Samastha History

Samastha Kerala Jam’eyyat ul-Ulama (All Kerala Ulama Organisation), known as Samastha, is an association of eminent Sunni scholars who enjoy the highest support base among Kerala Muslims. The formation of Samastha was the response of these traditional Ulama to the conditions of post-1921 period in which Kerala Muslim community generally witnessed a radical shift from the folds of individual leadership to the folds of organisations. When they became equally disturbed by the ongoing modernisation trends in western style, and in the first public circulation among Kerala Muslims of the fundamentalist and puritanical views of Muhammad bin Abdul Wahhab (1702-1793), Salafism of Rashid Rida (1865-1935), Islamic modernism of Muhammad Abduh (1819-1905), pan-Islamism of Jamaluddin Afghani (1939-1897), and the Tahreek e-Mujahideen in North India. The new ideologists first came out through the Kerala Muslim Aikya Sangham ( group for unity among Kerala Muslims), which was founded at Kodungallur of Cochin state in 1922 by leaders like KM Seethi Sahib, KM moulavi and EK Moulavi. It tried to bring the scattered and unorganised reformist activists together. Later, they formed a Ulama organisation, Kerala Jam’eyyat ul-Ulama, at a two-day conference of Aikya Sangham held at Alwaye in 1924 where a large number of scholars were invited. It is a fact that the outstanding members of the traditional Ulama did not openly reject the Kerala Jam’eyyat ul-Ulama at first. However, gradually, the platform of the organisation started to be utilised to attack the traditional Islam that was followed unopposed for centuries and which was nurtured under the guidance of eminent scholars headed by Makhdums of Ponnani. They declared a host of Islamic cultural traditions as Shirk and Bidaa, and alleged the centuries-old scholarly and intellectual tradition of Kerala Muslims with deviations and alterations. The Ulama felt the need to organise to defend and protect Kerala’s Islamic tradition and to wage a revivalist movement against the new interpretations. Moulana Pangil Ahmed Kutty Musliyar, who had already started counter campaigns against the ‘Wahhabi ideology’, along with some other scholars met Marhum Varakkal Sayyed Abdurahman Ba Alawi Mullakkoya Tangal, who was a Sufi Sheikh, renowned religious scholar and a prominent figure of Sayyed family, to discuss the need of an organisational movement to defend the true spirit of the religion. Tangal suggested convening a meeting of the eminent scholars to discuss the suitable solution. In 1925, some major ulama and other society leaders gathered at Calicut Valiya Juma Masjid and formed an Ulama organisation after prolonged and serious discussions. KP Muhammad Meeran Musliyar and Parol Hussain Moulawi was named the President and Secretary of the organisation respectively. The newly formed Ulama organisation convened within a year many popular conferences, mainly at places where the new ideologists had received big attraction, and directed the masses to be aware of the leaders and followers of the ‘Bida’i sects’. They also travelled throughout the state to convey the message of the ulama organisation to maximum religious scholars who were living in the mosques or religious centres serving the Islamic knowledge. A year later on June 26, 1926, a bigger convention was called at Calicut Town Hall, where eminent scholars from across the state participated, under the chairmanship of Sayyid Shihabuddhin Cherukunchikkoya Tangal. The convention reorganised the previously formed temporary organisation and adopted a full-fledged organisational set-up in the name of Samastha Kerala Jam’eyyat ul-Ulama. The convention nominated Varkkal Mullakkoya Tangal as Samastha’s first president, while Pangil Ahmed Kutty Musliyar, Muhammed Abdul Bari Musliyar, KM Abdul Qadir Musliyar and KP Muhammad Meeran Musliyar became vice presidents, and PV Muhammad Musliyar and PK Muhammad Musliyar became secretaries in the first committee.