Malang is a word used in the Indian subcontinent and Afghanistan for a type of transgressive, if not antinomian, Ṣūfī (Papas, Dervish). The etymology of the word and the origin of the group are uncertain. Coming perhaps from Hindi or Persian and attested since at least about 1008/1600, malang seems initially to have denoted certain members of a Ṣūfī group called Madāriyya; the scope of the term then broadened to individuals and communities comparable with respect to socio-religious practices (al-Haravī, 360; Sharīf, 172-3, 290; Dabistan , 223-