Muslim Saints of South Asia: The eleventh to ... - blog blog blog

THE SPIRITUAL SOVEREIGN OF MULTAN
always, was interested in finding out, where the women, who had
given birth to so many saints, were buried. It turned out that they are
laid to rest inside Bibi Pakdaman’s tomb, situated to the south of the
fort, in Basti Daira locality. It is a typical ‘residential’ oblong tomb
with a flat roof and an arched verandah in front, surmounted by two
small cupolas. In the centre of a hall stands the high wooden cenotaph
of the woman who was Baha’uddin Zakariya’s daughter-in-law and
Ruknuddin’s mother, and whose nickname Pākdāman means
‘innocent’, ‘virtuous’. Other women of this family have been laid to
rest in the tah-khāna (basement) of this building.
As with other tombs of women saints, men are barred from
admittance to Bibi Pakdaman’s dargāh, which has female keepers.
Adjacent to the tomb there is a sacred well, on the surface of which
floats a carpet of rose petals which are brought as an offering to the
saint. Women pilgrims perform ablution in this fragrant water in
order to be healed of diseases, mainly barrenness. The branches of
the banyan tree growing close to the reservoir are gay with a great
number of multicoloured shreds of cloth and threads – it is considered
that the supplicant’s wish will be fulfilled once the threads rot or
crumble to dust. Obviously Bibi Pakdaman’s baraka has a specialized
curative property, in addition to being connected with female fertility,
whereas supplications are made to the males of her family in
connection with a wider range of problems.
In the courtyard of Ruknuddin’s tomb a band of qawwāls plays
continuously. Side by side with them one may come across beggars
and dervishes of the most preposterous appearance – with tousled
hair, wearing flowing robes, decorated with iron bangles and
necklaces. Some of them belong to the marginal sect Jalaliyya, and
are considered to be bē-shar‘. The Jalali order claims its lineage from
Jalaluddin Surkhposh Bukhari and is historically connected with the
Surkh-Bukhari branch of Suhrawardiyya. Jalali dervishes did not
have a permanent residence; they roamed all the time from Multan
to Ucch and back. They were kept out of musāfir-khāna which is why
they passed the night in tents and cardboard boxes close to the walls
of the dargāh. At the sight of a Jalali dervish it is easy to understand
why Baha’uddin Zakariya had an aversion to juwāliqs.
However, there is something paradoxical in the fact that the
moderate and respectable Suhrawardiyya fraternity caused such an
abnormal sprout to grow on the South Asian soil: although the
Spiritual Sovereign of Multan did his best to guard himself from the
local substratum, it overtook him within the limits of his own silsila,
and that too in most deviant and aggressive forms.
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