The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India c8.s1.13

c8.s1.13

The *Shariat* law was so brazenly prejudicial to the interests of the vast majority of the non-Muslims (and hence the wishful thinking that it did not prevail and that the medieval state was secular), that even the medieval thinkers and rulers found it impracticable to enforce it in full. When the nobles and Ulama of the Sultanate pressed Shamsuddin Iltutmish to enforce the *Shara*, and give the Hindus a choice between Islam and death, the latter asked for time.³⁶ Equally helpless (or shrewd) were Balban and Jalaluddin Khalji.³⁷ It was probably the experience of such rulers that prompted Ziyauddin Barani to advocate that if the enforcement of the *Shariat* was impossible or impracticable, new laws should be enacted by rulers. It is the duty of a king, says he, to enforce, if he can, those royal laws which have become proverbial owing to their principles of justice and mercy. But if owing to change of time and circumstances he is unable to enforce the laws of the ancients (i.e. ancient Muslim rulers), he should, with the counsel of wise men frame laws suited to his time and circumstances and proceed to enforce them. Much reflection is necessary in order that laws, suited to his reign, are properly framed.³⁸ So that they in no way contravene the tenets of Islam. These laws Barani calls *Zawabits*.