The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India c11.s5.6

c11.s5.6

Add to this the Other Backward Classes and they all count to more than fifty percent. This staggeringly high figure has been reached because of historical forces operating in the medieval times primarily. Muslim rule spread all over the country. Resistance to it too remained widespread. Jungles abounded through out the vast land from Gujarat to Bengal and Kashmir to Kanyakumari, and flight into them was the safest safeguard for the weak and vulnerable. That is how SC / ST people are found in every state in large numbers. During the medieval period, in the years and centuries of oppression, they lived almost like wild beasts in improvised huts in forest villages, segregated and isolated, suffering and struggling. But by settling in forest villages, they were enabled to preserve their freedom, their religion and their culture. Their martial arts, preserved in their *Akharas*, are even now practised in different forms in many states. Such a phenomenon was not witnessed in West Asian countries. There, in the vast open deserts, the people could not save themselves from forced conversions against advancing Muslim armies. There were no forests into which they could flee, hide themselves and organize resistance. Hence they all became Muslim.