Iran’s Kintoor Connection
Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh, is home to one of the largest Shia communities in India. The connection between the Ayatollahs and India goes back to Kintoor, a village near Lucknow. It is the ancestral home of Ruhollah Khomeini, the Imam and former revolutionary leader of Iran. Khomeini’s paternal grandfather, Syed Ahmad Musavi Hindi, was born in this village. He travelled on a pilgrimage to Najf (modern day Iraq) in his twenties and eventually settled in Khomein, in Iran’s Markazi province, in 1834.