The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c29.s2.13

v3.c29.s2.13

When Muhammad b. Qāsim invaded Sind in 711 the Chālukyas, the Pallavas, and the Rāshtrakūtas were contending for supremacy in the Deccan, and the Arab geographers of a later date corrupted Vallabha Rãi, the title borne by many of the Rāshtrakūtas, imitating the Chālukyas, into Balharā, and used this word as a generic title for the leading ruler in India; but in Northern India the empire of Harsha had dissolved on his death in the middle of the preceding century, and no power had succeeded to the hegemony. How Muhammad dealt with Dāhir, the local ruler of Sind, we have seen. The Chāvadas of Kāthiāwār, the Gahlots of Chitor, the Chauhāns of Sāmbhar, and probably other houses claim to have met and defeated the Arab invaders, but these chiefs ruled principalities contiguous to or not far distant from the conquered state, and their opposition to Muhammad was not a united effort. The claims may well be true, but the conflicts were of little importance. The Arabs had Sind, and if they ever contemplated an extension of their conquests in India they soon abandoned the idea.