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The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c21: Chapter XVII. The Sultanate in Retrospect

The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c21

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Chapter XVII. The Sultanate in Retrospect

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The rapidity with which the Turks overran the whole of north India within a period of less than 15 years was phenomenal. In the western provinces the easy establishment of Muizzuddin's rule has an apparent explanation, for there, from the dawn of history, incursions from Central Asia had heavily diluted the people's racial and religious consciousness; the Ghaznawide and Shansabani attacks encountered little beyond mere political opposition. But in Hindusthan, which had known not many foreign invasions and dynasties, powerful kingdoms were overthrown with equal ease; even the Hindushahiyas of Waihind, under Anandpal and Triclochanpal, offered more sustained opposition to Mahmud of Ghazni. That defeat in a single battle should have been final and irreparable appears all the more strange when we remember the limited number of the conquerors and the distance from their homeland. On a careful analysis of the situation in India the course of events, however, appears almost inevitable.

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The Hindu kingdoms, it has been observed in an earlier part of this book, engaged in ceaseless warfare among themselves almst as a hobby. The Chauhana, the Chandella, the Gahdvala and also the Sena rulers, fought for paramountcy and territorial aggrandisement at each other's cost, and so one's discomfiture at the hands of a foreign enemy was considered another's

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Invaders' easy success. Causes.

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Internecine warfare.

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advantage. Victory in such wars did not lead to any increase of fighting potential for, usually, all that the victor demanded was a recognition of his paramountcy; and the vanquished felt at liberty to join any of the belligerents in the next war. Thus, instead of gaining any positive advantage they merely frittered away their resources. How great was this waste in men can be estimated when we remember that the Hindu soldier was drawn almost exclusively from one class of the population. Among themselves, the Rajput kings were generally evenly matched in fighting strength but against a foreigner, not bound by any professional caste-rules, they could bring forth an equal number of men only by straining their entire fighting personnel. Owing to their unshakeable belief in numerical superiority they usually brought out their entire army and thus staked everything on the fortunes of a single battle. Their sense of honour forbade retreat; soldiers were either taken prisoner or perished in battle. A single defeat thus became a lasting catastrophe.

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In individual fighting qualities the Rajput nearly surpassed the Turk, but he was a poor organiser. The feudatories fought more for individual glory than for wider issues of the contest. Only the king could hold the mutually jealous and ambitius troop-leaders together and when he fell in battle, all was lost. In fighting methods also, the Rajput showed a singularly unprogressive military talent. He depended on the weight of numbers rather than on mobility and tactics. A solid, almost unwiedly phalanx, arranged according to a stereotyped formation was his usual battle-array, with archers carried on elephants and also on foot drawn up in front. His mass frontal attacks were weighty and difficult to stand, but his cavalry could accomplish little in the serried ranks. The elephant was considered a mighty arm, and, accordingly, the field of battle had to be a level ground, for uneven soil would place it at a disadvantage. Such a ground however, was precisely where the Turk could put his cavalry to the best use, for, enclosed, mountainous terrain hampered its freedom of manoeuvre; Muizzuddin's defeat and Aibak's hesitation at Kayadra below Abu, in front of the Chalukya forces, are cases in point. The Turk initially possessed no elephants; he charged with the cavalry whose impetuosity broke the Hindu phalanx and would often turn the elephants against their own ranks. The Rajput made little provision against an attack from the flank or rear; as the cavalry broke through his lines and put the archers out of action, a body of light-armed horse wheeling round the flank at the crucial moment decided the contest.

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A defeat in such circumstances is scarcely surprising. Hope of further resistance lay in the fortresses and in organising countrywide opposition by the people. The former method, however, has one disadvantage; being purely defensive in nature, leaving the conqueror, as it does, free to exploit the countryside and therefore able to organise repeated attacks, it could have only a temporary value. Rarely did the Hindu princes take the offensive, but they bastirred themselves only when the enemy appeared before the stronghold. What a forward policy could achieve is shown by the Mher and Chalukya forces when they defeated Aibak and sent him flying for refuge in Ajmer. Another example is afforded by the siege of Lakhnauti by Narasinha of Orissa. Ejection of the invader was possible only by the sustained and united application of such offensive policy. But unity of purpose never inspired the Rajput; towards the end of the century the Chauhanas achieved notable success by continued offensive, but they fought only for military glory; they gloried equally in defeating the Baghelas of Gujrat and the Paramaras of Malwa.

