History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c84.s6: Gujrat
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c84.s6
- Language
- English
Contents
Gujrat
§ 33. Gujrat, its advantageous position.
v5.c84.s6.t1.1
Of all the provinces of India, Gujrat possesses the most complete and copious authentic records from ancient times down to the British period. A band of scholars have made much of this material available in English. Two of the longer Persian histories of the province have been translated down to the end of the 16th century by E. C. Bayley and J. Bird. As for the 17th century, we have a summary narrative of the chief events compiled by Col. Watson from the *Mirat-i-Ahmadi*, in the Bombay Gazetteer, Vol. I, part 1, pages 273-282,* while the mediæval history of the adjoining peninsula of Kathiawad is given in Forbes's *Ras-Mala* from purely Hindu sources. I, therefore, propose to deal here with only the broad features of this province's history during Aurangzib's reign, without going into details.
v5.c84.s6.t1.2
The economic and social condition of Gujrat, its poor soil, its liability to disturbances, have been described in Vol. I. Ch. 4 of this work. Its wealth was mainly due to its handicrafts and commerce. The former could flourish only in walled cities and in the villages nestling in their shelter. In commerce not only did its people, both Hindus and Muham-madans, possess a natural capacity surpassing that of other natives of India, but Gujrat enjoyed a position of exceptional advantage. All the merchandise of the rich inland districts of Khandesh, Berar, Malwa and even Upper India had to cross Gujrat for shipment abroad. On the coast of this province stand the greatest ports of India,—Broach in Hindu times and Surat in Muslim, while the ports of Konkan, further south afforded an outlet for the produce of the Deccan plateau.
v5.c84.s6.t1.3
Gujrat was, therefore, pre-eminently the gate of India in Mughal times, in respect of the outer Muslim world. Though a small stream of immigrants and traders filtered in through the Afghan passes, yet Surat and Broach were the most convenient and most frequented entrances to India for Southern Asia and Eastern Africa. Through Surat passed the enormous volume of Muslim pilgrims to the holy cities of Arabia and of Shia votaries to the shrines of Najaf and Karbala. Travellers, merchants, scholars, fortune-hunters, and political refugees from Persia, Arabia, Turkey, Egypt, Zanzibar and even Khurasan and Barbary used to enter India through the Gujrat ports by the short comfortable cheap and usually safe ocean highway, while the land route across the Sulaiman and Hindu Kush ranges fell into growing neglect from the early 16th century onwards.
v5.c84.s6.t1.4
∗ With gross mistakes of dates and wrong translation in places.
v5.c84.s6.t1.5
§ 34. Diversified population; Lawless tribes.
v5.c84.s6.t1.6
This geographical advantage had given Gujrat a very composite population and a large foreign strain from very early times. In this province the fire-worshipping Persians fleeing before the Muslim advance into Iran had found a new home, and today with all their contact with Europe Gujrati has not ceased to be the language of their homes. Here was the chief seat of that branch of the Ismailia heretics of Islam who are popularly known as Bohras. Another unorthodox Muslim sect, the Mahdavis, muster strong in certain of its localities, such as Palanpur. Isolated Arab, Turkish Persian and Afghan families and even sections of clans have settled here, and these, along with the remnants of the Muslim tribes that had held sway over the land before the coming of the Mughals, have given an unparallelled diversity to the racial complexion of the province. On the Hindu side the population is even less homogeneous. Leaving aside the foreign immigrants of forgotten antiquity who have been completely absorbed into Hindu society,—like the Nagar Brahmans, the Guhilots, the Hunas and Indo-Scythians,—there were in the fringe areas of Gujrat in the 17th century many primitive races not yet broken to civilization and orderly political life. Such were the Kolis in the broken jungly country of Dang (in the south), the Bhils in Baglana (south-east), the wild Rajputs and pseudo-Rajputs in the eastern frontier and the predatory Grasias scattered throughout the province, besides the Kathis of the west.
v5.c84.s6.t1.7
These were an ever-present menace to the peace of the country. To them were added in Aurangzib's reign another race of disturbers who soon surpassed the others in the range and vigour of their power, the superiority of their organisation and persistence, and the frequency and success of their raids, till at last they swept Mughal rule out of the province under Aurangzib's unworthy descendants.
v5.c84.s6.t1.8
Surat was thoroughly sacked by Shivaji in 1664, and again in 1670; and the country of Kolvan, to within 60 miles of this city, was brought under Maratha sway in 1672 by their annexation of the Jawhar and Ramnagar (modern Dharampur) States. Thus a thorn was permanently planted in the side of the Mughal Government of Surat. Thereafter, from this safe and convenient base, Maratha bands used to harry or menace some part of Gujrat almost every year. These raids and alarms of raids, even when the latter were false, most effectually ruined the economic life of the province. The trade of Surat, the richest port of India, was practically destroyed by them, as has been shown in Ch. 43 § 5.
