Who the Shaikh are
Shaikh is the single largest people group classified as unreached anywhere in the world — a South Asian Muslim community spread across Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, numbering somewhere around a quarter of a billion people. It is not a tribe or a language; it is a broad social category that historically marked descent from Arab or high-status Muslim families, and today functions something like a caste.
Scripture already exists in the languages Shaikh people speak — Bengali, Urdu, Hindi. The barrier is not translation but belonging: to follow Jesus is widely understood as leaving your family, your marriage prospects and your standing all at once. The believers who exist are mostly first-generation and mostly quiet.
Signs of hope
Scripture, radio and film are already available in every major language this group speaks — the access problem is social, not linguistic.
The honest difficulty
Conversion is read as defection from family and community, and the group is so large and dispersed that no single strategy reaches it.
What "Frontier" means
Fewer than 1 in 1,000 follow Jesus, and there is no indigenous movement large enough to grow on its own. Most people in this group will never meet a Christian.
This describes access to the Gospel, not the worth of a people or the sincerity of anyone's faith.
How to pray for the Shaikh
Take one of these for a week rather than all of them for a day.
- Pray for the largest unreached people group on earth — that Christ would be known among the Shaikh.
- Ask God for Shaikh believers who can stay inside their families rather than be expelled from them.
- Pray for Bengali, Urdu and Hindi media reaching homes no worker can enter.
- Pray for South Asian churches to see their Shaikh neighbours as reachable rather than closed.
Where the Shaikh live
Each nation profile carries church size, unreached peoples, what is going well, what is hard, and four prayer points.
Questions people ask about the Shaikh
Who are the Shaikh people?
The Shaikh (also called Sheikh, Shaykh) are a people group of roughly 250 million, living mainly in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan. They speak Bengali, Urdu, Hindi and regional languages and are predominantly Islam (Sunni). The largest unreached people group on earth, and most Christians have never heard its name. Population figures for people groups vary considerably by source and by how a group is defined.
Are the Shaikh an unreached people group?
The Shaikh are classified as frontier. Fewer than 1 in 1,000 follow Jesus, and there is no indigenous movement large enough to grow on its own. Most people in this group will never meet a Christian. Scripture status: Available in the major languages they speak.
How can I pray for the Shaikh?
Pray for the largest unreached people group on earth — that Christ would be known among the Shaikh. Ask God for Shaikh believers who can stay inside their families rather than be expelled from them. Take one of these for a week rather than all of them for a day.