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In a country of incessant wars the bulk of the people tend to become callous to the fortunes of battles or dynasties. National consciousness, as a compelling factor leading to sustained work, was as lacking in the people as in their rulers; they looked on with equal unconcern as their king humbled another king or went down before an invader. No common tie bound the people with the ruling dynasty; a foreign invasion meant only one of the many incessant dynastic changes that left the people no better or worse off.

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Peoples' indifference.

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This indifference on the face of a Muslim enemy seems to have had other causes also. As a Muslim the Turk was a new comer to Hindusthan but racially he was not. As a pagan kinsman of the Hunas and the Sakas he had many centuries' contact with India. He had come as a trader and as a settler. His language, manners and social distinctions, much of which he retained even after his conversion to Islam, added to the complexity of medieval Hindu society but they also prepared the way for his eventual appearance in the role of a conqueror. To the people of north India the Turk's lightly-borne Islam could not conceal the familier visitor, in whom some of the Rajputs could even see a distant kinsman¹. Hindu India therefore contained elements whose intensity of opposition to the invaders was liable to be qualified by racial sympathies.

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¹ On the Turkish immigrants in India, see Bagchi: Role of Cntrat Asiaa Nomads in the History of India, in JGIS, X, pp. 133-34.

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Racial sympathies.

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A resuscitated Brahmanism, which characterised the religious history of Rajput India, gave a militant aspect to Hindu society but at the same time, by its persecutions, alienated the Buddhists. They were outcasted and driven out from all parts of India to find refuge in Nepal. We have no direct evidence, as we have for the Arab occupation of Sind, but it is highly probable that the despised Buddhists and the lower classes of the country viewed with no great sorrow the disaster that befell the Brahminical dynasties.

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Like all foreign invaders the Turks followed a line that was calculated to offer the least resistance and yet enable them to live on the land. The first push carried them into the Central Provinces, the Himalayan regions, Southern Rajputana and even Assam. But they succeeded in establishing a durable hold only on a narrow belt of land along the Ganges and the Jumna while the Indus and its branches outlined their dominion in the northwest. The hold on Rajputana was never strong and towards the end of the century they were practically thrown out of the country. The Turkish dominion thus embraced a very small part of north India but it contained the most fertile regions, which explains the foreigners' continued ability to resist the determined hostility of the Hindu states and also of the all-conquering Mongols.

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Within this restricted area, the conquest took nearly a whole century to consolidate. Petty Hindu chiefs defied the Delhi government; Muslim colonization was vigorously resisted, and the fighting class were easily led to revolt by any enterprising chief, Hindu or Muslim. The organization of the administration was far from complete at the end of the century, though the military nature of the occupation disappeared as the first immigrants were replaced by those born in India and speaking Indian vernaculars and having an interest in the country. The Mongols did a great deal in indianising the Turks, for India became their last refuge and this they defended with the tenacity of a people defending their homeland. If the Sultanate was originally an alien imposition it soon became thoroughly Indian in purpose, struggling, as India has struggled many a time in her history, against a barbaric invader. The Turkish Muslims in resisting the Mongols were guarding India’s gate and, like the Hindushahiyas and the Chauhanas, could claim gratitude of the Indian princes.

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The state that the conquest brought into being was of a peculiar composition. In its outlook tribal polity combined with the divinely appointed monarchy. To Indian theories this was a little peculiar, for there, a king ruled either by divine choice or by a contractual delegation of powers; in either case, in effect, he became a person above the society¹. But to the Turk the kingdom was a joint property and every one had a proprietory share in it. In this any khan² was eligible for the throne if he could satisfy other conditions, for example, of fitness, and legitimacy; Kashlu Khan’s attempt to assume the crown provides an illustration of the fact that this was actually practised. Because the Turks were losing their share in the administration of their kingdom the *wazir* Muhazzabuddin was murdered; in fact the racial character of the Memeluke state arose from this deep rooted habit of political thought. How materially this share in the kingdom helped the individual members of the race is seen from a passage in the contemporary writing of Fakhruddin Mubarakshah. "Even a poor householder, who did not possess a single slave, became" as a result of Muizzuddin’s great conquest "the owner of numerous slaves, horses and camels; a man who originally owned only one horse, became a *sipahsalar* and possessed a kettle-dum, standard, *naubat*, all of his own"¹.

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¹ See Bhandarkar: *Some Aspects of Indian Polity*, pp. 125-168; also Ghoshal: *Hindu Political theories*, pp. 170-89, 269-78.

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² Even in Ibn Battuta’s time the khan was the highest dignitary below the king; *Rahlah*, I, p. 107.

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¹ Fakhre Mudir: *Tarikh*, p. 20.

