Abstract
As owners of extensive matrilineal joint households in the Tellicherry Coastal town (North Malabar, South India), Keyis upheld an urban-centred identity in the colonial period. Scattered around the coastal town of Tellicherry in Cannanore, the Keyis today form an economically diverse group. The socio-economic distinction of the Keyis from other Muslim merchants on the Coast, their consolidation of social organisation along the matrilineal line and their economic relations based in landlord–tenant relations are explored here. The nature of the transformation of economic relations and kinship practices among the Keyis in the colonial and post-colonial period puts forth interesting dimensions of their everyday practices as shaped by historic and region-specific socio-economic, legal and political conditions. By undertaking a historical and ethnographic examination of this kinship group, this paper explores Muslim communities and cultures through their pluralities and recommends a methodological shift towards the exploration of kinship practices to inform the current scholarship on the Anthropology of Islam and Kinship Studies.
Introduction
This paper makes two methodological moves. One challenges the homogenous understanding of Muslim societies as uniform and patrilineal in their social organisation, and the other re-centres the study of Muslim communities as an important area of attention in kinship studies. This methodological shift facilitates an understanding of and exploration into Muslim communities beyond a singular and monolithic assumption, as it provides a nuanced dimension in Kinship scholarship where studies on Muslim communities are yet to gain adequate visibility. 1 Much of the theoretical and methodological shift that has taken place in recent years in the scholarship on the Anthropology of Islam was about studying diversity within Islam. 2 Can religious practices co-exist with customary practices? How does the study on the plurality of ‘everyday Muslim practices’ as distinct from scriptural Islam – particularly in regions outside the so-called Islamic heartland of the Middle East be undertaken? Can Islamic doctrine and matrilineal traditions be looked at as complementary, and if so, how does this complementarity get shaped locally? This paper engages with some of these methodological concerns and interlinks them with Kinship studies while exploring pluralities in Muslim communities. It provides a new dimension to Kinship Studies by exploring the case of the Keyi Muslims. While presenting an intermingling of customary elements and religious practices, attention is also paid to the ways in which these factors are further informed by region-specific socio-economic and political factors and the colonial history of the coastal belt of the Malabar region of South India.
As owners of extensive matrilineal joint households in Tellicherry (North Malabar 3 South India), the Keyis upheld an urban-centred identity in the colonial period. Scattered around the coastal town of Tellicherry in Cannanore, 4 the Keyis today form an economically diverse group. This diversity is observed in their religious orientations, political affiliations, and their occupational and educational status. The emergence of Keyis as an economically and socially affluent merchant and matrilineal kinship group in Tellicherry in the colonial period needs to be understood in the context of colonial relations, the political economy and land relations in Malabar. 5 The growth of Keyis was also shaped by other locally rooted factors such as the trade rivalry between native Muslim traders and merchants on the Coast and their exercise of power and authority over socially and economically lower Muslim and non-Muslim communities in colonial Malabar.
The matrilineal social organisation among the Malabar Muslims (including Keyis) is deeply connected to the trans-oceanic trade linkages in the pre-colonial and colonial period. Descent traced along the female line, matrilocal residence 6 of the women and the matrilineal inheritance of landed properties and households are some of the notable features of this arrangement along the Malabar coast. The Muslim traders who were frequently away from their conjugal units for trade purposes found the matrilocal residence of their wives and the custody of their children under the matrilineal kin, a convenient arrangement.
The changing market conditions under the colonial rule challenged the trade monopoly and economic position of matrilineal joint households. Koyas, a matrilineal social group and trading community in the Calicut Coast (South Malabar) began to lose their monopoly over the ‘bazaar economy’ during this period. 7 On the other hand, Keyis (unlike the Koyas) who had not only emerged as merchants but also as landowners in Tellicherry began to invest the profits procured through trade and merchandise on land. This period also witnessed colonial legal interventions into the matrilineal social organisation of these communities, including that of the Keyis. Legislative modifications paved the way for re-fashioning familial and kinship relations along the lines of conjugality and patrilineality. Other factors that informed this shift over time include the contestations raised against matrilineal practices by the Islamic reformers in the colonial period, the impact of post-colonial land reforms and the gulf oil boom of the 1970s.
