Aga Khan Case

The Aga Khan Case was an 1866 court decision in the High Court of Bombay by Justice Sir Joseph Arnould that established the authority of the first Aga Khan, Hasan Ali Shah, as the head of the Bombay Khoja community.

The case was officially a property dispute between a subset of dissident leaders of the Bombay Khojas and the Aga Khan, a Persian nobleman who had arrived in Bombay in 1846 and was regarded by his followers, including most Khojas, as their rightful leader and the 46th imam of the Nizari Ismaili Muslims. The dissidents rejected the Aga Khan’s claim on authority by arguing that he was not a Khoja and that the Khojas had always been Sunni Muslims.

As part of adjudicating the dispute, Arnould undertook an extensive examination of the religious background of the Khoja caste. After a 25-day trial, which included testimony from the Aga Khan and a review of numerous documents, Arnould found in favor of the Aga Khan, ruling that the Khojas were Shia Ismailis and that the Aga Khan was their rightful leader.

In 1847, an inheritance dispute between two Khoja brothers led to the first legal dispute between a group of Khoja leaders and the Aga Khan, with the parties asserting that the dispute should be decided by caste custom and Quranic law, respectively. Though the judge, Sir Erskine Perry, decided the case in favor of the Khoja leaders, his findings included the assertion that the Khojas were a “Muhammedian” group (one with primarily Hindu practices, according to Perry), and that the 14th century Ismaili da'i, Pir Sadruddin, had converted the Khojas to Islam.

By 1851, the Bombay Khoja community was divided into two camps: a minority that rejected the Aga Khan’s authority and called for self-governance, and the majority that had been followers of the Aga Khan even before his arrival in India. After years of disagreements between the two sides—which were heightened when the Aga Khan asked Khojas to sign a document in 1861 prescribing the beliefs of the Nizaris, including loyalty to him—the dissident faction brought a case against the Aga Khan in 1866, seeking to overturn his claim as the community’s leader.

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