The ginan were transmitted orally before being recorded in which script?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 4
The correct answer is Option (4) → Khojaki
The Khojahs, a branch of the Ismailis (a Shi‘a sect), spread ideas from the Qur’an through local literary forms. One of these was the ginan (from the Sanskrit jnana, ‘knowledge’): devotional poems in Punjabi, Multani, Sindhi, Kachchi, Hindi and Gujarati, sung during daily prayer. The ginan were passed on orally before being written down in the Khojaki script, which was derived from the local landa (‘clipped’ mercantile script) used by the Khojahs of the Punjab, Sind and Gujarat.
Sawm, Shahada and Zakat are not scripts at all: they are three of the five ‘pillars’ of Islam: sawm is fasting during Ramzan, shahada is the declaration that there is one God and Muhammad is his messenger, and zakat is giving alms.
NCERT (2025-26): “5.2 The popular practice of Islam … These included the ginan (derived from the Sanskrit jnana, meaning ‘knowledge’), devotional poems in Punjabi, Multani, Sindhi, Kachchi, Hindi and Gujarati, sung in special ragas during daily prayer meetings.…”
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