This paper explores the history of the matrilineal Keyis. The merchandise and trade endeavours of the Keyis are contextualised by conceptualising the Malabar Coast as an operating belt for diverse trading communities since the pre-colonial era. The socio-economic distinction of the Keyis from other Muslim merchants on the coast, in terms of their economic relations based in landlord–tenant relations and the consolidation of their social organisation along the matrilineal line, are examined with the aid of historic sources and field study. The nature of the transformation of economic relations and matrilineal kinship practices of the Keyis in the colonial and post-colonial period brings forth interesting dimensions of the everyday practices among the Malabar Muslims, as embedded in, and reshaped by, historic and region-specific socio-economic, legal and political conditions. Through a historical and ethnographic exploration of this kinship group, this paper argues for a study of Muslim societies and cultures through their pluralities.
Conceptualising Diversity within Muslim Societies
A monolithic understanding of Islam informed Social Anthropology for a long period of time. This formulation also assumed that the Muslim societies across cultures are patrilineal in nature and that the religion is essentially antithetical to customary practices. The scholarship around the Anthropology of Islam witnessed a theoretical shift in the late 1960s in the study of Muslim communities that moved beyond this essentialism. The existing puzzle then was to formulate a theoretical framework to study diversity within Islam. According to Ovamir Anjum, 8 the ‘great and little’ tradition dichotomy formulated by Robert Redfield influenced anthropologists like Clifford Geertz in the study of Muslim societies. Redfield defined little tradition as ‘heterodox, peripheral, local and un-reflexive’ and great tradition as ‘orthodox, textual and reflexive’. 9
According to Talal Asad, 10 anthropologists held onto this dichotomous model where the scripturalist and puritanical faiths of the towns came to be defined as the ‘great tradition’, while the concept of ‘little tradition’ was deployed to refer to the ritualistic religion which included saint worship in the countryside. Contestations have been raised by scholars like Sami Zubaida, Muhammad Qasim Zaman and Vinod K. Jairath against these monolithic and dichotomous models. 11 According to Jairath, it is important to explore Muslim societies in relation to their spatial and temporal specificities. 12 The matrilineal practices among Muslims provide a suitable case in point to understand Muslim societies and communities beyond such essentialist claims.
The everyday practices among the matrilineal Keyi merchants need to be analysed as embedded in the socio-cultural and economic setting of the Malabar region. The Malabar Coast was a flourishing commercial hub of merchandise and trade for diverse Muslim communities since the pre-colonial time. Islam thrived through its local manifestations along the coast, with communities adopting socio-cultural practices such as the matrilineal kinship organisation.
Existing Literature on the Keyis
Kinship studies continue to remain an important field of inquiry in Social Anthropology in South Asia and elsewhere. Yet, very few studies are available on the matrilineal kinship practices among Muslim communities. 13 Studies on matrilineal Muslims, such as the present paper, challenge the assumption that Muslims across cultures are patrilineal, and conceptualise matriliny as shaped by other region-specific factors.
Among the Muslim communities in Malabar, matrilineal practices are predominant along the coastal belt. Yet, the Muslim communities here are not homogenous. They are diverse in terms of their trade and merchandise, size of landholdings and history of origin. In recent years, academic scholarship has delved into the matrilineal practices among the Koyas of Calicut, 14 without specifically engaging with their pluralities. To the global scholars engaged in the study of the history of Indian Ocean trade, Malabar is the location where trading communities flourished. Are these Malabar Muslims only traders? Is there regional specificity in their political economy and land relations? How does their socio-economic position as a landowning community redefine the social relations in Malabar? Here, the Keyis offer a context to explore these dimension – the matrilineal and landowning Keyis demonstrated socio-economic superiority to other Muslim and non-Muslim communities from lower classes. Their extended merchandise history during the colonial period provides insight into an analysis of diversity in political economy and land relations.
Unlike the Koyas who formed a social group that cherished extensive trade relations in the Indian Ocean and lived in a dwelling pattern like that of an enclave and married from neighbouring Koya tharavads, the Tellichery region has a marked presence of matrilineal families who are known by their independent family histories. 15 Yet, limited sources are available to investigate their socio-economic organisation. This paper bridges this gap by exploring the case of the Keyis. A research interest in providing a historical nuance to the ethnographic inquiry, based on the availability of archival collections on the merchandise of Keyis in the colonial period and scant academic sources on the same, laid the backdrop for the study.
