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

Meanwhile Shah Turkan, ‘in blind fury and vindictiveness’, set about avenging the indignities that she had suffered in the royal harem at the hands of the high-born wives of Iltutmish, by putting some of them to death in an ignominious manner, and by subjecting others to various gross humiliations. She even blinded a young son of Iltutmish and had him later put to death, fearing that he might grow up to be a threat to Firuz. She also hatched a plot to kill Raziya. In that environment of gross misrule several provincial governors broke out in rebellion, and when Firuz marched out against them, Raziya cleverly manipulated public sentiment in Delhi and incited a popular uprising against Shah Turkan. The people of Delhi, writes Siraj, ‘rose and … seized the royal palace and made the mother of the sultan a prisoner.’ And when Firuz, deserted by many of his officers, returned to Delhi, he too was imprisoned, and presently put to death. The reign of Firuz, according to Siraj, lasted just six months and twenty-eight days.

RAZIYA WAS THEN proclaimed the sultan by public acclaim. According to Isami, a mid-fourteenth century chronicler, when Firuz was overthrown, and the nobles were discussing to whom they should give the crown, Raziya, ‘waved her scarf from a window and said to them, ‘Here I am, the daughter of his majesty; the crown befits my head. It was I whom the king had chosen as his heir-apparent … Since you set the crown on the head of another person against the king’s orders, you have came to grief … [Give the crown to me for a few years to test my ability.] Should I acquit myself as a ruler better than a man, you might keep me on the throne. Should you see things otherwise, you may remove the crown from my head and give it to whomsoever you please … [On hearing Raziya, the nobles concluded that] a daughter is better than an ill-bred son. Many a woman has been the vanquisher of men in battle; many a man has owed his position to a woman. If this daughter of the king is raised to the throne … she would prove to be better than the sons of the king.’ So they offered the throne to Raziya. And in November 1236 she ascended the throne, assumed the title Raziya-ud-din, and issued coins bearing that title.

But Raziya’s accession was resented by some of the provincial governors, who then threateningly converged on Delhi with their armies. But Raziya managed to sow dissension among the governors, so the confederacy collapsed before it could do any harm, and the confederate nobles scattered. Several of the fleeing nobles were then captured and executed by royal officers. Raziya’s energy and decisiveness in dealing with the crisis earned the admiration of several of the vacillating nobles, and won them over to her side.

Raziya then broke free from the conventional constraints of harem ladies, and one day three years after her accession, ‘threw off the dress and veil of women, put on a tunic and cap, and thus appeared in public. When she rode on elephant all men clearly saw her,’ records Siraj. And ‘she rode on horseback as men ride, armed with a bow and quiver, and surrounded by courtiers. She did not veil her face,’ adds Battuta.

These practices of Raziya were most offensive to the orthodox Muslim nobles of the Sultanate, who were under the sway of ancient prejudices, and they decided to oust her. But they bided their time, waiting for an opportunity or excuse to overthrow her. A good part of Raziya’s persona as sultan involved her posturing as a man. But her biology betrayed her. She could pretend to others to be a man, but not to herself. And it was her yearning for intimate male companionship that eventually brought about her downfall — that, and her attempts to reduce the power of The Forty by selecting several of her principal officers from outside that elite group.

One of Raziya’s favourite officers was Jalal-ud-din Yaqut, an Abyssinian, whose elevation to the post of Amir-i-Akhur , Master of the Stables, a very high office, was deeply resented by Turkish nobles, especially as she was suspected of having an amorous relationship with him. A conspiracy was then hatched by a group of nobles headed by Aitigin, the Lord Chamberlain, to depose her. They did not however dare to move against her in Delhi, as she enjoyed decisive popular support there. But in the summer of 1240, when she was on a campaign against a provincial rebel in southern Punjab, the conspirators swung into action, killed Yaqut and the other close associates of Raziya who had accompanied her on the campaign, and threw her into prison in the Bhatinda fort. And in Delhi they raised Muiz-ud-din Bahram, Iltutmish’s third son, as sultan.

But Raziya was only down, not out. Not yet. She now used the lure of high office to entice Altuniya, the governor of Bhatinda, who was her captor, to ally with her. She married him, and together they advanced on Delhi with an army. But fortune no longer favoured her. In the ensuing battle her army was utterly routed by the Delhi forces. ‘Not even one horseman remained with her,’ states Isami. She and Altuniya then fled from the battlefield, but they both fell into the hands of the local people. There are three different versions of what happened then: according to Siraj, both of them were forthwith killed by their captors, but Sirhindi states that their captors ‘despatched them in fetters to the sultan, who put them both to death,’ and Battuta claims that it was a peasant who killed Raziya, to steal her ornaments.

Raziya had reigned for three years and six days. She was buried on the banks of Yamuna, and a small tomb was erected there to mark her grave. In time the tomb became a place of pilgrimage, as it was ‘considered a place of sanctity,’ states Battuta. ‘Sultan Raziya was a great monarch,’ comments Siraj. ‘She was wise, just, and generous, a benefactor to her kingdom, a dispenser of justice, the protector of her subjects, and the leader of her armies. She was endowed with all the qualities befitting a king. But she was not of the right sex, and so in the estimation of men all her virtues were worthless.’

BAHRAM ON HIS accession assigned, presumably as previously agreed with the nobles, the highest executive power in the Sultanate to Aitigin and designated him as Naib-i-Mamlikat, regent of the kingdom. But if the nobles expected Bahram to be a mere figurehead, a puppet in their hands, they were soon disabused of that fancy. Bahram was a bizarrely schizophrenic person, gentle and shy as well as savage and bloodthirsty. He was, according to Siraj, ‘a fearless, intrepid and sanguinary man … [but was also] shy and unceremonious, and had no taste for gorgeous attire which kings love to wear, nor for the belts, accoutrements, banners and other insignia of royalty.’

As sultan, it was Bahram’s vicious side that was most evident — he was brutally repressive towards nobles, even towards his benefactors. Thus when Aitigin, who was primarily instrumental in placing him on the throne, offended him by marrying one of his sisters, and took to the practice of keeping an elephant and a band at the entrance of his mansion, as at the entrance of the royal palace, Bahram had him promptly executed. These tyrannical acts of Bahram sent a shiver of anxiety through the nobles — an ‘uneasy feeling spread like an epidemic’ among the nobles, states Siraj. The politics of the Delhi Sultanate at this time was a dizzying whirl of Byzantine conspiracies and counter-conspiracies, in which life was nightmarish for those in the inner circle of power. The only solution to their awful predicament was to depose the sultan, the nobles decided, and one day in the summer of 1242, they, according to Isami, ‘bound him hand and foot in fetters and threw him into prison,’ and later had him murdered. Bahram had reigned for just over two years.

The nobles then assembled at the tomb of Iltutmish and chose Ala-ud-din Masud, a grandson of Iltutmish, to ascend the throne. Masud at the time of his accession was, according to Siraj, ‘a generous and good-natured prince, possessed of many estimable qualities.’ However, after a year or so of his reign he fell under evil influences, and turned into a bloodthirsty tyrant. He ‘acquired the habit of seizing and killing his nobles,’ reports Siraj. ‘He became confirmed in his cruelty; all his excellent qualities were perverted, and he gave himself up to unbounded licentiousness, pleasure, and hunting … [Moreover] he was given to depravity.’ So in June 1246 the nobles once again seized control of the situation, deposed Masud and threw him into prison, where he soon died, or was murdered. Masud had reigned for four years.