Kismet Stam accompanied Hazrat Inayat Khan when he returned to India in 1926, and later recounted this anecdote. It might be helpful to recall that even today a person’s caste and sub-caste will reveal a great deal to the average Indian regarding one’s family, one’s upbringing, one’s station in society, and even something about one’s place of birth. Note that the temple referred to is not the Sikh temple in Amritsar but the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in what is now called Varanasi.

A guide accompanied Murshid in the compound of the Golden Temple in Benares. Like all those who saw Murshid, he was keenly interested. At the moment of Murshid’s leaving, he asked : “What caste is yours?”

Murshid answered by quoting the verse of Kabir : ‘Santan jat na pucho nirguniyan…’; ‘Do not ask the worshipper of God the caste to which he belongs…’