Twilight of the Sultanate c6.s2.9

c6.s2.9

Nearer home Sultan Muhammad was grappling with the chiefs of the Doab with a view to bringing them to obedience. Important amongst these were Rai Vīra Singh,³⁴ the Tomar chief of Gwalior, his younger brother Rāwat Uddhāran Singh, Rai Sumēr of Etawah³⁵ and Ranvīr Vāhan of Mainpuri. Fīrōz Tughlaq had marched against Sumēr and Uddhāraṇ in A. D. 1377-78 (779 H), and they with their families were taken to Delhi and forced to reside there. In the court Sumēr and Uddhāraṇ used to sit behind Zafar Khan junior and Āzam Khan Khurasānī, not like them on a carpet but on the bare ground.³⁶ They had put up with this humiliation during the reign of Fīrōz, but now finding the Sultanate weak, they not only declared their independence but also occupied the *pargana* of Balārām³⁷ in Etah district, and some other *parganas* in its vicinity. Sultan Muhammad could not put up with this affrontery. He sent the Vazīr against Vīra Singh and himself marched to Etawah against Sumēr and Uddhāraṇ. Vīra Singh was defeated and carried to Delhi, but Sumēr and Uddhāraṇ entrenched themselves in Etawah, fought a bloody battle for thirty-six hours, and in the end escaped from the fort at night. Muhammad dismantled the fortifications of Etawah³⁸ and then marched to Qannauj and Dalmaū, striking at the recalcitrant zamindars on the way, and thence to Jalesar. Since Jalesar had brought him good luck, he ordered the construction of a fort there and christened the place Muhammadābād.