History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v2.c28.s1.38

v2.c28.s1.38

But the greatest mistake which Dr. D. R. Bhandarkar has committed in this connection is that of placing the town of Ahichchhatra and the country Sapādalaksha in the Siwalik hilly region of the Himalayas. He has in fact in doing so distorted the natural course of Indian history and represented Brahmins and Kshatriyas, as moving south from this place. But how can we believe that Rajputs spread from the Siwalik hilly regions into India even if they were Gujars? If Gujars were foreigners who had come along with the Huns as conquerors, they would settle in the inviting plains of the Panjab and not go to the difficult Himalayas to settle. As a matter of fact history and tradition tell us that Brāhmins and Rajputs went into these sub-montane inhospitable regions in historical times from the Panjab, in consequence of the inroads of foreign invaders down to the Turks, in the same way as many took shelter in the sands and hills of Rajastan. It is, therefore, absurd to point to the Siwalik hills as the original *habitat* of either the Rajputs or the Gujars. The identification of Sapādalaksha with Siwalik hilly region is absurd and we need not go to Babar for an explanation of that word. Babar gives perhaps the current explanation when the original and correct explanation was forgotten. We give in a note an extract from the Skanda Purāṇa giving the list of countries in India about the 9th century A. D. and the traditional number of villages assigned to each. Sapādalaksha is a name which is given in this list to four or five countries and the first of them is Śākambhara or the land of the Chauhāns. It is also given to Karnātaka and to Mewad and also to Varendu which is not identifiable, but which probably means the Delhi region*. When the coins noticed by Dr. D. R. Bhandarkar mention Takkān, Zabulistān and Sapadalakshān they probably mean the Panjab with Ghazni on the west and the Delhi province in the south-east which three probably comprised the territory ruled by Vāsudev Vahman, a Sassanian king. In any case Sapādalaksha does not indicate 1¼ lakhs of hills but 1¼ lakhs of villages and this number is traditionally assigned to Sākambhara, Mewad, Delhi and Karnātaka as the evidence of the Skanda Purāna conclusively proves.