From the early Muslim kingdoms developed Indian Muslim clan-groups who were well-rooted social groups that acted as warrior lineages providing court officers and military soldiers. These evolving communities or tribes played a key role in providing a local Muslim leadership. The language developed at the time of
Sultans of Dehli due to the mixture of people, likely to be soldiers, from Turkish, Arabic, Persian, Afghan and Indian background.
Mughal Empire As early as 1689, Europeans used the label
"Moors dialect", which simply meant "Muslim", to describe Urdu, the language associated with the Muslims in North India, such as John Ovington, who visited India during the reign of Mughal emperor
Aurangzeb: The language of the
Moors is different from that of the ancient original inhabitants of India, but is oblig'd to these Gentiles for its characters. For though the
Moors dialect is peculiar to themselves, yet it is destitute of Letters to express it; and therefore in all their Writings in their Mother Tongue, they borrow their letters from the
Heathens, or from the
Persians, or other Nations.
Fall of the Mughal Empire The Upper Doab and Rohilkhand was dominated by a literate and homogenous elite, who embraced a distinctive
Indo-Persian style of culture. This service gentry, performing both clerical and military service for the Mughal empire and its successor states, provided cultural and literary patronage that continued, even after the political decline, to act as preservers of
Indo-Persian traditions and values. File:Painting of Cavalry in Durbar Procession of Mughal Emperor Akbar II.png|Cavalry in the Durbar Procession of Mughal Emperor Akbar II () under British rule File:1st Regiment of Skinner's Horse returning from a General Review, 1828.jpg|Regiment of Skinner's Horse returning from a General Review, 1828 File:An Officer of Col Gardiner’s irregular Cavalry.jpg|Officer of Col Gardiner’s irregular Cavalry, "drawn mainly from Muslism from Hindoostan" File:Sowar of Rohilla Cavalry, 1815.jpg|Sowar of the Rohilla Horse, 1815 The end of Muslim rule saw a large number of unemployed
Indian Muslim horsemen, who were employed in the army of the
East India Company. Thus 75% of the cavalry branch of the British army was composed of a social group referred to as the "Hindustani Mahomedans". This included Indian Muslim
Baradaris of the
Urdu-Hindustani Belt such as the
Ranghar (Rajput Muslims),
Sheikhs,
Sayyids,
Mughals, and
Indianized Pathans. British officers such as
Skinner,
Gardner and Hearsay had become leaders of irregular cavalry that preserved the traditions of Mughal cavalry, which had a political purpose because it absorbed pockets of cavalrymen who might otherwise become disaffected plunderers. The Governor-general insisted that it was incumbent upon the British to "give military employment" to various north Indian Muslim soldiers, particularly those "formerly engaged in military service of the Native powers". The lingua franca spoken in the army was a form of
Urdu referred to in colonial usage as "military Hindustani". The
Indian Rebellion of 1857 was initiated by the
3rd Bengal Light Cavalry in Meerut, which was composed mainly of Indian Muslims. The mutineers made for Delhi, where its garrison revolted, massacring its British population, and installed
Bahadur Shah Zafar as its nominal leader. The spread of the word that the British had been expelled from Delhi, interpreted as the breakdown of British authority, acted as a catalyst for mutiny as well as revolt. Regiments in other parts of northern India only revolted after Delhi had fallen. British characterisations of Muslims as fanatics took the fore during and after the Great Rebellion, as well as produced the Indian Muslims as a unified, cogent group, who were easily agitated, aggressive, and inherently disloyal.
Urdu nationalism and
Mohsin-ul-Mulk|thumb Even in later days, the same clans were dominant groups in the associations in the defence of Urdu and district Muslim Leagues which were among the first forays of Muslims into electoral and pressure-group politics. In the 19th century,
Sir Syed Ahmed Khan and his followers such as
Mohsin-ul-Mulk further advocated for the adoption of Urdu as the language of
Indian Muslims, and led organisations such as the
Anjuman-i Taraqqi-i Urdu and
Urdu Defence Association, which won popular support in the
Aligarh Movement and the
Deoband Movement. It was made the official language of British India in 1825 and got large opposition from the Hindus and thus sparking the
Hindi-Urdu controversy in 1867. This resulted in Sir Syed's
Two Nation Theory in 1868. The Urdu language was used in the emergence of a political Muslim self-consciousness. Syed Ahmed Khan converted the existing cultural and religious entity among Indian Muslims into a separatist political force, throwing a Western cloak of nationalism over the Islamic concept of culture. Furthermore, in 2008 Syed Nadeem Ahmed brought forward the idea of Urdu Nationalism by presenting his idea of an "Urdu Qaum" based on Urdu language and culture. The distinct sense of value, culture and tradition among Indian Muslims originated from the nature of Islamification of the Indian populace during the
Muslim conquests in the Indian subcontinent. ==Demographics==