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THE DELHI SULTANAT
Iltutmish, the son-in-law of Qutbuddin Aibak succeeded him. Thus, the principle of heredity of son succeeding his father was checked at the outset.
Iltutmish is regarded as the real consolidator of the Turkish conquests in north India.
Iltutmish considered none of his surviving sons to be worthy of the throne. Thus, he nominated his daughter Raziya to the throne.
Razia had to contend against her brothers as well as against the nobles and could rule only for three years.
Razi’s rule marked the beginning of a struggle for power between the monarchy and the Turkish chiefs, sometimes called ‘ the forty ‘ or the
Razia always appeared in public on an elephant, not on a horse.
Turkish chief, Ulugh Khan, was known as Balban.
Balban stood forth as the champion of the Turkish nobility. He refused to entertain for government posts anyone who did not belong to a noble family. This virtually meant the exclusion of Indian Muslims from all positions of power and authority.
Balban adopted a policy of ‘ blood and iron ‘ to deal with law and order situation such as robbery, those defying the government, etc.
To emphasise that the nobles were not his equals, he insisted on the ceremony of sijada and paibos (prostration and kissing the monarch’s feet ). The practices were un-islamic.
On account of its natural boundaries, India has been safeguarded during most of its history from external invasions. It was only in the northwest that India was vulnerable.
Changez Khan, the Mongol leader, called himself “ the scourge of God”.
The Mongols deliberately used terror as an instrument of war. Mongol onslaught had serious repercussions on the Sulatant of Delhi. Many princes and large numbers of scholars, theologians, learned men flocked to Delhi. As the only remaining Muslim state in the area, the Delhi Sulatant became the centre of Islam.
The Mongol threat to India appeared in 1221. Although Changez loitered near the river Indus, he decided not to cross into India, preferring to give his attention to conquering the remaining portions of the Khwarizmi empire in Iran.
Iltutmish tried to appease the Mongols by refusing a request from Jalaluddin for asylum. However, Jalaluddin remained for sometime in the area between Lahore and Sutlej. This resulted in a series of Mongol attacks. The river Indus ceased to be India’s western boundary.
Till 1240, the Mongols desisted from making any encroachments in India beyond the river Indus. The major reason for this was the Mongol pre-occupation with Iraq and Syria.
In 1299, for the first time, the Mongols had launched a serious campaign to establish their rule over Delhi. However, Mongols had to retreat. The Mongols now ceased to be a threat to India, till a new conqueror, Timur, unified the Mongols.
Thus, for the entire 13th century, the Sultanat of Delhi had to face a serious danger from the northwest.
Jajnagar was in Orissa, Tirhut in north Bengal, Kamrup in Assam.
Bengal and Bihar remained outside the control of Delhi during greater part of the 13th
The Khaljis were a mix of Turkish-Afghan origin.
The rise of Khaljis to power ended the Turkish monopoly of high offices, though Turks were not excluded from high offices.
Jalaluddin Khilji was the first ruler of the Delhi Sultanat to clearly put forward the view that the state should be based on the willing support of the governed, and that since the large majority of the people in India were Hindus, the state in India could not be a truly Islamic state.
Although the Tughlaqs continued to rule till 1412, the invasion of Delhi by Timur in 1398 may be said to mark the end of the Tughlaq empire.
The Turkish rulers had strong reasons for coveting Malwa and Gujarat. Not only were these areas fertile and populous, they controlled the western sea-ports and the trade routes connecting them with the Ganga valley. The overseas trade from Gujarat ports brought in a lot of gold and silver. Further, control of Gujarat could secure them a better control over the supply of horses to their armies.
Malik Muhammad Jaisi was a Hindi poet.
Allauddin sought to fix the cost of all commodities from foodgrains to a needle. For this purpose he set up three markets at Delhi. Each market was under control of an officer called shahna.
The Mongol invasions of Delhi had pinpointed the need to raise a large army to check them. But such an army would soon exhaust his treasures unless he could lower the prices, and hence lower their salaries. To realise this objective, Allauddin sought to fix the cost of all commodities.
The peasants were forced to sell their foodgrains at a low price to banjaras who were to carry them to the towns, and to sell them at prices fixed by the state.
The position of the supply of horses had improved as a result the conquest of Gujarat.
The prices of cattles and slaves are mentioned side by side by Barani. This shows that slavery was accepted in medieval India as a normal feature.
Alauddin paid his soldiers in cash instead of land revenue. He was the first sultan in the Sultanat to do so.
Apart from the control of the market, Alauddin took important steps in the field of land revenue administration. He was the first monarch in the Sultanat who insisted that land revenue would be assessed on the basis of measuring the land under cultivation.
The most controversial step which Muhammad Tughlaq undertook soon after his accession was the so-called transfer of the capital from Delhi to Deogir.
He wanted to make Deogir, 1500 km away from Delhi, a second capital so that he might be able to control south India better. For this purpose, he ordered many of the oficers and their followers and leading men, including Sufi saints to shift to Deogir which was later named Daulatabad. No attempt was made to shift the rest of the population.
After a couple of years, he decided to abandon Daulatabad as he could not control north India from Daulatabad.
He introdcued a ‘ token curency ‘ as there was shortage of silver. He also introduced a bronze coin which was to have the same value as the silver However, later he withdrew both these decisions as these turned to be failure.
The Moroccan traveller, Ibn Battuta, came to Delhi in 1333.
The line formed by the Hindukush and Qandahar has been called the ‘scientific frontier’.
The Qarachil expedition was launched by Tughlaq in the Kumaon hills in the Himalayas was aimed at Kashmir in order to control the entry of horses from the Chinese side.
Muqaddams was the term used for village headmen.
Plague broke out in the army of Muhammad Tughlaq due to which two-thirds of his army perished. Tughlaq could not recover from this blow.
Vijayanagara empire was set up by Harihara and Bukka in south India.
In Deccan, some foreign nobles set up the Bahmani kingdom.
Firuz Tughlaq made the position of nobles hereditary. He extend the principle of heredity to the army as well.
The weakness of the Delhi Sultanat was made even worse by Timur’s invasion of Delhi in 1398.
Timur was a Turk but claimed a blood relationship with Changez.
Timur also took with him a large number of Indian artisans, such as masons, stone cutter, carpenters, etc.
The invasion of Timur may be regarded as marking the end of the phase of strong rule by the Delhi sultans, although the Tughlaq dynasty itself lingered on till 1412.
