Reform in the Ottoman world and India (1839-1900)

Part oneReform from above in the Ottoman lands

In 1839 the Ottoman government announced the Tanzimat, the "reorganisation". It promised every subject security of life, honour and property, fair taxes and equality before the law, whatever their religion. A second edict in 1856 repeated the promise. In the following decades came new law codes, a reformed army, state schools, a central bank, railways, the telegraph and a census.

The reformers hoped that if all subjects, Muslim and Christian, felt like equal citizens, the empire's peoples would stop breaking away. It did not work as they hoped. Many Muslims resented losing their old standing, and many Christians preferred the self-rule of their own communities. European powers kept intervening on behalf of the Christian subjects. The empire also borrowed heavily from European banks, and in 1875 it could not pay its debts.

Part twoThe Young Ottomans

A group of young writers and officials, the Young Ottomans, formed in 1865. They thought the Tanzimat had given too much power to a few ministers and too much influence to Europe. They wanted a constitution and a parliament, and they argued that these were in keeping with Islam.

The best known of them, the poet and journalist Namik Kemal, pointed to the Quran's command to consult in matters of rule, and to the saying that "the leader of a people is their servant". A ruler, he said, must answer to the community. In 1876 the empire's first constitution was proclaimed and a parliament elected. But the new sultan, Abdulhamid II, suspended both in 1878 during a disastrous war with Russia and ruled alone for thirty years. He built schools, railways and the telegraph, and he stressed his role as caliph of all Muslims to hold the empire together.

From the Quran

فَبِمَا رَحْمَةٍ مِّنَ ٱللَّهِ لِنتَ لَهُمْ ۖ وَلَوْ كُنتَ فَظًّا غَلِيظَ ٱلْقَلْبِ لَٱنفَضُّوا۟ مِنْ حَوْلِكَ ۖ فَٱعْفُ عَنْهُمْ وَٱسْتَغْفِرْ لَهُمْ وَشَاوِرْهُمْ فِى ٱلْأَمْرِ ۖ فَإِذَا عَزَمْتَ فَتَوَكَّلْ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ يُحِبُّ ٱلْمُتَوَكِّلِينَ ۝١٥٩

It is out of Allah’s mercy that you ˹O Prophet˺ have been lenient with them. Had you been cruel or hard-hearted, they would have certainly abandoned you. So pardon them, ask Allah’s forgiveness for them, and consult with them in ˹conducting˺ matters. Once you make a decision, put your trust in Allah. Surely Allah loves those who trust in Him.

Part threeIndia after 1857

In India the failed uprising of 1857 brought down the Mughal dynasty and left the Muslims of the north in disgrace with their new rulers. The British blamed them for the revolt. Muslim nobles and scholars lost their posts, and the old Persian-language schools lost their place.

Muslims answered in different ways. In 1866 scholars founded a madrasa at the small town of Deoband to protect traditional learning. It taught the Quran, hadith and law without help from the state, and graduates of the Deoband school went on to found thousands of madrasas across South Asia and beyond.

Another answer came from Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, a nobleman of Delhi who had served the East India Company and stayed loyal to it in 1857. He believed that Indian Muslims had fallen behind because they shut themselves off from modern learning. In his book on the causes of the revolt he argued that the British had never given Indians a voice in government. He wanted Muslims to learn English and the sciences while keeping their faith, and he wrote a commentary on the Quran to show that true faith and reason did not conflict. In 1875 he founded the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh, modelled on Oxford and Cambridge, which later became Aligarh Muslim University. He came to believe that Hindus and Muslims were two nations with different interests, an idea that later shaped the movement for Pakistan.

Deoband and Aligarh disagreed sharply, and both shaped Muslim life in South Asia for the next century. Between them they showed the question every Muslim society faced in the age of empire: what to learn from the West, and what to protect.

Every Muslim society faced the same question: what to learn from Europe, and what to protect.

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The mapWhere it happened

• Istanbul
• Cairo
• Delhi
• Aligarh
• Deoband
• Lucknow

This map is a simple sketch to help you picture where events took place. Positions, distances and borders are approximate, so please use it for reference only, not as an accurate map.

SourcesSources for this chapter