Twilight of the Sultanate c17.s4: The Commoners
Twilight of the Sultanate c17.s4
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The Commoners
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The privileged classes in the cities consisted mainly of the nobles and high government officials. The rest of the people were commoners. The so-called middle-class of today was non-existent in Medieval India. Even the rich Baniā dared not live luxuriously or parade his wealth for fear of appearing to emulate the great and thereby inviting their wrath; he lived without any ostentation, like a poor man. There were thus only two classes—the privileged and the commoners. Indian and foreign writers like Shams Sirāj 'Afīf, Ibn Battūta and Athnasius Nikitin were struck by the disparity that existed between the luxurious life of the rich on the one hand and the miserable existence of the common people on the other.⁴⁶ Ibn Battūta, although a nobleman himself, also dilates upon the life of want of the common man.⁴⁷
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⁴⁶ Major, lxxviii; Nikitin, 14; Cf. also I. B., 60 and T.F.S. (A), 288-89.
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⁴⁷ I.B., 60; Also T.F.S. (A), 288-89.
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The commoners can be divided into two major sections—Hindus and Musalmāns. The Hindus were divided into many castes and sub-castes, and the system had unconsciously permeated into the Muslim society also.⁴⁸ But caste distinctions were more prominent in the villages than in the cities. Among the Hindus, the highest caste was that of the Brahmans. In the post-Vedic period, their superiority had been challenged by the other classes, especially the Kshatriyas, who alone perhaps could stand up to them, but deliberate rewriting of books and use of the system of education for the purpose, had re-established Brahmanical superiority. In law as well as in practice the Brahmans enjoyed all kinds of privileges.⁴⁹ For the Brahmans, therefore, life in ancient India was a golden age, and so they have made it out to be. One of the reasons why ancient Indian times look so glorious is because only the Brahmans, who were enjoying the best of time, have written about them. We do not have the Shudra version or the Vaishya version of the story of the ancient times to have a complete picture of the age. Brahmanical superiority continued right up to the coming of the Muslims.
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⁴⁸ Cf. W.M., 63 (b).
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⁴⁹ K.M. Panikkar, *Survey of Indian History*, 17. He writes on the authority of Pargitar and Sukhthankar.
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With the advent of Islam the position of the Brahmans in Indian society received a set-back. Although they were exempted from taxes which other Hindus paid, they were no longer advisers or ministers of the Sultans. The destruction of temples in preceding centuries must have affected their social and economic position as priests and teachers, but in the fifteenth century Hindus had regained much power. Hindu learning also revived; it put its impress on the teachings of the Socio-religious reformers about whom we shall read in the next chapter. Consequently the position of the Brahmans improved during our period of study. Besides, among the Hindus the Brahmans always enjoyed a position of respectability.⁵⁰
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⁵⁰ When Fīrōz Tughlaq imposed Jeziyā on the Brahmans, there was protest from all sides, and when the Sultan would grant them no concession, the merchant-class promised to pay the Jeziyā on their behalf. T.F.S. (A), 382-84.
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Another influential and respected caste was that of the Kshatriyas. The higher among the Kshatriyas were Rajas, their nobles and high officials. The lower among them were enrolled in the army. Their's was the profession of warriors; they mostly joined the army of the Hindu Rajas. Kshatriyas seem to have enjoyed all rights of citizenship and could hardly brook an insult. They dressed in white,⁵¹ rode on horses and bore themselves with dignity and pride. Howsoever much their bearing might have been resented by the ruling class,⁵² they could not be completely suppressed. Besides soldiering they took to other professions also and became artisans and craftsmen and agriculturalists.
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⁵¹ People generally wore white clothes I.B., xlvii.
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⁵² As by Jalāluddīn Khaljī, T.F.S. (B), 216-17.
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During the fourteenth century the Kshatriyas had been reduced to the position of big zamindars and petty rulers, except in Rajputana. But after Tīmūr's invasion they had gathered strength. Gwalior had been taken by them not to be recovered till the sixteenth century. Katēhār had become entirely Hindu. Hindus in general and Kshatriyas in particular had never been so strong ever since Muhammad Ghorī's invasion as they were in the first half of fifteenth century Hindustan.
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The Vaishya community was mostly engaged in agriculture, trade and commerce. We do not hear of the big Marwārī merchants in the Sultanate period. Trade was mostly confined to the Sindhīs, called Multanīs by Ziyauddīn Baranī, and the Vaishya community. As we shall see presently trade and industry were in a flourishing state in the fifteenth century, and the Vaishya class benefited by it immensely.
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Low caste Hindus and converts to Islam generally manned the various minor professions, although the occupational castes were not all low. These occupational castes comprised brewers, goldsmiths, iron-smiths, tin-workers, carpenters, tailors, betel-leaf (*tāmbul*) seller, flower sellers, oilmen, barbers, jugglers, mountebanks, musicians, shepherds and still others.⁵³ The Muslims could neither be divided on a caste basis nor on the basis of occupation. The higher stratum confined themselves to Government service and the lower amongst them, mostly converts from Hinduism, stuck to their old professions; and although the lower class Muslim converts enjoyed the satisfaction of belonging to the ruling class, they remained as insignificant as their Hindu counterparts.
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⁵³ Ashraf, 193; Jaisi, *Padmāvat*, 154, 413.