v5.c84.s6.t1.9
§ 35. Governors of Gujrat under Aurangzib.
v5.c84.s6.t1.10
During Aurangzib's reign of 50 years Gujrat was governed for him by twelve viceroys, of whom Mahabat Khan (6 years, 1662—1668), Md. Amin Khan (10 years, 1672—1682), Shujaet Khan (17 years, 1684—1701), and Prince Md. Azam (4 years, 1701—1705) ruled the province longest. In the remaining 13 years there were as many as eight subahdars. Md. Amin Khan's love of ease and aristocratic temperament made his tenure a period of peace, if also of supineness. The strenuous rule of Shujaet Khan and his tact and enterprising spirit have been already noticed in connection with his administration of Marwar in addition to that of Gujrat (Ch. 58). This exceptionally able officer kept the Marathas out of Gujrat and at the same time enforced peace in Marwar for many years.
v5.c84.s6.t1.11
Of Prince Md. Azam's viceroyalty we possess copiously detailed accounts in the daily news-letters of his Court of which two volumes are extant in the library of the Royal Asiatic Society of London (Tod MS.), and also in the mass of Aurangzib's letters to him included in Inayetullah's *Ahkam* and *Kalimat-i-Tayyibat*. On the whole he succeeded in keeping order in his charge, though his difficulties were aggravated by a fresh rupture with Durgadas due to imperial orders, as we have seen in Ch. 58, §§ 8 and 9.
v5.c84.s6.t1.12
Gujrat had an evil reputation for famines in the middle ages, and the reign of Aurangzib was no happier in this respect. We read of famines in 1681, 1684, 1690-91, 1695-96 and 1698. In 1681 there were bread-riots in the capital. The drought of 1696 was so terrible that "from Patan to Jodhpur no water nor blade of grass could be seen." [Mirat, 317, 354.] In addition to these natural calamities, pestilence desolated many of the cities, lingering for years together in them. [Mirat 342, Eng. F. R.]
v5.c84.s6.t1.13
Among the noteworthy public disturbances were the overflow of the Rajput war across the north-eastern frontier of Gujrat (1680) when Bhim Singh the son of Maharana Raj Singh raided Vadnagar, Vishalnagar and some other rich cities of Gujrat and returned with much booty, and the recovery of Idar by its Rathor chief, who was subsequently defeated and slain by the Mughals. [Ch. 26 § 7. Mirat 311.] A Beluch adventurer falsely personated Dara Shukoh, and assembling a band of desperadoes in the Viramgaon subdivision (1663) and rousing the Kolis, who were ever ready for mischief, plundered the country for some time, until he was put down by the viceroy Mahabat Khan [Mirat 269.] Highway robberies by the predatory tribe of Grasias are often mentioned. [Mirat, 321 ; Akh.]
v5.c84.s6.t1.14
§ 36. Maratha invasion of 1706.
v5.c84.s6.t1.15
The earlier Maratha disturbances in the province have been noticed in Ch. 43. The greatest disaster that they inflicted on the Emperor's troops occurred early in 1706, during the interval between the departure of Prince Azam from Ahmadabad (25 Nov. 1705) and the arrival of Bidar Bakht there (30 July 1706). The Marathas under Dhana Jadav took prompt advantage of this defenceless condition of the province for the time being. They had been hovering on the southern frontier of Gujrat and now entered it in a vast body which rumour increased to nearly 80,000 men. The deputy governor of the province detached a force against the raiders, but the Mughal commanders quarrelled with one another, and lay inactive on the bank of the Narmada near the Baba Piara ford for a month and a half. Then, under sharp orders from head-quarters, they advanced to Ratanpur (in Rajpipla), and halted there in two widely separated bodies, which were signally defeated one after the other by Dhana. Two of their chiefs, Safdar Khan Babi and Nazar Ali Khan, were captured and held to ransom; their camps were looted, and large numbers of Musalmans fell in the field, perished in the Narmada, or were taken captive, (15 March, 1706).
v5.c84.s6.t1.16
When Abdul Hamid Khan (the deputy governor) himself arrived with another army, his small force was surrounded by the exultant victors near the Baba Piara ford, all the chiefs including the deputy governor himself were taken prisoner, and their entire camp and baggage plundered. Then the Marathas levied *chauth* on the surrounding country and retired after plundering the towns and villages that failed to pay it. The Kolis had taken advantage of these disorders to rise and sack the rich trading centre of Baroda for two days. [*Mirat*, 378-388, *Dil.* ii. 156a, *Storia* iv. 246; see Ch. 57 § 11.]
v5.c84.s6.t1.17
§ 37. Religious persecution of the Bohra sect.
