Promotion of Learning in India during Muhammadan Rule (by Muhammadans) c10.330

c10.330

We notice that all the colleges founded by Fīrūz Shāh had masjids attached to them, and were most probably of the type indicated by the Fīrūz-Shāhī-Madrasah; and religious training and pursuit of the Muslim faith were essentials of the academic life of the residents of those colleges. Consequently, the residence and education of a Hindu youth in these madrasahs were quite out of the question. However, we find that the Hindus were being appointed to important Government offices, as, for instance, the two singularly efficient Hindu administrators, Khān-i-Jahān, father and son, to whom Fīrūz Shāh virtually abandoned all authority; and the performance of the duties of those offices required a knowledge of the foreign languages such as Persian and Arabic. Similarly, we find the Muhammadans attaining proficiency in the Indian languages, as the following fact will show: the Rājā of Nagarkoṭ was conquered by Fīrūz Shāh in a battle, but was restored to his dominions. About this time, the people of the place told Fīrūz that the idol which the Hindus worshipped in the temple of Nagarkoṭ was the image of Nauṣhābāh [the wife of Alexander the Great?], and that the Greek conqueror had left the idol with them. The name by which the idol was known at the time of the contest was Jawālāmukhī. In the temple of this idol was a fine library of Hindu books consisting of 1300 volumes. Fīrūz ordered that some learned