The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c20.515

Language: English

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Tughluq, thus temporarily relieved of anxiety, plunged into dissipation and sought to secure his tenure of the throne by removing possible competitors. By imprisoning his brother, Sālār Shāh, he so alarmed his cousin Abu Bakr that that prince was constrained, in self-defence, to become a conspirator. He found a willing supporter in the ambitious Rukn-ud-dīn, Khānjahān's deputy, who had much influence with the household troops. Their defection transferred the royal power from Tughluq to Abu Bakr and Tughluq and Khānjahān fled from the palace by a door opening towards the Jumna. They were overtaken and slain by a body of the household troops led by Rukn-ud-dīn, and on February 19, 1389, the nobles at Delhi acclaimed Abu Bakr Shāh as their king. The appointment of Rukn-ud-dīn as minister followed as a matter of course, but he was almost immediately detected in a conspiracy to usurp the throne, and was put to death. This prompt action established for a time Abu Bakr's authority at Delhi, but a serious rebellion broke out in the province immediately to the north of the capital. The centurions of Sāmāna rose against their governor, Khushdil, a loyal adherent of Abu Bakr, put him to death at Sunām, and sent his head to Nāsir-ud-dīn Muhammad, whom they invited to make another attempt to gain the throne. Muhammad marched from Kāngra to Sāmāna, where he was proclaimed king on April 24, 1389.

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He continued his march towards Delhi, and before reaching the neighbourhood of the city received such accessions of strength as to find himself at the head of 50,000 horse, and he was able to take up his quarters in the Jahānnumā palace in the old city. On April 29 some fighting took place at Fīrūzābād between the troops of the rival kings, but the arrival of Bahādur Nāhir from Mewāt so strengthened Abu Bakr that on the following day he marched out to meet his uncle and inflicted on him so crushing a defeat that he was glad to escape across the Jumna into the Doāb with no more than 2000 horse. He retired to Jalesar, which he made his headquarters, and sent his second son, Humāyūn Khān, to Sāmāna to rally the fugitives and raise fresh recruits. At Jalesar he was joined by many discontented nobles, including Malik Sarvar, lately chief of the police at Delhi, whom he made his minister, with the title of Khvāja Jahān, and Nasīr-ul-Mulk, who received the title of Khizr Khān, by which he was afterwards to be known as the founder of the Sayyid dynasty. Muhammad was thus enabled, by July, again to take the field with 50,000 horse, and marched on Delhi, but was defeated at the village of Khondlī and compelled to retire to Jalesar.

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Notwithstanding this second blow his authority was acknowledged in Multān, Lahore, Sāmāna, Hissār, Hānsī and other districts to the north of Delhi, and was confirmed by executions of those disaffected to him, but the general effect of the prolonged struggle for the throne was temporary eclipse of the power and authority of the dominant race. Hindus ceased to pay the poll-tax and in many of the larger cities of the kingdom menaced Muslim supremacy. In January, 1390, Humāyūn Khān advanced from Sāmāna to Pānīpat and plundered the country as far as the walls of Delhi, but was defeated and driven back to Sāmāna. Abu Bakr had hitherto been detained in Delhi by the fear that his enemies in the city would admit Humāyūn in his absence, but this success encouraged him to attack Muhammad in his stronghold, and in April he left Delhi. As he approached Jalesar Muhammad, with 4000 horse, eluded him, reached Delhi by forced marches, and occupied the palace. Abu Bakr at once retraced his steps, and as he entered the city Muhammad fled and returned to Jalesar. Abu Bakr’s success was, however, illusory and transient; his authority was confined to the capital and the district of Mewāt, where Bahādur Nāhir supported his cause, and even at Delhi his rival had many partisans. In August Islām Khān, a courtier who had great influence in the army, opened communications with Muhammad and placed himself at the head of his adherents in Delhi.

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The discovery of the conspiracy so alarmed Abu Bakr that he retired with his partisans to Mewāt, and Muhammad, on August 31, entered the capital and was enthroned in the palace of Fīrūzābād. He ordered the expulsion from Delhi of all the household troops of Fīrūz Shāh, whose share in the late revolutions had proved them to be a danger to the State. Most of these troops joined Abu Bakr in Mewāt and those who claimed the right, as natives of Delhi, of remaining in the city were required to pronounce the shibboleth *khārā* (‘brackish’). Those who pronounced it *khārī*, after the manner of the inhabitants of eastern Hindūstan and Bengal were adjudged to be royal slaves imported from those regions, and were put to death.