 When I ever leave Banaras, this holy city is the Kaaba for all. Every man here looks like the son of Ram and Lakshman. These verses were composed by Muslim poets, Ali Hazim from Persia and Delhi's very own Mirza Ghalib. Banaras, the ancient center of Hinduism and yet a symbol of Hindu-Muslim interaction, the very essence of the composite culture of the Indians of continent. It was largely the fusion of Sufism or Islamic mysticism and bhakti, the Hindu devotional movement that resulted in the evolution of India's unique composite culture. This culture still survives in various parts of India. India is home to over a hundred million Muslims, the world's second largest Muslim population. The only uniformity about Indian Muslims is their diversity. They speak in different languages. They belong to diverse cultural zones. It was the Sufis or Islamic mystics who settled in various parts of the country. They carried the message of Islam to the masses. They stressed the humane aspects of Islam and the religious message was simple. Belief in one God and equality of man. Many of the early Sufis came from Iran and Arabia over the Northwest Passes and settled in Sin and Rajasthan. They were able to win over people in an alien land because they were men of exceptional piety. They proclaimed and practiced the equality of all believers, embracing all converts, even those considered outcast by Hindu society. The converts carried many of their old beliefs and superstitions into their new faith and in this manner gave birth to a uniquely Indian Islam. Everywhere in India, the lifestyle of the Muslim bears, the cultural stamp of the region where they live. This is Ajmer Sharif, the biggest Sufi center in India. Perhaps the most exceptional of the early dervishes was Hwaja Moinuddin Chishti who settled in Rajasthan in 1195. His tomb in Ajmer is undoubtedly the most famous Dargah in the entire subcontinent. Moinuddin Chishti counted that a Chishti order which went on to become the most popular Sufi order in India. This order produced legendary saints like Nizamuddin Awliya and Baba Farid. Baba Farid is believed to have had great influence on Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion. Sufism was a liberal brand of Islam that respected the indigenous customs of India and incorporated many local festivals into the Sufi cults. The Sufi saints had much in common with Bhakti, the Hindu devotional movement. This movement stressed personal devotion to God and intense piety. It attempted to break the stranglehold of caste on the Hindu faith and made it accessible to all. Many of the rituals and customs at the Sufi Dargahs or Mazars are clearly Hindu in origin and are not found anywhere else in the Muslim world. Even the custom of worshipping Sufi saints by giving them divine status and attributing magical powers to their tombs is alien to Islam and clearly inspired by Hindu devotionalism. This then is the portrait of Islam in the subcontinent, a practice of the faith within a totally Indian framework.