Changes

The Muslims records may basically be divided into two groups, (a) those found in latter-day India and (b) those found in present Pakistan. In both instances, some public records of marriages and deaths are available only in major, bigger cities and towns, where during British times municipal records of this sort were maintained.

It must further be remembered that in most cases, in the vast rural hinterlands of old/British India where most Muslims dwelt, almost no records exist for marriages and/or deaths. Amongst Muslims, birth records were kept (if at all) exclusively by families and indeed, almost none were ever kept for womenfolk. The only two places that one might try to find out any possible records of marriages and deaths are: (a) at the local town or village mosque, where an official called the ''Nikah Registrar'' (marriage contract registry) was sometimes available and kept some records of stipulations and such formalities of Muslim marriages; and (b) the local village or town ''Patwari'' or land revenue accountant, who certainly kept long and often complicated ''Shajrahs'' (Muslim pedigrees of landowners) and ''Daftars'' (succession/devolution records of lands from generation to generation). These, too, however, were mostly only available for landowners and landowning classes, big and small. Unfortunately, chances are that if your Muslim ancestors in India prior to the late 19th century did not keep any records of their own, written or oral, then digging out any 'official' records might be a rather uphill task.