Twilight of the Sultanate c12.s2: 'Ālam Shāh
Twilight of the Sultanate c12.s2
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'Ālam Shāh
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After the death of Muhammad Shāh, his son succeeded peacefully to the throne with the title of Sultan 'Alāuddīn 'Ālam Shāh, in accordance with the testamentary disposition of his father⁵⁴ and the concurrence of the nobility.⁵⁵ Shāh 'Ālam signalised the event by issuing coins,⁵⁶ and all and sundry did him homage.⁵⁷ In those troubled times no king could have got such an easy succession to the throne, without any opposition whatsoever, but unfortunately 'Alāuddīn lacked acquaintance with the affairs of the state and within a short time proved himself to be even less intelligent and more vacillating than his father.⁵⁸ A pleasure seeker by temperament, he found kingship a difficult office. Sincere advice used to sting him, while the pursuit of pleasure was all that he thought life worth for.
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⁵⁴ Badaonī, Ranking, I, 400 T.A., I, 292.
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⁵⁵ T.A., I, 292.
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⁵⁶ A silver coin weighing 175 grains gives his full name as well as title as سلطان علاالدنيا و الدين عالمشاه بن محمد شاه بن فريد شاه (Sultan Alāudduniya-va-uddīn 'Ālam Shāh bin Muhammad Shāh bin Farīd Shāh). J.(P.)A.S.B. New Series, XI, 1915, 483; Thomas, *Chronicles*, 338, 339. Also see Nelson Wright, Plate XI, 920.
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⁵⁷ T.A., I, 292; Badaonī, I, 305. Only Ferishta, I, 171 (line 2 from below) says that Bahlūl did not pay homage to the new king.
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⁵⁸ T.A., I, 292, 297-98.
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There was yet another reason why kingship had no charm for him. At the time of his accession the Sultanate had shrunk to its narrowest limits. Not only Gujarat, Malwa, and Jaunpur had surpassed it in strength and Bahlūl Lodi ruled over the whole of the Punjab as far east as Panipat,⁵⁹ but even the districts around Delhi were in the hands of certain tribal chiefs, mostly Afghan. The tract from Maholi near Mathura up to Sarai Lado in the vicinity of Delhi, was in the hands of Ahmad Khan Mewati,⁶⁰ while on the western side of the Jumna the tract from Sambhal up to the ford of Khwājā Khizr (through which Tīmūr had crossed into Delhi near Wazīrābād) was in the possession of Dariyā Khan Lodī so that their authority extended up to the capital from opposite directions. Kol was occupied by 'Īsā Khan Turkbachchā. In Rapri, Chandwār and Etawah Qutb Khan, son of Hasan Khan Afghan, held his sway. Bhongaon, Kampil and Patiali were with Rai Pratap Singh.⁶¹ Bayana was with Dāūd Khan Auhadi.⁶² Gwalior and Dholpur had their own Rajas. The country being thus parcelled out,⁶³ the sultanate was shrunk to such an extent that a contemporary poet satirically declared : "The Empire of the Emperor of the World (Shāh 'Ālam) extended (only) from Delhi to (a distance of ten miles to) Palam".⁶⁴
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⁵⁹ T.A., I, 296; Ferishta, I, 174.
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⁶⁰ Nizāmuddīn, Ni'āmatulla and Ferishta have Mahraulī. A. B. Pandey accepts it (*First Afghan Empire in India*, 52 and n.). Mahraulī lies only 11 miles distant from Delhi on the Delhi-Gurgaon Road and it would be funny to mention a tract of eight miles from Mahraulī to Sarai Lado as of any consequence. Besides all historians mention the region of Mewat. In all probability the place is Maholi near Mathura. It was a Mahāl in Sarkar Agra, Sūba Agra (Āīn. trs., II, 183 ; Elliot, *Races*, II, 85-86). Its ruler Ahmad Khan Mewatī was a grandson of Bahādur Nāhar and paid his respects to Muhammad Shāh in 838 H (T.M.S., 243).
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⁶¹ T.A., I, 297 ; Dorn, 44.
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⁶² He is called Auhadī by Nizāmuddīn, Ni'āmatulla and Ferishta. Erskine calls him Lodī, I, 405.
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⁶³ T.A., I, 296-297 ; Ferishta, I, 172 ; *Makhzan*, 42 (a). T.S.A., 5 and T.D., 7 only refer to it. Badaonī does not give these divisions.
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⁶⁴ T.D., 7 ; T.S.A., 5. شهنشاهی شاه عالم ـ از دهلی تا پالم. Palam, 10 miles south of Delhi, is now an international airport. During the time of Akbar it was a small pargana and was included in the Sarkar of Delhi. Āīn., II, 286.
