Ye imaarat o Maqabir ye fasilein ye hisaar,
Mutlaq-ul-hukm shahanshahon ki azmat ke sutoon;
Seena-e-dahar ke nasoor hain kohna nasoor,
Jazb hain unmein tere mere ajdaad ka khoon.
– Sahir Ludhianvi
(Maqabir- Graves,
hisaar- Fortress, Mutlaq-ul-hukm- Sovereign, azmat- Greatness, sutoon- Pillars,
Seena-e-dahar-The
chest of the world, kohna- Ancient, Azdaad- Ancestors)
The above couplet from Sahir’s famous Nazm, Taj Mahal,
loosely translates as below:
“These grand graves, and these high-walls of the majestic fortresses,
Are the pillars of the brutal majesty of the sovereign dictators.
These gaping wounds are the
ancient wounds on the breast of the world,
Mingled with the ugly pus and the oozing bloods of our common
ancestors.”
In today’s world where the
intellectual mind stands divided on communal lines with even daughters of noted
Urdu poets like Munawwar Rana proudly declaring first to be a
Muslim and then to be an India, it is no wonder that these couplets of Sahir, a
proud secularist India remain buried in the oblivion. While the Nazm, Taj Mahal, became popular, to me these
two couplets stand apart in their scathing and brutal honesty. Today, more than
ever, when riding on the crafty and cunning Communist re-telling of Indian
history, there is a growing tendency to recreate the myth of Mughal majesty, it
is important for people to read, understand and acknowledge the pain and truth
in Sahir’s words. This is one rare
poem which goes back into the history, when the Mughals looked at the Indians,
those converted and not yet converted to Islam, with equal distrust, disgust
and disdain. There were far too many people in India, the most populous land on
the Earth even then, for all of them to be converted to Islam. The Mughals were
often far too busy to manage their empire amid overwhelming number of people of
different faiths who were so different from them. The wars with the remnants of
earlier Islamic Sultanate and Hindu kings continued, while the Mughals tried to
neutralize the antipathy against the foreign invaders by aligning with Hindu
kinds. Even the Mughals would not have known that someday, they will be
projected as great Secularists merely because they established alliances with
Hindu kings out of political expediency. Equally surprised they would be to
know, if they were to know, that the descendants of the same people they had
treated with disdain and whom they converted to Islam under duress, will hail
them as an epitome of greatness, long after they were gone, resurrecting the
Mughals as some Motif of Muslim Identity, incongruent and inconsistent with their
National Identity and history as Indians. We need to see things in the right
perspective. At the time of Mughals, or even before the Mughals when Islam
first made entry into India, around Seven Hundred years after it came into
existence and nudged at the Hindu borders; the business in the Indian
subcontinent went about as usual.
The Mughals were
no more and no less secular than the Afghans before them. Even the most secular
of them, Akbar, while he married in the families of Hindu Kings, it was mostly
out of political expediency. History does not tell us of any of the offspring
of Hindu wives of Akbar who was raised as a Hindu. Akbar did not raise any of
his descendants as a Hindu and in two generation will give rise to the most
fanatic Emperor India had ever seen in Aurangzeb. The fact is that religion was
less of a political tool even under Akbar when they were constantly fighting
the co-religionists, the Afghans for supremacy in India. While Aurangzeb was a
fanatic Sunni, Humayun, when he sought help from the King of Persia, claimed to
have faith in Shiaism. More than anything, the Mughals were fanatic Timurides.
Akbar, the
greatest among the Mughals, is often equated with Emperor Ashoka. John S
Hoyland and SN Bannerjee do not agree with this comparison. In their editorial
introduction to ‘The Commentary of Father
Monserrate’ , they write, “Akbar’s
greed for conquest and glory and his lack of sincerity form a marked contrast
to Ashoka’s paternal rule, genuine self-control and spiritual ambition. They
add that ‘the old notion that Akbar was a
near-approximation to Plato’s philosopher king has been dissipated by modern
researches. Akbar remains a personality full of contradictions. His philosophical
wanderings were secular, he grants lands to the Sikhs, abolishes Jaziya, builds
relationships through marriages with the Rajputs. A great deal of these
initiatives had to do with Akbar’s desire to bring some stability to his
newly-established Muslim empire in an overwhelmingly Hindu land. Let us stick
to the falsehood of great economic shape of India under the Mughals.
