The Institutes of Akbar 2.2.6

2.2.6

Islám Sháh after quelling the Niyází disturbances, returned to Agrah, but almost immediately afterwards his presence was again required in the Panjáb, and it was there that Shaikh ’Aláí joined the royal camp. When Islám Sháh saw the Shaikh, he said to him in a low voice, “Whisper into my ear that you recant, and I will not trouble you.” But Shaikh ’Aláí would not do so, and Islám Sháh, to keep up the appearance of authority, ordered a menial to give him by way of punishment a few cuts with the whip in his presence. Shaikh ’Aláí had then scarcely recovered from an attack of the plague, which for several years had been raging in India, and had a few badly healed wounds on his neck. Whilst he got the cuts, one of the wounds broke open, and ’Aláí fainted and died. His body was now thrown under the feet of an elephant, and orders were given that no one should bury him, when all at once, to the terror of the whole camp and the king who believed that the last day had dawned, a most destructive cyclone broke forth. When the storm abated, ’Alái’s body was found literally buried among roses and other flowers, and an order was now forthcoming to have the corpse interred. This happened in 957 [A. D., 1550]. People prophesied the quick end of Islám Sháh and the downfal of his house. Makhdúm ul-Mulk was never popular after that.