Explanation:

Explanation: The movements for religious reform were late in emerging among the Muslims. The Muslim upper classes had tended to avoid contact with the western education and culture, and it was mainly after the Revolt of 1857 that the modern ideas of religious reform began to appear. The Muhammedan Literary Society was founded at Calcutta in 1863. This Society promoted discussion of religious, social and political questions in the light of modern ideas and encouraged upper and middle-class Muslims to take to western education. The most important reformer among the Muslims was Sayyid Ahmad Khan. He was tremendously impressed by modern scientific thought and worked all his life to reconcile it with Islam. Even the Quran he interpreted in the light of contemporary rationalism and science. In his view, any interpretation of the Quran that conflicted with human reason, science or nature was in reality a misinterpretation. All his life he struggled against blind obedience to tradition, dependence on custom, ignorance and irrationalism. He also warned against fanaticism, narrow-mindedness and exclusiveness, and urged the students and others to be broad-minded and tolerant. Sayyid Ahmad Khan believed that the religious and social life of the Muslims could be improved only by imbibing modern western scientific knowledge and culture. Therefore, promotion of modern education remained his first task throughout his life. In 1875, he founded at Aligarh the Muhammedan Anglo-Oriental College as a centre for spreading western sciences and culture. Later, this College grew into the Aligarh Muslim University. Sayyid Ahmad Khan was a great believer in religious toleration. He believed that all religions had a certain underlying unity which could be called practical morality. Believing that a person‘s religion was his or her private affair, he roundly condemned any sign of religious bigotry in personal relations. He was also opposed to communal friction, appealing to the Hindus and the Muslims to unite. Moreover, the Hindus, the Parsis and the Christians had freely contributed to the funds of his college, whose doors were also open to all Indians. However, towards the end of his life, he began to talk of Hindu domination to prevent his followers from joining the rising National Movement. This was unfortunate, though basically he was not a communalist. He only wanted the backwardness of the Muslim middle and upper classes to go. On the other hand, any hostility by the officials might prove dangerous to the educational effort which he saw as the need of the hour. He believed that only when the Indians had become as modern in their thinking and actions as the English were, could they hope to successfully challenge the foreign rule. He, therefore, advised all Indians, and particularly the educationally backward Muslims, to remain aloof from politics for some time to come. Consequently, to prevent the orthodox Muslims from opposing his college, he virtually gave up his agitation in favour of religious reform. For the same reason, he would not do anything to offend the government and, on the other hand, encouraged communalism and separatism. Sayyid Ahmad‘s reformist zeal also embraced the social sphere. He urged the Muslims to give up medieval customs and ways of thought and behaviour. In particular, he wrote in favour of raising women‘s status in the society and advocated the removal of Purdah and the spread of education among women. Sayyid Ahmad Khan was helped by a band of loyal followers, who are collectively described as the Aligarh School. Chiragh Ali, the Urdu poet Altaf Husain Hali, Nazir Ahmad and Maulana Shibli Nomani were some of the other distinguished leaders of the Aligarh School.