I don't know how many Shia sub-sects there are in the world. I know of at least four that exist in Pakistan. Those who call themselves the Dawoodi Bohras are perhaps the most brainwashed, even more so than the Sunni Barelvis.
The head of the Dawoodi Bohras is regarded as someone very holy and deserving of worship by his followers. I have seen some of them kissing the tyres of his cars. He lives mostly in India, but every year, he spends the first ten days of the sacred month of Muharram in a foreign city, where his followers are numerous. This year he has come to Karachi and there is an influx of 80,000 Dawoodi Bohras from all over the world. Twenty thousand of them have come from India alone.
This man compels his followers to practice female circumcision and other abhorrent practices. For a good sum of money, he gives a scented piece of paper (with a written recommendation that the bearer be allowed to enter Paradise). This paper has to be placed inside the shroud of a dead Bohra so he can immediately go to Heaven. Some of his followers even purchase such papers years before their deaths. He's also ordered his followers to use old-fashioned Indian WCs instead of the normal English commode for peeing and pooping. I was once in a hospital where a Bohra was dying. His relatives went on waving their spiritual leader's portrait near his face for hours until the man breathed his last.
I can't understand why educated Bohras tolerate him. Years ago, the father of a friend of mine and six or seven of his relatives rebelled against him. They were immediately expelled from the community and were not allowed to bury their loved ones in the Bohra cemetery in Karachi. They could not marry anyone in the community, even those who were their close relatives.
Verily this kind of brainwashing is unique.
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