The book titled, The History of the Keyis of Malabar, by A. P. Ummerkutty published in 1916 in Malayalam was the pioneering work on the history of the Keyi family. 16 The author was also the son of a Karnavar 17 in a tavazhi 18 of the Keyi family. In 1930, Churia Vasudevan brought out a pamphlet titled The Keyis of Malabar for the English-reading public. 19 There has been no significant contribution to the study of Keyis thereafter, until The Keyis of Malabar: A cultural study which was published by K. K. N. Kurup and E. Ismail came out in 2008. 20 The latest contributions to this field include a working paper by M. P. Mujeebu Rehiman in 2006 titled, ‘Merchants and Colonialism: The case of Chovvakkaran Moosa and the East India Company’ 21 and a research article titled, ‘The Keyi Mappila Muslim merchants of Tellicherry and the making of coastal cosmopolitanism on the Malabar Coast’ by Santhosh Abraham. 22
Because of limited sources, the present study relies on the ethnographic data collected through a six-month-long empirical study conducted by the author in Tellicherry in 2015. Other colonial records such as Talasseri Rekhakal (a linguistic series in Malayalam which documents early British affairs in Tellicherry), Tellicherry factory records and diaries, Malabar records of Northern Superintendency, Malabar Residency commercial diaries and political consultations in the period 1750–1800, manuals, treaties and Gazetteers are analysed to understand the trade transactions carried out by the Keyis in the service of the British Company, unlike other native Muslim merchants on the coast. Despite the significant visibility of the Keyis in the colonial documents in the archives of Madras and Kerala, there has never been an adequate effort to bring this community into the focus of academic scholarship. The Keyis constitute a minority group among the Muslim communities in Malabar today. No authentic source could be retrieved to state the numerical strength of this group.
Native Muslim Merchants along the Malabar Coast
The Coastal Malabar Muslim merchants constituted a heterogeneous group since the pre-colonial period in terms of their origin, region, social status, economic position, choice of marital alliance and dwelling pattern. Such pluralities could be observed in other regional contexts as well. 23 The native merchants along the Malabar Coast in the pre-colonial and colonial periods comprised the offspring of foreign merchants and native women (who converted to Islam), and local converts from the Hindu population in Malabar. 24 Matrilineal practices formed an important aspect of the social organisation among them. The Koyas of Calicut, the Keyis of Tellicherry and the Arackal royal family of Cannanore were the major native merchant and trading families in the Coast till the 20th century. 25 Native Muslim merchants also included other matrilineal families residing in the Coastal belts of Mahe, Vadakara and Ponnani regions of Malabar. 26
While Koys are believed to have emerged through the marriage alliances between Arab traders and matrilineal women in the Malabar Coast, such an Arab ancestry cannot be traced in the case of the Keyis, as they were local converts to Islam. In addition to local converts, the Koyas also comprise those who trace their ancestry from Yemen (called ‘Barami Koyas’ in the locality), who claim their origin in the Prophet’s lineage (Koya Thangals in this case) and enjoy a superior status.
The origin of the Arackal family is traced back to the middle of the 16th century. 27 As the only Muslim royal family in colonial Malabar, Arackal exercised its power over parts of Chirakkal and Kottayam Taluks, as well as over the Laccadive and Minicoy islands. 28 The main source of income for the royal family was procured from the Indian Ocean trade. The political and economic relations of the royal family with the Portuguese, Dutch, French and English varied in accordance with the benefits they received from each. 29 In the matrilineal social arrangement of Arackal, the eldest member (despite their gender) succeeded to the throne. The male rulers of Arackal were adorned by the title, ‘Ali Raja’ of Cannanore and the female rulers were referred by the title, ‘Adi Raja Beebi’. 30
According to Prange, 31 it is important to study Muslim merchants in the Malabar Coast as ‘communities in the plural’. These diversities are demonstrated in the paper through a comparison of the socio-economic organisation, and the trade and merchandise history of the Keyis and Koyas. It helps to move beyond a homogenous assumption of Muslim communities in the Malabar coast. Keyis and Koyas are of specific interest to this paper mainly because of the extensive ethnographic study conducted by the author among them.
