History

The Sufi mystic Syed Ahmed got the honorofic of Baad e Paa. According to folklore, Syed Ahmed was summoned by his spiritual master Nizamuddin Aulia in the night; he rode the wind to meet his master and returned equally quickly. And he got the title Baad e Paa (Baad in Arabic is wind and Paa foot). On one side of the Eidgah Maidan is the dargah of Syed Ahmed Baad e Paa where people come for getting their wish fulfilled.

While the mystical feat appears like a fanciful tale, an equally surprising story is about how the dargah became famous. “Among the many spiritual followers of Nizamuddin Aulia was Burhanuddin Gharib. When Burhanuddin was asked to go to Deccan after the death of his brother sometime in 1309 AD, he was accompanied by Syed Ahmed. While Burhanuddin stayed back in Daulatabad and later Khuldabad; Syed Ahmed moved further south and settled down near a sloping valley in a village called Malkapur which was frequented by shepherds and cattle rearers,” informs Nizamuddin Ahmed, the current caretaker of the Dargah. Then, Syed Ahmed disappears from history. His grave was discovered and resurrected a few hundred years later during the time of Nizam Nasir Ud Dowlah by a grateful shepherd called Balan Chowdhury. The apocryphal story is about Balan Chowdhury losing his herd of goats near the hillock. “The despondent goatherd then sat down in an open ground where he found a grave. He vowed at the grave that he will build a dargah if his goats were found. He dozed off and in a dream saw the goats on the other side. True to his word, Balan Chowdhury built the Dargah and story about the Nizamuddin Aulia’s pupil was discovered,” says Nizamuddin Ahmed.

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