History
Pedro Shah, a Portuguese sailor, who, legend has it, was converted to Islam two centuries earlier.
Pedro Shah Baba is probably the only saint in Mumbai credited with leveling a building. In 1903, Sita Ram Building, near Crawford Market, collapsed. And though weak pillars and load-bearing walls may have been ostensibly to blame, residents of the Muslim neighbourhood saw it as an act of divine justice. At the time, the building housed Windsor Bar on its ground floor - patronized by boisterous British sailors - and the spot had become the focus of contentious clashes between Muslim morality and British revelry. Pedro Shah's shrine faced Windsor Bar and the caretaker had already complained about it to the authorities; but when they failed to act, devotees were convinced the pious saint had taken matters into his own hands.
Coincidentally, the saint wreaking havoc on boozy British seamen, all the casualties in the building collapse were bar patrons. In another narrative, the saint is a porter, who revealed himself first to a Parsi couple. "Instead of carrying his usual basket load on the top of his head, he walked past them with the basket floating above him," writes Nile Green in his book, 'Bombay Islam'. This Parsi couple had a blind daughter, who was later cured by the saint. A third version claims he was an Arab merchant, who came to Bombay from Makran and died here in 1799. A descendant of the prophet and the renowned Kadiri family, his real name was Syed Abdulla Shah Kadiri. As for the title "Pedro", it was conferred on him by the Portuguese, who compared him to St Peter.
A hagiography by a local bookseller Abdul Karim Munshi seemed intent on securing the saint an Arab bloodline and merchant occupation, which as Green hypothesizes, probably "appealed to the city's Konkani Muslims, who treasured the genealogies of merchant Arab descent that set them apart from the city's other Muslims".
Pedro Shah Baba lies in a marble shrine bedecked with flowers and illuminated by an ostentatious chandelier.
According to Feroz Khan, one of the dargah's many mujawars, the saint attracts devotees who have been possessed by spirits. Initially, they behave like lunatics but over time they are completely cured, he says citing the example of a man, who was initially so violent that he had to be chained to the dargah's railing. People, who are visually impaired, drop silver eyes into the donation box once they are cured, he adds. During the annual Urs, which takes place during Moharram, thousands visit the shrine, including many Parsis and Hindus.