UPSC History Delhi Sultnat (Gulam, Khilji, Tughlak, Sayyed, Lodhi) NCERT Extracts - The Delhi Sultanat (Circa 1200-1400)

• Muizzuddin (Muhammad Ghori) was succeeded (1206) by Qutbuddin Aibak, a Turkish slave who had played an important part in the expansion of the Turkish Sultanat in India after the battle of Tarain. Another slave of Muizzuddin, Yalduz, succeeded at Ghazni.

 Iltutmish (1210-36)

• In 1210, Aibak died of injuries received in a fall from his horse while playing chaugan (polo). He was succeeded by Iltutmish who was the son-in-law of Aibak.
• Iltutmish must be regarded as the real consolidator of the Turkish conquests in north India.
• At the time of his accession, Ali Mardan Khan had declared himself the king of Bengal and Bihar, while Qubacha, a fellow slave of Aibak, had declared himself an independent ruler of Multan.
• During the early years of his reign, Iltutmish's attention was concentrated on the north-west. A new danger to his position arose with the conquest of Ghazni by Khwarizm Shah.
• The Khwarizmi Empire was the most powerful state in Central Asia at this time, and its eastern frontier extended up to the Indus.
• In 1220, the Khwarizmi Empire was destroyed by the Mongols who founded one of the strongest Empires in history, which at its height extended from China to the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, and from the Caspian Sea to the river Jaxartes.

Raziya (1236-39)

• During his last years, Iltutmish was worried over the problem of succession.
• He considered none of his surviving sons to be worthy of the throne.
• After anxious consideration, he finally decided to nominate his daughter, Raziya, to the throne, and induced the nobles and the theologians (ulama) to agree to the nomination. Raziya had to contend against her brothers as well as against powerful Turkish nobles, and could rule only for three years.
• It marked the beginning of a struggle for power between the monarchy and the Turkish chiefs, sometimes called "the forty" or the chahalgani.
• Iltutmish had shown great deference to these Turkish chiefs. After his death, these chiefs, drunk with power and arrogance, wanted to instal on the throne a puppet whom they could control.
• The Turkish nobles accused her of violating feminine modesty, and of being too friendly to an Abyssinian noble, Yaqut Khan. Rebellions broke out at Lahore and Sirhind. She personally led an expedition against Lahore,
• On the way to Sirhind, an internal rebellion broke out in which Yaqut Khan was killed, and Raziya imprisoned at Tabarhinda (Bhatinda).
• However, Raziya won over her captor, Altunia, and after marrying him made a renewed attempt on Delhi.
• Raziya fought valiantly, but was defeated and killed in fight by bandits.

Era of Balban (1246-87)

• The struggle between the monarchy and the Turkish chiefs continued, till one of the Turkish chiefs, Ulugh Khan, known in history by his later title of Balban, gradually arrogated all power to himself, and finally ascended the throne in 1265.
• During the earlier period, Balban held the position of naib or deputy to Nasiruddin Mahmud, a younger son of lltutmish, whom Balban had helped in securing the throne in 1246. The growing authority of Balban alienated many of the Turkish chiefs.
• Balban was replaced by Imaduddin Raihan who was an Indian Muslim.
• After some time, Raihan was defeated and killed. Balban got rid of many of his other rivals by fair or foul means.
• In 1265, Sultan Mahmud died. Balban constantly sought to increase the prestige and power of the monarchy
• It was an age in which authority and power was supposed to be the privilege of those born in noble houses and those who could boast of an ancient pedigree.
• Hence Balban tried to strengthen his claim to the throne by declaring that he was the descendant of the legendary Iranian king Afrasiyab.
• He refused to grant audience to an important trader because he was not high born.
• The historian, Barani, who was himself a great champion of the Turkish nobles, put the following words in Balban's mouth: "Whenever I see a base-born ignoble man, my eyes bum and I reach in anger for my sword (to kill him)".
• Balban was determined to finally break the power of the chahalgani (the Turkish noble). He administered justice with extreme impartiality.
• Thus, the father of the governor of Badaun as also the father of the governor of Awadh were given exemplary unishment for cruelty to their personal slaves.
• Balban appointed spies in every department.
• He also organized a strong centralised army, both to deal with internal disturbances, and to repel the Mongols who had a serious danger to the Delhi Sultanat.
• For the purpose, he reorganized the military department (diwan-i-arz), and pensioned off those soldiers and troopers who were no longer fit for service.
• The Mewatis had become so bold as to plunder people upto the outskirts of Delhi.
• To deal with these elements, Balban adopted a policy of "blood and iron".
• Robbers were mercilessly pursued and put to death. By these harsh methods, Balban controlled the situation. In order to impress the people with the strength and awe of his government, Balban maintained a magnificent court. Whenever he went out, he was surrounded by a large force of bodyguards withdrawn swords.
• To emphasize that the nobles were not his equals, he insisted,on the ceremony of sijada and paibos (prostration and kissing the monarch's feet).
• These and many other ceremonies which he copied were Iranian in origin and were considered un-Islamic.
• Balban died in 1286. He was undoubtedly one of the main architects of the Sultanat of Delhi, particularly of its form of government and institutions.

