Yusuf Desai attends 'Britain's Jihadis & the Two World Wars' by Jahan Mahmood, House of Lords, 16th July 2012

Yusuf attended this event, where Jahan Mahmood, former lecturer at the University of Birmingham and one of the country’s leading experts on ethnic communities in the UK, explored the nature and role of the 'Punjabi Mussalmans', Britain's largest overseas force and the first non-British troops to be deployed on Britain's battle fronts.Predominantly Muslim recruits from areas now located in Pakistan's Punjab Province, the 'Punjabi Mussalmans' numbered 136,000 in WWI and more than 200,000 in WWII. They were the largest single ethnic class to fill the ranks of the British Indian Army. The British considered them to be the cornerstone of their army.In his talk, Jahan addressed questions such as: Why so many young Muslim Boy Soldiers? Why were they mostly recruited from cities now located in Pakistan? And what was the reason behind the large presence of Muslim Soldiers?