At about the same time, another group from central India travelled west, across the Middle East, to Europe. We know them today as the Gypsies or the Roma. The link between the Roma and India has long been debated on linguistic and cultural grounds, but genetic studies have now confirmed it. 9 We do not know why this group left the subcontinent, but it is possible that they were a group of stranded soldiers from the Gujara–Pratihara armies fighting the Turks and Arabs in Sindh. Alternatively, they may have always been a nomadic group that the circumstances of history caused to drift ever westwards. In 1971, at the World Romani Conference near London, the Roma adopted a blue and green flag for their nomadic nation. At the centre of the flag, they placed a wheel—the symbol of the Chakravartin. In some ways, the Roma have the greatest claim to this symbol, for their wheels can truly roll in all directions.
Of course, the exchange of goods, people and ideas was not just with the outside world. There was a great deal of internal exchange, with several examples of how ideas emanating from one part of India spread quickly across the rest of the country during this period. The eighth-century philosopher Adi Shankaracharya, for instance, was from Kerala in the extreme south, but he travelled all over the country. His ideas would become very influential across the subcontinent and beyond.
Similarly, the Shakti tradition associated with the worship of Goddess Durga and her incarnations originated in ancient times in the eastern provinces of Bengal and Assam. However, by the medieval period, the distribution of the fifty-two shakti-peeths 10 (i.e. pilgrimage sites related to this tradition) came to be spread across the subcontinent—from Kamakhya in Assam to Hinglaj in Baluchistan, and from Jwalamukhi in Himachal Pradesh to Jaffna in Sri Lanka. There are even Shakti temples in South East Asia. The ninth-century Prambanan temple complex in central Java, Indonesia, has a shrine dedicated to the Goddess Durga slaying the demon Mahishasura. The exquisitely carved idol would not look out of place, twelve centuries later, at the annual Durga Puja festival in modern Kolkata.
THE TURKIC INVASIONS
In many ways, life in the subcontinent till the beginning of the eleventh century remained more or less a continuation of earlier times. Maritime trade continued to flourish in the southern ports even as foreign scholars continued to flock to Nalanda to study. There had been changes in architecture, technology and style, but the cities of the subcontinent would have been broadly familiar to a visitor from a thousand years earlier. However, the country was about to experience a major shift.
In the late tenth century, waves of Turkic invasions began to erode the Hindu–Buddhist kingdoms of Afghanistan. In 963 AD, the Turks captured the strategically important town of Ghazni. From there they steadily ate away at the Hindu Shahi kingdom of Kabul and pushed them into Punjab. The Shahis doggedly fought back for decades but, on 27 November 1001, they were routed by Mahmud of Ghazni in a battle near Peshawar. The Shahi king Jayapala was so distraught that he abdicated in favour of his son and committed suicide by climbing on to his own funeral pyre. 11 The Shahis would continue to fight the Turks, but they were now a spent force.
Over the next quarter-century, Mahmud would make seventeen raids into India, many of them directed at wealthy temple towns such as Mathura and Nagarkot. His most infamous raid was against the temple of Somnath, Gujarat, in 1026 AD. It is said that this single attack left over fifty thousand of its defenders dead and yielded twenty million dirhams worth of gold, silver and gems. Although the Somnath temple would be destroyed and rebuilt many times, it is the raid of Mahmud Ghazni that is still remembered most vividly.
The temple that stands on the site today was built in the early 1950s. Its symbolic importance can be gauged from the fact that its reconstruction was one of the first major projects initiated by the Indian Republic. Standing right on the seashore, the temple is a wonderful place to watch the sun set even as the sound of the evening ‘arati’ drifts across from the inner sanctum. Yet, something of the horror of that medieval massacre seems to linger in the air. Barely half a kilometre away is the spot where the Pandav warrior Arjun is said to have conducted the last rites of Krishna. Three rivers meet the sea here—one of them named after the Saraswati.
The Turkish raids were no doubt inspired partly by religious zeal and partly by the lure of plunder. However, it is often forgotten that one of their most important motivations was the capture of slaves. 12 Over the next few centuries, hundreds of thousands of Indian slaves—particularly from West Punjab and Sindh—would be marched into Afghanistan and then sold in the bazaars of Central Asia and the Middle East. Unused to the extreme cold of the Afghan mountains, they died in such large number that the range would come to be known as the Hindukush meaning ‘Killer of Hindus’.
