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

THE BAHMANI KINGDOM had in all eighteen sultans in its 180-year long history, though its last five sultans were mere figureheads. The kingdom was founded during the political turmoil of the closing years of the reign of Muhammad Tughluq, when several of his provincial chieftains rebelled against him and founded independent kingdoms. One such chieftain was Hasan Gangu, who seized control of Daulatabad and set himself up as an independent ruler there. On his investiture he took the title Ab’ul Muzaffar Ala-ud-din Bahman Shah, so the kingdom he founded came to be known as the Bahmani Sultanate.

There is considerable uncertainty about Hasan’s background. According to a fascinating but improbable story told by Ferishta, Hasan was originally a farm labourer, who one day, while ploughing his master’s field on the outskirts of Delhi, dug up a copper pot full of gold coins, and he dutifully took it to the landlord, a Brahmin named Gangu. And Gangu, awestruck by Hasan’s probity, took him to the sultan, who then rewarded him by appointing him a captain in his army. The Brahmin then predicted, on the basis of the astrological calculations he made, that Hasan would one day become a king. And this destiny Hasan eventually fulfilled.

Other medieval sources tell a less romantic but more vaunting story, and trace Hasan’s ancestry to the ancient Persian king Bahman. Ferishta however dismisses this story as a fabrication by the sycophantic courtiers of the sultan. ‘I believe his origin was too obscure to be traced,’ Ferishta states, and goes on to assert that Hasan took the appellation Bahman as a ‘compliment to his former master … the Brahmin, a word often pronounced as Bahman. The king himself was by birth an Afghan.’

Hasan ascended the throne in August 1347 and ruled for eleven years. A short while after his accession he shifted his capital from Daulatabad to the southern city of Gulbarga, presumably to be further away from Delhi. Over the next few years he consolidated his position by launching a number of military campaigns, to subdue refractory chieftains, to expand his territory, to exact tribute, and to seize plunder and war materials. The perennial conflict between the Bahmani Sultanate and the Vijayanagar kingdom also began during the reign of Hasan, in the very second year of his reign. This was followed by another clash five years later. The results of these campaigns are given differently by the two kingdoms, each claiming victory over the other. However that may be, by the end of Hasan’s reign the Bahmani Sultanate covered a fairly large area in central Deccan, from the Tungabhadra northward up to the Penganga, and from the Telingana Plateau westward up to the Arabian Sea, covering parts of Marathi, Kannada and Telugu linguistic regions. Hasan regarded his military achievements to be grand enough for him to assume the title Second Alexander and stamp it on his coins, probably in imitation of Ala-ud-din Khalji.

HASAN DIED IN 1358, aged 67, after a prolonged illness, and was succeeded by his eldest son Muhammad Shah I. Muhammad’s mettle was tested right at the beginning of his reign by the Hindu kingdoms of Warangal and Vijayanagar, each impudently demanding that he should surrender certain territories to it. Muhammad met that insolence with an even greater insolence on his part, by treating the two rajas as his vassals, and accusing them of neglecting to send him, their overlord, the customary presents on his accession. He then demanded that they should therefore send to him, in reparation for their discourtesy, all their elephants loaded with treasures. Warangal’s response to this was to send an army to seize the territory it demanded from the sultan. But the raja was defeated in the ensuing battle, and he had to purchase peace by sending to the sultan a large quantity of gold coins and several war elephants. The peace between them did not however last long, and hostilities between the two kingdoms broke out again and again in the following years. The raja was the loser in all those battles, and he had to surrender to the sultan the fortress of Golconda, and even his treasured turquoise throne, which thereafter became the throne of the Bahmani kings.

Bukka, the Vijayanagar king, too had no success against Muhammad. The raja invaded the Raichur Doab soon after Muhammad’s accession, hoping to annex that rich region to his kingdom. But on Muhammad’s impetuous advance against him, Bukka, ‘not withstanding his vast army consisting of 30,000 cavalry, besides infantry,’ hastily retreated, reports Ferishta. But the raja left behind a good part of his camp, presumably to entice the enemy soldiers to plunder the camp, and thus distract them from pouncing on him. The Bahmani army then, according to Ferishta, swept into the defenceless camp, and ‘put to death, without distinction, men, women, children, free and slave, to the number of 70,000 souls.’

The sultan then crossed the Tungabhadra into Vijayanagar territory. Meanwhile Bukka reassembled his scattered forces and turned to confront Muhammad. The ensuing battle was hard-fought and lasted from dawn till evening, in which the Bahmani army suffered heavy losses. Its wings were routed early on and their commanders killed, but its centre held, and in the end it prevailed over the Vijayanagar army by the effective use of its artillery — manned by European and Middle Eastern gunners — and by the headlong charge of its cavalry. Bukka then retreated into the fortified city of Vijayanagar. Muhammad did not have the means to storm the city, so he turned to ravage the countryside, indulging in unconscionable, indiscriminate slaughter of thousands and thousands of people.

This carnage forced Bukka to sue for peace. During the ensuing peace negotiations, the Vijayanagar envoys expostulated with the sultan about the slaughter of civilians by his army. ‘No religion requires the innocent to be punished for the crimes of the guilty, more especially helpless women and children,’ they submitted. They then suggested that since Bahmani and Vijayanagar kingdoms were likely to remain neighbours for many generations, it would be desirable that ‘a treaty should be made between them not to slaughter helpless and unarmed inhabitants in future battles.’ Muhammad, according to Ferishta, was ‘struck with the good sense of this proposal, [and he] took an oath that he would not thereafter put to death a single enemy after a victory, and would also bind his successors to observe the same line of conduct. From that time to this, it has been the general custom in the Deccan to spare the lives of prisoners of war, and not to shed the blood of an enemy’s unarmed subjects.’

Unfortunately, this humane undertaking was not kept up by Muhammad’s successors, or by the Vijayanagar rajas. Pillaging and slaughtering the common people wantonly was the routine rather than the exception in medieval Indian wars, and neither Bahmani nor Vijayanagar would ever altogether cease committing such excesses.

Muhammad himself however maintained peace in the latter years of his reign. His focus during this period was on improving the administration of the Sultanate and on promoting culture. He made several changes in the administrative system of the Sultanate, and gave his provincial governors a great amount of autonomy, but ensured their discipline and subordination by regularly touring through the provinces. He also took care to improve the law and order in the state, and is said to have secured its roads by executing some 20,000 brigands. In the field of culture, Muhammad’s patronage turned Gulbarga into a major centre of culture and learning in India. And it was under his patronage that Deccani architecture acquired its distinctive style, as in the great mosque he built in Gulbarga.

Muhammad died in 1375, and was buried beside his father. ‘He was,’ comments Ferishta, ‘respected in his life, and after his death remembered on account of his virtues.’ And on his tomb was engraved this solacing aphorism: ‘All is vanity!’