Conclusion (Part 13)
The Muslim community of the Konkanis have survived thirteen hundred years in India. As the oldest surviving Muslim community, their history is truly fascinating. Sea-faring commerce demands exchange of capital and enterprise among peoples of difference races, religions, and cultures. This probably explains why, despite the advent of foreign immigrants --Persians, Arabs, Jews, Christians of various denominations, and the Parsis in the coastal areas of Gujarat, Konkan and Malabar-- the local societies did not undergo ethno-religious strife, so common a feature of upper and peninsular India.
Since the early Arabs were either refugees or traders and not contestants for power as in the Deccan and North India, the integration but not assimilation of the Arabs and their progeny was a smoother process in Konkan. Trade in goods and services involves exchange, unlike extraction of revenues by the force of arms. Thus trade contributed to the harmonious relations between the Muslims and the local communities.