The Mongols and the Problem of the North-West Frontier

• Changez Khan was a Mongol leader, who prided in calling himself "I the scourge of God’.
• The Mongols destroyed the Khwarizmi Empire in 1220.They ruthlessly sacked flourishing cities from the Jaxartes to the Caspian Sea and from Ghazni to Iraq.
• The Mongols deliberately used terror as an instrument of war.
• The Mongol threat to India appeared in 1221. After the defeat of the Khwarizmi ruler, the crown prince, Jalaluddin, fled and was pursued by Changez Khan.
• Iltutmish, who was ruling at Delhi at the time, tried to appease the Mongols by politely refusing a request from Jalaluddin for asylum.
• 1245, the Mongols invested, and only a speedy march by Balban saved and situation.
• Although Balban fought against the Mongols stoutly, the frontiers of Delhi gradually receded from the river Jhelum to the Beas.
• Balban adopted a policy of both force and diplomacy. He repaired the forts of Bhatinda, Sunam and Samana, and posted a strong force in order to prevent the Mongols from crossing the river Beas.
• He sent diplomatic feelers to Halaku, the Mongol II-Khan of Iran and the neighbouring areas. Envoys from Halaku reached Delhi and were received with great honour by Balban. Balban tacitly agreed to leave the major portion of the Punjab under the Mongol control.
• He was successful in wresting Multan, and placed it as an idependent charge under his eldest son. Prince Mahmud.
• It was in the effort at holding the Multan-Beas line that Prince Mahmud, the heirapparent of Balban, was killed in an encounter.
• In 1292, Abdullah, a grandson of Halaku, advanced on Delhi with 1,50,000 horses.
• In 1299, a Mongol forces of 2,00,000 under his son, Qutlugh Khwaja, arrived to conquer Delhi. Alauddin Khalji, who was ruling over Delhi, decided of face the Mongols outside Delhi.
• In 1303, the Mongols appeared again with a force of 1,20,000. Alauddin Khalji, who was campaigning in Rajputana against Chittor, rushed back and fortified himself at his new capital, Siri, near Delhi.
• The two armies camped facing each other for two months. During this period, the citizens of Delhi had to suffer many hardships. There were daily skirmishes. Finally, the Mongols retreated again, without having achieved anything.
• It will, thus, be seen that during the entire thirteenth century, the Sultanat of Delhi had to face a serious danger from the north-west.
• After the death of Balban in 1286, there was again confusion in Delhi for some time. Balban's chosen successor, Prince Muhammad, had died earlier in a battle with the Mongols.
• A second son, Bughra Khan, preferred to rule over Bengal and Bihar although he was invited by the nobles at Delhi to assume the throne.
• Hence, a grandson of Balban was installed in Delhi.
• Many non-Turks, such as the Khaljis, had come to India at the time of the Ghurid invasion.
• They had never received sufficient recognition in Delhi, and had to move to Bengal and Bihar for an opportunity for advancement.

