The Sultanate of Delhi, 711–1526 A.D. c4.3

c4.3

Since the publication of the first edition of this book which for the first time laid down in unambiguous words that the rulers of the Sultanate period were foreigners, one or two scholars have tried to show that that was not so. In the introduction to the second edition of the second volume of Elliot and Dowson’s *History of India as told by its own Historians*, Professor Muhammad Habib has asserted that the Muslim rule was not foreign rule and the only argument advanced by him in support of his view is that the Muslim rulers of the period had no ‘home government’ outside India. He forgets that nearly all the rulers of the period recognised at least in theory the foreign *Khalifa* to be their sovereign, and the Sultanate as a mere dependency of the Caliphate. They sent cash and presents of enormous value to the Khalifa and large sums of money to be spent in Mecca, Medina and other places sacred to Islam. True, they had made India their home, but their aim was to convert it into an Islamic country. The personnel of their government was foreign; the religion and culture which they wanted to impose on India was foreign; their system of government and their way of life were foreign. They looked to Arabia and Central Asia for inspiration. They had little sympathy with the religion, culture, tradition and way of life of the people of this country which they held in military occupation. They were unwilling to become Indians and generations’ sojourn in this country failed to Indianise them completely. Professor P. Hardy is of opinion that the government of the Sultans discharged socialistic functions because it interfered with the religion of the Hindus. This interference might have amounted to socialistic work in the eyes of Muslims, but to the Hindus who formed a vast majority of the population, it was nothing less than cultural and national destruction. The author regrets his inability to accept the views of the above scholars.