Despite the shock of Mahmud Ghazni’s raids, however, there was no equivalent to the Mauryan or Gupta responses to foreign invasion. The last great Hindu empire of North India—that of the Gujara–Pratiharas—was in steep decline and the creative heart of Indic civilization had shifted south of the Vindhyas. The most powerful Indian kingdom of that time, the Cholas, ruled in the far south and would not have been concerned with the gathering clouds in the North West. Meanwhile, freed from the political and cultural domination of the Gangetic plains, Central India experienced a cultural and economic boom. This was the age of the remarkable Raja Bhoj, the warrior-scholar who ruled much of Central India and of the Chandelas of Bundelkhand who built the temples of Khajuraho.
Academic historians tend to ignore Raja Bhoj but the oral tradition of Central India is full of stories and ballads about him. It is difficult to ascertain the veracity of all these tales but one cannot deny the geographical importance of this king. He rebuilt the Somnath temple, repulsed a number of Turkish raids and constructed one of the largest forts in the world at Mandu in Madhya Pradesh. However, his most visible legacy is the huge lake that he created using an earthen dam in Bhopal, a city that is also named after him. Before the infamous industrial accident of 1984, the city of Bhopal was best known for this body of water. It is a testimony to the skills of the medieval engineers that the lake still exists a thousand years later. It is proof that big dams work well in the Malwa plateau. Tectonics and silt often make them unwise in the rest of India.
Farther north, the Chandelas of Bundelkhand were originally feudatories of the Gujara–Pratiharas but carved out a small but vigorous kingdom for themselves when the latter went into decline in the tenth century. They celebrated their successes by building the famous temples of Khajuraho, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Kandariya Mahadev temple, the largest in the complex, is said to have been built after the Chandelas succeeded in fending off Mahmud Ghazni himself.
All discussion about Khajuraho tends to focus on the erotic sculptures that adorn some of the temples. However, if one actually visits the temples, it is quickly apparent that the most striking sculptures depict lions or lion-like dragons. Several of them are shown locked in mortal combat with a Chandela king or warrior (occasionally women warriors). Just like the Mauryan emperors, the Chandelas liked to use the lion as a symbol of their power. Equally telling is the total absence of tigers in the sculptures. I found this particularly intriguing given that Panna Tiger Reserve is barely a twenty-minute drive away from Khajuraho. Was this lion country during medieval times? Or, was the tiger simply not considered a worthy symbol of royal power?
For a century and half after Mahmud’s raids, the Turks were largely restricted to West Punjab. If anything, there was a sense of complacency. That changed in 1192 when Muhammad Ghori defeated Prithviraj Chauhan, the Rajput king of Delhi and Ajmer, in the Second Battle of Tarain (150 km from Delhi in the modern state of Haryana).
The Turks occupied Delhi and then embarked on a series of conquests that radically changed the political, social and urban geography of India. By 1194, Varanasi and Kannauj were captured and sacked. The latter, then the largest city in northern India, would never really recover. Within a few years, the university of Nalanda was destroyed by Bakhtiyar Khilji,
its library was torched and most of its scholars put to death. The scene was chronicled by Minhaj-ud-din, a judge from Ghor, who had accompanied the invading army:
The great number of the inhabitants of that place were Brahmans … and they were all slain. There were a great number of books there; and when all these books came under the observation of the Mussalmans they summoned a number of Hindus that they might give them information respecting the import of these books; but the whole of the Hindus had been killed … 13
While there were many Brahmin scholars at Nalanda, the bulk of those massacred were probably Buddhist monks. A few survivors would linger, but most would flee to Tibet where their traditions would be kept alive till the Chinese take-over of the mid-twentieth century. After Nalanda, Bakhtiyar Khilji attacked and completely destroyed Vikramshila, another famous Buddhist university. The practice of Buddhism in the subcontinent, already in decline, would collapse after these devastating attacks. In 1235, Sultan Iltutmish laid waste Ujjain—once the secondary capital of the Gupta empire and a major centre for mathematics, literature, astronomy and Hindu philosophy. It is worth noting that at exactly the same time as these universities were being destroyed, the University of Oxford was being established on the other side of the planet.
