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Khwaja Band-e Nawaz Gesudaraz
Compiled By: Syed Ali Shahbaz
On July 13, 1321 AD, the most prominent Sufi preacher of the Deccan (Southern India), Seyyed Mohammad Zaidi Hussaini, known popularly as “Khwaja Band-e Nawaz Gesudaraz”, was born in Delhi into a family of migrants from Herat, Khorasan, that traced its lineage to Martyr Zaid, the son of Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS) – the great-grandson and 4th Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).
He was a disciple of Seyyed Naseer od-Din, titled “Chiragh Dehli” (Lamp of Delhi), and spent several years in Qandahar (Afghanistan) and Baluchestan as a preacher, before returning to Northern India. In 1398, at the age of 77, he moved to Daulatabad, owing to the attack of Amir Timur on Delhi, and finally settled down in Gulbarga, at the invitation of Taj od-Din Firouz Shah of the Bahmani Dynasty of Iranian origin. He died forty years later at the age of 101, and his shrine in Gulbarga is a site of pilgrimage. He wrote about 195 books in Arabic, Persian and the Deccani form of early Urdu. His book on Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) titled “Me’raj al-Asheqin” for the instruction of the masses is regarded as the first one of its kind in vernacular language, rather than in Persian or Arabic.
He was a devout follower of the Prophet’s Ahl al-Bayt. Although the original inscriptions of his mausoleum no longer exist or have been tampered with, his wife’s mausoleum has remained in its original form, and on its entrance is inscribed in stone, the testimony of the Oneness of God, the Mission of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), and the vicegerency of Imam Ali (AS).
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