Social Science

History:

·       Reshaping India’s political map

Late medieval period: Mughals turks and afghans

1206-1526: Delhi sultanate

Sources:

i.                 Court chronicles:

 provide detailed accounts of court proceedings administration and life of sultan

·       Hasan nazami

·       Zia ud din barani

·       Shams-i-siraj afif

·       Minhaj us siraj

ii.               Auto and biographies

iii.             Travelogues: ibn batuta and marco polo

iv.              Coins inscriptions and monuments

1. Slave dynasty: 1206-1290

Rulers: slave sultans or mamluk ( Arabic- owned)

1.     Qutb ud din aibak: slave of Muhammad ghori

2.     Iltutmish : considered the real founder of delhi sultanate

3.     Raziya sultan: (1236-1240)

·       able and just ruler

·       maintained law and order

·       led the army from the front

·       built roads and postal stations

·       nobles opposed taking orders from a woman and deposed her as she reduced their power and took decisions without consulting her

4.     balban: most powerful mamluk ruler

5.     muiz ud din qaiqabad

2. Khalji Dynasty: 1290-1320

1.     jalal ud din firuz khilji: (1290-1296) not very powerful and adopted a lenient policy towards mongols and tried maintaining friendly relations

2.     ala ud din khilji: (ali gurshasp, the son in law of the past king) 1296-1316:

·       most powerful and ambitious an aimed to have an all india empire

·        gujurat in 1299 and gave him control over western seaports  

·       Rajasthan: 1301-1303 conquered ranthambore and chittor

·       Malwa: 1305

Thereafter he sent a large army entrusted to be led by malik kafur who defeated the:

·       Pandyas

·       Kakatiyas

·       Yadavas

·       Hoysalas : veer ballala III 1310-1311 resistance from dwarasamudra

Carried a large war bounty of metals elephants horses and slaves and rulers paid tribute to overlord

To counter mongol raids:

·       New forts such as siri built at strategic positions

·       Army reorganized

·       Frontier provinces placed under able commanders

Economy:

Land revenue:

• raised land tax near doab ( ganga Yamuna) to half of the produce.

• This was harsh on peasants and they paid directly to assigned officials which weakened the position of middleman

Less corruption:

• introduced a system of getting accounts of his officers audited which was further followed by sher shah suri and akbar

Market control policy:

• lowered price of basic items like food grains sugar cooking oil cloth etc

• shopkeepers to sell at rates fixed by sultan

• appointed special officers to keep a check on shopkeepers

• one caught cheating was punished severely

• introduced to pay his soldiers a low salary and allowed him to maintain a large army with limited resources

according to barani no gold silver tankas jitals of superfluous commodities which are the causes of rebellion were found in house of hindu

they were even deprived of chewing betel

3.     Khusrau malik defeated by Ghiyas-Ud-Din Tughlaq

3. Tughluq Dynasty (1320-1413)

i. Ghiyas-ud-din Tughluq (1320-1325):

• suppresed rebellions and strengthened the sultanate

• his son, Jauna Khan conquered warangal (present day telengana) by defeating prataparudra II of Kakatiya

• warangal renamed to sultanpur

ii. muhammad bin tughluq (jauna khan) from 1325-1351

• powerful ruler

• moroccan traveller, Ibn Batuta lived in his court for several years and wrote in detail about his reign

• it tells that sultan had many great ideas and plans but most failed as common people did not understand them

his actions:

i. taxation in Doab: to increase revenue collection he raised land tax but bad timing as the region was already facing a famine and raising tax during this period resulted to be disastrous

• result: peasants abandoned the land while some revolted and eventually the sultan had to withdraw his orders

ii. shift of capital: in 1327 population of delhi ordered to move to devagiri that was renamed to daulatabad

• reason: the sultan assumed he would be able to administer the empire better from from a centrally located capital and would be safer compared to delhi which was subject to frequent mongol raids and threat

• result: unable to control the northern provinces and weaker administration in northern frontiers thus ordered a re shift and this experiment damaged the prestige of the empire

iii. introduction of token currency: in 1330 a token currency was introduced made of copper and brass

• reason: world wide shortage of silver during that period and that he planned a conquest in central asia for which he needed money

• twist: sultan failed to check the illegal minting of those tokens as the design was simple enough for ordinary craftsmen to copy and brass and copper were easily available and cheaper than silver

• result: empire was flooded with forged coins and it lost its value and foreign merchants refused accepting those coins and thus trade suffered

• action: the sultan had to give silver coins in exchange of forged ones to restore order

• result: heaps of bronze coins near tughluqabad and the treasury went empty

iii. Firoz Shah Tughluq:(1351-1388)

• muhammad bin tughluq's cousin

• felt that his cousin had failed to consolidate his hold over the empire as he did not have support from nobles and ulema

• to please them, he imposed islamic laws and resluted the nobles and ulema to become more powerful and influence the policies of the sultanate

• Also known as reformer king and did much for his subjects by building canals, tanks, wells, hospitals, and rest houses

• established towns such as jaunpur, firozabad, firozpur, and hissar-firoza.

