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History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c36.s1: His Conflict with Prithvīrāj.

History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c36.s1

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English

His Conflict with Prithvīrāj.

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The important kingdom in his immediate neighbourhood was the kingdom of Ajmer and Delhi ruled by Prithvīrāj and the two emperors were equally matched in their personal capacities and the extent of their resources. The history of this conflict is differently told in the Rāsā of Chand and the Taj-ul-Ma'sir of Nizamuddin followed by the Tabakat-i-Nasiri. Both sides exaggerate the merits of their heroes; but historically considered, the account of the Taj and the Tabakat, written about 20 and 50 years respectively after the event, is more reliable than the almost fabulous account given in the Rāsā amplified to its present form nearly 300 years after Prithvīrāja. We will, therefore, mainly follow the account of these Mahomedan writers and try to test it historically; though it may be regretted that the Taj is not more detailed and less poetical, in fact is not to be compared with the well-known chronicle of Mahmud by Utbi.

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We may first notice the extract from the Tabakat given by Elliot II (p. 295). The first attack was made by Muhammad Ghori who invaded Hindu territory and seized the fort of Sirhind and placed it under a Mahomedan governor. "Rai Pithaura came up against the fort and the Sultan faced him at Narain. All the Rais of Hindustan were with the Rai Kola (a term of abuse)." Probably Prithvīrāja for this conflict, in order to nip in the bud this aggression by Mahomedans against Hindus, collected a confederate Hindu army and then advanced against the Sultan. But there is no corroborating evidence from epigraphic records to prove this confederacy. "In the fight, the Sultan seizing a lance attacked Govindrai of Delhi who was riding an elephant, the Sultan being on horseback. The Sultan drove his lance into the mouth of Govindrai and knocked down two of his teeth. The Rai, however, by his blow wounded severely one arm of his adversary. The Sultan reined back his horse and turned aside. As the Sultan began to totter on his horse, an intrepid young Afghan sprang upon the Sultan's horse and supported him and took the horse safely away. But the army thinking the Sultan killed, gave way and fled; and thus was inflicted a severe defeat upon the Mahomedans."

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Whether this account is true and whether the defeat was not, in the usual fashion, due to superior numbers or superior tactics or superior heroism, we need not discuss. One thing may be said, however, that the Mahomedans, even according to their account, like the Hindus, fled unbeaten because of the report of the death of their king. This is not strange. Eastern armies fight not for nations but for kings. The Mahomedans were no more fired by a national sentiment than the Hindus; and the substitute of a religious for a national sentiment was equal on both the sides. Certain it is that in this battle, Shihabuddin Ghori was signally defeated (1191 A. D.).

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The tradition among the Hindus is, as recorded in the Rāsā, that the Sultan was captured. The story of Dhira Pundira given in the Rāsā is clearly fictitious; but it is possible that when Govindrai (who is not mentioned in the Rāsā at all and who is represented as killed in the next conflict with Prithvirāj) inflicted a severe wound on the Sultan and he began to totter on his horse, he may have been seized by Pundir and finally captured. The Sultan was allowed to return by Prithvirāj after a ransom of 30 elephants and five hundred horses was taken from him. This much may be historically true. The Taj does not mention this defeat at all but discreetly begins with the Sultan's next advance against Prithvirāja. It is, of course, entirely unbelievable as alleged by the Rāsā that the Sultan was many times captured in battle and at each time released and sent back by Prithvirāja. This is the usual reduplication of events noticeable from the story of Krishna in the Purānas down to the story of Munja by the chroniclers who is supposed to have six times defeated and captured Taila Chālukya of Kalyan (see Vol. II p. 120). But an exaggeration like this generally has some truth behind it and we may believe that Shihabuddin was captured in this battle and released on ransom just as Jaipal was released by Mahmud after his first defeat on a similar ransom.*

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Whatever be the reality of this incident, the fact that the Sultan was defeated in this battle is accepted on both sides. The place of this battle is given as Narain which, in the original, must be Tarain. The scene is said to be on the Sarsuti but Cunningham thinks that the exact site was on the banks of the Raukshi river, four miles south of Tirauri and ten miles to the north of Karnal. "Tirauri is also called Azimābād" (note Elliot II p. 295). The Karnāl Gazetteer (1918) gives the latest information and states (p. 10) that the battle was fought at Nardina a village in the Nai Wafi in the Nardak, 12 miles south of Thanesar and 3 miles from Taraori.

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The Tabakat proceeds to relate that when the Sultan retired, Prithvīrāja invested the fort of Sirhind for 13 months. If this is true it can not be believed that the Sultan was captured in battle and released. For one condition of such release would naturally have been the surrender of the fort which had been wrongly seized by the Sultan; and probably the fight would not have been continued or even renewed so soon. The Sultan according to the Tabakat made fresh preparations and returned to the fight with an overwhelming force.

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The Taj-ul-Ma'sir suppresses all this and begins with the statement that the Sultan sent a venerable reliable man to Ajmer calling upon Prithvīrāja to accept Islam and subordination to the Sultan; thus giving the affair a wholly religious aspect. It does not seem to us that Muhammad Ghori's war upon India was from religious motives as that of Mahmud was, though Mahommedan writers naturally give it this form. The war was waged solely for aggression and extension of dominion as the more truly historical Tabakat describes.

