Khawaja Shaikh

Khawaja Shaikh (Urdu: خواجه شيخ‎) are prominent branch of Khawaja in South Asia.

Khawaja or Khwaja (Arabic: خواجة khawājah, Persian: خواجه pronounced khâje) is a title used in Middle East, South Asia, and Central Asia. Khawaja is a Persian word . It means lord or master.

Khawaja is also used as family name in South Asia. In South Asia they are chisti and the Chishti Order is explained in detail below: A number of Chishti family members are now living in different parts of South Asia especially in northern Punjab province of Pakistan and also in Indian state of Gujarat. They often bear the surname "Khwaja" and it is claimed that they are Sayyid.

Khawaja people usually marry within their own social affiliation that is "Sayyid or Khawaja". They marry regardless of status wealth or class discrimination. Depending on circumstances a group (clan) may be as small as few hundred families and as large as few thousand families. For example, in the Bhat clan's definition, their clan system is to be an entire group having very few sub-groups, whereas Khawajas are branched into a dozen or two sub-groups. For the Bhat clan (a Kashmiri clan) a group, by and large, usually shares an ancestral village in Kashmir as a reference point. Marriage into a family other than Khawaja family and between first cousins was discouraged in the past. Marriages to men outside the social group, i.e. the Khawaja clan (e.g. marrying outside such as Muslim Punjabi families), is now welcomed and accepted by a few Khawaja families, although some community elders may still discourage it. Although most of the departed Group of families who are out of the Family clan system (Baradari) are not following the antique family traditions.

...
Wikipedia