The Malabar Coast also witnessed an inflow of foreign merchants from Muslim and non-Muslim merchant communities from across India since the pre-colonial time. Among them, the foreign merchants included those who sailed from Cairo, Aden, Bussora, Hormuz, China and Arabia, while the Bohra Muslims, Nawayaths and Cutchi Memons were from different parts of India. 32 Rice, timber, coir, pepper, ginger and cardamom were some of the major products exported. 33 The trade ties on the South-west coast also extended to the realm of marriage alliances of the non-native Muslim merchants with local women whose offspring were converted to Islam.
History of the Matrilineal Keyis of Tellicherry
The history of the Keyis in Tellicherry begins with the migration of Aluppy Kakka, the founder of the Keyi family from Chovva to Tellicherry in 1680 AD. 34 Chovva is a place in the Chirakkal Taluk of Cannanore where Kakka engaged in the trade of cardamom, ginger, pepper and copra. He collected goods from the traders who were engaged in overseas trade along the Tellicherry port. Trans-oceanic trade seemed impossible for Aluppy Kakka in Chovva as it was not a port town. 35 So, he migrated to Tellicherry along with his sisters and nephews. They came to be known as the ‘Chovvakkaranmar’ 36 (people who came from Chovva) in the Tellicherry Coastal town amidst other merchants.
The emergence of the Keyis as distinct and prosperous merchants in the Tellicherry coastal town during the colonial period needs to be analysed in terms of its specific regional colonial history and merchandise. The ethnographic study indicates that the native merchants in the Tellicherry coastal town (including the Keyis) and Cannanore did not form a social group like the Koyas of Calicut but were known by their tharavad (joint household) names, kinship ties and the legacy of extensive trade and merchandise in the colonial period. This continues to be the case even today. The economic rivalry between the matrilineal tharavads for trade monopoly, and status demarcations, exercised through the construction of separate mosques and burial grounds for the tharavad members put forth an important dimension of strategies for status demarcations by these communities in the coastal belt.
As the trade expanded, the warehouse that was previously used for drying copra and even dwelling purposes seemed inconvenient. With the construction of ‘Valiya Orkateri’, the then biggest tharavad in Tellicherry, the settlement of the Keyis was consolidated along the matrilineal line. 37 Aluppy Kakka’s sisters and nephews resided in the tharavad. Later, when Orkateri could not accommodate all its members, tavazhis or branches were formed along the matrilineal line.
The term Keyi is believed to be a later adoption as the term used earlier to refer to them was Kakka. It is assumed that the term ‘Keyi’ was first used to refer to Kunchi Pakki Keyi who was the fourth lineal descendant of the family who owned ‘several crafts plying between Bombay and Malabar around A.D. 1809’. The term Kakka is of Gujarati origin, which means Karnavan. 38 Senior members of the matrilineal family are generally referred to by the term Karnavan. Later, the term Kakka came to be replaced by the title ‘Keyi’ which has a Persian origin, meaning ‘owner of the vessel’. 39 The trading engagements of the Chovvakkaran family extended beyond local and regional boundaries in even new coastal belts such as Mangalapuram, Gujarat and Bombay. The rich trader Chovvakkaran then began to be called ‘Keyi’ by his servants in Bombay. 40 Later, this title came to be adopted by the members of the Chovvakkaran family in order to mark their status distinction among other native matrilineal Muslim tharavads in Tellicherry as well as to embellish their legacy of matrilineage and trade on the coast.
Trade flourished as a kindred affair among the matrilineal Keyis. The senior anantaravan or nephew replaced his maternal uncle in the management of trade and tharavad affairs. Trade and kinship ties reciprocally sustained them both. The interconnections between the economic patterns and social organisation among the merchants on the coast cannot be discarded. Matrilineal practices formed an important aspect of their social organisation and the communal pattern of economic endeavours facilitated trade, ‘through the establishment of bonds of trust’. 41
The Advent of the British Factory and the Emergence of Keyis as Prosperous Merchants in Tellicherry
Malabar became a commercial enterprise for the British in the second decade of the 17th century.
