Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c10.s2: § 3. Lawless tribes of the Panjāb
Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c10.s2
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§ 3. Lawless tribes of the Panjāb
v1.c10.s2.1
The Panjāb had, generally speaking, enjoyed more internal peace than any other frontier province of India during the 17th century. The visits of the Emperors Jahāngir, Shāh Jahān, Aurangzib and Bahādur Shāh I to Lāhor, their marches through this province on expeditions and journeys beyond it, the movements of large armies across the land for the wars in Central Asia, Qandahār and the Khaibar Pass, had all tended to impress the local law-breakers with a wholesome fear of the Emperor's power and respect for the Emperor's peace. The Sikh risings under guru Govind Singh in the 17th century and under Banda in 1710 and 1713 disturbed and desolated some well-defined zones only.
v1.c10.s2.2
After Banda and his personal followers had been crushed in 1714, the Sikhs remained quiescent for over one generation and did not disturb the public peace. But there were other lawless classes in that province, predatory by instinct and tribal usage, who were ever on the look-out for an opportunity to plunder cities and caravans and seize the rents of villages. Such were the Ranghars and the Gujars, the brethren of the hereditary Jāt robbers living further east. In the Panjāb the Jāts supplied the main body of recruits to the Sikh fraternity, but their lawless activity as Sikhs revived only after 1750.
v1.c10.s2.3
The land of the five rivers has in our day become one vast granary with an assured if artificial water-supply, and the home of a prolific manly but peacefully prosperous population. But in Mughal Panjāb man had not yet harnessed Nature to his service, and an infinitely smaller population than to-day's could then find a subsistence on its soil. Vast forests overspread the doābs or tracts enclosed by two rivers, where we now see only smiling fields of wheat and cotton, millet and oil-seeds, stretching up to the horizon, broken by rapidly rising cities, the homes of industry and arts. And these jungles afforded safe homes and ready refuges to robber bands. One jungle covered the country from Karnāl (70 miles north of Delhi) to Ludhiāna near the Satlaj as late as 1803. The town of Sarhind was no doubt a centre of population and tillage, but beyond a narrow belt of clearance around it the forest reigned supreme. So, too, after crossing the Satlaj into the Jālandar doāb. Further south the state of things was still worse. A Panjābi Hindu, writing in 1695, thus describes the land: "The sarkār of Dipālpur (the modern Montgomery district) is the home of the Wattu, Dogar and Gujar tribes, who are notorious for their turbulent and rebellious character. Every year the floods overspread the land far and wide, and when the water subsides so many jungles spring up all over this country owing to the great moisture, that a pedestrian has great difficulty in travelling. How then can a rider? It is called the *Lakhi Jangal* (forest of a hundred thousand trees.) The wicked men of this plain, owing to the shelter afforded by the impassable jungle,—which stretches over leagues in length and breadth,—become ambuscaders, highwaymen and thieves. The hand of the imperial commanders cannot reach them for chastisement." (*Khulāsat-ut-tawārīkh* of Sujān Rāi.)
v1.c10.s2.4
A strong man was needed to keep such a province in order, and that strong man was found in the person of Abdus Samad Khān.