By the end of the thirteenth century, armies led by generals like Malik Kafur would be making raids into the deep south. It was a very bloody period in Indian history—ancient cities, universities and temples were laid waste and hundreds of thousands, probably millions, were massacred. Anyone who doubts this should read the Tarikh-i-Farishtah 14 . Thus ended the second cycle of urbanization that had begun in the Gangetic plains during the Iron Age.
A few sparks of the classical period would remain alive in the city of Vijaynagar in the far South and in the even more faraway kingdoms of South East Asia. However, India was embarking on a new cycle of urbanization that derived many of its elements from Central Asia and Persia. This book is not meant as a comprehensive history of empires, individuals and events. I will, therefore, deal with this cycle of urbanization largely through the evolution of its most prominent city—Delhi.
THE MANY CITIES OF DELHI
The area in and around Delhi has been inhabited by humans from the Stone Age—stone implements have been found scattered in the ridges of the Aravalli range. The Rig Vedic people would also have been familiar with the region since it falls in the eastern corner of the Sapta-Sindhu landscape. There are even scattered remains of small settlements from the late Harappan age. Perhaps, this was one of the places where the Harappans settled as they abandoned the drying Saraswati and shifted to the Gangetic plains.
Since then, cities have been built, abandoned, pillaged and rebuilt many times on this site. Depending on how you count, between eight and sixteen Delhis have been built through history. Thus, the terms ‘Old Delhi’ and ‘New Delhi’ have meant different things at different points in time. So when William Sleeman visited the city in 1836, he referred to Shahjehanabad, what we now call Old Delhi, as New Delhi 15 . To him, Old Delhi referred to the ruins that were scattered from Mehrauli to Purana Qila—the area that is now occupied by what we call New Delhi. Nevertheless, the current cycle of expansion is remarkable even by standards of the city’s long history. After Delhi was sacked by the British in 1858, its urban population fell to a mere 154,417 as per the 1868 census. 16 Today, the urban system of Delhi, the National Capital Region, is home to almost twenty million people and it continues to grow and evolve rapidly.
As we have already discussed in Chapter 3, many of the events of the Mahabharata relate to the area around Delhi. Indraprastha, the capital of the Pandavas, is said to have been situated in Delhi along the banks of the Yamuna. According to a strong tradition, its site was under the sixteenth-century fortress of Purana Qila (literally Old Fort). The tradition was given credence by the fact that a village called Indrapat used to occupy the mound. Archaeological excavations inside the fort have revealed a significant Late Iron Age settlement that continued to be occupied till the Gupta period. There is a small museum in Purana Qila that shows photographs and artifacts from the excavations. However, it is impossible to prove if this was indeed the city mentioned in the epic. Nothing has been found so far that obviously matches the descriptions of Indraprastha—no palace or audience hall that would have attracted the envy of the Kauravas. Perhaps the remains lie hidden under a later building or perhaps they were swept away by a flood on the Yamuna. It is impossible to say. Nonetheless, we can see that Delhi was an important settlement for many centuries. An Ashokan rock inscription was found near the Kalkaji temple in 1996, suggesting that Delhi may have included several habitations in addition to that at Purana Qila.
The first Delhi of which we have definite historical knowledge was built by the Tomar Rajputs, who made it their headquarters in the eighth century. Their first settlement was at Suraj Kund in the extreme south of Delhi. Then, as now, the water supply was a major concern, and a large stone dam built by the Tomars still stands. The nearby village of Anangpur recalls the name of Raja Anang Pal. A stream from the dam feeds a stepped tank that was probably linked to a temple dedicated to the Sun God—hence the name Suraj Kund (Pool of the Sun). Unfortunately, the lake is often dry now because urbanization and illegal quarrying have disrupted the water-catchment.
In the eleventh century, the Tomars moved to a more defensible position farther west and constructed a large fort—Lal Kot, meaning Red Fort. Thus, Shah Jehan’s seventeenth-century Red Fort was not the first to bear that name. To mark his place in history, Anang Pal also added his name to the Iron Pillar.
