I just learnt that not all Bohras make this. It’s region specific from their origin. It’s quite a “Sidhpuri” thing coming from Sidhpur in Gujarat! https://twitter.com/yusufdfi/status/1247789283005480965

It’s not surprising that all Bohras don’t make it. While there are common customs & food, the region from where they come from had their own customs, food or variation of it, way of living, even accent. 1/

The Fatemi belief system that they follow first came to Gujarat. Pockets of Bohras developed. Amongst the larger ones were/are
-Sidhpur,Palanpur,Dahod,Totana, Amdavad,Kathiawar,Surat, Rampura,Ujjain,Burhanpur.Udaipur,Sagwara. 2/

Being traders, Bohra men travelled all over. The women & children stayed in the native. The enterprising ones made tons of money from the Brits during world wars. Migration to cities started during British times but largely only the men moved. 3/

The Bohras were/are “regionlists”.They didn’t marry outside their native.Maybe that sense was more amongst ppl of some regions.A Sidhpuri would marry only another Sidhpuri.The tag Sidhpuris carry is of being large hearted & bholey bhale kind, while a Surti is cunning & stingy 4/

5/ So marrying outside the native was frowned upon. It would be a culture shock,esp for the girl,if she did marry outside.Divorce would be blamed on cultural mismatch. The marriage customs also varied. Bohras are class conscious too. This was very strong till about 15 yrs back

6/ Most of the urban migrants by end of last century had their families with them. Today major urban pockets for Bohras are Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Amdavad, Hyd/Secunderabad,Indore,Coimbatore. The sense of their native is lesser now esp in the young gen

7/ Urbanisation has led to dilution or even extinction of age old customs & regional identity. Also there is a “central” effort to homogenise the Bohras who are led by a “Syedna”. So now there are things like a marriage “manual” so that everyone follows the same rituals

8/8 But then, somethings will remain. Like the Dahi vara.

Will end this by saying there are so many differences within the small Bohra community itself, it’s funny ppl think Muslims as a whole are a monolith.