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The Taj gives no details about this final conflict but merely says that the army of Islam was victorious and a hundred thousand Hindus swiftly "departed to the fire of hell." The more truly historical Tabakat gives interesting details. Quoting an eye-witness who was in the army, it states that the army of Islam numbered a hundred and twenty thousand horsemen clad in armour. The numbers on the Hindu side are not given. "Before the Sultan arrived, the fort had capitulated and the Hindu army was encamped in the vicinity of Narain." It thus appears that the site of the second battle was nearly the same as before. The tactics adopted at this battle are described by the Tabakat as follows:—

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∗ Rēzā mentions guns and even canon in this battle which plainly indicates that the Rēzā account was written after Babar who first used guns in India in the 16th century.

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"The Sultan drew up his battle array, leaving his main body in the rear with the banners, canopies and elephants. The light-armoured horsemen were made into four divisions of 10,000 each and were directed to advance and to harass the enemy, on the right, on the left, in the front and in the rear. When the enemy collected his forces to attack, they were to support each other and to charge at full speed. By these tactics the enemy was worsted, the Almighty gave us the victory over them and they fled". (p. 297).

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The manner of fighting adopted by the Mahomedans at this momentous battle as described above appears similar to that adopted by Mahmud in his battles with Jaipal and Ānandapāla; frequent attacks by bodies of cavalry and a final attack by a reserve force, a measure also adopted by Ahmed Shah Abdali. How the Hindus fought cannot be stated as the descriptions in the Rāsā are imaginary and as the author copies the Mahābhārata in describing Vyūhas in the form of birds or animals, and the description is not from an eye-witness but from a poet who wrote centuries afterwards. But that the fighting was tough and the battle was severely contested appears clear from the single sentence of the Tabakat. "The Almighty gave us the victory". There being no superiority of arms as at Assaye or at Plassey, and there being no lack of heroism on the side of the Hindus, we may take it that the battle was not a walk over, as may perhaps be thought. It cannot be gainsaid that Prithvīrāja fought most bravely in this final fight and that fate was against him at this time. The story of the Rāsā that Prithvīrāja after his marriage with Sanyogitā gave himself up solely to pleasure and neglected the army is probably fictitious. And this is doubly true when we remember that Prithvīrāja was not in Delhi as the Rāsā represents but in Ajmer. The importance of Delhi commences from Kutub-uddin. Those who wrote in later centuries, as even Firishta, could not resist the idea of bringing in Delhi, much less could the amplifier of the Rāsā and the whole story of the Rāsā including the names of the fighters on both sides, notably of Samarasinha of Chitod has to be given up as unhistorical.

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But the story of the Rāsā as to how Prithvirāj ended his life is the climax of its unhistorical nature. It is the usual story of vengeance, a story invented after the true account of the death of Muhammad Ghori at the hands of Gakkhar assassins on the south bank of the Indus had been forgotten. The real manner of Prithvirāja’s death, however, still remains a mystery like that of Bhaosaheb or Jankoji Scindia at Panipat The two accounts of the Taj and Tabakat differ. The latter merely records that “Pithaura alighted from his elephant, mounted a horse and galloped off but he was captured near Sarsuti and sent to hell”. The Taj, however, records (p. 215) that the Rai of Ajmer was taken prisoner and his life was spared. At Ajmer where he was taken, he was detected in an intrigue (*which is only obscurely hinted*) and orders were, therefore, given for his being beheaded and a sword accordingly severed the head of that accursed wretch from his body”. In this state of the evidence, it is difficult to decide how Prithvirāj met his death; but we prefer to believe that Prithvirāja was captured on the Sarsuti and immediately put to death as the Tabakat relates.

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NOTE:-1 MUHAMMAD GHORI AND PRITHVIRAJ.

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The translation of the Tabakat by Raverty gives a somewhat different wording from Elliot and states "When the ranks were duly martialled, the Sultan seized a lance and attacked the elephant on which Govindrai of Delhi was mounted and on which elephant he moved about in front of the battle. The Sultan struck Govindrai on the mouth and he launched a javelin at the Sultan and inflicted a very severe wound. The Sultan turned his charger's head round and receded and from the agony of the wound he was unable to continue on horseback any longer. Defeat befell the army of Islam and it was irretrievably routed. The Sultan was very nearly falling from his horse, seeing which a Khilji stripling recognised the Sultan and sprang up behind and supporting him in his arms urged the horse with his voice and brought him out of the field of battle. On the Muhamadan forces not seeing the Sultan, lamentations broke from them and they reached a place where the defeated army was safe from pursuit. Suddenly the Sultan arrived. (p. 431 ).

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Raverty in his note gives here the different account given by later authors and the account of Firishta as also of modern English historians based on the last. Firishta gives the army of Pithora as amounting to two lakhs of men and 3,000 elephants. He also states that the right and left wings had already been defeated and had turned their faces; and that the Sultan in the centre not heeding this led a furious assault. One account lastly states that the Sultan fell from his horse and was not known till night when slaves came searching for him among the slain on the battlefield. All this gives plausibility to the Rāsā account that the Sultan was captured. From the Tabakat even, it is clear that the Sultan was far from his men when wounded and turning back went on somehow for some time. It is likely that Dhira Pundīra, a young Rajput from the Hindu side, seeing his condition rushed on and seized him. That he was set free and asked to fight again is not inconsistent with the chivalrous character of Prithvirāj who perhaps imitated the tradition of Munja releasing his enemy Talla six times. It may further be added that Mahmud had released Jaipāl on ransom though he knew he would have to fight with him again.

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