The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c19.67

c19.67

With regard to industry it is reasonable to hold that the Hindu craft-guilds and professional castes functioned also in Muslim administered territories. In manufacture, India's self-sufficiency and exporting role seemed little disturbed by the conquest. To provide for the nobleman's luxury kept the craftsmen busy. The king's various needs not only kept the wheels of industry moving but even caused the setting up of state manufactories (*karkhanah*). We hear of these early in the 14th century but their earlier beginning cannot be ruled out². The builder and stone worker, the tent-maker and the saddler, the perfumer and the oil-man, the upholsterer and cloth-maker, the metal worker and armourer, all were in great demand. Manufactured articles, to whose excellence Amir Khusrau pays warm tribute³, found ready buyers and the city markets never had a dull moment. If rising price of the manufactured article is any indication of the demands made on industry, the Khalji control would prove the flourishing condition of the craftsmen in the 13th century. The majority of these was Hindu; a small percentage came from the lower class Muslims, mostly Indian converts.