The Age of Wrath: A History of the Delhi Sultanate (32 page)

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!’

MUHAMMAD WAS SUCCEEDED by his son Ala-ud-din Mujahid, a handsome man of awesome physical prowess. But he was ill-fated, for after a brief reign of three years he was assassinated by his cousin Daud, who then ascended the throne. But Daud himself was assassinated within a few weeks by Ala-ud-din’s partisans, who then raised Daud’s brother, Muhammad, to the throne. The reign of Muhammad II was largely peaceful and lasted nineteen years. He was a rather unusual ruler for that age and place, for he was a learned man—lauded as an Aristotle by his courtiers—and a man of peace and culture, who showed a genuine concern for the welfare of his subjects, such as providing famine relief—though only for Muslims—and by establishing several orphanages and free schools.

Muhammad II was succeeded by his eldest son Ghiyas-ud-din, a seventeen-year-old youth, but he was blinded and overthrown within two months by Tughalchin, the chief of the Turkish slaves in the royal service, who then raised the sultan’s younger brother Shams-ud-din to the throne. But the arrangement lasted only five months, as the new sultan in turn was blinded and overthrown by his cousin Firuz Shah, who then ascended the throne.

The quarter-century-long reign of Firuz was the most engaging period in the history of the Bahmani Sultanate. Firuz, like his uncle Muhammad II, was a highly cultured, talented and liberal monarch. He was a linguist and
a gifted calligrapher, and a keen and knowledgeable patron of literature, art and music, who delighted in the company of writers and intellectuals. A keen student of astronomy, he had to his credit the building of a major observatory near Daulatabad.

According to medieval chronicler Tabataba, Firuz was ‘a good, just, generous king, who supported himself by copying the Koran, and the ladies of whose harem used to support themselves by embroidering garments and selling them.’ This is quite probably an idealized account. The reality would not have been quite so edifying. Still, there is no doubt that Firuz was a highly successful monarch, who had substantial accomplishments to his credit in nearly every sphere of government. Ferishta describes him as the greatest of the Bahmani kings.

In administration, Firuz had the wisdom and broadmindedness to appoint a good number of Hindus, particularly Brahmins, to high positions in government, and that no doubt improved the efficiency of his administration. Firuz was equally successful in his military campaigns. For three decades since Muhammad Shah’s invasion of Vijayanagar in 1367, there had been no major military conflict between the two Deccani kingdoms, but the wars resumed in earnest during the reign of Firuz. The aggressor this time was king Harihara II of Vijayanagar, who in 1398 invaded the Raichur Doab with a mammoth army of about 30,000 cavalry and 900,000 infantry. Advancing north through the Doab, he deployed his forces along the southern bank of the Krishna, his army covering a vast area measuring roughly 27-by-27 kilometres, according to medieval Muslim chroniclers. The size of the Vijayanagar army, and the land area it covered, are no doubt vastly exaggerated by these writers, to glorify the victory of their hero over such immense odds. In contrast to the vast Vijayanagar horde, the Bahmani army deployed against it is said to have been a cavalry force of just 12,000.

WHATEVER THE ACTUAL strength of the rival forces, Firuz would have had only a much smaller army than that of Harihara. In the face of the massive deployment of the Vijayanagar army along the Krishna riverbank it would have been suicidal for the Sultanate army to cross the river and engage the enemy. Some means therefore had to be found to divert the attention of the Vijayanagar forces, to enable the Sultanate army to cross the river safely. In that predicament one of Firuz’s officers suggested a clever stratagem to him. This officer, Siraj-ud-din, was an expert juggler, and was also proficient in music and dance, and he offered to infiltrate into the Vijayanagar camp with a small troupe of followers in the guise of wandering minstrels, and cause some turmoil there, taking advantage of which Firuz could then cross the river and surprise the enemy, it was suggested.

The plan worked out perfectly. Siraj-ud-din and a band of two dozen companions entered the periphery of the Vijayanagar camp one day, and gradually, over several days, gained such a high esteem as entertainers that they were summoned to perform before Harihara’s son in the army camp. That the entertainers were Muslims roused no suspicion, for the Vijayanagar army itself had a good many Muslim soldiers and officers in it. On receiving the prince’s invitation, Siraj-ud-din sent a secret message to Firuz informing him of the developments and requesting him to be ready to cross the river and attack the Vijayanagar army during the chaos he would cause in their camp.

As usual, Siraj-ud-din’s performance was given at night, and it involved, among several other items, a display of startling skills with sword and dagger. As the prince and his cohorts relaxed watching the show, Siraj-ud-din and his comrades suddenly pounced on them and cut them down, then killed the royal bodyguards, and, in the ensuing confusion, escaped from the camp. Soon, as the news of the incident spread, and along with it several fantastic rumours, the Vijayanagar camp was thrown into utter turmoil. Taking advantage of this, the Bahmani army crossed the Krishna, and at dawn stormed into the Vijayanagar camp. Harihara, grieving over the death of his son, and faced with the disorder in his camp, was in no position to stand and fight, so he quickly withdrew to Vijayanagar, his capital, carrying his son’s body with him. Firuz chased him in hot pursuit, plundering the countryside all along the way, and this forced Harihara to purchase peace from Firuz by paying him a very substantial indemnity.

After this, Firuz was for a while engaged in campaigns in the north of his kingdom, to consolidate his power. Then he once again turned against Vijayanagar. There is an engaging romantic legend associated with this campaign. The story centres on Parthal, the stunningly beautiful daughter of a poor goldsmith in Mudgal, a town in the Raichur Doab. On hearing about her great beauty, Devaraya I, who had succeeded Harihara to the throne of Vijayanagar, demanded her for his harem. But the girl declined the proposal. So Devaraya, enraged, swept into the Doab with a small contingent of 5000 horse, and sent a band of his soldiers to abduct the girl. But by the time the soldiers reached Mudgal, the girl and her parents had fled north across the Krishna, so the contingent vented its frustration by pillaging the region before returning to Vijayanagar. Parthal was eventually married to Firuz’s son, Hasan Khan.