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If Shāh 'Ālam was not quite happy with his Empire, he had genuine reasons for being so. But even for the Sultan of this Sultanate from "Delhi to Palam" there was no peace. The neighbouring rulers wanted to derive the fullest advantage from the Sultanate grown so weak while Bahlūl, in whose mind "the egg of royalty was hatching", was more aggressive than ever before. In A.D. 1447 (851 H) he once again marched to Delhi, invested Sīrī, and went back only at the intercession of Qutb Khan Lodī and Rai Pratap Singh.⁶⁵ The Sultan's nerves were greatly strained under the stress of this invasion and he went to Badaon for a change. The climate of the place had a spell on him, and he developed a deep desire to stay there. 'Alāuddīn had neither the capacity nor the inclination to rule, and he finally left for Badaon in A.D. 1448 (852 H) leaving the management of the government in the hands of his wife's two brothers one of whom he appointed as Shahnā-i-Shahr (Superintendent of the City) and the other as Mīr-i-Kuī (Superintendent of the Highways).⁶⁶ The existence of double courts—one at Delhi and the other at Badaon—disintegrated the Central Government. Worse still, the two brothers-in-law of the Sultan soon fell out at Delhi. One of them killed the other, and other was killed by the people in revenge for the first one.⁶⁷ 'Ālam Shāh consulted 'Īsā Khan, Qutb Khan and Rai Pratap "as to how he might re-establish his authority".⁶⁸ They promised to help him only on the condition that he would put Hamīd Khan, the Vazīr, to death, alleging that Hamīd was in secret correspondence with Sultan Mahmūd of Mandu with a view to placing him on the throne.⁶⁹ 'Īsā Khan and Qutb Khan hoped to gain if a strong Vazīr like Hamīd Khan was done to death, while Rai Pratap bore a personal grudge against him as Hamīd's father, Fatēh Khan, had laid waste the Rai's territories and killed his old father. "Sultan 'Alāuddīn who had no acquaintance with the administration of an empire, gave the orders for the death of Hamīd Khan without deliberation or delay".⁷⁰ But Hamīd proved too smart for him. He collected his friends and supporters, occupied the fort of Sīrī, captured the royal treasure and turned out the members of the royal family, including the ladies, with great insult.⁷¹
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⁶⁵ *Makhzan* 42 (a) ; Also Thomas, *Chronicles*, 338. Other chroniclers do not make mention of their intercession.
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⁶⁶ T.A., I, 293; Ferishta, I, 172; Badaonī, Ranking, 401. Also Z.W., III, 920, wherein it says that one was made governor of the city and other of the environs.
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⁶⁷ T.A., I, 293.
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⁶⁸ *Ibid.*, I, 297.
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⁶⁹ T.D., 6; T.S.A., 6. According to Ferishta, I, 172, they made such allegations to weaken the King, but the argument is hardly tenable.
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⁷⁰ T.A., I, 297; De's trs., 336.
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⁷¹ Ferishta, I, 172; Dorn, 45.
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Hamīd was now securely entrenched in Delhi. But he thought it discreet not to assume the regal title. Instead, he decided to place a monarch on the vacant throne. He thought of Sultan Mahmūd Sharqī of Jaunpur but, as he was the brother-in-law of Sultan 'Alāuddīn, he could not be relied upon. Sultan Mahmūd of Malwa, who was connected with the old Khaljī house of Delhi, was also dropped because he was placed too distant to be invited.⁷² Moreover, both of them were strong and ambitious monarchs and would not have acted as showboys for Hamīd.⁷³ While Hamīd was thus meditating on a good choice Bahlūl Lodī, who had all along been watching the developments at Delhi with keen interest, marched with his army and besieged it in A.D. 1450 (854 H.).⁷⁴ Unable to face him Hamīd entered into a compact with Bahlūl, made him the king and himself the Vazīr, but kept to himself all authority and power.⁷⁵
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⁷² Ahmad Yādgār says that he had only two persons in view, one Bahlūl Khan and the other Sultan Mahmūd of Mandu. T.S.A., 6.
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⁷³ Ferishta, I, 172.
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⁷⁴ Dorn, 45.
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⁷⁵ W.M., 2 (b).
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Hamīd had calculated wrongly. The Afghans had already spread out into the Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. They only needed to gain some more strength to become rulers of Hindustan. Bahlūl knew this, but he was also aware of the fact that because of their shifting loyalties and intriguing nature the Delhi nobility could not be depended upon. He therefore sent an appeal to his home country Roh, in eastern Afghanistan,⁷⁶ and invited his "brethren" to help him secure his position. He promised their leaders large jagirs and equal status, and the Afghans of Roh began their trek into Hindustan in ever larger numbers like "ants and locusts".
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⁷⁶ For Roh see Appendix C.
