After giving up all worldly possessions, they wander the Bangladesh countryside dressed in white robes, singing of peace and love for all with their single-stringed ektaras.
Bangladesh’s “mystic minstrels” have long been dismissed as hippies and even attacked and killed after being branded heretics in the Muslim-majority country.
According to their leaders, Bangladesh’s minstrels, known as Bauls, are growing in popularity, even attracting members of the rising middle class with their ethos of inclusion and rejection of consumerism.
“More and more people are drawn to Baul philosophy and its humanism despite the attacks and daily humiliation,” said Mohammad Aynuddin, 35, an English teacher at a state school who describes himself as a Baul enthusiast.
Originating in Bengal in the 17th century, the sect was popularised by musician and social reformer Lalon Shah whose moving songs of religious tolerance inspired poets and thinkers of the time.
Many ascetic Bauls renounce the modern world and travel on foot from town to town singing and begging alms, staying at ashrams, but have no fixed address. Others choose to remain in their homes, but live a quiet, secluded life of music and worship.
Strongest in west Bangladesh and across the border in India’s West Bengal, the sect’s philosophy is a mix of Hinduism and Sufism rather than one specific religion — angering some Islamic hardliners.
In November, suspected Islamist militants hacked to death a popular sociology professor who had held weekly meetings on Baul philosophy and also pushed for a ban on the full-face veil on campus.
Although police are still investigating, the professor’s son and his colleagues believe both moves enraged religious fanatics.
In August, Muslim villagers also attacked a group of wandering Bauls, hacking off their beards and hair and forcing them to recite Islamic prayers, according to the Daily Star newspaper.
But such attacks failed to dent the mood recently at Lalon’s shrine in a remote western village, where sect members new and old, gathered to mark the 124th anniversary of the singer’s death.