FIRUZ USED DEVARAYA’S intrusion into the Raichur Doab as an excuse to mount a fresh invasion into Vijayanagar. In the ensuing battle, fought beside the city of Vijayanagar, Firuz was defeated by Devaraya, and he himself was wounded. He then fell back to his fortified camp some distance away from the city, where he was able to defend himself successfully against Devaraya’s
repeated attacks. He in turn then sent his soldiers to ravage and despoil the countryside all around. Devaraya then, to protect his people, sent envoys to Firuz to arrange peace, and it was concluded on the terms dictated by Firuz, under which Devaraya agreed to pay a huge sum as indemnity to the sultan, and also to give him a daughter in marriage with suitable endowments.

Ferishta offers a detailed account of the marriage, which throws interesting sidelights on the social practices of the age. According to Ferishta, ‘though the rajas of Carnatic had never yet married their daughters except to persons of their own caste, and giving them to strangers was highly disgraceful, yet Devaraya, out of necessity, complied [with the demand of Firuz], and preparations for celebrating the nuptials were made by both parties … [By then] both sides of the road between [Vijayanagar] city and the sultan’s camp … were lined with shops and booths, in which jugglers, buffoons, dancers, and mimics of Carnatic displayed their feats and skill to amuse passengers.’

The princess was then ceremoniously taken to the sultan’s camp, where presumably a Muslim marriage ceremony was performed. A few days after the marriage, the sultan along with his bride set out for Vijayanagar, to visit the raja. On the way the couple were formally received by the raja, and he escorted them to the city with great pomp. ‘From the gate of the city to the palace, a distance of six miles, the road was spread with cloth of gold, velvet, satin, and other rich stuffs. The two kings rode on horseback together, between ranks of beautiful boys and girls, who waved plates of gold filled with incense and silver flowers … Upon their arrival at the palace gate, the sultan and the raja dismounted from their horses and moved into a splendid palanquin, set with valuable jewels, and in it they were carried together to the apartments prepared for the reception of the bride and bridegroom … The sultan, after being treated with royal magnificence for three days, took his leave of the raja, who pressed upon him richer presents than given previously, and accompanied him for four miles on his way, and then returned to the city.’ Firuz had expected the raja to accompany him all the way to his camp, and was upset that he did not do this, so the enmity between the two persisted.

FIRUZ WAS IN many ways an admirable ruler, sagacious, spirited and enterprising. But he was also addicted to carnal indulgences. He drank heavily, perhaps for relief from his many onerous duties, and he is said to have maintained a harem of 800 women of different nationalities. This self-indulgent lifestyle eventually ruined his health and he became, as Wolseley Haig puts it, ‘a jaded and feeble voluptuary.’ In the end, being no longer able to function effectively as a ruler, he was forced to abdicate the throne in favour of his brother Ahmad. This was in September 1422. Firuz died the following month—or was probably strangled or poisoned, according to some sources.

Ahmad was in every respect quite unlike his suave brother, and was rather rustic in his outlook and lifestyle. But he was considered a saint—he was in fact called
vali
(saint) by the common people—and was given to ostentatious displays of his saintly powers. Thus, when the kingdom was once ravaged by a severe drought, he devoutly climbed to the top of a hill near his capital, and there, before the awed eyes of the assembled multitudes, prayed for rain—and indeed rain clouds presently appeared scudding over the horizon, and there was a heavy downpour.

Saint or not, Ahmad was as aggressive and brutal towards his neighbours as any other Bahmani sultan, and he waged several successful wars against them—against Warangal, Malwa, Gujarat, and, as usual, against Vijayanagar, which was the perennial adversary of Bahmani sultans. Ahmad’s very first military campaign, right after his accession, was against Vijayanagar. For this, he led an army of 40,000 cavalry, and encamped on the northern bank of the Tungabhadra at his chosen ford, preparing to invade Vijayanagar. Devaraya II, the king of Vijayanagar, countered that move by assembling, on the southern bank of the river, an immense force of about a million soldiers, consisting of cavalry, infantry and gunners. That blocking deployment of the Vijayanagar army made it far too risky for the sultan to attempt to cross the river there. He therefore sent a contingent of his army at night some distance upstream, to cross the river secretly and suddenly fall on the rear of the Vijayanagar army. This surprise attack threw the Vijayanagar army into disarray, taking advantage of which the main body of the Bahmani army crossed the river, engaged the enemy in battle, and routed it.

What followed was unprecedented even in the history of the savage wars between these two kingdoms. ‘Ahmad Shah … overran the open country, and wherever he went, he put to death men, women and children, without mercy,’ writes Ferishta. ‘Wherever the number of the slain amounted to 20,000, he halted for three days, and made a festival in celebration of the bloody event.’ It was as if Ahmad meant to exterminate a whole people. He also destroyed the Hindu temples he came across along the way, and deliberately slaughtered very many cows, to outrage and mortify Hindus. Leaving thus a trail of wanton destruction and senseless carnage, Ahmad advanced on Vijayanagar city. There the raja, Devaraya II, appalled by the woes of his subjects, purchased peace by paying a substantial tribute to the sultan. And Ahmad, to heap on the raja an abject humiliation on top of his shame of military rout, insisted that he should be escorted part of the way into the Sultanate by the raja’s son. The raja had no alternative but to comply. Fortunately for Vijayanagar, this was the only war that Ahmad waged against it.