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Meanwhile the shrewd Bahlūl continued to treat Hamīd Khan with all possible courtesy,⁷⁷ although he had made up his mind to do away with the Vazīr. He used to call on Hamīd every day, always keeping near his person his own Afghan followers from Roh.⁷⁸ One day when Hamīd Khan had invited Bahlūl to dinner, the latter went with a large following and so seated them that two or three Afghans sat close to every man of Hamīd Khan. When the dinner was over, Bahlūl's cousin Qutb Khan Lodī, drew out a chain from under his arm and throwing it before Hamīd said, "The best thing for you will be to retire from public life. As I have eaten your salt, I do not intend to put you to death".⁷⁹ Hamīd was taken by surprise, but he was helpless. He and his men were overpowered. Hamīd was probably put to death soon after for he is not heard of any more.
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⁷⁷ T.D., 8.
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⁷⁸ *Makhzan*, 43 (a).
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⁷⁹ T.S.A., 8; *Makhzan*, 43 (b); Dorn, 46; T.D., 10. Rizqulla says that Hamīd Khan was told that his treachery to 'Alāuddīn had rendered him unworthy of the office. W.M., 3 (a).
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Having removed Hamīd from the political arena, Bahlūl moved with utmost tact to gain the confidence and support of the Delhi nobility. By his extreme generosity he was soon able to win them over to his side.⁸⁰ Thereupon he wrote to Sultan 'Alāuddīn thus : "Since I was brought up through the kindness of your father, I have put the ungrateful Hamīd in chains. I consider myself your regent for this country, and am ready to secure to you the empire which was wrested from your hands. Nor will I prevent the Khutba from being read in your name". 'Alāuddīn wrote back : "Since my father addressed you as son, I consider you as my elder brother. I have therefore made over the government to you and have contented myself with the pargana of Badaon. Would to God the Sultanate of Delhi might prosper under you".⁸¹ 'Alāuddīn's reply exhilarated Bahlūl. He held a coronation Darbār and ascended the throne on 19 April, 1451 (17 Rabiul Avval, 855 H)⁸² with the title of Sultan Abul Muzaffar Bahlūl Ghāzī.⁸³
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⁸⁰ T.S.A., 10.
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⁸¹ *Makhzan*, 44 (a) ; Dorn, 46-7. Ahmad Yādgār also gives the contents of both the letters. T.S.A., 9.
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⁸² T.A., I, 298; *Makhzan* 43 (b); Ferishta, I, 173; Dorn, 47; M.R., I, 437, 440. Badaonī, I, 306 gives the year only. T.S.A., 10 and T.D., 11-12 give 27 instead of 17 as the date of accession.
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⁸³ T.S.A., 10; T.D., 11.
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'Alāuddīn 'Ālam Shāh continued to live at Badaon. Such a peaceful transfer of power was unique in the annals of Medieval India. Sir Wolseley Haig treats 'Alāuddīn harshly by saying : "The contemptible 'Ālam Shāh remained contentedly at Badaon, where the revenue of the small territory which he had been permitted to retain sufficed to defray the cost of his pleasures".⁸⁴ Dr. Ishwari Prasad is equally uncharitable when he writes : "The imbecile 'Alāuddīn lived out the remnant of his life, perhaps without any pangs of regret or sense of humiliation, in undisturbed repose at Badaon".⁸⁵ In 'Alāuddīn one should not try to find an imbecile or a contemptible monarch, but a true Saiyyad not only in calling but also in temperament. Badaonī faithfully expresses the sentiments of 'Ālam Shāh in one of his letters to Bahlūl. It reads : "There is neither fruit nor profit for me in sovereignty ; living in solitary contentment at Badaon, I resign the empire of Delhi to you".⁸⁶
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⁸⁴ C.H.I., III, 227.
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⁸⁵ *Medieval India*, 468. Cf. also Dr. R. P. Tripathi, *Rise and Fall of the Mughal Empire*, 21.
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⁸⁶ Badaonī, I, 306 ; Ranking, I, 401.
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Indeed the peace-loving Sultan had got fed up with the all-round confusion. While all and sundry were trying to gain the most from the prevailing confusion, here was a monarch who willingly renounced what was not in his power to manage. To be able to rule successfully in those days needed all the tact, nay the cunning, of a medieval despot. 'Alāuddīn does not seem to have possessed it. If he was not a man of saintly temperament, he was certainly a man of a quiet and peaceful disposition. For more than two decades his predecessors had unwittingly transferred large assignments to the Afghans for securing their help in solving the problems of the state. The Afghans had gradually established their power both in the west and east of Delhi and one day they were bound to try for the throne. Sultan 'Alāuddīn only paid for the mistakes of his predecessors. The Sultanate he must necessarily have lost, for the powerful Bahlūl had set his heart upon it, and seen in this context, 'Ālam Shāh was a gainer in getting Badaon at least. No one could appreciate his nature and position better than his contemporaries. Ambitious rulers of Delhi and Jaunpur not only did not consider him a thorn in their side, but respected him and left him undisturbed to rule in Badaon for twenty-eight long years. Moreover, except for renouncing the honour of being called the Sultan of Delhi, 'Ālam Shāh had not lost much, for his kingdom was in no way less in territory than the "empire of Delhi to Palam" which he had relinquished. 'Ālam Shāh's little kingdom consisted of "Badaon and the districts appertaining to it, towards the river Ganga as far as Khairābād and the foot of the hills, and he used to read the Khutba in his own name in those districts"⁸⁷ for the next twenty-eight years till his death in A.D. 1478 (883 H.).⁸⁸
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⁸⁷ Badaonī, I, 306; Ranking, I, 402.
