History of the Qaraunah Turks in India c14.s1.8

c14.s1.8

An oft-quoted later compilation is the *Khulāsat-ut-tawārīkh* of Sujan Rai Khatri of Batālā in the Punjab composed in 1695-96 A.D. There are several MS. copies of it in India, and it has been edited and published by Mr. Zafar Hasan of the Archæological Department. Sujan Rai gives a large bibliography, but it does not appear that he consulted all the works mentioned therein. Strangely enough none of the contemporary works dealing with the Tughluqs find a place in his list. He follows Nizām-al-Din and Firishta and gives no new information about anything except the origin of Ghiyās and the Punjab floods of the early times. Though a Hindu writer, he shows no partisan spirit. He is so saturated with the Persian histories that he forgets that he is a Hindu and writes as if he were a Muslim. Captain Lees describes (J.R.A.S. 1868, p. 423) the *Khulāsat* as ‘one of the most carefully compiled general histories of India’ and he was much impressed by the ‘ability and modesty of the real historian.’ Needless to say, this praise is not altogether deserved and Sujan Rai is nothing more than an ordinary compiler.