The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c11.38

c11.38

While Balban was still engaged in these parts news arrived of fresh aggression by the Katehriyas on Budaun and Amroha. He immediately returned to Delhi, assembled a larger force, and marching out, ostensibly on a hunting expedition, suddenly appeared before Katehar. A body of five thousand archers was detailed to plunder and set fire to the habitat of the insurgents and to slay the whole adult male population. The punishment was inhumanly severe and calcuated to strike terror; Barani records how at every village and jungle heaps of human corpses lay rotting, the stench poisoning the air as far as the Ganges. The district was almost depopulated, but the measure served its purpose. Adjacent districts were thoroughly cowed and no further action was found necessary. The country was cleared of forest, roads were built and civil government was introduced. The Katehriyas never raised their heads again, for Barani records that from that day the iqtas of Budaun, Amroha Sambhal and Kanuri (?) were rendered safe and permanently freed from trouble⁴. The Tarikh-i-Mubarakshahi adds that Balban on this occasion extended his operations to the *Kohpayah* of Santur¹, probably necessitated by the insurgents obtaining assistance from the hill-chief, who, in any case, had shown particular unfriendliness by harbouring rebels in the past.