42
Prior to this period, the Malayan Archipelago received considerable attention in the spice trade compared to the Malabar Coast. The British exploration for a suitable market to settle down in Malabar ended with the establishment of a factory in 1683 at Tellicherry. Tellicherry being the chief emporium for the Company’s pepper trade, the factory at Calicut was made subordinated to it. Then the English shifted their headquarters to Tellicherry on account of its proximity to the finest pepper and cardamom lands in Malabar. The English left a few factors at Calicut to look after their commercial interests. Tellicherry factory raised to the status of the headquarters of the English affairs on the Malabar Coast was destined to play a predominant role for a century in the history of the country.
43
No manufacturing was carried out in the Tellicherry factory. It was meant solely for administrative purposes and to symbolise the consolidation of British power in Tellicherry – the port town in Malabar which exported the best quality pepper around this period.
44
Kurup argues that the local traders who helped the British in terms of the export and import of various articles were termed ‘agents’. The native merchants procured articles for lower rates from inland cultivators and provided them to the British. Their economic relation with the British facilitated by their trading engagements brought prosperity to the Keyis, aiding in their subsequent accumulation of landed properties in Tellicherry, Mangalapuram and Bombay. Some of the Keyi members also functioned as agents to the Company.
45
carries the note of the dispatch and a copy of the letter to the Rajah of Chirakkal from Chovvakkaran Moosa complaining of the detention of his pepper at Balliapatam which he procured under his contract with the Honourable Company and requesting its release (see Table 1). The Moplas on the Coast, who were always peaceful, carried on their usual vocation of trade and amassed large fortunes. In addition to the family of the Ali Rajah of Cannanore who derived considerable wealth by trade, there were many rich merchants in Tellicherry and other places in North Malabar who, like Chovvakkaran Moosa [emphasis added and spelling modified], were able to advance money even to the Ali Raja of Cannanore on a mortgage of the Laccadive Islands.
46
Historical sources on the extensive merchandise by the matrilineal Keyis. Source: Press List of Ancient Records in Fort St. George from 1750–1800, Tamil Nadu Archives, India.
Amidst other native Muslim merchants operating on the Malabar Coast, the Keyis were able to mark their distinct socio-economic identity during the colonial period. They constituted a smaller group among the Malabar Muslims who played a crucial role in trade and merchandise in the colonial period as the ‘wealthy Mappila traders of Cannanore and agents of heiress of the house of Ali Raja’. 47 The trade transactions of the Keyi merchants figured prominently in the colonial records. 48 The constant references to the Keyi merchants in various documents relating to British affairs in the Malabar (unlike other merchants) indicate the higher social position extended to the Keyis by the British. In the Malabar Gazetteer by C. A. Innes, 49 the Keyis are referred to as a prominent Muslim merchant family living on the coast of Tellicherry. The Keyi merchants are cited by their family name, Chovvakkaran, in the Gazetteer. According to Innes, Chovvakkaran Moosa held a monopoly over the coir of the Laccadive Islands in 1784. This coir was offered to the Company on contract for the supply of six thousand candies of pepper by the Keyis.
References were made to the Chovvakkaran family as agents and tax collectors of the Company in the Talasseri Rekhakal as well. 50 Apart from Chovvakkaran Moosa, the trading engagements of other Keyi merchants such as Chovvakkaran Bapen and Chovvakkaran Makki are also cited in the colonial records. 51 Apart from the Keyis, the trade transactions of other merchants on the Tellicherry Coast such as Vaniyambalathu Koyyambu, Valikkandi Makki, Mukkatupurathu Makki, Nochilakathu Pokker and Ayyarakathu Mammi with the Company are also documented. 52
The trade carried out by the Keyis and their economic transactions with the British can be inferred from the Press List of ancient records in Fort St. George (see Table 1). This historical account throws insight into the nature of the merchandise that the Keyis were trading in, and their power relations with the British and the native rulers.
Archival evidences indicating the prominent role played by the Keyis as native merchants during the colonial period also include a petition by Chovvakkaran Moosa to the British Company on the loss of his elephants, requesting to have more consideration for his ‘zeal and loyalty in the service of the Company’ and a letter from M. H. Clephane, Secretary to the Commissioners of Malabar, requesting to lodge the brimstone belonging to Chovvakkaran Macky in one of the Company’s warehouses at Tellicherry to safeguard it from the depredations of the Cotiote rebels. These details can be found in the Malabar Residency Commercial Diaries 1800 53 and the Tellicherry Factory Diaries 1791.54, 55
According to Kurup, the consolidation of British power in Tellicherry facilitated the emergence of Keyis and other socio-economically lower ranked communities such as the Thiyyas as prosperous trading communities in Malabar.
