Shia Islam in Bangladesh

During the reign of the Sultan of Bengal, Alauddin Husain Shah, many paiks and other administrative position holders were of Habshi origin. After many significant agitations, as well as after the disestablishment of the Habshi dynasty, Husain Shah replaced the Habshis with Arabs, Turks, Persians (Shias) and local Bengalis. A Shia nobleman from Persia known as Sakhi Salamat of Isfahan settled in the village of Prithimpassa, Kulaura in 1499. His son, Ismail Khan Lodhi was later on given the status of Nawab.

From 1717 until 1880, all three successive Nawab dynasties – the Nasiri, Afshar and Najafi – ruled what was then known as Bengal.[4]

The first dynasty, the Nasiri, ruled from 1717 until 1740. The founder of the Nasiri, Murshid Quli Khan, was born a poor Deccani Odia Brahmin before being sold into slavery and bought by Haji Shafi Isfahani, a Persian merchant from Isfahan who converted him to Shia Islam. He entered the service of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb and rose through the ranks before becoming the Nawab Nizam of Bengal in 1717, a post he held until his death in 1727. He in turn was succeeded by his son-in-law, Shuja-ud-Din Muhammad Khan.[5] After Shuja-ud-Din's death in 1739 he was succeeded by his son, Sarfaraz Khan, who held the rank, until he was killed in the Battle of Giria in 1741, and was succeeded by Alivardi Khan, former ruler of Patna, of the Afshar Dynasty in 1740.[6]

The second dynasty, the Afshar, ruled from 1740 to 1757 starting with Alivardi Khan. Siraj ud-Daulah, the last Afshar Nawab was killed in the Battle of Plassey in 1757 by the British Empire[7] They were succeeded by the third and final dynasty to rule the whole Bengal, the Najafi.[8] The first Najafi Nawab was Mir Jafar in June 1757 and the post was abolished in November 1880 with Mansur Ali Khan as the final Nawab of Bengal.

In 1799, Agha Muhammad Reza, a Mughal Shia nobleman in Sylhet of Iranian origin rebelled against the East India Company. Gaining support from thousands of peasants after claiming to be a Sufi saint, Reza successfully invaded the nearby Kachari Kingdom. Later proclaiming himself as the Mahdi (promised messiah) and twelfth imam, he was captured and imprisoned in Calcutta.[9][10]

Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the Quaid-e-Azam ("the Great Leader"), the founder of the state of Pakistan, was born into an Ismaili Shia family although later in life he followed Twelver Shia Islam.[11]

There is a very small minority of Sylheti Shias who gather every year during Ashura for the Mourning of Muharram processions in places such as Prithimpasha Nawab Bari in Kulaura, home to a Shia family, as well as Balaganj, Osmani Nagar and Rajtila.