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

Meanwhile Lakshmana-sena fled to east Bengal, a heavily forested region, and set up his rule there, but was not pursued there by Bakhtiyar. Lakshmana-sena was an aged, scholarly king, a patron of poets, and a poet himself. Jayadeva, the renowned author of Gita-Govinda , is said to have adorned his court. Quite probably the raja was not martially inclined. Besides, there was an ancient and widely believed prophecy that Muslim rule would be established in Bengal at this time. Bakhtiyar therefore had little difficulty in subjugating most of Bengal.

Bakhtiyar’s sword now rested on the slopes of the Himalayas. Beyond the mountains lay the mysterious land of Tibet, which set Bakhtiyar dreaming. His thirst for adventure was insatiable, and it now led him to launch an invasion of Tibet. He set out on this campaign with a large force of 10,000 cavalry, but the operation turned out to be a total disaster, because of the extreme weather of Tibet as well as the virulence of the local tribesmen. Bakhtiyar gained nothing whatever from the campaign, but lost a good number of his soldiers in it, and himself barely managed to escape with his life.

This was a humiliation that Bakhtiyar could not bear. ‘He would thereafter never go out, because he felt ashamed to look on the wives and children of those who had perished [in that campaign],’ writes Siraj. ‘If ever he did ride out, all people, women and children, from their housetops and the streets, cried out cursing and abusing him.’ According to Siraj, Bakhtiyar’s mental distress led to the collapse of his health, and presently he ‘took to bed, and died.’ Other sources however state that he was put out of his misery by his fellow officer, Ali Mardan, who subsequently assumed the leadership of the Khalji clan of Bakhtiyar.

Bakhtiyar died in 1206. Four years later, in 1210, Aibak died in Lahore, in an accident while playing polo. ‘The sultan,’ writes Siraj, ‘fell from his horse in the field while he was playing chaugan , and the horse came down upon him, so that the pommel of the saddle entered his chest, and killed him.’

Aibak had ruled North India in all for fifteen years, eleven years as the deputy of Muhammad Ghuri, and the last four years as a sovereign, ‘during which he wore the crown, and had the khutba read and coin struck in his name,’ records Siraj. The Delhi Sultanate that he founded would endure for 320 years, from 1206 to 1526, till Babur conquered Delhi and established the Mughal Empire.

WHY DID THE Indian kingdoms, many of them ruled by Rajputs renowned for their martial valour, collapse so rapidly and abjectly? The reason that is commonly given for this is that Indian kings made no united stand against Turks. There could in fact be no such united stand by them, because, from the Indian point of view, there was no we/they divide between Indians and Turks. Turks were seen by Indians as just one element — though a new element — in the racial, linguistic, socio-cultural and political agglomeration of India. There was no sense of any unique Indianess among the people or the rulers anywhere in India at this time. Indians did not look like one people or speak like one people — the language of one regional group was entirely unintelligible to the other regional groups. And each of these regional groups was itself divided into several distinct socio-cultural groups based on caste and sect. India was a landmass, at best a civilisation, like Europe, but not a nation.

Because of all this, Turks were hardly ever seen by Indians as aliens. Several other races from outside the subcontinent had entered India over the centuries, and they were all absorbed into the local society over time, and Indians presumably did not see Turks as any different from these earlier invaders and migrants.

But of course Turks were different. Unlike the previous invaders and migrants, they could not be absorbed into Indian society, for there was an insurmountable barrier between them and the people of India. The problem was primarily religious. Polytheistic and poly-religious Indians had no problem in accommodating Turks and Islam in their society without in any way compromising their society and religion, but monotheistic Turks could not possibly accommodate Indians in their society without fundamentally altering the composition and ethos of their society and religion. The divide between the two civilisations was insurmountable.

The Turkish invader was of course seen by the threatened Indian rajas as an enemy. But not as an alien — for the rajas, Turks were not much different from their enemies within India. The local rajas in fact persisted in their self-destructive internecine wars even when the Turks were invading India. Indeed, in several instances Indian chieftains and royal commanders defected to Turks, or connived with them against their own rajas. And very many Hindu soldiers served in the Turkish army. There was no sense among Indian kingdoms that they were facing a common danger from Turks. Though there were a few instances of rajas banding together to oppose Turks, these were evidently the banding together of subordinate chieftains under their overlord, as indicated by the very large number of the confederate chieftains — fifty of them! — joining Jayapala in his first battle of Tarain against Muhammad Ghuri.

The absence of concerted military action by the rajas cannot however be considered as the decisive factor that led to their rout by Turks, for many of the Indian kingdoms were much larger in size, population and resources than Ghazni, and the rajas often fielded armies which were very much larger than the Turkish army.

But this numerical advantage of the Indian armies was more than negated by the decisive superiority of the Turkish army in weaponry, regimental discipline, innovative tactic, and group martial spirit. Indeed, the vast size of the Indian armies often proved to be a disadvantage, as their size was mostly made up of ill-trained and ill-disciplined hordes who could not act efficiently in concert. As individual soldiers, Rajputs, who constituted a large section of North Indian armies, were a match, or more than a match, to Turks in valour. But the lack of regimental training and discipline nullified that advantage. On the whole Indians had very little chance of prevailing over Turks.

The main dependence of Turks was on their cavalry, which was far superior to the Indian cavalry in every respect, in men as well as in mounts. In contrast, the main dependence of Indian armies was on their elephant corps, but elephants, though forbidding in appearance, were no match for the storming, whirling charge of the Turkish cavalry. Elephants were in fact quite often a menace to their own side, for when wounded in battle or otherwise frightened they ran pell-mell, causing havoc in their own army.

Equally decisive was the Turkish ability to rapidly innovate their tactics to suit any emergent military situation, and execute lightning manoeuvres, while Indians were slaves of tradition, and they generally fought in the same manner regardless of the actual military situation.

Besides all this, Turks, as aggressors swooping down from the cool Afghan mountains, had irresistible kinetic energy, while Indians were mostly plains people leading a sedentary life in an enervating climate, and their posture, as defenders, was generally static. Psychologically too Indians were at a disadvantage, as they suffered from the victim syndrome, and were often sluggish in battle, unlike the spirited Turks. Moreover, the fatalistic value system of Indians inculcated in them a generally defeatist attitude. In some cases Indians were also demoralised by astrological predictions that the Turkish conquest of India was inevitable. In contrast, Turks were energised by religious fervour, confident in their faith that they were invincible as the soldiers of their god. Equally, they were motivated by the irresistible lure of plunder.