Culture & Heritage

By Asiff Hussein, Vice President, Outreach Centre for Islamic Studies Harmony Center Muslims in Sri Lanka have a long and colorful history of over a thousand years and have lived in different parts of the country in harmony with the Sinhala and Tamil communities. Early Muslims came to Sri Lanka as traders and won the hearts and minds of Sri …

  Ali Haydar was part of the Zawi Zayd clan within the Sharif dynasty that ruled over Mecca for centuries (Kronik Kitap) Arab aristocrat’s career saw him serve as an Ottoman lawmaker and the empire’s go-to man in the Hejaz region Ottoman sovereignty over the Muslim holy city of Mecca began in 1517 after the conquest of the Mamluk Empire under Sultan Selim …

There is said to have existed in certain areas like Matale, a little community of South Indian Muslims known as Rawuttar. These folk evidently formed a sizeable community in Matale until about the 1960s before gradually declining in numbers probably due to migration as well as intermarriage and assimilation into the Moorish fold. They are said to have been relatively …

The Moor community of Sri Lanka has a number of traditional beverages that have especially figured on festive occasions. Here are the main ones with a description and likely origins: FALUDA By far the most popular beverage among the Moors is Faluda, a refreshing drink of a rosy hue made of milk and rose syrup and often embellished with kadal-pasi or agar …