Life and Conditions of the People of Hindustan (1200–1550 A.D.) c7.s5.1

c7.s5.1

We have now come to the close of our survey of social life in Hindustan, which has necessarily been brief and sketchy. Our estimate of the social developments in Hindustan on the eve of the reign of Akbar the Great would now be easier. We started by saying that the period under review is the formative period of Indian society as it shaped itself under the late Mughals and in some measure, even as it survives to-day. We have also noticed that the official record of the reign of Akbar, compiled by his brilliant and talented courtier and friend, Abu'l Fazl, is somewhat defective in so far as it neglects to do justice to the contribution of his predecessors. As the course of political developments unfolds itself, the fact becomes clearer that the maximum territorial expansion of the Sultanate synchronized with the high water-mark of social and cultural advancement. In this respect we might almost say that except for a few contributions which have been duly noted in their proper place, a very large measure of social progress had been achieved by the time of Sultan Firuz Shah Tughluq, when the dismemberment of the Sultanate commenced. The rulers and the upper classes of Indian society lived in an atmosphere of the greatest luxury and the highest refinement to which the culture of the age had advanced. Delhi represented the most advanced capital of Asia from every point of view. In view of this fact, Sultan ‘Ala-ud-din Khalji and his son and successor assumed the title of ‘the Caliph of Islam’. Muhammad Tughluq, who stooped to recognize a shadow caliph, was thoroughly conscious of his own unequalled greatness in the world of Islam.