56
The British commercial enterprise along the Malabar Coast failed to influence the emergence of a middle class like in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. Kurup points out several reasons for this.
57
According to him, the Company’s trading endeavours failed to reach all except a few already established traders and merchants in Malabar. The centres like Calcutta, Bombay and Madras had been largely benefitted as commercial and industrial entrepots from the innovations brought by the oceanic trade. Neither Tellicherry nor its hinterland had resources for such developments. Only massive improvements in agriculture and plantation crops which supported nine tenths of the population could have done so. But in Malabar there had been no agrarian revolution…the agricultural produce was not intended for a large international or national market, but only for the subsistence of the groups.
58
A subsistence-based rather than export-based economy, landlord–tenant relations, caste-based restrictions in choosing one’s vocation, and the restrictions imposed by local chieftains on the free mobility of commodities to a common market were some of the factors that restricted the emergence of a middle class in Malabar. 59
The trading engagements with the British and the emergence of wealthy merchants from Muslim and Thiyya communities as trustworthy agents of the British also promoted their entry into the colonial bureaucracy and salaried jobs in the 19th century. For example, Murkkoth Kumaran and C. Krishnan who hailed from the Thiyya families of Tellicherry worked in the colonial legal and educational institutions. 60 The British influence came to be observed in the lifestyle, dressing and leisure patterns of these newly formed native bureaucrats. They appeared for public events wearing black coats and a black turban (cap), as recounted by a senior male Thiyya respondent who hails from a matrilineal tharavad in Tellicherry.
Membership in Colonial clubs and participation in new forms of leisure such as cricket and tennis differentiated the class positions of the Thiyya and Muslim bureaucrats from other Thiyyas and Muslim merchants in Malabar. 61 These bureaucrats also exercised considerable influence over the colonial judiciary in the interpretation of local customs and usages. Their daughters were convent-educated, under the influence of the Basel Mission in Tellicherry, which faced vehement opposition from the orthodox sections in the community. 62 On one hand, a smaller section among the Muslims and Thiyyas adhered to colonial education, and on the other hand, the orthodox groups among the Muslim communities discouraged English education. Hence, it could be argued that the challenges to colonial education by Islamic reformist trends of the early 19th and 20th centuries flagged off an alternative way of embracing modernity and scientific thinking. Purification of Islam from accretions such as the veneration of saints and matrilineal practices surfaced as important concerns in the reformist trends of this period. 63
Matrilineal Social Organisation and Religious Practices
Matrilineal practices constituted an important aspect of the social organisation among native Muslim merchants like the Keyis during this period. As already mentioned, the matrilineal joint household of the Keyis is called a tharavad. A woman and her descendants in the female line constituted a typical tharavad. Women exercised their permanent right to dwell in the matrilineal tharavad through the practice of matrilocality. Polygamous and cross-cousin marriages were also prominent among the Keyis unlike with the Koyas till the mid-20th century. It has come to be replaced by monogamous conjugal units in recent times.
The matrilineal Koyas inherited the family properties related to trading endeavours such as warehouses according to the Muslim Law of Inheritance, except the tharavad which descended down the female line in the colonial period.
64
In contrast, the ethnographic study gathered that the Keyis inherited both the matrilineal tharavad and landed properties down the matrilineal line. In the matrilineal tharavad of the Keyis, a child is born as a property holder. His or her father need not acquire any property. Even a 250 days-old foetus is eligible for a share of the ancestral property. (Kunji Muhammad, Male, Age 61)
65
One becomes a Keyi only when his mother is from a Keyi tharavad. The term Keyi is not attached to the name of the female members and this paper argues that it conveys a gendered dimension of their trade expeditions. The division between the domestic and public domains is visible in the ways in which titles are conferred upon kins. The title Keyi which is acquired through trade and merchandise may be argued as symbolising the public domain of economic affairs of the men, which relegates the women to the domestic sphere.
