The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c20.207

v3.c20.207

His first, and probably his most unpopular reform, was the establishment of a rigid ceremonial at his court, which differed entirely from that of his meek and unassuming predecessor. His maxim was that the freedom which came naturally and easily to one born to a throne could not be safely used by a monarch who had acquired one, and was surrounded by courtiers who had formerly been his equals; but his policy ministered to his pride, for though his original position among the royal slaves had been extremely humble he claimed descent from Afrāsiyāb of Tūrān, and pretended, on this ground, to an innate right to sovereignty. His court was an austere assembly where jest and laughter were unknown, whence wine and gaming, to which he had formerly been addicted, were banished, partly because they were forbidden by the Islamic law but chiefly because they promoted good fellowship and familiarity, and where no detail of punctilious ceremony was ever relaxed. He atoned for former laxity by a rigid observance of all the ceremonial ordinances of his faith, and at meals his favourite companions were theologians and his favourite topic the dogmas of Islam. His justice knew no respect of persons, if we except a prejudice against the Forty. Malik Baqbaq, a great noble who maintained from the revenues of his fief of Budaun 4000 horse, caused one of his servants to be beaten so unmercifully that he died under the lash. When Balban next visited Budaun the man’s widow demanded justice, and Malik Baqbaq was flogged to death and the news-writer who had suppressed the circumstance was hanged over the city gate. Haibat Khān, who held the great fief of Oudh, slew a man in a fit of drunken rage, and when the victim’s relations appealed to Balban he caused Haibat Khān to be flogged with five hundred stripes and then delivered him to the widow, saying, ‘This murderer was my slave, he is now yours. Do you stab him as he stabbed your husband.’ Haibat Khān found intercessors who induced the woman to stay her hand, and purchased his freedom for 20,000 *tangas*, but was so overcome with shame that to the day of his death he never left his house. Balban more than once announced that he would treat his own sons in like manner in similar circumstances. An officer who was defeated by rebels was hanged over the gate of the city which was the seat of his government. This was not a proper punishment for incapacity or ill fortune, but the officer was, like Baqbaq and Haibat Khān, one of the Forty. Balban was occasionally, as will be seen from the chronicle of his reign, capricious as well as cruel in his punishments. A virtue eulogised by Muslim historians was his capacity for weeping at sermons, but he could remain unmoved by the sight of cruel executions.