It is true that
India, as a nation, was quite rich by the time British stepped into India. But
the three things they looked for – Spices, Indigo and Textiles- were industries
based on the skill and land of India. It had precious little to do with the
state. The Emperor was rich, richest Monarch on the face of this Earth. But there
was no just distribution of wealth. There was almost no middle-class and the
society was split between the extremely rich and severely poor. The myth of
India being rich as society under the Mughals is as big as India being totally
under the Mughals. Even at the time of death of Akbar, Vijaynagar, Deccan,
Khandesh, Ahmadnagar, Bidar and Bijaipur were independent, towards the south,
so was the region in North-East. A quick glimpse into Indian History,
objectively, without interference of the partisan parties gives a different
picture than what those who somehow feel that Mughal greatness is equivalent to
Muslim greatness and in some way is a justification of Islamic supremacy. Let
us look at Maddison’s The World Economy-
A Millennial Perspective. In the First Century AD, India’s share in the
Global GDP was 32.9% which went down to 28.9% in 1000 AD. When the Mughals
arrived, in 1500 AD, it went further down to 24.5% and at the end of Akbar’s
rule, in 1600 AD it was 22.6%. The slow decline under the Mughals ended at 16%
of Global GDP in the year 1820 AD. Looking at things from Individual prosperity
perspective, the Per Capita GDP remained almost stagnant during Mughal period,
with USD 550 in the year 1500 AD, unchanged in year 1700 and reducing further
to 533 $ in the year 1820 AD. In comparison, Per capita GDP for the British was
762 USD in 1500, and 2121 USD in 1820 AD (at 1994 rate of USD). This was the
state of individual wealth at the time when the Mughal Emperor would sit on a
throne worth Millions of Dollars.
The relationship
between the Hindu masses of India and the Mughals remained that of the
Conquered and the Conqueror. The welfare schemes were minimal. The irrigated
land constituted around 5% of the land. Maddison writes that ‘there was little motive to improve the
landed property. Mughal officials needed high incomes because they had many
dependents to support. They maintained polygamous households with vast retinues
of slaves and servants. This lack of initiative to create revenue sources
apart from regressive taxations which appeared more like security money
extracted by the warlords could possibly explain the quick crumbling down of
the Mughal empire and subsequent poor state of landless Muslims with the
decline of Mughal empire. Maddison called this a system of warlord predators leading to wasteful use of resources coming
down from the tradition of the nomadic
societies which created Islam in Arabia and the Ottoman Empire.
Far from the
Utopian world of secularism under Islamic rulers projected by the Islamists and
leftist historians alike, as Maddison says, under the Mughals, Muslims were the ruling elite in India from
the 13th Century until the British take over. Bernier writes that the Mughals were even then (17th
Century) were foreigner in India. Among the Nobles in Mughal courts, 70%
above the rank of 500 were Foreigners (Turks, Persians and Afghans). Of the
remaining 30% who were Indians, more than 50% were Muslims. Even in Akbar’s
court, which with revocation of Jaziya- a
tax exclusively on Hindus, as charge for practicing a non-Islamic faith, was
one of the better period under the Islamic rule, in 40 years of rule, Akbar
only appointed Twenty-One Hindus above 500, out of these 21, 17 were Rajputs,
One was Brahmin (Birbal), two Khatris (Todarmal and his son), and one unknown.
The larger masses of Indian population had no say, no stakes to play in Mughal
rule. Taxation was oppressive. Unlike earlier Hindu kings whose taxation as per
Hindu books was limited at One-Sixth (History of Mediaeval Hindu India by Ck
Vaidya quoting Hiuen Tsang), Akbar took 1/3rd
of the Produce as taxes. It was only slightly better than Delhi Sultanate
period when taxes were half the produce for the Hindus.
With little
attempt to involve the masses and totally dependent on taxes as protection
money, the Mughal empire quickly collapsed under its own weight when the
Pre-Akbar intolerant practices came in. Continuing to be disconnected from the
people, the Emperors continued to indulge in their decadent luxuries.
