The Sufis, practitioners of a spiritual movement in Islam, are perhaps best known in the West for the Whirling Dervishes of Turkey. In Pakistan, this dance is not performed, but a variant called raqs o sama ("dance and audition") exists, in which the chishtia school of the Sufis (the most popular Sufi school in Pakistan) have integrated dance as part of their ritual.

During religious festivals, everyone–men and women–dance the dhammaal, a devotional dance with high stepping and hands raised above the head, the index finger pointing at the sky to indicate the unity of all creation. The dhamaal is driven by the beat of a large double-headed drum carved out of a hollow tree trunk with goatskins stretched across the heads.