• built educational institutes and translated sanskrit texts into persian and arabic

invasion of Timur, the ruler of a large dynasty in central asia who invaded and looted india and massacared thousand and then beautified his capital, samarkand in 1398

before leaving he assigned khizr Khan as his deputy in punjab region who later in 1414 established the sayyid dynasty

4. Sayyid Dynasty: ( 1414-1451 )

four sayyid rulers and last was ala ud din alam shah sayyid who lost delhi to bahlul lodi

5. Lodi Dynasty: 1451-1526

• only afghan origin rulers in delhi sultanate others were turkish

i. bahlul lodi from 1451-1489 removed rebellious governors replacing them with loyal afghan nobles as governors of important provinces and tried consolidating the fragmented sultanate

ii. sikander lodi- 1489-1571

• most powerful ruler

• annexed jaunpur and bihar and signed treaty of friendship with bengal ruler

• initaiated many public welfare measures and founded city of agra in 1504

iii. ibrahim lodi 1517-1526

• afghan nobles revolted against him however he defeated them

• to prevent such revolts in the future he replaced powerful senior nobles and governors with younger men

• displaced nobles conspired with babur the ruler of kabul and babur defeated him in the first battle of panipat in 1526 and with this the delhi sultanate came to an end

administration in delhi sultanate:

• sultan needed support of nobles and yet had to keep them in check

• sultan was head of administration

• departments and officers:

iqtadari system:

• nobles granted land called iqtas for thier service

• those nobles were called iqtadars

• collected tax from peasants working and living in thier iqtas

• used this for day to day use and pay salary to soldiers working under them

• in return iqtadars provided troops to the sultan whenever required

trade:

• internal trade: Delhi, Lahore, Lakhnauti and daulatabad

• every town had a market

• baniyas and multanis were among the many communities involved in trading

• external trade: china, malaya islands, east africca west and central asia

• exported textiles handicrafts and spices

• instruments of credit called hundi were used to transfer money from one place to another

• instead of carrying cash a trader carried hundi and this note could be exchanged for money at anther town through merchant or banks

vijaynagar empire:

• founded by harihara and bukka rai in 1336

• feudatory to kakatiyas of warangal

• when warangal was overrun by ghiyas ud din tughluq in 1323 they shifted their base to kampili and serviced the local rulers

• after ughluq annexed kampili brothers were taken captive and sent to south india to crush the rebellions there but later rebelled against muhammad bin tughluq

• after this they declared indipendence and built the vijaynagar

• foreign travvelers like nicolo conti domingo paes abdur razzaq mention vijaynagar emerging as a vibrant centre of commerce art and culture

• vijaynagar lasted for more than 300 years and rulers from 4 main dynasty ruled over it

krishnadevaraya of tuluva dynasty:

• defeated bahmani sultan and gajapati king of odisha

• annexed raichur doab the fertile land between krishna and tungabhadra rivers

• encouraged trade and commerce and established trading links with portugese

• paid attention to agriculture and built tanks dams and canals for irrigation

• scholar in sanskrit and telugu and composed a poem called amuktamalyada in telugu

• patronised learned men eg. 8 telugu scholars called ashtadiggaja

• krishna temple in hampi was commisioned by him

• expanded and beautified vittalaswami temple

• built new city called nagalpura

battle of talikota in 1565 when krishnadevaraya died and empire became weak kingdoms of deccan joined hands to defeat the ruler of vijaynagar and after this aravidu dynasty rose to power as last ruling line of the vijaynagar empire however the power and extent was significantly reduced

Bahmani Kingdom:

• established by ala ud din hasan who became king in became king in 1347 and took the title of ala ud dib bahman shah

• kingdom lasted for 180 years from 1347-1527

• at its greatest extent the kingdom included entire northern deccan up to river krishna

• first gulbarg then bidar became the capital

• firoz shah bahmani and mahmud gawan were the most powerful people of the kingdom

• by 1527 the kingdom split into 5 independent sultanates

  region	ruled by
  ahmadnagar	nizam shahis
  bijapur	adil shahis
  golconda	qutb shahis
  berar	imad shahis
  bidar	barid shahis

resistance to delhi sultanate:

• establishment of new regimes does not imply that the old powers vanish completely

• rather they continue resisting orders of the new rulers in different forms

• defeat did not mean complete destruction but marked a new phase of recovery adaptation and renewed resistance against central authority

eastern gangas:

• one of the fiercest challengers to delhi sultanate came from eastern gangas of odisha and emerged under the rule of anantavarman chodaganga deva 1078-1147/1150

• during his reign the empire extended from hooghly river in the north and godavari in the south

• capital from kliganagar to kataka

• faced invasions delhi sultanates and bengal provice governors

• anangbhima deva III1211-1238 reorganized the kingdom's defence and reppeled attacks from ghiyas ud din iwaz khalji the bengal governor

• reign of narasimha deva I 1238-1264 marked the zenith of the ganga power as he:

• in 1243-1244 led a successful campaign against tughral tughan khan the new bengal governor of the delhi dultanate and defeated the invading turkish army in battle of katasin

• he annexed lakhnauti and temporarily ended the turkish control in parts of radha in south bengal

• to commemorate his triumph he commisioned the sun temple at konark

musunuri nayakas:

• kakatiya kingdom was divided in 77 nayankaras each controlled by a nayak or military chief

• after the fall of kakatiya kingdom in 1323 there was political disarray in andhra region

• after a former commander of kakatiya, malik maqbul was appointed as governor of warangal then sultanpur

• this provoked local nayakas and started a war against the tughluq rule and chose prolaya nayaka of musunuru chiefdom as their leader who launched guerilla attacks and expelled them from rajahmundry and large stretches of land between godavari and krishna rivers

• kapaya nayak in 1336 annexed warangal and expelled malik maqbul and took title or andhradesadiswara and andhra-suratrana

• he consolidate musunuri control over surrounding areas and defended it against the sultanate attacks