaan was a South African Muslim scholar and jurist. He was the head-mufti of the Muslim Judicial Council, South Africa. He was the founder of Mahajjah Research Institute and the Dar al-Uloom al-Arabiyyah al-Islamiyyah in Strand.
Darul Uloom Deoband was established in 1866 in the Saharanpur district of Uttar Pradesh, India, as part of the anti-British movement. It gave rise to a traditional conservative Sunni movement known as the Deobandi movement. The Deobandi Movement has an international presence today, with its full-fledged manifestation in South Africa, a country where the movement was initiated through the Indian Gujarati merchant class. The Islamic education system of the Deobandi movement, as well as the necessary components of social and political organizations such as Tablighi Jamaat, Sufism and Jamiat, are fully functioning effectively in South Africa, as they do in India. Madrasas in South Africa provide Islamic higher education and are now centers for Islamic education for foreigners who are interested in receiving a Deobandi-style education. Many of their graduates, especially from Western countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States, are Western students. Some of South African madrasas are recognized globally, providing fatwa services. South Africa is now known for producing exceptional Islamic literature through translation and compilation. Similarly, the Tabligh Jamaat is a hub in South Africa that spreads throughout South and East Africa. Graduates of South African madrassas spend their time in the path of the Tabligh Jamaat. Through the work of several spiritual personalities of the Deobandis, the tradition of Deoband's Tasawwuf (Sufism) has taken root in South Africa. Among them are Zakariyya Kandhlawi, Masihullah Khan, Mahmood Hasan Gangohi and Asad Madani. South African Deobandi Muslims have many important and influential educational and socio-political organizations that educate the people and play an important role in religious and social activities. Among them are Jamiatul Ulama South Africa and the Muslim Judicial Council.
