Captivity of Nairs at Seringapatam

They were subjected to forcible conversions to Sunni Islam, the official religious sect sanctioned by the Ottoman Caliphate, whose approval and alliance was sought by Tipu Sultan.

[14] The period of Sultan of Mysore Hyder Ali’s conquest of Malabar between 1766 and 1793 was met with stiff opposition from the local Nairs.

[15] To this end, he deprived Nairs of caste privileges, equating them to Paravas, prohibited them from carrying arms, and outlawed them.

You did right in causing a hundred and thirty-five of them to be circumcised, and in putting eleven of the youngest of these into the Usud Ilhye band, and the remaining ninety-four into the Ahmedy troops, consigning the whole, at the same time, to the charge of the Kiladar of Nugr (Bednore).

[20] In May of the same year, an order was sent to the Faujdar of Calicut, Arshad Ali Baig, pertaining to the treatment of a Nair dissident:[19] "Getting possession of the villain, Goorkul, and of his wife and children, you must forcibly make Mussalmans out of them, and then dispatch the whole under a guard to Seringapatam.

[21] Their assaults were met with resistance by the Nairs of Calicut and southern Malabar led by Ravi Varma and other princes of the Padinjare Kovilakam.

[21] Tipu set 6,000 troops under his French commander, M. Lally to raise the siege, but failed to defeat Ravi Varma.

There he ordered some of the inhabitants to be converted (made Asadulai), placed Officer Ghafar in command there and had a wooden fort or stockade built.

[21] General orders were issued to his army that 'every being in the district without distinction should be burned, that they should be traced to their lurking places, and that all means of truth and falsehood, force or fraud should be employed to effect their universal conversion'.

[21] He then made arrangements for the administrative reorganisation of the province, and retired to Coimbatore, leaving a permanent occupying force to frighten and subjugate the local population.