Source: TW
Bengali Muslims make up the 2nd largest Muslim community in the world after Arabs at around 190-200M. 90% in East Bengal, 27% in West Bengal, 27% in Assam, 8.5% in Tripura and small proportions elsewhere. Bengali Muslims represent ~70% of the total Bengali community (Up from 55% during 1947). Hindus make up the remaining ~30% with Buddhists at 0.2% and Christians at 0.4% rounding up at miniscule proportions of the Bengali population.
Historians like Richard Maxwell Eaton, Ahmed Sharif, Muhammad Mohar Ali and Jadunath Sarkar believe that the bulk of Muslims are descended from Buddhists who were converted to Islam by missionaries. Urban Bengali Muslims have some patrilineal foreign ancestry as well. “The rise of Islam and the Bengal frontier, 1204-1760” by Richard Maxwell Eaton gives a good idea about how the Bengalis came to be majority Muslim.
Prior to the arrival of Islam, Bengal was ruled by the Sena dynasty (সেন সাম্রাজ্য) who were staunchly Hindu compared to the previously ruling Pala Empire (পাল সাম্রাজ্য) who were Buddhists. Ganga didn’t meet Brahmaputra until the 16th century. The Islamic conquest of Bengal began with the capture of Gauda (around modern day Maldah) from the Sena dynasty in 1204. Led by Bakhtiar Khilji, an army of several thousand horsemen from the Delhi Sultanate overwhelmed Bengali Hindu forces during a flash war campaign. One of the most significant turning points was the conquest of Sylhet (Srihatta). The Hindu king Gour Gobindo was defeated by Sultan Shamsuddin Firoz Shah.
A Turkish missionary named Hazrat Shah Jalal settled there and he and his disciples married a few native women. This is one of the reasons why Sylheti Muslims tend to have a considerable Afghan, Turkic, Arab admixture from patrilineal side. The Sylheti script (ꠍꠤꠟꠐꠤ ꠘꠣꠉꠞꠤ) is also assumed to be brought or made up by him during this time for missionary work. Sylhet had one of the highest percentages of non-Muslims (~40%) during the time of partition and now has the highest of all divisions in Bangladesh at ~20%. On genetic analysis, it has been found that Urban Muslims have a higher degree of foreign patrilineal admixture, indicating foreign men marrying with native women, about 20-30% of all Bengali Muslims. Rural Muslims on the other hand showed affinity to lower caste Hindus.
The Bengal Sultanate was formed after governors of the Delhi Sultanate declared independence in the region. One important event was the rise of the Ganesha dynasty where Raja Ganesha usurped the throne when he saw an opportunity. His successor, Jadu would take over but convert to Islam. He would assume the title “Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah”. His father would have him reconverted back to Hinduism but after his father’s death, he would convert back to Islam.
Initially Muslims were having a hard time converting the populace. So, they had to “indigenize” their faith. Abrahamic tales were modified into native variants. e.g., Nile became Padma, etc. Islam was syncretized with Hindu traditions to woo potential converts. It would take up until late 16th century-early 17th century for East Bengal to reach a Muslim majority under Mughal rule. Satya Pir cult (Satyanarayan), and Bengali folk religion were syncretized with Islam. A text devoted to the cult composed by the poet Sankaracharya in 1664 identifies Satya Pir as the son of one of Sultan ‘Ala al-Din Husain Shah’s daughters, and hence a Muslim. Another version, composed by Krishnahari Das begins with invocations to Allah and stories of the Prophet. Yet the same text portrays Satya Pir as born of the goddess Chandbibi and as having come into the world to redress all human ills in the Kali Yuga, the last and lowest Hindu epoch preceding a period of restored justice and harmony.
The early 19th century would see mass “purification” movements. The Faraizi movement was founded in 1818 by Haji Shariatullah to give up un-Islamic practices and act upon their duties as Muslims. Bengalis whose identity as Muslims had not previously been expressed in exclusivist terms now began adopting Arabic surnames, a sure sign of a deepening attachment to Islamic ideals. For instance, the district gazetteer for Noakhali… …published in 1911, notes that the “vast majority of the Shekhs and lower sections of the community are descended from the aboriginal races of the district,” and that Muslims “with surnames of Chand, Pal, and Dutt are to be found in the district to this day.”
Tariqah-i-Muhammadiya Muslim was another revivalist movement in the early nineteenth century. Its aim was to establish the code of life advocated by Prophet. Shah Sayyid Ahmad (1780-1831) of Rai Barelwi and Shah Ismail (1782-1831) were the pioneers of the movement.
Both of them emphasised the interpretation of the Quran and the Sunnah of the Prophet. Under the influence of the teachings of another Muslim reformist, Karamat ‘Ali (d. 1874), boatmen of Noakhali District who had hitherto been addressing their prayers to the saint Badar and to Panch Pir (the “five pīrs”), were soon addressing their prayers to Allah alone. In essence, the same syncretism that brought in converts was now being rooted out and replaced with Wahhabi conservatism.