History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c33.s7.10

v3.c33.s7.10

The successful raid of Nialtagin shows the weak state to which the kingdom of Kanauj, no longer an empire, had been reduced. Rajyapala was already dead and was succeeded by Trilochanapala who made a grant at Prayaga in 1026 as already stated. But Prayaga must have, like Benares, gone subsequently into the possession of Gangeya, who, as will be stated in the history of the Kalachuri kings, died at Prayaga. We do not know how long Trilochanapala ruled and who succeeded him. A king Yasahpala is mentioned in a broken inscription published by Colebrooke in his essays ( II. p. 278 ) wherein he is described as Maharajadhiraja, but not Paramesvara. He made a grant in the Kausambi Mandala south of the Jumna and south-west of Prayāga. Kanauj held undoubted sway in Oudh but the Turks of Ghazni emboldened by the raid of Nialtagin made further raids into Oudh. The improbable story of Salar Masa'ud, Mahmud's sister's son, may at least suggest the certainty of many raids by the Turks especially in Oudh where the scene of Salar's story is laid. It is believed that Salar Masa'ud, had his head-quarters at Saraikh in the present Bara-Banki District of Oudh and from there made raids in several directions. Many districts in Oudh contain sacred places supposed to belong to that saint. These raids took place probably from 1038 to 1050. The story of Sālār is not wholly a fiction, as we find from a Rathod inscription found at Badaun (Ep. Ind. II pp. 64) that one of the kings Madanapāla made the raids of any Amir impossible. We will comment upon this inscription at great length elsewhere in another connection. The date of this inscription is not given and that of Madanapāla cannot, therefore, be fixed but we think this is a reference to the raids of Nialtagin or Sālār Masa'ud, who must have passed into Oudh via Badaun. The Hindu Rajput kings of India resented these raids on their sacred places particularly and, as we shall show later on, Bhoja of Malwa (1040 A. D.), Karṇa Kalachūri of Tripur and lastly Chandra Gāhadavāla drove out these Turks and others mentioned before from Upper India and "freed the country of its oppressors". The last king took Kanauj and established a powerful Hindu kingdom there, the effete Pratihāra line thus ending about 1080 A. D. These later Pratihāra kings, as shown already, were tributaries of Ghazni and levied an impost named Turushkadanda on the villages in their kingdom which under the Gāhadavālas continued to be realised though not paid to the Turks.