Twilight of the Sultanate c9.s3.1

c9.s3.1

Interested groups were not slow to take advantage of such a state of affairs, and an impostor from Bajwara,⁶⁵ a dependency of Jalandhar, declared himself to be Sārang Khan.⁶⁶ It was well known that Sārang Khan had been killed during Tīmūr’s invasion,⁶⁷ but many people, some foolish and ignorant while others clever and interested, joined the Pretender. It was Sārang Khan who had expelled Khizr Khan from Multan a little before Tīmūr’s invasion, and his very name must have given the Sultan a creeping feeling as well as revived bitter memories in his mind. He therefore immediately directed Malik Sultan Shāh (subsequently entitled Islam Khan),⁶⁸ belonging to a family of the Lodī clan recently domiciled in India and holding the governorship of Sarhind, to march against the impostor. In July, 1419 (Rajjab, 822 H)⁶⁹ Sultan Shāh marched with his forces from Sarhind. On the way he was joined by Zīrak Khan of Samana and Tughān Raīs of Jalandhar.⁷⁰ The pseudo-Sārang together with the forces of Khwājā ’Alī Māzindrānī,⁷¹ the Amīr of Jath in Sindh⁷² who had joined him, advanced from Bajwara to Rupar to meet Sultan Shāh. The latter succeeded in inflicting a crushing defeat on the rebels, who retreated into the Simla hills. The royalists occupied Rupar, where they were joined by Malik Khairuddīn who had been sent from Delhi to help quell the rebellion.⁷³ They combed the mountains but the Pretender succeeded in eluding them. Finding the task hopeless, the royal commanders returned to their respective fiefs. Khizr Khan had failed against the Pretender, but the latter soon fell a victim to the perfidy of Tughān Raīs who inveigled him into his power, not so much from any sense of loyalty to the Sultanate as for possessing the great wealth which the impostor had amassed, and later put him to death in February, 1420 (Muharram, 823 H).⁷⁴ Howsoever his fall was brought about, the death of the Pretender was Khizr Khan’s gain.