SHĀH DAULĀ (1581-1676), a renowned Muslim divine of his time, was the son of 'Abd ur-Rahīm Khān Ḷodhī, a descendant of Sultān Ibrāhīm Lodhī and Niāmat Khātūn, a scion of the chiefs of Gakkhaṛ tribe of western Punjab, though the Gujjars of Gujrāt, now in Pakistan, claim him as belonging to their clan. Daulā was brought up in utter penury by his widowed mother in her native Poṭhohār. Upon his mother's death in 1590 after several years of hard toil, he left home and in the course of his wanderings came to Saṅgrohī, a village near Siālkoṭ, where he became a disciple of Shāh Saidān Sarmast, a faqīr of the Suhrāwardī sect. Twelve years later, Shāh Sarmast, at his deathbed, blessed him and nominated him as his successor. Shāh Daulā became famous for his piety and he launched several works of public weal. He built many mosques, tanks, wells and bridges over some unfordable torrential, seasonal rivulets, which earned him the epithet of Daryāī, from daryā, i.e. river. Shāh Daulā Daryāī shifted, in 1612, to Gujrāt where he settled permanently. He died there, according to the anagram of his death, Khudādost, in 1676.

        Shāh Daulā was acquainted with the teaching of Gurū Nānak. According to Sarūp Dās Bhallā, Mahimā Prakāsh, he once met at Gujrāt Bhāī Gaṛhīā, appointed masand by Gurū Hargobind to preach in Kashmīr, and requested him to recite Gurū Arjan's Sukhmanī to him. Bhāī Gaṛhīā, uttered the verse : "In Sukhmanī is the peace, the very ambrosia of God's Name and it dwelleth in the hearts of the devotees." Shāh Daulā was enchanted and, to quote the Mahimā Prakāsh, instantaneously spoke, "Nothing equals the Gurū's word. Listening even to a single line brings the highest bliss." Shāh Daulā is also said to have met Gurū Hargobind when he visited Gujrāt on his way back from Kashmīr.