Jalaluddin Khalji (1290-1320)

• A group of Khalji nobles led by Jalaluddin Khalji, overthrew the incompetent successors of Balban in 1290.
• The Khaljis did not exclude the Turks from high officers, but the rise of the Khaljis to power ended the Turkish monopoly of high offices.
• Jalaluddin Khalji was the first ruler of the Delhi Sultanat to clearly put forward the view that the state should be based on the willing support of the governed, and that since the large majority of the people in India were Hindus, the state in India could not be a truly Islamic state.
• He also tried to gain the goodwill of the nobility by a policy of tolerance and avoiding harsh punishments.

Alauddin Khalji (1296-1316)

• Alauddin Khalji came to the throne by treacherously murdering his uncle and father-in- law, Jalaluddin Khalji.
• After murdering his uncle Alauddin won over most of the nobles and soldiers to his side by a lavish use of gold.
• He resorted to a wholesale massacre of the Mongols, a couple of thousands of them having settled down in Delhi after embracing Islam in the time of Jalaluddin.
• Alauddin framed a series of regulations to prevent the nobles from conspiring against him. They were forbidden to alliances without the permission of the sultan.
• To discourage festive parties, he banned the use of wines and intoxicants.
• He also instituted a spy service to inform the sultan of all that the nobles said and did. His favourite, Malik Kafur faraised a minor son of Alauddin to the throne and imprisoned or blinded his other sons.
• Soon after this, Kafur was killed by the palace guards, and a Hindu convert, Khusrau, ascended the throne.
• Although the historians of the time accuse Khusrau of being anti-Islamic and of committing all types of crimes, the ct is that Khusrau was no worse than any of the preceding monarchs.
• Even Nizamuddin Auliya, the famous Sufi saint of Delhi, acknowledged Khusrau by accepting his gifts.
• In 1320, a group of officers led by Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq raised the banner of revolt
• They broke out into open rebellion, and in a hard fought battle outside the capital, Khusrau was defeated and killed.

Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq (l320-1412)

• Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq established a new dynasty which ruled till 1412. The Tughlaq provided three competent rules: Ghiyasuddin,his son Muhammad bin Tughlaq (1324-51), and his nephew Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1351-88).
• After the death of firuz, the Delhi Sultanat disintegrated and north india was divided into a series of small states.

• Although the Tughlaqs continued to rule till 1412, the invasion of Delhi by Timur in 1398 may be said to mark the end of the Tughlaq Empire.

 Expansion of the Delhi Sultanat

• Ranthambhor was the most powerful Rajput state.
• Another reasons for the sultans of Delhi to establish their rule over Gujarat was that it could secure them a better control over the supply of horses to their armies.
• The import of Arabi, Iraqi and Turki horses to India from the western sea-ports and been an important item of trade since the eight century.
• Early in 1299, an army under two of Alauddin Khalji's noted generals marched against Gujarat by the way of Rajasthan.
• The Gujarat ruler, Rai Karan, was taken by surprise, and fled without offering a fight.
• The chief cities of Gujarat, including Anhilwara where many beautiful buildings and temples had been built over generations, were sacked.
• It was here that Malik Kafur, who later led the invasions of south India, was captured. He was presented to Alauddin, and soon rose in his estimation.
• Rajasthan
• After the conquest of Gujarat, Alauddin turned his attention to the consolidation of his rule over Rajasthan. The first to invite his attention was Ranthambhor which was being ruled by the Chauhan successors of Prithviraj.
• Its ruler, Hamirdeva, had embarked on a serious of war-like expeditions against his neighbours. He is credited with having won victories against Raja Bhoj of Dhar and the Rana of Mewar.
• Alauddin himself had to march against Ranthambhor. The famous poet. Amir Khusrau, who went along with Alauddin, has given a graphic descriptions of the fort.
• After three months of close siege, the fearful jauhar ceremony took place.
• This is the first description we have of the jauhar in Persian.
• All the Mongols, too, died fighting with the Rajputs. This event took place in 130.
• Alauddin, next turned his attention towards Chittor which, after Ranthambhor, was the most powerful state in Rajasthan.
• Its ruler Ratan Singh had annoyed him by refusing permission to his armies to march to Gujarat through Mewar territories.
• There is a popular legend that Alauddin attacked Chittor because he coveted Padmini, the beautiful queen of Ratan Singh.
• Alauddin closely invested Chittor. After a valiant resistance by the besieged for several months, Alauddin stormed the fort (1303).
• The Rajputs performed jauhar and most of the warriors died fighting.
• Chittor was assigned to Alauddin's minor son, Khizr Khan, and a Muslim garrison was posted in the fort. After some time, its charge was handed over to a cousin of Ratan Singh.

