Life and Conditions of the People of Hindustan (1200–1550 A.D.) c5.s2.t1.20

c5.s2.t1.20

The life of a Sultan inside the *haram* is so much a matter for the personal concern of a monarch, that the chroniclers reveal to us little, if anything, about this aspect of his life. We can infer from the fact of Sultan Iltutmish suggesting Raziyya as his successor to the throne, that the monarch must have loved her tenderly, and looked after her education and training with great care and interest. The historians make a slight suggestion that Sultan ‘Ala-ud-din Khalji was not very happy with his wife which, according to them, accounts for his first raid into the distant Deccan, undertaken as a relief from his domestic miseries. Haji Dabir, however, narrates an amusing incident to prove that this inference was true.² Prince Khizr Khan, the son of ‘Ala-ud-din Khalji was extremely happy in the love of his second wife, Dewalrani. An autographed memoir of the Prince himself, giving the whole story of their romance and marriage, so Amir Khusrau tells us, is the basis of his famous poem *Dewalrani Khizr Khan*, which was published after the murder of the Prince and immortalises the love and tragic sufferings of the devoted couple. We get very little information on the subject until we come to the period of the Mughuls. Here we get a closer view of life inside the royal *haram*. The memoirs of Babur and Gulbadan, as others of later days, disclose to us a picture of happy domestic life with a strong tradition of affection and love which led many credulous travellers to believe in curious tales and scandals.¹