These continuous jihad campaigns were accompanied by great destruction and acts of wanton cruelty. Utbi describes the slaughter which transpired during the attacks on Thanesar and Sirsawa:

The chief of Thanesar was…obstinate in his infidelity and denial of Allah, so the Sultan marched against him with his valiant warriors for the purpose of planting the standards of Islam and extirpating idolatry… The blood of the infidels flowed so copiously that the stream was discoloured, and people were unable to drink it… Praise be to Allah… for the honour he bestows upon Islam and Musalmans. [17]
 
[at Sirsawa] The Sultan summoned the most religiously disposed of his followers, and ordered them to attack the enemy immediately. Many infidels were consequently slain or taken prisoners in this sudden attack, and the Musalmans paid no regard to the booty till they had satiated themselves with the slaughter of the infidels… The friends of Allah searched the bodies of the slain for three whole days, in order to obtain booty [18]

Mahmud’s final well-known expedition in Hindustan, to Somanath in 1025 C.E., was similarly brutal, and destructive:

Mahmud captured the place [Somanath] without much difficulty and ordered a general slaughter in which more than 50,000 persons are said to have perished. The idol of Somanath was broken to pieces which were sent to Ghazni, Mecca, and Medina and cast in streets and the staircases of chief mosques to be trodden by the Muslims going there for their prayers [19]

Over 900 years apart, remarkably concordant assessments of Mahmud’s devastating exploits have been written by the renowned 11th century Muslim scholar Alberuni (a counselor to Mahmud), and the contemporary Indian historian A.L. Srivastava. First Alberuni, from about 1030 C.E.: [20]

Mahmud utterly ruined the prosperity of the country…by which the Hindus became like atoms of dust scattered in all directions, and like a tale of old in the mouth of the people. Their scattered remains cherish of course the most inveterate aversion towards all Muslims. This is the reason too why Hindu sciences have retired far away from those parts of the country conquered by us, and have fled to places which our hand cannot yet reach, to Kashmir, Benares, and other places.

Srivastava in 1950, wrote: [21]

To the Indian world of his day Mahmud was a veritable devil incarnate- a daring bandit, an avaricious plunderer, and wanton destroyer of Art. He plundered many dozens of…flourishing cities; he razed to the ground great temples which were wonderful works of art; he carried thousands of innocent women and children into slavery; he indulged in wanton massacre practically everywhere he went; and…he forcibly converted hundred of…unwilling people to Islam. A conqueror who leaves behind desolate towns and villages and dead bodies of innocent human beings cannot be remembered by posterity by any other title.

K.S. Lal believes that by the late 12th century, Muhammad Ghauri was consummately prepared for the conquest and rule of India. Well-elaborated theological justifications for jihad, and comprehensive writings on India’s geography and sociopolitical culture were readily available to him, complementing his powerful army of Turks, Persians, and Afghans.

He now possessed Alberuni’s India and Burhanuddin’s Hidayah, works which were not available to his predecessor invader. Alberuni’s enecyclopedic work provided to the Islamic world in the eleventh century all that was militarily advantageous to know about India. Equally important was the Hidayah, the most authentic work on the laws of Islam compiled by Shaikh Burhanuddin Ali in the twelfth century. These and similar works, and the military manuals like the Siyasat Nama and Adab-ul-Harb, made the Ghauris and their successors better equipped for the conquest and governance of non-Muslim India. There need be no doubt that such works were made available, meticulously studied and constantly referred to by scholars attached to the courts of Muslim conquerors and kings. [22]

Muhammad Ghauri launched his first expeditions against Multan and Gujarat (in 1175 and 1178 C.E., respectively). By 1191-92 C.E., following Ghauri’s defeat of a Rajput confederation under Prithviraj Chauhan (and Prithviraj Chauhan’s death),

Sirsuti, Samana, Kuhram, and Hansi were captured in quick succession with ruthless slaughter and a general destruction of temples, and their replacement by mosques. The Sultan then proceeded to Ajmer which too witnessed similar scenes. In Delhi an army of occupation was stationed at Indraprastha under the command of Qutub-ud-din Aibak who was to act as Ghauri’s lieutenant in Hindustan. Later on Aibak became the first Sultan of Delhi  [23]

Qutub-ud-din Aibak’s accession in 1206 (consistent with Muhammad Ghauri’s desires and plans), marks the founding of the Delhi Sultanate.

