Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c23.8

c23.8

Al-Bīrūnī, who was a contemporary of Yādavaprakāśa and wrote his celebrated work on India about 1030 A.D., refers to the ‘capital of Al-Kandahār (Gandhāra), *i.e.* Vaihand’.² Elsewhere he speaks of ‘Waihind, the capital of Kandhāra (Gandhāra), west of the river Sindh’,³ which is said to have been situated 14 *farsakh* (about 52 miles) to the south-east of Purshāwar (Peshawar). Both here and in another context,⁴ Al-Bīrūnī locates Vaihand (Waihind) between Peshawar and the river Jhelam. There is no doubt that Vaihand has to be identified with modern Und near Attock on the Indus. As Raychaudhuri points out,⁵ an Arabic work called *Hudud-ul ’Alam* (982-83 A.D.) speaks of Waihind as a big city, with some Muslim population, under king Jayapāla who was a feudatory of the Rāya of Kanauj, probably Pratihāra Vijayapāla. The Sanskrit form of the name is Udabhāṇḍapura (or Udakabhāṇḍapura) which was the capital of the great Śāhi king Lalliya (*c.* 875-90 A.D.) and his successors according to the *Rājatarangiṇī* of Kalhaṇa. According to Firishta, the dominions of the Śāhi king Jayapāla (*c.* 965-1001 A.D.), son of Ishtpāl (probably the same as Aṣaṭapāladeva known from his coins), extended in length from Sirhind to Lamghan and in breadth from the kingdom of Kashmir to Mūltān. This ruler is further said to have resided in a fort, the correct reading of whose name is apparently Vaihand, although some writers wrongly take it to be Bhatinda in the Patiala State. Firishta frequently refers to Jayapāla as the Rājā of Lahore and, as the king resided in the Vaihand fort ‘for the convenience of taking steps for opposing the Muhammadans’, it is hardly possible that the historian could have referred to a locality in the Eastern Punjab. It seems that, when the Śāhi possessions lying West of the Indus were threatened by the Turkish Musalmans of Ghaznī, Jayapāla transferred his capital from ancient Udabhāṇḍapura to Lahore. But even then he himself resided at the old capital which now became the advance base of his operations against the Muhamadans. It is thus possible that the passage *Gandhārās=tu Dihāṇḍās=syuḥ* is actually a mistake for *Gandhārās=tu Udabhāṇḍās=syuḥ*, ‘the Gandhāras are also known as the Udabhāṇḍas’. But Udahāṇḍa was probably another form of the name.