Deccan and South India

• In 1306-07, Alauddin planned two campaigns. The first was against Rai Karan who after his expulsion from Gujarat, had been holding Baglana on the border of Malwa.
• The second expedition was aimed against Rai Ramachandra, the ruler of Deogir, who had been in alliance wih Rai Karan.
• The command of the second army was entrusted to Alauddin's slave, Malik Kaftr.
• Rai Ramchandra who surrendered to Kafur, was honourably treated and carried to Delhi where, after some time, he was restored to his dominions with the title of Rai Rayan.
• A gift of one lakh tankas was given to him along with a golden coloured canopy which was a symbol of rulership.
• Between 1309 and 1311, Malik Kafur led two campaigns in south India – the first against Warangal in the Telengana area and the other against Dwar Samudra and Mabar (modem Kamataka and Madurai (Tamil Nadu).
• For the first time, Muslim armies penetrated as far south as Madurai, and brought back untold wealth.
• Alauddin himself was not in favour of direct administration of the southern states.
• Khusrau Khan, a slave of the sultan, made a plundering raid into Mabar and sacked the rich city of Patan.

Market Control and Agrarian Policy of Alauddin

• Alauddin sought to fix the cost of all commodities from foodgrains, sugar and cooking- oil to a needle, and from costly imported cloth to horses, cattle, and slave boys and girls.
• For the purpose, he set up three markets at Delhi - one market for foodgrains, the second for costly cloth, and the third for horses, slaves and cattle.
• Each market was under the control of a high officer called Sahana who maintained a register of the merchants and strictly controlled the shopkeepers and the prices.
• But Alauddin had some additional reasons for controlling the market. The Mongol invasions of Delhi had pinpointed the need to raise a large army to check them.
• In order to ensure a regular supply of cheap food grains, he declared that the land revenue in the doab region, that is, the area extending from Meerut near the Yamuna to the border of Kara near Allahabad would be paid directly to the state, i.e., the villages in the area would not be assigned in iqta to anyone.
• Alauddin kept himself constantly informed to everything and very harsh punishment was given if any shopkeeper charged a higher price, or tried to cheat by using false weight and measures.
• Barani tells us that prices were not allowed to be increased even by a dam or a paisa even during the time of famine.
• Barani says : "The permanence of prices in the grain market was a wonder of the age".
• Control of the prices of horses was important for the Sultan
• The position of the supply of horses had improved as a result of the conquest of Gujarat.The price of a first grade horse fixed by Alauddin was 100 to 120 tankas,
• The prices of cattle as well as of slaves were strictly regulated, and Barani gives us their prices in detail. The prices of cattle and slaves are mentioned side by side by Barani.
• We are told that large sums of money were advanced to the Multani traders for bringing fine quality cloth to Delhi from various part of the country.
• Realization of land revenue in cash enabled Alauddin to pay his soldiers in cash. He was the first sultan in the Sultanat to do so.
• A sawar (cavalryman) in his time was paid 238 tankas a year, or about 20 tankas a month.
• Apart from the control of the market, Alauddin took important steps in the field of land revenue administration.
• He was the first monarch in the Sultanat who insisted that in the doab, land revenue would be assessed on the basis of measuring the land under cultivation.
• Alauddin wanted that the landlords of the area called khuts and muqaddams should pay the same taxes as the others.
• In the picturesque language of Barani. "the khuts and muqaddams could not afford to ride on rich caprisoned horses, or to chew betel leaves and they became so poor that their wives had to go and work in the house of Muslim".
• The market regulations of Alauddin came to an end with his death, but it did achieve a number of gains. It enabled him to defeat the subsequent Mongol onslaughts.
• The land revenue reforms of Alauddin marked and important step towards closer relationship with the rural areas.
• Some of this measures were continued by his successors, and later provided a basis for the agrarian reforms of Sher Shah and Akbar.