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⁸⁸ Ferishta, I, 173. Badaonī wrongly has 855 H. That was the year of Bahlūl's accession, not of 'Alāuddīn's death.
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*The Saiyyad Dynasty*
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'Ālam Shāh's abdication brought to an end the rule of the Saiyyad dynasty. It had ruled for thirty-seven years. Of its four rulers, Khizr Khan was the first and the greatest. His accession had reunited the Punjab to the Sultanate of Delhi. But while his kindness, which did not treat recalcitrants as rebels, endeared him to all, it encouraged many to rise against him. The extent of rebelliousness during his reign and after can be gauged from the fact that only military expeditions could collect the yearly tribute from as nearby regions as Katehar in the north-east, Mewat in the south and Etawah in the east of Delhi. "There were, of course, the ordinary concessions to expediency . . . submission for the moment in the presence of a superior force . . . or desertions of fields and strongholds easily regained; but there was clearly no material advance in public security or in the supremacy of the Central government".⁸⁹
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⁸⁹ Thomas, *Chronicles*, 327.
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Mubārak Saiyyad showed determination by freely using the title of the Sultan, effecting constant transfers, fighting rebels and invaders and marching against the kings of Jaunpur and Malwa, but behind this imposing facade lay the hard fact that throughout his reign of thirteen years the Punjab was constantly harried by rebels and invaders and the east could not be brought under control. In dealing with the problems of the Punjab, Mubārak Shāh continued the policy of his predecessor, of giving high civil and military assignments to Afghan nobles. Sarhind had been bestowed upon Sultan Shāh Lodī by Khizr Khan (A.D. 1419). Mubārak Shāh gave Lahore and Jalandhar to Malik Kālā Lodī (1432) and later on he was made governor of Sambhal and Ahar. Similarly many other large and small provinces passed into the hands of the Afghans so much so that during the last years of the Saiyyad rule the whole of the Punjab and the western U.P. was controlled by them. Thus because of the necessity of fighting the rebels, Khizr Khan and Mubārak Khan had mortgaged the Punjab to the Afghans, particularly the Lodīs. They had fought one evil with another, for while the rebels were disloyal the Afghans looked only to their personal gain. The first two Saiyyads had unconsciously helped in the rise of the Lodī power at the expense of their own dynasty.
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During Muhammad Saiyyad's eleven years of misrule, the king of Jaunpur annexed many eastern districts belonging to the Delhi Sultanate, Gwalior became completely independent, Mewat got out of control, and the Punjab was lost to the Afghans. Muhammad Shāh tried to crush Bahlūl Lodī, but he found himself completely helpless. We shall study about the power and politics of the kingdoms of Malwa and Gujarat in their proper perspective. Suffice it here to say that after the invasion of Tīmūr they had become independent of the Sultanate of Delhi. Maḥmūd Khaljī I of Malwa was ambitious and energetic. By 1445-46 he had extended its frontiers up to Kalpi and had compelled the ruler of Bayana to read the Khutba in his name. The situation was so hopeless indeed that had Gujarat's pressure not threatened Maḥmūd, he would probably have annexed Delhi to his kingdom. Thus when Muhammad Saiyyad died, no point on his frontier was more than forty miles distant from Delhi. Shāh 'Ālam could not hold even this little kingdom not to say of augmenting it. He even became a butt of ridicule, and nobody perhaps shed tears when he eventually faded out of history.
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In these circumstances the Saiyyads could make no positive contribution to kingship⁹⁰ or to the system of civil administration, which had not been checked up or improved upon for the last fifty years. We hardly hear of any civil or revenue officials during this period and revenue could be collected only through military operations. During the last days of the Saiyyad rule, their kingdom disintegrated rapidly and even cities and districts became independent. Bahlūl, the first ruler of the Lodī dynasty, had to begin the process of empire building all afresh, to bring under his sway district after district and even to create a new theory of kingship.
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⁹⁰ R. P. Tripathi, *Some Aspects of Muslim Administration*, 80.