Finally, the imposition of Islamic law upon the Hindu populations of India, i.e., their relegation to dhimmi status, beginning with the advent of Muslim rule in 8th century Sindh, had predictable consequences during both the Delhi Sultanate period (1206-1526 C.E.), and the Mughal Empire (1526-1707 C.E.). A.L. Srivastava highlights these germane features of Hindu status during the Delhi Sultanate: [24]

Throughout the period of the Sultanate of Delhi, Islam was the religion of the State. It was considered to be the duty of the Sultan and his government to defend and uphold the principles of this religion and to propagate them among the masses…even the most enlightened among them [the Sultans], like Muhammad bin Tughlaq, upheld the principles of their faith and refused permission to repair Hindu (or Buddhist) temples…Thus even during the reign of the so-called liberal-minded Sultans, the Hindus had no permission to build new temples or to repair old ones. Throughout the period, they were known as dhimmis, that is, people living under guarantee, and the guarantee was that they would enjoy restricted freedom in following their religion if they paid the jizya. The dhimmis were not to celebrate their religious rites openly…and never to do any propaganda on behalf of their religion. A number of disabilities were imposed upon them in matters of State employment and enjoyment of civic rights…It was a practice with the Sultans to destroy the Hindu temples and images therein. Firoz Tughlaq and Sikander Lodi prohibited Hindus from bathing at the ghats [river bank steps for ritual bathers] in the sacred rivers, and encouraged them in every possible way to embrace the Muslim religion. The converts were exempted from the jizya and given posts in the State service and even granted rewards in cash, or by grant of land. In short, there was not only no real freedom for the Hindus to follow their religion, but the state followed a policy of intolerance and persecution. The contemporary Muslim chronicles abound in detailed descriptions of desecration of images and destruction of temples and of the conversion of hundreds and thousands of the Hindus. [Hindu] religious buildings and places bear witness to the iconoclastic zeal of the Sultans and their followers. One has only to visit Ajmer, Mathura, Ayodhya, Banaras and other holy cities to see the half broken temples and images of those times with their heads, faces, hands and feet defaced and demolished.

Majumdar sees a continuum between the Delhi Sultanate and the subsequent Mughal Empire, regarding the status of the Hindus: [25]

So far as the Hindus were concerned, there was no improvement either in their material and moral conditions or in their relations with the Muslims. With the sole exception of Akbar, who sought to conciliate the Hindus by removing some of the glaring evils to which they were subjected, almost all other Mughal Emperors were notorious for their religious bigotry. The Muslim law which imposed many disabilities and indignities upon the Hindus…and thereby definitely gave them an inferior social and political status, as compared to the Muslims, was followed by these Mughal Emperors (and other Muslim rulers) with as much zeal as was displayed by their predecessors, the Sultans of Delhi. The climax was reached during the reign of Aurangzeb, who deliberately pursued the policy of destroying and desecrating Hindu temples and idols with a thoroughness unknown before or since.

Majumdar also makes this interesting juxtaposition of Hindu cultural advancement under the lengthy period of Muslim colonial rule, compared to the much shorter interval of British colonial rule: [26]

Judged by a similar standard, the patronage and cultivation of Hindu learning by the Muslims, or their contribution to the development of Hindu culture during their rule…pales into insignificance when compared with the achievements of the British rule…It is only by instituting such comparison that we can make an objective study of the condition of the Hindus under Muslim rule, and view it in its true perspective.

Andrew Bostom is an Associate Professor of Medicine, and the author of the forthcoming The Legacy of Jihad on Prometheus Books (2005).