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There was however, another aspect to this polity. By the time the Turks came to live and rule in India, they had been largely influenced by the political and cultural ideals of Persia. They turned to the ancient kings like Jamshed, Khusrau and Bahram for guidance in political affairs rather than to the Muslim law. Autocracy, the keynote of Persia’s political system, thus found its devotees in Delhi; the elective Imam was nearly forgotten and, in his place, the Sultan ruled by a right that could never be questioned. He was God’s chosen and appointed by him to rule over mankind. Absolute obedience to him was tantamount to obedience to God². If the person of the Sultan was not infallible, his office was certainly above all human failings. All the people were his slaves and he, the master of their person and property. Early in the 13th century a writer defined the people’s position *vis-a-vis* the king. "It was not open to the Muslims to exercise their right of choosing the Imam; they were simply to carry out his orders, even if he was a negro, or a slave and mutilated in form"³. Obedience to his orders was a *farz*, and the Sultan, if not a God himself, was "the shadow of God on earth"¹. His person was consequently regarded as sacred and whenever the chronicler has any occasion to refer to him, the term 'sacred' or 'august' is invariably used². Barani even describes Firoz Taghluq as a God in human form and compares his court to that of "Allah attended by Gabriel and other angels"³.

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² *Ibid*, p. 12.

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³ *Ibid*, p. 13; see also *Adabul Harb*, f. 3b.

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¹ Fakhre Mudir; *Tarikh*, p. 13. Also Minhaj, p. 205.

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² e.g., Minhaj, pp. 167, 176.

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³ Barani, p. 578; *Fatawa-i-Jahandari*, f. 199a.

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In this sacredness, however, the king's children did not share, and to that extent the theory of divine monarchy was imperfectly practised in India.

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The son of the reigning king, even his heir apparent, was only one of his courtiers⁴. The Sultan's authority was unquestionable but the right of his descendent to a similar authority was not necessarily conceded. In other words, the monarch's unquestioned right to obedience could not be made inherent in his dynasty but had to be acquired in every individual case. The absence of a law of primogeniture was another qualifying factor in the development of a dynastic absolutist kingship, for the *Shariah* allots an equal share to all the sons. A Muslim king's rightful heirs were usually many and in a position to assert their claims; even nomination by the deceased monarch could hardly decide the choice. Succession became still more complicated by the fact that slaves also were regarded as the master's heirs, though, usually, the descendents of his body were conceded priority. Despite the crown's almost superhuman status, its undefined methods of transfer thus tended to hamper its perpetuation.

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⁴ Iltutmish's sons are listed among his courtiers, Minhaj, p. 177. So are those of Balban and Firoz Khalji; Barani, pp. 24 and 176.

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This clearly un-Islamic sovereignty was not confined to the theorists but found concrete expression in the court etiquette and in the Sultan's absolutism. We have referred to Balban's court ceremonials and to the *zaminbos* and *paibos* system on whose unfailing observance he laid great emphasis; these were a recognised feature even in the time of his predecessors. Such assumption of divine honours did not always go unprotested; a leading ecclesiastic in Iltutmish's court condemned, in no ambiguous terms, all these practices which, he said, clearly amounted to *shirk* (denial of God's unity). But that such protests could always be circumvented is shown by the fact that the same divine was prepared to accord sanction to these practices only if the king tried to act up to what he called the four essential duties of *dinpanahi* (preservation of the Faith) one of which was the suppression of heresy¹.

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¹ Barani, p. 41; *Fatawa-i-Johandari*, f. 45a; see also Amir Khusrau *Kulliyat*, f. 221; also Barani, p. 142.

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On the face of it such absolutism was irreconcilable with the tribal polity mentioned above. A strong man like Iltutmish, who owed his accession to the fact of his being the most influential of the Turkish chiefs after Aibak, was able to resist the assertion of the latter principle. His militarist policy helped him to divert the energy of his compatriots, and all opposition was, for the time being, hushed, when eminent princes came flying from the Mongols to find refuge in his kingdom. The Caliphial investiture clothed his autocracy with legal sanction and he was able to reserve the monarchy for his family. But to continue his dynasty after his death required the constant support of a party. This he sought to create through his slaves who thus introduced a third political factor and gave a characteristic name to the period. A slave was potentially more loyal to his master than his sons¹. As Lanepoole has observed, the slave was a surer investment than a son whose claim to inheritance was not based on efficiency². A large progeny was not favourable to a king's interest, while a number of tried and efficient slaves having no other interest than to serve the master's family, was a sure asset³. Iltutmish had no illusions about the capacity of his sons and the only way to counteract the opposite tendency seemed to lie in organising his personal retainers into a party who would stand by his family and thereby uphold his absolutist monarchy. Like the Muizzi and Qutbi slaves, the Shamsi slaves were thus allowed to form themselves into a political group which, after his death, received the collective name of the "Forty"⁴. By absorbing or destroying the adherents of former kings they were enabled to reign supreme after his death; in the language of Barani, "they divided the kingdom amongst themselves"⁵.