A century later, the Chauhans of Ajmer took control of the city and substantially expanded it. Now renamed Qila Rai Pithora, this was the capital of Prithviraj Chauhan. I was pleasantly surprised to find that large sections of the walls of this city have survived, although almost no one visits them. Anyone interested can drive to the northern end of Mehrauli village and will find them just past Adam Khan’s tomb. The approach is not pretty and is used as an open toilet by a nearby slum. The visitor is therefore advised to walk through one of the shanties and climb on top of the walls. The walk on top of the nine-hundred-year-old ramparts is beautiful. As one leaves the village behind, one is surrounded by a thick forest of thorny Kikar trees. The walls extend a couple of kilometres and along the way one can distinguish towers and other structures including a major gateway. Perhaps Prithviraj used this gate as he bade farewell to the beautiful Samyukta as he rode out to face Muhammad Ghori. The urban landscape of Delhi can just be discerned beyond the trees even as the Qutub Minar looks sternly on.
When the Turks captured Rai Pithora, they made it their Indian headquarters and began to remodel it for their own use. The Qutub Minar complex, a UNESCO World Heritage site, has some of the oldest Islamic buildings in northern India. At its centre is the mosque built by Ghori’s slave-general Qutubuddin Aibak. An inscription on the east gate of the mosque tells us that it was built by demolishing twenty-seven Hindu–Jain temples. 17 Defaced idols can still be discerned amongst the columns. Interestingly, the Iron Pillar was allowed to continue standing on one side of the mosque courtyard. Perhaps it was an effort by the new rulers to appropriate ancient symbols of power. It is also possible that Qutubuddin wanted to let it stand in the shadow of his own great column, the 72.5m-high stone tower of the Qutub Minar, a medieval example of ‘mine is bigger than yours’. It is a truly impressive structure even by modern standards. When the Moroccan traveller Ibn Batuta visited Delhi over a century later, he was impressed by both the spectacular height of the tower and the unique metallurgy of the pillar. 18 He also tells us of how a later sultan wanted to build a tower twice as high but the project was abandoned. The remains of Alauddin Khilji’s failed attempt can still be seen nearby.
At the beginning of the fourteenth century, Alauddin Khilji built the new fort of Siri at the site of a military camp northeast of the existing city. The main urban cluster continued to be in the old city but the sult
an, who was paranoid about assassins, probably felt safer in the new fort. Unfortunately, within a few years of it being built, Siri fell to a Mongol raid. Alauddin managed to push the invaders back and then took care to strengthen the fortifications. This was a wise move because the Mongols were soon back. This time they captured the main city and pillaged it. However, Alauddin held out in Siri for months till the Mongols decided to go back. There are only a few stretches of walls and other buildings that remain of Siri. Its site is now occupied by the urban village of Shahpur Jat. It is one of the many villages that live on in the urban fabric of modern Delhi and is home to numerous small offices and designer workshops. The rest of Siri is covered by the Asian Games Village that was built to house athletes for the event in 1982.
Water supply has always been a major issue for Delhi. In order to supply the expanding city, Alauddin Khilji built a large reservoir called Hauz Khas. It still exists and is surrounded by a beautiful park, a wonderful place to go for a walk on a sunny winter afternoon. Overlooking the waterbody are the remains of an old Madrassa (Islamic religious school) built by a later sultan and the urban village of Hauz Khas. Since the 1990s, this village has transformed itself into a warren of expensive boutiques and trendy bars. This is ironic because Alauddin was a severe man who strictly controlled the prices of all goods and forbade the consumption and sale of alcohol. 19 Such is the revenge of history.
The Khilji dynasty barely survived a few years after Alauddin and was replaced by another Turkic dynasty, the Tughlaqs. They also decided to build a new city, called Tughlaqabad, and chose a location to the east of the existing city. It is unclear why the first Tughlaq Sultan wanted to build yet another city and why he chose the specific location. Perhaps it was just to satisfy his ego. Ibn Batuta tells an interesting story that may or may not be true. Evidently, when the Sultan was just a nobleman serving the Khiljis, he had suggested to the king that this would be a good place to build a city. The incumbent had sarcastically replied, ‘When you are Sultan, build it.’ Thus, it was one of the first building projects of the Tughlaqs.
Land of seven rivers: History of India's Geography Page 13