 Muhammad Tughlaq?s Experiments

• Next to Alauddin Khalji, Muhammad bin Tughlaq (1324-51) is best remembered as a ruler who undertook a number of bold experiments, and showed a keen interest in agriculture.
• He was deeply read in religion and philosophy and had a critical and open mind.
• He conversed not only with the Muslim mystics, but with the Hindu yogis and Jain saint' such as Jinaprabha Suri.
• He was also prepared to give high office to people on the basis of merit, irrespective of whether they belonged to noble families or not.
• He was inclined to be hasty and impatient. That is why so many of this experiments failed and he has been dubbed an "ill starred idealist".
• Muhammad Tughlaq's reign started under inauspicious circumstances.
• Sultan Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq was returning to Delhi after a successful campaign against Bengal. A wooden pavilion was erected hastily at the orders of Muhammad Tughalaq to give a fitting reception to the sultan.
• When, the captured elephants were being paraded, the hastily erected structure collapsed, and the sultan was killed.
• This led to a number of rumours - that Muhammad Tughlaq had planned to kill his father, that this was a curse of the heavens and of the famous saint of Delhi Shaikh Nizamuddifl Aulia, whom the ruler had threatened to punish, etc.
• The most controversial step which Muhammad Tughlaq undertook soon after his accession was the so-called transfer of the capital from Delhi to Deogir.
• The most serious rebellion was that of a cousin of Muhammad Tughlaq, Gurshasp, against whom the sultan had to proceed personally.
• It appears that the sultan wanted to make Deogir a second capital so that he might be able to control south India better.
• For this purpose, he ordered many of the officers and leading men, including many sufi saints, to shift to Deogir which was renamed Daulatabad.
• No attempt was made to shift the rest of the population. Delhi remained a large and populous city in absence of the sultan.  
• Coins minted in Delhi, while the sultan was at Deogir, testify to this.
• Daulatabad was more than 1500 km away. Many people died due to the rigours of the journey and the heat, since this movement took place during the summer season.
• Many of those who reached Daulatabad felt homesick, for some of them had lived for several generations in Delhi and looked upon it as their home.
• Hence, there was a good deal of discontent. After a couple of years, Muhammad Tughlaq decided to abandon Daulatabad, largely because he soon found that just as he could not control the south form Delhi, he could not control north India from DauIatabat.
• They became the means of spreading in the Deccan the cultural, religious and social ideas which the Turks and brought with them to north India.
• Token currency - Another step which Muhammad Tughlaq took at this time was the introduction of the "Token currency".
• There was a shortage of silver in the world in the fourteenth century.
• Qublai Khan of China had already successfully experimented with a token currency.
• A Mongol ruler of Iran, Ghazan Khan, had also experimented with it.
• Muhammad Tughlaq decided to introduce a bronze coin which was to have the same value as the silver tanka.
• Muhammad Tughlaq might still have been successful if the government had been able to prevent people from forging the new coins.
• Finally Muhammad Tughlaq decided to withdraw the token currency.
• The failure of these two experiments affected the prestige of the sovereign, and also meant wastage of money.
• A far more serious problem with which Muhammad bin Tughlaq had to contend was that of the security of the frontier.
• In the early years of Muhammad Tughlaq's reign the Mongols under their leader Tarmashrin burst into Sindh, and a force reached up to Meerut, about 65 km from Delhi.
• Muhammad Tughlaq not only defeated the Mongols in a battle near the Jhelum, but also occupied Kalanaur and for some time his power extended up to Peshawar beyond the Indus.
• After coming back from Deogir, the sultan recruited a large army in order to occupy Ghazni and Afghanistan. Barani says that his object was to occupy Khurasan and Iraq.
• The effects of the Khurasan project should not be exaggerated, or confused with the Qarachil expedition.
• Qarachil expedition - This expedition was launched in the Kumaon hills in the Himalayas, allegedly to counter Chinese incursions.
• After success, the armies went too far into the inhospitable region, and suffered a disaster.
• Subsequently Muhammad Tughlaq undertook an expedition in the Kangra hills
• Agriculture - Muhammad Tughlaq undertook a number of measures to improve agriculture. Most of chese were tried out in the doab region.
• The sultan left Delhi and for two and half years lived in a camp called Swargadwari, 100 miles from Delhi on the banks of the Ganges near Kanauj.
• After returning to Delhi, Muhammad Tughlaq launched a scheme to extend and improve cultivation in the doab.
• He set up a separate department called diwan-i-amir-i-kohi.
• The scheme failed largely because the men chosen for the purpose proved to be inexperienced and dishonest.
• Another problem which Muhammad Tughlaq had to face was the problem of the nobility.