Shahjahaan who is said to build Taj Mahal, as per Badshaahnama by Abdul Hamid
Lahori ordered demolition of 70 Temples in Benaras. After the great famine
of 1629-1632 which killed Millions in Gujrat, the Emperor was busy building his
famous Throne in 1634 AD, adorned with the diamonds and rubies valued Rupees
Two Crores then, Jewels worth Eighty Six Lakhs, with Twelve Emerald Columns.
The cost of construction of the throne came to be One Crore, over a period of
Seven Years. Majlisu-s-Salatin of Muhammad Shah Hanafi mentions the revenue of
Hindustan (collected by the Mughals) as Six
Arbs and Thirty Crore Dams (One Arb being equalt to 100 Crores, and A Hundred
Crore Dam equal to Two Crore Fifty Lakh Rupees). The much-touted symbol of
love, Taj Mahal, also turns out anything but that (Sahir’s poem above refers to that). It is nothing more than a
narcissist and self-indulgent memory of Shah Jahaan’s second and most favorite
wife, Aliya Begum or Mumtaj Mahal, who died at the age of Forty, having birthed
Eight Sons and Six Daughters to the Emperor.
Then came the
repressive empire of Aurangzeb. Miraat-i-Aalam
of Bakhtawar Khan mentions the policies of Aurangzeb when he writes that Hindu writers have been entirely excluded
from holding Public offices and all the worshipping places of these infidels
and the great temples have been destroyed in a manner which excites
astonishment. A firman of 1679
orders to restart the campaign to demolish Hindu temples. On 2nd of
April, 1679 Jaziya was imposed on the
Hindus. The opposition to the same was met with releasing elephants on the
protesting crowds. An Imperial order dated 10th of April, 1665,
imposed Custom duty on all material imported for re-sale at 5% for the Hindus
and 2.5% for the Muslims. This collection was considered as Zakaat only to be used on the welfare of
Muslims. Another order dated 9th of May, 1667, changed this to 0%
for Muslims and 10% for the Hindus. Manucci notes that many Hindus who
were unable to pay converted to Islam. An order in March, 1695, forbade all
Hindus except Rajputs to ride Palkis, horses
or Elephants. Carrying of Arms was prohibited for the Hindus. Shivaji wrote a
passionate letter asking Aurangzeb to stop harassing Hindus, trying to tell the
fanatic Emperor that Hindus and Muslims both should be treated similarly. His
letter is ignored, paving way for huge discontent which waited for the empire
to weaken a little. With the death of Aurangzeb, the Jats, the Marathas all
rise in rebellion. The weakened Mughal forces harassed everywhere. The queens
have to run away from Red Fort in disguise to Loni. After attack of Bajirao on
Delhi in 1737 and later the complete plunder under Nadir Shah in 1739, the fate
of Mughals, deprived of power and money to maintain forces, and isolated from
the Hindu population around them, was sealed. It would take centuries for India
to become Independent and for Islamist forces, not satisfied with the Partition
of this great land to come under the flag of a cynical opposition and Communist
politics to resurrect a fake history of secular Mughals. The emperors did not
look at themselves as a forefront of a campaign to destroy a civilization. As
many have written, they considered themselves foreign warlords only. Much has been
written about Bahadurshah Zafar leading Indian Freedom Struggle, the fact
remains that he was forced to lead the rebels only reluctantly and tried to
disown them in front of the British immediately thereafter. The attempt here is
not to prove if Mughals were all good or all bad. It is merely to establish
that in spite of administrative principles left behind by Sher Shah Suri, the
Mughals, in general, did not govern well and treated India as a foreigner war
lord would. How the Mughal Empire and once the richest Monarch fell into
bankruptcy and not one tear was shed for him is a story for another day. The
matter under consideration right now is that Mughals were neither great rulers
nor were they secularists competing with Nehru. It is also to remind us what
Sahir wrote, that it wasn’t the Hindus alone who suffered under the Mughals,
rather the same riches which modern Muslims boast about where created by a
shared suffering inflicted on the ancestors of both Hindus and Muslims, many of
latter might have been former then.
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