Jats of Sindh

Jat Muslim or Musalman Jat also spelled Jutt ( ur, ) (also spelled Jatt or Jutt; ) are a sub-group of the Jat people, who are followers of Islam and are primarily native to the Punjab region, Gujarat Region or Northern regions of the Indian Subcontinent. They are found primarily throughout Sindh, Pakistan and Punjab region of Pakistan. Jats began converting to Islam from the early Middle Ages onward, and constitute a distinct sub-group within the diverse community of Jat people.

Origin

Muslim Jats are the descendant of Hindu Jats who converted into Islam during Islamic period in India. The Jats have been identified by one writer with the gypsies of Europe, another makes their original home in the Mesopotamian marshes, others again consider them to be the descendants of the Jatii, Getae and other Scythian races, which entered the subcontinent in about the beginning of the Christian era. It is though confirmed that they were pastoralists who had migrated from the lower Indus river-valley of Sindh and Balochistan to the Northern regions around the Middle Ages.

Introduction of Islam

When Arabs entered Sindh and other Southern regions of current Pakistan in the seventh century, the chief tribal groupings they found were the Jats and the Med people. These Jats are often referred as Zatts () in early Arab writings. The Jats were the first external converts to Islam, and many were employed as soldiers by the new Arab Muslim administration in Sindh. The Muslim conquest chronicles further point at the important concentrations of Jats in towns and fortresses of Lower and Central Sindh.

Between the 10th and the 13th Century, there was large immigration of Jat groups northwards to Punjab and eastwards towards what is now Rajasthan. Many Jat clans initially settled in a region known as the Bar country, which referred to the country between the rivers of Punjab, thinly populated with scanty rainfall which accommodated a type of pastoral nomadism which was based primary on the rearing of goats and camels. Between the 11th and the 13th centuries, the Jats became essentially a farming population, taking advantage in the growth of irrigation. As these Jats became farmers, they started accepting Islam. Most Jats clans of western Punjab have traditions that they accepted Islam at the hands of many famous Sufi saints of Punjab, Shaikh Faridudin Ganj Shaker of Pakpattan, Ahmad Sirhindi of east Punjab and Baha-ud-din Zakariya of Multan, Lal Shahbaz Qalandar of Sindh, Jalaluddin Surkh-Posh Bukhari of Bahawalpur area. Critically, the process of conversion was said to have been a much slower process by .

It is still uncertain when the Jats embraced Islam, but when Babur invaded India in 1525 A. D. he found that in the Salt Range they had been subdued by the Awans, Janjuas and other Jat tribes, which had adopted the Muslim religion; we may conclude therefore that they may have been Muslims before this period. Punjabi Muslim Jats have been, and still are, democratic in their tribal arrangements.

Social organization

In the plains of Punjab, there are many communities of Jat, some of whom had converted to Islam by the 18th century, while others had become Sikhs. 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, together with the Rajputs and Gujjars, are the dominant ethnically-Punjabi and religiously-Islamic tribes settled in the regions comprising eastern Pakistan. They exert considerable influence in various mainstays of Pakistani society, including the realms of the judiciary, agriculture industry, private sector, academia, and military.

References

External links

Jat (caste) on Encyclopedia Britannica
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jat Muslim
Punjabi tribes
Jat
Jat clans of Punjab
Jat clans of Jammu and Kashmir
Jat clans of India
Jat clans of Pakistan