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¹ See Muizzuddin's reply to his courtier who once expressed regret at the king's having no son, Minhaj, p. 132.

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² Medieval India, p. 64.

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³ See Barani, p. 150 how Balban explained to his heir-apparent the dangers of having a large family.

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⁴ Barani, p. 26; Barani and Minhaj's account however include more than forty names among Iltutmish's slaves.

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⁵ Barani, p. 25.

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Thus there came into being a curious political phenomenon, a party of bondsmen pledged to support the power of the master's family who considered the state a vast household in which outsiders could have no place. The Sultanate was converted into a kind of household polity. On behalf of their master's heir they managed the state and considered themselves the sole custodians of Iltutmish's tradition. His degenerate successors could at any time have been supplanted, as indeed they were by Balban; but so long as the party remained, personal jealousy and fear of raking up general hostility among other Turks, compelled the Forty to keep, even though as puppets, Iltutmish’s children on the throne; for their sole *raison d’etre* was loyalty to his family. This household party thus contributed in no small measure to the growth of monarchy for it kept alive a dynasty. But, almost equally, it affected the state’s natural evolution, for under this system the state could derive strength and support, not from the general body of the people, nor even of the Turks, but only from a few, though influential, retainers of the founder of the dynasty. It also circumscribed the Crown.

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With Balban’s appointment as the *naib*, however, this phase in the state’s evolution began to wane, for, although Mahmud’s elevation was calculated to ensure the continuance of this household system, in actual practice, it marked the beginning of its end. Balban shared in Iltutmish’s political ideals but not in his methods of buttressing the Crown’s absolutism by household slaves. Nor did he favour Raziah’s methods of counter-balancing the ‘Forty’ by non-Turkish supporters. During his long tenure of the *niyabat* he completely broke the party and restored the Crown’s power. His own accession to Mahmud’s throne confirmed the final dissolution of the Shamsi party. In its place, he aimed at creating a broader basis for the state in the person of the whole body of the Turkish immigrants. In so doing, he no doubt emphasised the clannish character of the Sultanate but the unprecedentedly autocratic powers which he assumed for the crown, prevented its growth into a rival political force. The new party consisting of all the Turks necessarily shared in Balban’s ideals and was irrevocably committed to upholding his dynasty as representing the racial despotism. Clannish loyalties were thus skilfully harnessed to the service of absolutist monarchy. How this racialism proved unworkable and led to a revolution has been noticed in the relevant chapter, but the monarchy came out unscathed from the disorder, to be utilised by the Khaljis to usher in a new phase in the Sultanate's development.

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A word may be said about the slave-king, a social anachronism. In Islam the potentialities of a slave are many, for except in name, he suffered little visible social disability. A bondslave, wearing a crown was, besides, not a peculiarly Muslim phenomenon; the Byzantine history also affords a number of instances. But, correctly, the Turkish wearers of the crown in 13th century India can hardly be designated as slaves, for every one of them died a free man. Aibak alone was technically a slave when he assumed power at Lahore; but he lost no time in obtaining manumission from his master's heir, Ghiyasuddin Mahmud¹. Iltutmish obtained his freedom quite early, even before Aibak had obtained his own². Freedom undoubtedly was an asset, though not the main qualification, and there were formalist lawyers whom it was prudent to satisfy, for it was they who would be expected to proclaim the ruler's name from the pulpit as 'the defender of the Faith' and 'the Lord Protector of Muslims. In the ceremony of oath-taking on Iltutmish's accession, before the assembled people had sworn allegiance, the lawyers, we are told by Ibn Battuta, "entered the monarch's presence and sat down". The Sultan knew what they wanted to speak about, and so he raised the corner of the carpet on which he was sitting, and presented to them the deed of his manumission. The qazis and the lawyers read it and then took the oath of allegiance¹. We have no explicit mention of Balban's manumission but it is more than probable that his close family ties with the ruling house had procured his freedom.

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¹ Alfi, f. 529b. According to Minhaj both Aibak and Yalduz were manumitted together in about 605/1208; p. 89-90.

