A tiny grocery store tucked away in a suburb of Ottawa, Canada, called the Desi Price Club. We go there very often to buy Indian groceries as they have the best prices in town and, as a bonus, the owner is very soft-spoken. For a long time, we did not realise that the word “desi” referred to Pakistan and not India, as we had assumed. Of course, this discovery did not stop us from going to the store.
One day, while we were shopping at this store, we heard beautiful Sufi music playing on the video at the store, set to a very modern beat. There were drums and guitars and even a trumpet; only the words were in Urdu, and we could not even understand many of them. On an impulse, we bought a CD of this music and took it home. This was the beginning of our love affair with Coke Studio.
Later, we discovered more Coke Studio music on Youtube, with English captioning. With the help of captions, we began to understand the lyrics much better and were carried away by the spiritual beauty of the compositions. We discovered that Coke Studio was quite a phenomenon in Pakistan as well as in India. Newspapers called it the best thing that came out of Pakistan in recent times.
I had grown up in a typical Hindu family and had formed typical stereotypes about Muslims in my mind. We didn’t know too many Muslims personally, as they lived mostly in different parts of the city. The most recognisable feature of this area was the burkha that many women wore. I always thought these people were very different from us, dressing very differently, eating different food from us, praying differently and following their strange customs. My image of Pakistan was even worse; after all, this is the enemy country that keeps attacking us.
Listening to Sufi music from Coke Studio Pakistan shattered many of these stereotypes for me. I discovered that many Sufi saints were born in India or, at least, in the Indian sub-continent as it then existed. Then I made a major discovery that changed my thinking even more — the Sufi tradition is the meeting point for three of the major religions of the world: Hinduism, Islam and Christianity. Sufis go beyond any particular belief, although they imbibe elements from every culture. I wondered to myself: why can’t all of us do the same?
There are innumerable references to these three religions in Sufi poetry. The words change a bit, but the essence remains the same. Yogi becomes Jogi, Savla (a name for Lord Krishna) becomes Sawal Yaar. Moses becomes Musa, Mother Mary becomes Mariam, while Noah becomes Nooh. We say Guru in Hinduism, but the same person becomes Murshid in the Sufi tradition.
I discovered that the Sufi Qawwali artform was born in India, perhaps around the time of Hazrat Nizamuddin and Amir Khusro. It was a form of music developed by the Sufi mystics, involving repetition of key phrases and melodies, until the audience reaches a trance-like state, along with the singers. My own belief is that the name Qawwali itself is derived from the Sanskrit word Kavya, meaning poetry, although not many Muslim scholars would support this viewpoint. Regardless, this art form has found deep roots in India and Pakistan.
Both the Sufi Qawwali and Hindu Bhajans developed around the same time, the heyday of the Bhakti movement in the Indian sub-continent. In essence, Qawwali is not any different from bhajans, as they are both devotional. Both achieve their effects using the same foundation of the Indian raga structure. Both can lead to trance-like states.
The Indian ragas use particular notes, and particular combinations of notes, to appeal to our deep-seated emotions. The raga Bhairava, for example, uses mostly flat notes to induce a spiritual feeling. The word Bhairava is a name for Lord Shiva, and the raga has been used very often in Shiva bhajans. I recently heard a song from legendary singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, set to raga Bhairava. However, it was a Sufi song in praise of Allah. I made another discovery: for a Sufi, Allah and Shiva are the same. Can inter-faith love ever get closer than this?
As I listened to Coke Studio, I also discovered that Muslim society, even in Pakistan, is not at all backward. There are plenty of women Sufi singers, and many of them, like Sanam Marvi and Abida Parveen, are extremely talented. Some have travelled all over the world to showcase their music. Many Indian singers have followed the Sufi path, and it is becoming more and more popular as people realise it is essentially secular and goes beyond any individual religion.
Politics is dividing the world today, promoting national disharmony. Perhaps, Sufi music can bring things back into balance and make India the tolerant, inclusive country that is its basic nature.