The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c6.s3: Muslim States of Punjab and Sind
The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c6.s3
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Muslim States of Punjab and Sind
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Ever since the days of Mahmud, Punjab had remained an integral part of the Ghaznawide empire. Masud found there a safe refuge from the Seljuqs. We have seen how Bahram and finally his son Khusrau were driven out of Ghazni to rule their Indian province. The last-named was succeeded by Khusrau Malik at Lahore, but, in the language of the chronicler, "abandoned himself wholly to pleasure while the servants of state and governors of the country exercised independent power¹.
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¹ Minhaj, p. 26.
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The extent of his kingdom cannot be determined with any amount of certainty. It probably included Peshawar to which Muizzuddin led his first attack on the Ghaznawide possessions in India. Mahmud had wrested Multan from the Qaramitah sect of the Shiite Muslims but with the reassertion of the latter's power a few years after his death, it fell off from the Punjab province². Sialkot appears as the boundary towards the state of Jammu which, according to a late chronicle, was hostile to Khusrau Malik³. The Ghaznawide frontier, however, was far from stable, for the Rajputs steadily pushed it back. An inscription of the Chauhana prince Prithviraja I records his conquest of Asi (Hansi) and its conversion into a fortified outpost against the Muslims, in V.S. 1224/1167 A.D.⁴ That this pressure must have continued is proved by the fact that Bhatinda (written Tabarhinda), situated further north, appears a few years later, in the possession of Prithviraja II from whom Muizuddin was to capture it in 1191.
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² Adabul Harb; f. 76a.
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³ Raj Darashani, I. O. 507, f. 45. The Raja of Jammu is named Chakra Deo and is said to have invited and helped Muizzuddin against Khusrau. The account, inspite of its doubtful authenticity is accepted unreservedly in the CHI, iii, p. 39. Raverty quotes extensively from it. The hostility of the alleged ruler of Jammu with Khusrau, however, might have had some connection with the aggressions of the "Mlecchas from the upper Indus valley" in 1144 and of the "Javana Turushkas" between 1150-55, as mentioned in the Kashmir chronicles; Rajatarangini, ii, p. 217; see also introduction, p. 128; Dvitiya Rajatarangini, cited in Roy, H.C.: Dynastic history of Northern India, i, pp. 172-3.
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⁴ IA, xli, p. 17-8; see also Tod: Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, p. 135. Thomas: Chronicles, p. 60.
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Faced with the prospect of a long war with the Khwarizm Shah, the Shansabanis found it necessary to eliminate the enemy finally from the rear. The thrust through Sind proving a failure, Muizzuddin directed his attention to the northern entrance and occupied Peshawar in 575/1179¹. Two years later he advanced against Lahore. Khusrau could buy his safety only by offering costly presents and furnishing his son as a hostage. In 581/1185 Muizuddin again invaded the Punjab but contented himself in plundering the countryside and occupying the fortress of Sialkot, which was repaired and garisoned. Sensing the enemy's ultimate design, Khusrau at last exerted himself, and with the help of the Khokar² tribes besieged the fortress but had to retire unsuccessful. Next year, Muizuddin returned to the attack and laid siege to Lahore. Unable to take it by force, he resorted to diplomacy and by assurances of safety persuaded Khusrau to visit his camp. There, he was treacherously siezed and sent to the castle of Balarwan in Gharjistan to be kept in perpetual confinement. He was put to death in 588/1192³.
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¹ Raverty: *op. cit.* p. 452, note 8, doubts whether the word *Furshor*, as written in Minhaj, p. 116, really refers to Peshawar, which according to him, was called Bagram in those days. Ibnul Asir, xi, pp. 75-6, however, removes the doubt by referring to it as Furshawar which according to Raverty, was the same as Peshawar. Minhaj also uses the term on another occasion; p. 9.
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² Minhaj, p. 117. The *Raj Darashani*, f, 45b, states that the Khokars were originally subjects of Jammu but had withheld the payment of taxes and allied themselves with Khusrau. Upon this the Raja invited Muiz-zuddin and it was on his suggestion that Sialkot was garrisoned.
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³ Minhaj gives no less than three dates for the event: p. 27, 598; p. 118, 587; p. 74, 588.
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The Qaramitah of Multan held the greater part of Upper Sind. The history of Uch, however, is far from clear. Later writers like Yahya Sirhindi, Ferishta and others, probably on the authority of Ibnul Asir, state that it was held by the Bhatti Rajputs¹. The annals of the Bhattis, however, do not make the slightest reference to their ever having held Uch². A likelier suggestion is that it was held by the Qaramitah; Muizzuddin in any case captured both Uch and Multan in one operation in 571/1175³.