In addition to the term ‘Keyi’, an initial ‘C’ is also added to the names of its family members. The initial ‘C’ stands for ‘Chovvakkaran’. For example, in the name C. Muhammad Keyi, the initial ‘C’ stands for the family name and is attached to the names of female members as well. In the case of female members, the initial ‘C’ and the initial of their respective tharavad is added. An example is the name, C. K. Ayisha. Here, ‘C’ stands for ‘Chovvakkaran’ and ‘K’ stands for the tharavad name. They rarely carry their husband’s name.
If branches and sub-branches are formed along one matrilineal line, it is also conveyed by adding those initials. For example, the name C. K. P. Mammu Keyi suggests that the initial ‘C’ stands for the Chovvakkaran family which binds him to the main tharavad, while the initials ‘K’ and ‘P’ refer to the branch and sub-branch of his main tharavad.
Tharavad affairs were overseen by the eldest male here called the Karnavar. Apart from the management of tharavad affairs, trade was also carried out under his supervision by the younger male family members during the colonial period. The trade endeavours of maternal uncles were inherited by their nephews. It can be assumed that this matrilineal social organisation provided a conducive environment for merchants and traders, and trade was cherished as a kinship affair along the coast. 66
The matrilineal social organisation sustained as a diverse practice among various Muslim communities since the pre-colonial time because of its region-specific political economy, colonial history and post-colonial socio-economic transformations. The Muslim merchants and traders constituted a heterogeneous group in terms of their economic positions and land relations.
The Keyi merchants of Tellicherry emerged as a landowning and trading family group in the colonial period, while the Koyas of Calicut remained mere traders. This demarcation can be understood in the context of the regional political economy of Malabar and its colonial history. Ports like Calicut functioned through multifaceted regents like the Arabs, Portuguese, Dutch and British in the pre-colonial and colonial periods. It helped the Muslim traders of the region to obtain quick incomes. The assurance of quick incomes as well as the fact that land was a minimal resource in Calicut prompted the Koyas to make investments in non-landed ancestral properties and warehouses, unlike the Keyis of Tellicherry who emerged as landowners in the colonial period. 67
Landlord–tenant relations formed an important aspect of the political economy of the affluent Muslim merchants of Tellicherry, including the Keyis. Reciprocity served as an important socio-economic linkage between the landlords and tenants till the mid-twentieth century. Customary practices were based in a reciprocal exchange of services between landlords and tenants. The Muslim landlords, including the Keyis, received gifts in the form of ghee and chicken from their tenants during the fasting month (especially after the 17th day of the fasting month) of Ramzan. It is assumed that the landlord is gifted the most valuable things that the tenant possesses. In return, they received clothes from the landlord. (Khadija, a Keyi woman in her mid-50s) The well to do Muslim tharavads consisted of a number of servants who served their masters across generations. Their children were also brought up in the landlord’s tharavad. The landlord also lent financial support for their marriage ceremonies and offered a piece of land to dwell for rent. The lower class and socially inferior groups among the Muslims served these Muslim tharavads. In addition to them, non-Muslims such as the Nambiars and Thiyyas also served as trusted agents of the wealthy Muslim traders. (Ahmad,
68
male, aged 57, a non-Keyi who hails from a matrilineal Muslim merchant family in Tellicherry town which has established marital alliances with the Keyi family).
Apart from land, the Keyis owned warehouses, buildings, textiles and vessels during the colonial period for maritime trade across India. They also traded in black pepper and cardamom. The profit procured from the trade was invested in acquiring land from across the territories. While the market reforms deteriorated the economic status and the bazaar-based economy of the Koyas in the colonial period, the Keyis secured their economic position through investments in land. 69
The Keyis also extended their economic superiority to the socio-political and religious domains through the construction of mosques during the colonial period. After the demise of Aluppy Kakka (the founder of the Keyi family), the Odathil mosque was built by Moosa Kakka (nephew of Aluppy Kakka) in 1806. According to C. A. Innes, 70 this mosque in Tellicherry town was built on a government garden. The mosque is open for all the Muslims in the locality for namaz or prayer. However, only the Keyis and their children are buried here. In recent years, sons-in-law and daughters-in-law are also buried here.