v5.c84.s6.t1.18
Aurangzib's policy of religious persecution had full play in Gujrat too, with its usual baneful consequences. We have seen how in the reign of his father he had as *subahdar* of Gujrat destroyed the Chintaman temple in Ahmadabad and several other Hindu shrines elsewhere [Ch. 34 § 9 and App. 5.] Throughout his reign, and more especially after 1669, when his iconoclastic zeal bubbled forth anew, he frequently sent out orders to the local officers of Gujrat to demolish particular temples, the most notable of them being the Somnath on the sea-coast and the Hateshwar Mahadev of Vadnagar. [*Mirat*, 273, 372, 346; *Inayet* 10a.]
v5.c84.s6.t1.19
It will be enough if we briefly refer here to his treatment of the Ismailia sect,* the Bohra branch of which supplied the best oversea traders and retail dealers in his western realm. Their spiritual guide Qutb had been put to death by order of Aurangzib early in his reign, and the sect was driven into secret ways in practising its faith. Later, many of their leading men were arrested and kept in prison on a charge of teaching heresy. In 1705 Isa and Taj, two silk-vendors of the Sulaimani branch of the Bohras, were bound down in security not to collect money from the people by threat and accusation nor to teach heretical opinions. A little later they were sent to Court in chains. In the same year, the Emperor learnt that Khanji, the head of the Ismailia sect and successor to Qutb, had sent twelve emissaries (*dais*) who were secretly perverting Muslims to this heresy and had collected Rs. 1,14,000 from the members of this creed in Ahmadabad for procuring the release of their brethren then confined by Aurangzib. The Emperor on hearing of it ordered the twelve men and certain other members of this community to be arrested quietly without the knowledge of the rest of the sect, and sent to him under careful guard, with the money collected and the sixty and odd holy books of their faith. This was done. At the same time orthodox teachers were appointed by the State to educate the children and illiterate people of the Bohras in every village and city in Sunni doctrines and practices. [*Mirat* 376—378; Inayet's *Ahkam* 271 *b*.] Their mosques had been converted to Sunni usage earlier in the reign [*Mirat*, 277.]
v5.c84.s6.t1.20
∗ Bombay Gaz. vol. ix. pt. 2, pp. 24-57. But *Dabistan* 227-238 and *Encyclo. Islam* ii. 549 refer to the sect outside India.
v5.c84.s6.t1.21
§ 38. Rising of the Khoja sect in Broach, 1685.
v5.c84.s6.t1.22
Another branch of these sectaries, called Khojas in Kathiawad and Mumins (or Matias) in Gujrat, consisted mostly of Hindus converted to Islam by a saint named Sayyid Imam-ud-din, whose tomb at Karmatah (9 miles outside Ahmadabad) was their chief shrine. They paid idolatrous adoration to their spiritual guide, kissing his toes and heaping up gold and silver on his feet, while he sat in royal splendour behind a screen. They supported their spiritual guide by a regular voluntary tax of one-tenth of their annual income, (including the market-price of one of their children when they had ten!)
v5.c84.s6.t1.23
In the general persecution of heretics, some Khojas had been arrested and imprisoned in Gujrat, and one of them revealed the secret practices of the sect. Aurangzib at once ordered the Sadr and Qazi of the province to arrest their spiritual head, Sayyid Shahji by name, and send him to Court. The man killed himself by poison on the way, but his son, a boy of twelve, was sent to Aurangzib. At this all his followers in Gujrat, old and young, set out for Ahmadabad, saying that the subahdar had killed their guide and they must secure the punishment of the murderer. Near Broach, as they were crossing the Narmada, the local faujdar opposed them; a battle was fought; they killed him and captured the walled city of Broach. They held it in a body 4,000 strong and set to improving its fortifications, without molesting the citizens in any way, (Oct. 1685.) At the news of their success, others came to join them. The imperial faujdar of Baroda arrived there for expelling them, but soon retired in fear of their superior strength.
v5.c84.s6.t1.24
Then an army sent by Shujaet Khan, the subahdar, opened regular siege operations against Broach. The garrison fought long and well, making frequent sorties. At last one day, at broad noon, when the defenders overconfident of the strength of the walls used mostly to vacate the ramparts, and even the few sentinels had retired to the shade, the Mughals suddenly scaled the walls by means of ladders, slew the sleeping guards and opened the gate to their comrades. The rest was mere butchery. The fanatics fought desperately, openly courting death as martyrdom. Even the captives begged their conquerors to slay them quickly that they might join their brethren in Paradise. Many of their men and women wilfully drowned themselves in the river. Thus a bloody stop was put to the movement. [Mirat 337—339; F. R. Surat 92, Surat to J. King, 30 Oct. 1685.]