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² On the recommendation of Muizzuddin himself Aibak gave him freedom in 601/1205; Minhaj, p. 170.

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¹ Rahlah, II, p. 25.

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The chronicles tend to give us an impression that the Sultanate was a truly Islamic state, constantly striving to make its policy conformable to the *Shariah*. That it was scarcely so in actual practice, will have been gathered from the last few chapters. We have noticed the un-Islamic character of the kingship; Barani admits that *duniyadari*, of which kingship is the highest perfection, is absolutely opposed to *dindari*², After tracing the process by which the pagan institution of monarchy had crept into Islam, he concludes that sovereignty is never possible without practising non-Islamic customs³. Conscientious ecclesiastics might delude themselves that the Sultan really existed for protecting the Faith and upholding the *Shariah*; but it requires little stressing that the decisive factor in his actions was the law of force and expediency. In summing up his account of the origin and nature of kingship Barani remarks "the meaning of kingship is possession (*istilā*), whether by lawful means or by force; even the older pagan law of dynastic legitimacy finds no place in the present kingship"⁴. The *Shariah*, in ordinary practice, was no more respected than any other law. Barani admits that capital punishment of Muslims which, he adds, was contrary to the Sacred Law, was necessary for the exigencies of better government¹. Similarly the law of inheritance, the strict distinction between *halal* and *haram*, and many other well-known injunctions were violated; the ecclesiastics protested but were constrained to find excuse. The well-known prohibition of the *Shariah* regarding the taking and giving of interest on monetary transactions was openly disregarded; Amir Khusrau mentions the rate of interest at one *jital* per month for the principal sum of one *tankah*² which, when agreed upon by the parties on a written bond, had a legal sanction and was enforced by the *qazi*³. Of the four conditions which Barani advises the king to bear in mind when issuing decrees (*zabitah*), one is, that if any of the proposed ordinances is found contrary to the *Shariah*, it need not be withdrawn but, as an evil necessity, to be retained not longer than is necessary⁴.

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² Fatawa-i-Jahandari, f. 159a.

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³ Ibid, f. 100a.

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⁴ Ibid, ff. 214a and 225a.

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¹ *Ibid*, f. 147a; also Barani, p. 511.

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² *Kuliyat*, p. 312; See also *Malaul Anwar*, p. 150, for the existence of Muslim money-lenders.

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³ *Ferishta*, I, p. 95.

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⁴ *Fatawa-i Jahandari*, f. 159a.

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Even the majority of the *ulema*, the guardians of the sacred law, was utterly materialistic in outlook and opportunist in conduct. They entered into an unholy alliance with the secular authorities and by distorting the rules of the *Shariah*, found sanction for the Sultan's pagan practices. Even traditions from the Prophet were concocted to give the king's despotism a moral backing. They held out that the Sultan's office was only slightly inferior to that of the Prophet and his sanctity almost equalled that of God⁵. To suit the Sultan's convenience his religious duties were sought to be confined to such matters as leading the prayers, making endowment for the *ulema* and religious establishments and dispensing justice, while the most flagrant breaches of the *Shariah* rules like drinking, non-observance of the fast etc. were condoned¹. The *ulema* even authorised him to appropriate the people's wealth whenever he desired².

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⁵ An example is the saying "if there were no Sultan the people would devour each other"; See Fakhre Mudir: *Tarikh*, pp. 12-13.

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¹ *Fatawa-i-Jahandari*, f. 11a. Barani tries to prove the great piety of Mahmud of Ghazni by saying that he never drank so heavily as to be unable to say his prayers.

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² *Fiqh-i-Firozshahi*, (I.O. 2987), f. 191-2.

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The *ulema* had thus become utterly servile and unprincipled. The abject flattery with which both Minhaj and Barani refer to their respective patrons and the eulogies showered on them have a disgusting obsequiousness. They even lacked the elementary moral virtues. Balban complained of their want of truthfulness and courage, while Amir Khusrau considered them a gang of 'ignorant hypocrites, conceited and detestably selfish'³. This amorality was infectious and even appears to have spread to the common people. Amir Hasan narrates an incident of some Muslim traders from Lahore unscrupulously defrauding the Hindus of Gujrat⁴. It is tempting to ascribe true Islam to the Sultans of the past, but its calculated distortion to serve material ends is not a peculiarly modern phenomenon. Of earnest, saintly men there was, of course, no dearth; the Muslim mystic provides the best example; but, clearly, his was not the power which determined the complexion of society and politics.

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³ Barani, p. 94; *Matlaul Anwar*, p. 69.

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⁴ *Fawadul Fawaid*, f. 63b.

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