The management of the mosque is under the control of the senior male members of Tavazhis or matrilineal branches of the main tharavad. The authority of the management committee is vested upon the senior-most male member of all the branches. It is the case even today (Figure 1). Odathil Mosque built by the Keyis in Tellicherry in 1806. Source: Taken by the author during field visit.
The socio-economic transformation – Post Independence Scenario
With the socio-economic and political conditions of the 20th century, trade deteriorated among the Keyis. The later generations made no effort to invest in their industries as they relied on the incomes generated from their already existing landed properties and the rent generated from the buildings they owned in the nearby regions of the coastal town. 71 As per the field narratives, they were absentee landlords to a great extent in terms of the properties owned outside Tellicherry, and those were illegally occupied by outsiders in the long run as the later generations showed no interest in the properties situated away from home. A few of the properties were in Mangalapuram, Bombay and Mysore. Some of these were also given away as charity to build mosques and other religious institutions. The Keyis lost a considerable portion of their landed properties due to the land reforms initiated under the first Communist Government in post-colonial Kerala which upheld the agenda of ‘land to the tiller’. These changing economic conditions led to the migration of the Keyis to the Gulf countries in the 1970s. 72
The Gulf migration can be understood as a significant socio-economic process during this time which brought about economic mobility among many Muslim traders and merchants along the Malabar Coast who had to suffer the economic turmoil created by colonialism, market changes and land reforms in the 20th century. 73
The matrilineal tharavad of the Keyis transformed with the decline in trade, land reforms and absentee landlordism which occurred during different phases in the 20th century. The Islamic reformist contestation of matriliny as an un-Islamic practice, and the intervention of the younger generations through legal reforms for the formal validation of patrilineal inheritance over matrilineal inheritance also informed this shift. The reformulation of familial values within the matrilineal tharavad and the transformation of the economic position of the Keyi merchants can be understood as fostered through an interplay of contextual and historical factors such as colonialism, legal reforms, Islamic reformism, land reforms and Gulf migration. The findings pointing towards these dynamics could urge scholars to embark on an anthropological exploration of Muslim societies beyond essentialist and dichotomous claims.
Towards a Conclusion: Recent Shifts
Scattered around the coastal town of Tellicherry, the Keyis today form an economically divergent group. The decline of colonial trade links along the coast of North Malabar in the mid-20th century had consequences on the economic position of the Keyis. The 1960s land reforms and the reformulation of landlord–tenant relations in Malabar also contributed to shifts in the ownership of landed properties. However, the Gulf migration in the 1970s facilitated the economic mobility of the Keyis, like the Koyas. The differences in the class relations among the Keyis in recent times are linked to the Gulf migration in the 1970s and their individual accumulation of wealth. Keyi migrants in professional jobs can be found in cities like New York and London, while migration to Western and European countries is minimal among the Koyas. The Keyis also continue to assert their identity in the public sphere as participants in socio-political and cultural realms.
The Keyis emerged as an affluent merchant family whose economic positions, familial ties and social relations came to be modified in relation to the wider socio-economic processes that took place in Malabar. Elements of continuity from the colonial period are observed in recent times in their kinship practices like the construction of bridal chambers, while a devolution to the traditional practices in property ownership and control is observed largely in accordance with the Muslim Law of Inheritance. The same can be observed among the Koyas as well.
This exploration of matrilineal practices among the Keyis through the change and continuity of these practices provides attention to the examination of Muslim communities through their pluralities. It debunks the monolithic reading of Muslim communities across cultures through a singular lens. The case of the Keyis offers a seminal contribution to the field of Social Anthropology in general and Anthropology of Islam in particular to study Muslim communities through their everyday practices. As outlined in the beginning of this paper, this exploration of the Keyis also brings new perspectives to Kinship studies, where explorations of Muslim communities continue to remain marginal.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I acknowledge the financial assistance I received through Senior Research Fellowship (SRF) from the University Grants Commission (UGC), New Delhi, to carry out the research. I am thankful to Pushpesh Kumar (University of Hyderabad) for his comments on an earlier draft of this paper. I thank Alippy Keyi (Kerala), K. K. N. Kurup (scholar of history, Kerala) and Dennis B. McGilvray (University of Colorado, USA) for their valuable insights into the history of Malabar Muslims and matrilineal Muslim communities in South Asia.