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

As in his treatment of foreign visitors, the sultan was equally cordial in his relationship with foreign rulers. Typical of this was his response to a diplomatic mission from China. ‘The king of China had sent valuable gifts to the sultan, including a hundred slaves of both sexes, five hundred pieces of velvet and silk cloth, musk, jewelled garments and weapons, with a request that the sultan permit him to rebuild the idol-temple which is near the mountains called Qarajil,’ reports Battuta. ‘It is in a place known as Samhal, to which the Chinese go on pilgrimage; the Muslim army in India had captured it, laid it in ruins and sacked it.’ On receiving the Chinese request for permission to rebuild the temple, Muhammad wrote to him that under Islamic law permission to build infidel temples could be given only to those who paid poll-tax. ‘If thou wilt pay the jizya we shall empower thee to build it,’ he wrote. But along with this negative reply, the sultan sent to the Chinese ruler, to mollify him, even richer presents than what he had received from him: ‘a hundred thoroughbred horses, a hundred white slaves, a hundred Hindu dancing and singing girls, twelve hundred pieces of various kinds of cloth, gold and silver candelabra and basins, brocade robes, caps, quivers, swords, gloves embroidered with pearls, and fifteen eunuchs.’

THERE IS VERY little information in medieval chronicles about Muhammad’s private life, but he seems to have been very close to his mother, whom he always treated with the highest respect and was ever obedient to her. He was continent in sexual relationships, and prohibited the presence of women in military camps. He also abstained from drinking.

Muhammad, as sultan, had many reprehensible and ludicrous qualities, but these were compensated, though only in a small part, by a few laudable qualities. Battuta records several instances of Muhammad’s concern for equity and justice. ‘Once a Hindu noble claimed that the sultan had put his brother to death without cause, and cited him before the qazi,’ writes Battuta. ‘The sultan then walked on foot and unarmed to the kazi’s court, saluted him and made obeisance, and remained standing before him, having previously commanded the kazi not to rise before him … when he entered the court. The qazi gave judgement against the sultan, to the effect that he must give satisfaction to his adversary for the blood of his brother, and he did so. At another time a certain Muslim claimed that the sultan owed him a sum of money. This matter too was brought before the kazi, who again gave judgement against the sultan for the payment of the debt, and he paid it.’

In the same compliant, caring spirit he did at times, though rarely, take special measures to succour the people in distress. Thus ‘when a famine broke out in India and Sind, and prices became so high that [the cost of] a maund of wheat rose to six dinars , the sultan ordered that every person in Delhi, small or great, freeman or salve, should be given six months’ provisions from the granary, at the rate of a pound and a half per person per day,’ records Battuta. ‘The doctors and qazis then set about compiling registers of the population of each quarter and brought the people, each of whom received six months’ provisions.’ Even in normal times the sultan took care to provide sustenance for the indigent in Delhi, by setting up public kitchens for feeding several thousands of them every day. He also set up hospitals for the sick, and hospices for widows and orphans.

IN RELIGION, AS in everything else, Muhammad was a bundle of contradictions, rigidly orthodox in some ways, but in other ways flagrantly unorthodox. According to Battuta, ‘the ceremonies of religion are strictly complied with at his court, and he is severe in the matter of attendance at prayer and in punishing those who neglect it.’ Ferishta confirms this. On the other hand, Barani and Isami denounce Muhammad as an irreligious person — Barani in fact, despite being a timorous courtier, once openly told the sultan that many of his actions, particularly the harsh punishments he meted out to rebels, had no sanction in Islamic tradition. Isami went further, and he in his chronicle denounced Muhammad as a kafir, an infidel, who sided with infidels and indulged in infidel practices, and he urged people to rise up against him.

One of the ‘infidel practices’ of Muhammad that outraged orthodox Muslims was his patronage of yogis, of which Battuta gives a vivid account. ‘The sultan sent for me once when I was in Delhi, and on entering I found him in a private apartment with some of his intimates and two … yogis,’ records Battuta. ‘One of the yogis, who squatted on the ground, then rose up in the air above our heads, still sitting. I was so astonished and frightened by this that I fell to the floor in a faint. A potion was administered to me, and I revived and sat up … Meantime … the yogi’s companion took a sandal from a bag he had with him, and beat it on the ground like one infuriated. The sandal rose in the air until it came above the neck of the … [yogi who had risen up in the air] and then began hitting him on the neck while he descended little by little until he sat down alongside us. Then the sultan said, “If I did not fear for your reason I would have ordered them to do still stranger things than this that you have seen.” I took leave, but was affected with palpitation and fell ill.’

Another paradoxical trait of Muhammad was that he, for all the violence of his rule, was an ardent patron of Jain sage Jinaprabha Suri, who was, in conformity with the precepts of his religion, a strict practitioner of nonviolence. According to Jain sources the sultan once invited the sage to the royal palace, ‘treated him with respect, seated him by his side, and offered to give him wealth, land, horses, elephants etc, all of which the saint declined. The sultan praised him [for his austerity] and issued a firman … for the construction of a new … rest-house for the monks.’ The sage was then carried on an elephant to his residence, escorted by several nobles and ‘to the accompaniment of varied music and dances of young women.’

Whatever be the veracity of these stories, Muhammad seems to have loved to explore other faiths, at least as an intellectual exercise, for he was, despite all his wildness, a man of learning and wide cultural interests. ‘In calligraphy … Sultan Muhammad abashed the most accomplished scribes,’ writes Barani. ‘The excellence of his handwriting, the ease of his composition, the sublimity of his style, and the play of his fancy, left the most accomplished teachers and professors far behind. He was an adept in the use of metaphor. He knew by heart a good deal of Persian poetry, and understood it well … No learned or scientific man, or scribe, or poet, or wit, or physician, could have had the presumption to argue with him about his own special pursuit, nor would he have been able to maintain his position against the throttling arguments of the sultan.’ Confirms Battuta: ‘He is one of those kings whose felicity is unimpaired and surpassing all ordinary experience.’

Muhammad Tughluq was an incorrigible daydreamer. And it was only in his dreams that he was able to fulfil himself. The problem was not with his ideas, which were mostly quite sound, but with his character, which was mercurial and erratic, and lacked the tenacity and pragmatism needed to implement his schemes successfully. In this, the contrast between Muhammad and Ala-ud-din, the other great radical reformer sultan of Delhi, could not have been greater. While Ala-ud-din was a pragmatist, motivated solely by practical considerations, Muhammad was a fantasist, who was motivated more by the excitement of his whimsies than by expediency. Muhammad was impulsive, while Ala-ud-din was deliberate and calculating. So while Ala-ud-din succeeded in almost all his reforms, Muhammad failed in everything. In nearly every case the result that Muhammad got out of his projects was the exact opposite of what he hoped for.