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¹ *TM* p. 6, Ferishta, p. 56. *TA*, I, p. 37. The story of Muizzuddin's intrigue with the queen of the Bhatti raja of Uch who, in the hope of marrying her daughter to the Ghoride chief, poisoned her husband and then allowed the fort to be occupied, is first related by Ibnul Asir, XI, p. 77; but the author himself admits, on p. 79, that his account regarding India is based on hearsay and is unconfirmed. And yet this admittedly tainted account is unreservedly accepted in *CHI*, III, p. 38. For an obviously legendary account of the early Muslim occupation of Uch see, *IGI*, XXIV, p. 82.
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² See Tod: *Annals*, II, pp. 1190-1205, where the progress of the Bhattis from the Punjab to Jaisalmer in the end of the XII century is recounted. Jaisal, the founder of Jaisalmer, is said to have sought and obtained the assistance of the king of Ghor in occupying Lodorva, the ancient capital, 10 miles N. W. of Jaisalmer. He is also said to have acknowledged the latter's suzerainty whose troops thereafter left for Bhakar in Lower Sind. The story may have some obscure reference to actual facts but does not confirm Ibnul Asir's account. See also Erskine: *Rajputana Gazetteer*, p. 11.
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³ Minhaj, p. 127, speaks of the holy war against the Qaramitah of Multan and Uch; see also *TM*, p. 5-6. Ferishta, I, p. 56, dates the event in 572/1176.
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Lower Sind, with its capital at Debal, was under a local dynasty. Mahmud's conquests in those parts were anything but complete. Not long after his death, a local tribe called Sumra, recovered control over the district and became independent. The origin of the tribe is uncertain. Ibn Battuta had heard they were of Arab descent⁴. He is supported by the *Tuhfatul Kiram*⁵, but controverted by Ferishta, Tahir Nisyani and Abul Fazal who assert that they were a local Indian tribe converted to Islam at an early date⁶. Elliot and Tod regarded them as of Rajput stock, a branch of the Paramaras¹. Their rise to power, according to Mir Masum², occurred towards the end of Abdur Rashid Ghaznawide’s reign whose weakness prompted them to establish their sovereignty near the town of Thari. The *Tarikh-i-Tahiri*, however, places the beginning of their independence about 700/1302³. This is near enough to the statement of the *Tuhfatul-Kiram* that they rose to power in the reign of Ghiyasuddin Tughluq⁴. This, however, should in reality, refer to the Summas who, it is certain, supplanted the earlier dynasty and were in possession of Lower Sind when Firoz Tughluq, in 762/1362, opened his attack against the Jam of Thatta. Elliot found evidence dating from 1032 of a Sumra prince (Rai) of Sind receiving communications of a religious import from the Qaramitah leader of the Druzes who were staunch supporters of the Fatimide Caliphs⁵. Their acceptance of the Shiite faith and a resulting intimacy with the Qaramitah of Multan would thus appear to be long-standing. In the list of the Sumra rulers found in the *Tuhfatul-Kiram*, the eleventh, named Chanisar (or Chatisar) is clearly to be identified with Sinanuddin Chanisar, the ruler of Debal who submitted to Iltutmish in 1228⁶. According to Juwaini, he fled from his capital when the Khwarizmi prince Jalaluddin Mangbarni passed through Lower Sind on his way to Iraq⁷. When Muizzuddin captured Debal “as far as the sea” in 578/1182⁸, he must have only
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⁴ *Kitabur-Rahlah*, II, p. 5.
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⁵ Add. 21589 f. 263b.
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⁶ Ferishta, II, p. 314; *Tarikh-i-Tahiri*, f. 14b; *Ain-i-Akbari*, Jarrett
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¹ Elliot, i, pp. 448-9; *Annals*, iii, pp. 1281-83 and 1299.
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² *Tarikh-i-Masumi*; f. 51a.
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³ *Op. cit.* f. 12a.
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⁴ *Op. cit.* 263b.
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⁵ Elliot i, p. 491.
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⁶ Quoted by Raverty, *op. cit.* p. 614; note; Minhaj, p. 173.
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⁷ ii, p. 147.
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⁸ Minhaj, p. 117.
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and Blochmann, ii, p. 341, 345.
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compelled the Sumra ruler to acknowledge his suzerainty.
Linked texts (1)
- Rājataraṅgiṇī — Kalhaṇa, Sanskrit