Abraham Eraly - The Age of Wrath - A History of the Delhi Sultanate

Soon after defeating Jayachandra, Muhammad returned to Ghazni with the vast booty he had gathered. He would lead a few more campaigns into India, and collect more booty, but he does not seem to have had any intention to shift his capital to India and live there. His last Indian campaign was in 1206, to reinforce Aibak in his battle against Khokars, a fierce martial tribe of the upper Indus Valley. On the conclusion of that campaign, the sultan set out, as usual, to return to Ghazni, and on the way he camped on the banks of Indus to rest for a while. And there, in mid-March that year, he was assassinated.

It is not clear who the assassins were, or what their motive was. Possibly they were vengeful Ismailis of Sind — whose kingdom Muhammad had overrun in his very first Indian campaign — or, more likely, they were Khokars, a large number of whom Muhammad’s army had just recently slaughtered. Whoever the assassins were, they came in a small band of three or four daredevils, who swam across Indus and entered the royal camp through its unguarded riverfront. ‘On the king’s return from Lahore towards Ghazni … [he pitched his camp] on the bank of a pure stream in a garden filled with lilies, jasmines and other flowers,’ writes Hasan Nizami, an early thirteenth century chronicler. ‘There, while he was engaged in the evening prayer, some impious men … came running like the wind towards His Majesty … and on the spot killed [the guards, and then] … ran up towards the king and inflicted five or six desperate wounds upon the lord of the seven climes, and his spirit flew above the eight paradises and the battlements of the nine heavens, and joined those of the ten evangelists.’

MUHAMMAD HAD NO sons. That left the field wide open for his three chief nobles — Aibak in Delhi, Yildiz in Ghazni, and Qabacha in Multan — to grapple with each other for power, even though they were closely related to each other. On Muhammad’s death Aibak in Delhi promptly assumed sovereign power, but this was challenged by Yildiz, Aibak’s father-in-law, who, in possession of Ghazni, declared himself as the successor of Muhammad Ghuri and claimed suzerainty over all the late sultan’s territories. The third contestant for the throne was Qabacha, Aibak’s son-in-law, who declared himself to be an independent ruler in Multan, and sought to widen his territory by advancing on Lahore.

Of the two challengers whom Aibak confronted, Yildiz was the more serious one, so he decided to deal with him first, and promptly swept into Afghanistan with an army, and expelled him from Ghazni. But his triumph was short-lived, for Yildiz soon regained his power in Ghazni, and forced Aibak to retreat to India. And Yildiz, hovering at the frontier of India, would remain a threat to Aibak and his successors in Delhi for about a decade.

Aibak was originally a native of Turkistan, but was enslaved as a boy, and, after being sold and resold a couple of times, he was in his teenage taken to Ghazni by a slave trader, and there he was bought by Muhammad Ghuri. Aibak rose rapidly in the service of the sultan, because of his energy, efficiency, dedication, and nobility of character. The name Aibak means moon-face, indicating beauty, but physically Aibak was hardly personable. ‘He was not comely in appearance,’ states Siraj. But the richness of his talents more than compensated for his poor looks. Aibak, comments Siraj, ‘was a brave and liberal king. The almighty had bestowed on him such courage and generosity that in his time there was no king like him from the east to the west … He was possessed of every quality and virtue.’

In 1195 Aibak was appointed the viceroy of India by Muhammad, as a reward for his successful campaign against Gujarat, which he had undertaken to avenge the defeat that Muhammad had suffered there early in his career. Muhammad, writes medieval chronicler Sirhindi, ‘sent a canopy of state to Malik-Khutb-ud-din [Aibak] and conferred on him the title sultan.’ That honour presaged Aibak’s eventual accession to the throne of Delhi.

In every sense Aibak was the real founder of the Delhi Sultanate. Muhammad’s campaigns, rather like those of Mahmud, were primarily plundering raids, and he left it to Aibak to consolidate and extend the Ghuri conquests in India. And Aibak achieved that objective with consummate skill. Then, on the death of Muhammad, the Turkish territories in India under the governorship of Aibak became an independent kingdom, not just a province of the Ghuri empire. And presently, as Afghanistan was conquered by the Mongols, the connection of the Delhi Sultanate with Ghuri entirely ceased.

Aibak was tirelessly active all through his rule in Delhi, as governor and as sultan, conquering new territories and suppressing rebellions. These campaigns were essential for stabilising the Turkish rule in India, but they also served to keep the Turkish army active and in fine fettle, and to boost the morale of the soldiers with a constant feed of rich plunder.

It is difficult to see Aibak as a ruthless fanatic or as a savage invader, but these are the qualities that Muslim chroniclers laudatorily attribute to him, no doubt with considerable exaggeration. ‘His bounty was continuous and his slaughter was continuous,’ states Siraj. In Varanasi, according to Nizami, Aibak ‘destroyed nearly one thousand temples, and raised mosques on their foundations.’ And in his campaign against the Khokars, he was, according to Nizami, so ruthless in exterminating them that ‘there remained not one inhabitant [there] to light a fire.’

THE MILITARY CAMPAIGNS that Aibak personally led were confined to the central and western Indo-Gangetic Plain; he left the conquest of the eastern Gangetic Plain to the initiative and enterprise of his lieutenant, Bakhtiyar Khalji. Bakhtiyar, according to Siraj, ‘was a very smart, enterprising, bold, courageous, wise, and experienced man.’ But he, like Aibak, was not physically personable. His appearance, according to Siraj, was rather gorilla-like, his arms reaching down to his calves. But his lack of handsomeness was more than offset by his enormous physical power and energy. Taunted by envious nobles, he is said to have once even subdued an elephant in a single combat.

Aibak recognised Bakhtiyar’s potential and assigned to him the conquest of Bihar and Bengal, and in this he was phenomenally successful. But he was also phenomenally destructive — he was responsible for the destruction of the great Buddhist University of Nalanda in Bihar, though it has to be noted, as an extenuating circumstance, that he mistook the walled university to be a fort, and Buddhist monks to be Brahmins. As Siraj describes the scene, ‘Great plunder fell into the hands of the victors. Most of the inhabitants of the place were Brahmins with shaven heads. They were put to death. Large numbers of books were found there, and when Muhammadans saw them, they called for some persons to explain their contents, but all the men had been killed. It was then discovered that the whole fort and city was a university.’

After subduing Bihar the general advanced into Bengal, which had been under the rule of the Sena dynasty for several centuries. Bakhtiyar with characteristic impetuosity rode into Nadia, the then capital of Bengal, with an escort of just eighteen cavalrymen, leaving his army behind. Nobody challenged him and his men, for they were taken to be horse traders. They ‘did not molest any man, but went on peaceably and without ostentation … In this manner he (Bakhtiyar) reached the gate … [of the royal palace, and there] he drew his sword and commenced the attack,’ writes Siraj. ‘At this time the raja (Lakshmana-sena) was at his dinner, and gold and silver dishes filled with food were placed before him according to the usual custom. All of a sudden a cry was raised at the gate of his palace.’ Hearing the commotion and learning about the attack, ‘the raja fled barefooted by the rear door of the palace, and his whole treasure, and all his wives, maid servants, attendants, and women fell into the hands of the invader. Numerous elephants were taken, and such booty was obtained by the Muhammadans as is beyond all compute.’