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Ustad Baba Allauddin Khan Saheb was a Muslim and a Hindu - ahead of his time - like Akbar. When many people hear the name Allauddin Khan, they think of a grumpy old man (after all, he lived to 110) with a hot temper but a heart of gold -- anecdotes about him range from throwing a tabla tuning hammer at the Maharaja himself to taking care of disabled beggars. (Nikhil Banerjee said that the tough image was "deliberately projected in order not to allow any liberty to the disciple. He always had the tension that soft treatment on his part would only spoil them".Allauddin Khan was a very religious man, and though Muslim by name, was strongly devoted to the goddess Saraswati, in the form of Sarada Devi, to whom there stands an old and famous temple atop a hill in Maihar. This is why Allauddin, despite more lucrative offers from other courts, never left Maihar, refusing to move away even for hospital treatment -- he would rather die near Sarada Devi than live someplace else.A few years before the turn of the century, he married Madanmanjari Devi (1888--?). He had one son and sarod heir, Ali Akbar Khan, and three daughters, Sharija, Jehanara and Annapurna Devi. After Sharija got married, and her jealous mother-in-law burnt her tanpura, Allauddin decided not to train his other daughters, but Annapurna proved so talented he changed his mind. She later married and divorced Ravi Shankar.This man alone created Ali Akbar Khan (and his children), Annpurna Devi, Ravi Shanker (anad his children), Panna Lal Ghosh, Nikhil Bannerjee, Hari Prasad Chaurasia and the list goes on. A simple God fearing man who couldn't differentiate between Islam and Hinduism. He was besotted to Music and even on his wedding night ran away to his music.Allauddin Khan (Bangla: �স�তাদ �লা�দ�দ�ন �ান, also known as Baba Allauddin Khan) (1862 -- 1972)was an Indian sarod player and multi-instrumentalist and one of the greatest music teachers of the 20th Century. Allauddin Khan was born in Shibpur village in Brahmanbaria, in present-day Bangladesh, the son of Sabdar Hossain Khan, also known as Sadhu Khan. Alluddin's elder brother, Fakir Aftabuddin, first taught him some music in the home.At the age of ten, Allauddin ran away from home to join a jatra band, a traditional Bengali form of theater. This experience exposed him to the rich folk tradition of Bengal. After some time, he went to Kolkata, and was accepted as a student by singer Gopal Krishna Bhattacharya, alias Nulo Gopal. Allauddin committed to a 12-year practice program; However, Nulo Gopal died of plague after the seventh year. Khan then became a disciple of Amritalal Dutt, a close relative of Swami Vivekananda and music director at Kolkata's Star Theatre, with the goal of becoming an instrumentalist. At this time, he also took lessons in European classical violin from a Mr Lobo, a bandmaster from Goa.Alauddin Khan got interested in sarod after a concert at Jagat Kishore Acharya's, zamindar of Muktagachha, where he listened to Ahmed Ali Khan, a student of Asghar Ali Khan (Amjad Ali Khan's grand-uncle). Alauddin became his student, and studied the sarod under him for five years. His next step was to go to Rampur for lessons from Wazir Khan Beenkar, court musician of the Nawab there, and one of the last direct descendants of the legendary Tansen. Through him, Alauddin was given access to the Senia gharana (Tansen school of music), arguably north India's most coveted body of musical knowledge. He later became the court musician of Brijnath Singh Maharaja of Maihar Estate in Central Province.