Notes

[1] Jadunath Sarkar “The Condition of Hindus under Muslim Rule”, The Hindusthan Standard, Calcutta,  Puja Annual (Deepavali special) 1950.
[2] A.L. Srivastava. “A Survey of India’s Resistance to Medieval Invaders from the North-West: Causes of Eventual Hindu Defeat”, Journal of Indian History, 1965, pp. 349-350.
[3] A.L. Srivastava., The Sultanate of Delhi (711-1526 A.D.) , Agra, 1950, p.127; R.C. Majumdar (editor). The History and Culture of the Indian People, Vol. 6, The Sultanate of Delhi, Bombay, 1960, p.xxiii, states, for example, with regard to the Delhi Sultanate:

The popular notion that after the conquest of Muhammad Ghauri, India formed a Muslim Empire under various dynasties, is hardly borne out by facts…barring the two very short lived empires under the Khaljis and Muhammad bin Tughlaq which lasted respectively, for less than twenty and ten years, there was no Turkish empire of India. The Delhi Sultanate, as the symbol of this empire, continued in name throughout the period under review [i.e., 1206-1526] but, gradually shorn of power and prestige, it was reduced to a phantom by the invasion of Timur at the end of the fourteenth century A.D.

For discussions of the limits of the Mughal Empire, see: A.L. Srivastava.,The History of India (1000 A.D- 1707 A.D.), Agra, 1964, pp. 674-676; and K.S. Lal. Indian Muslims-Who Are They? , New Delhi, 1990, pp. 122-123, 127, 136-137.
[4] Baburnama. Translated by A.S. Beveridge, Lahore, Sangmeel Publications (reprint), 1976, pp. 484,518.
[5] Vincent Smith, The Oxford History of India, Oxford, 1928, p. 221.
[6] Al-Baladhuri. The Origins of the Islamic State (Kitab Futuh Al-Buldan). Part II, Translated by F.C. Murgotten, New York, Columbia University, 1924, pp. 217-224; Al-Kufi. The Chachnama, excerpts translated in H.M. Elliot and J. Dowson. A History of India As Told By Its Own Historians-The Muhammadan Period, 1867-1877 (reprinted 2001, Delhi), Vol. 1, pp. 157-211.
[7] Al-Baladhuri. The Origins of the Islamic State, Part II, p. 218.
[8] R.C. Majumdar (editor). The History and Culture of the Indian People, Vol. 3, The Classical Age, Bombay, 1954, p. 458.
[9] Majumdar, The Classical Age, pp. 458-459.
[10] From a translation of Ziauddin Barani's Fatawa-i Jahandari, circa, 1358-9 C.E., in Mohammad Habib. The political theory of the Delhi sultanate., Allahabad, Kitab Mahal, 1961, pp. 46-47.
[11] Chachnama, Elliot and Dowson, pp. 173-174.
[12] Majumdar, The Classical Age, pp. 460.
[13] Majumdar, The Classical Age, pp. 461-462.
[14] Elliot and Dowson, Vol. II, Appendix Note D, pp. 434-484.
[15] Srivastava. The Sultanate of Delhi, p. 52.
[16] K.S. Lal. The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India, New Delhi, Aditya Prakashan, 1992, pp. 96-97
[17] Elliot and Dowson, Vol. II, 40-41.
[18] Elliot and Dowson, Vol. II, 49.
[19] Srivastava. The Sultanate of Delhi, p. 59.
[20] Alberuni. Alberuni’s India- An Account of the Religion, Philosophy, Literature, Geography, Chronology, Astronomy, Customs, Laws, and Astrology of India (about 1030 C.E), Edited by E.C. Sachau, 1888 (reprinted New Delhi, 1993), p. 22.
[21] Srivastava. The Sultanate of Delhi, p. 61-62.
[22] K.S. Lal. Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India, New Delhi, Aditya Prakashan, 1999, pp.20-21.
[23] Lal. Muslim State in India, p. 21
[24] Srivastava. The Sultanate of Delhi, pp. 304-305.
[25] R.C. Majumdar (editor) The Mughul Empire, Bombay, 1974, p. xi.
[26] Majumdar Vol. 6, The Sultanate of Delhi, p. 623

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