The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c20.2

c20.2

That religion contributed little to the motive force of the Shansabani conquest is scarcely an arguable point. Muizzuddin’s first adversary on Indian soil was not an ‘infidel’ but a monarch with an equally orthodox adherence to Islamic law as himself¹. While he destroyed the Muslim ruler of Lahore he tolerated the continuance of Hindu rule in Ajmer, Gwalior and Delhi; his lieutenant was prepared to allow the Chandella king to hold his dominions. Muizzuddin, according to a later account, even entered into alliance with the Hindu ruler of Jammu against Khusrau Malik². Numerous Hindu princes retained power and internal autonomy. To suggest that the Muslim Turks commenced their rule by an indiscriminate destruction of life, property and religion³, is to exhibit a gross misreading of their history. Such references as are found in the contemporary accounts to the destruction of temples must be examined not only against the background of war operations but also against the chronicler’s habit of exaggeration. Hasan Nizami, for example, speaks in righteous satisfaction, of the destruction of all the temples in Kalinjar⁴, but, as a matter of fact, most of the pre-Muslim temples there or at Mahoba and Khajuraho are still in tact⁵. Similar statements are also to be found in the accounts of the conquest of Benares, Kalpi, Delhi and Ajmer¹; Minhaj also mentions the destruction of the Mahakal temple of Ujjain by Iltutmish and his conversion of Vigrahapala’s college at Ajmer into a mosque². The Quwwatul Islam mosque at Delhi was admittedly built out of materials of Hindu temples³; so was also Iltutmish’s mosque at Budaun⁴.