Officials of Sultan Muhammad Tughluq

• Sultan Muhammad Tughluq appointed Aziz Khummar, a wine distiller, Firuz Hajjam, a barber, Mank a Tabbakh, a cook, and two gardeners, Ladha and Pira, to high administrative posts.
• Ziyauddin Barani, a midfourteenth-century-chronicler, reported their appointments as a sign of the Sultan's loss of political judgement and his incapacity to rule.
• After his accession, Firuz Tughlaq was faced with the problem of preventing the imminents break-up of the Delhi Sultanat.
• He adopted a policy of trying to appease the nobles, the army and the theologians, and of asserting his authority over only such areas which could be easily administrated from the centre.
• Firuz led a campaign against the ruler of Jajnagar (Orissa). He desecrated the temples there and gathered a rich plunder, but made to attempt to annex Orissa.
• He also led a campaign against Kangra in the Punjab hills.
• His longest campaigns were to deal with rebellions in Gujarat and Thatta.
• Although the rebellions were crushed, the army suffered great hardship due to losing its way in the Rann of Kutch.
• He decreed that whenever a noble died, his son should be allowed to succeed to his position, including his iqta and if he had no son, his son-in-law and in his absence, his slave.
• In a mistaken view of generosity, the sultan himself once gave money to a soldier to bribe the clerk of the muster.
• Firuz tried to win over the theologians by proclaiming that he was a true Muslim king, and that the state under him was a truly Islamic state.
• He tried to ban practices which the orthodox theologians considered un-Islamic. Thus, he prohibited the practice of Muslim women going out to worship at the graves of sainst
• He persecuted a number of Muslim sects which were considered heretical by the theologians.
• It was during the time of Firuz that jizyah became a separate tax.
• Earlier, it was a part of land revenue.
• Firuz refused to exempt the brahmanas from the payment of jizyah since this was not provided for in the sharia.
• Only women, children, the disabled and the indigent who had no means of livelihood were exempt from it.
• Worse, he publicly burnt a brahmana for preaching to the Muslims, on the ground that it was against the sharia.                                
• Firuz Tughlaq was the first ruler who took steps to have Hindu religious works translated from Sanskrit into Persian, so that there may be a better understanding of Hindu ideas and practices,    
• Many books on music, medicine and mathematics were also translated from Sanskrit into Persian during his reign.

Humanitarian measures

• He banned inhuman punishments such as cutting of hands, feet, nose, etc., for theft and other offences.
• He set up hospitals for free treatment of the poor, and ordered the kotwals to make lists of unemployed persons, and provided dowries for the daughters of the poor.
• He set up a large department of public works which looked after his building programme.
• Firuz repaired and dug a number of canals.
• The longest canal was about 200 kilometres which took off from the river Sutlej to Hansi.
• Another canal were meant for irrigation purposes, and also for providing water to some of the new towns which Firuz built.
• These towns, Hissar-Firuzah or Hissar (in modem Haryana) and Firozabad (in modem Uttar Pradesh) exist even today.
• He ordered his officials that whenever they attacked a place, they should select handsome and well-born young boys and send them to the sultan as slaves.
• In this way, Firuz gradually gathered about 1,80,000 slaves.
• Nasiruddin Mahmud who ruled from 1394 to 1412, could control the ambitious nobles and the intransigent rajas.
• The governor of provinces became independent, and the sultan of Delhi was confined virtually to a small area surrounding Delhi. As a wit said, “The dominion of the Lord of the Universe (being the title of the sultans of Delhi) xtends from Delhi to Palam."
• Timur, who was a Turk but could claim a blood relationship with Changez, had started his career of conquest in 1370. The raid into India was a plundering raid.
• Timur's army mercilessly sacked and plundered the various towns on the way to Delhi.
• Timur's invasion (1398) once again showed the dangers of a weak government in India.