History of the Qaraunah Turks in India c6.209

c6.209

This passage shows that Ibn Batūṭah's informant Shaikh Rukn-al-Din knew about the affair and at the time suspected that some foul play was going to be practised, otherwise why should he suggest to the party to walk out? Why he did not inform the Sultan whose favour he enjoyed that something untoward was going to happen is a mystery. Perhaps the expectation of seeing better days under the new regime prevented him from expressing his sense of danger in a more articulate fashion. Ibn Batūṭah tells us that the Shaikh was called away by Muhammad who asked him to say the evening prayers. It was at this time that elephants were brought and the building crumbled down. If we read together the passages in Ibn Batūṭah and the *Gulzār-i-abrār* we come to the conclusion that Shaikh Rukn-al-Din Multani knew how the Sultan's death had been caused, and the information he supplied to Ibn Batūṭah was correct. Ibn Batūṭah is impartial, for in his distant home where he dictated these observations he had nothing to hope for or fear from the Sultan. There are other circumstances which support Ibn Batūṭah. Ahmad Ayāz’s rapid elevation from the supervisor of state buildings to the position of the chief minister of the realm and the principal adviser of Muhammad strengthens the suspicion against him. If the building fell by accident, why was not Ahmad Ayāz punished afterwards, for the structure had been erected under his personal supervision in the capacity of the chief architect of the realm? Why should a building designed by the royal engineer for the reception of the Sultan himself fall down so quickly? The condonation of this criminal neglect of duty points to the Prince’s complicity in the parricidal plot. There are other things to be taken into account. The hasty and somewhat superfluous construction of the pavilion, the sudden exit of the officials and the Crown Prince after the dinner, the Prince’s suggestion to bring the elephants at that particular moment, and Barani’s hesitation to state the truth in a straight-forward manner together with the popular explanation of the emperor’s death, which the Moorish traveller found current in India on his arrival and the liberal grant of twelve parganas for the upkeep of the Shaikh’s monastery in addition to the allowance given to his followers after his death⁹⁶ lend support to the theory that the Sultan’s death was the result of pre-meditation and conspiracy and not of accident.