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The first in a series of articles on a topic I long intended to write on, and promised certain friends I would
The 'Great' Mughals - 1
While it is of utmost importance to correct the highly distorted narration of Indian history, it is equally essential to keep it from being manipulated to ideological agendas. It requires a high degree of integrity, objectivity and scholarship to tell it ‘as it was’. The (rightful) indignation at the gross misrepresentation of facts, whitewashing of some of the biggest genocides in history and diminution of the true heroes who’s valiance and sacrifices ensured the continuation of Hindu civilisation (the last standing ‘pagan’ bastion) and the struggles and achievements of India’s native people, has resulted in a gaggle of amateur ‘historians’ today, churning out stories and theories each according to individual persuasion and taste. Historical characters eulogised as paragons of secular ideals through exaggerations and selection of facts, are being now blackened as their diametric opposite, diabolical villains. Admittedly, this might actually be close to truth for some characters, given the millennium long violence and destruction brought on by Islamic invasions and British occupation, for some others this is entirely unwarranted. The most recent targets of their ire are the Mughal rulers who may arguably be assessed to have been all shades grey to black, but all of them most definitely were not quite as black as a couple of recent articles/books (I link one of them here: http://agniveer.com/Jodha-Akbar-rape-daughter-name-religio…/) describe them, substituting missing details and ambiguous portions with lurid imagination.
The starkest of such bids is in the case of the foremost of the Mughal emperors, Akbar, who has long been touted as the icon of India’s famed (rather, fabled) ‘composite culture’, the assumptions of which have recently come in question. Surprisingly, even the gentle Humayun is not spared, against whom there is no record nor living memory of any atrocities committed upon Indians. The present write-up is not meant to salvage the reputation of characters nor to whitewash brutal massacres perpetrated by the Mughal invaders, but to point out counterposing facts which ought to restore perspective.
Akbar was no benefactor of Hindus/Indians as he is often glorified in Indian history textbooks, but he was not a persecutor of Hindus either. He was simply an astute statesman who evolved the best possible way in those times to hold the divergent factions of Indian polity together and to keep them loyal to the Mughal crown.
It has been pointed out that Akbar ordered mass massacres of defeated Hindu people in at least two well-documented cases. But it may also be noted that Akbar dealt ruthlessly with ALL revolts. He came down equally harshly on the Uzbeks. Most importantly, unlike the earlier Sultanate rulers, these were not inspired by Islamic zeal (it is interesting to note that NONE of the early Mughals were really Islamic bigots in the manner seen in later rulers, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb) and moreover most of these belong to the earlier part of Akbar’s reign when he sought to conquer and campaigned for dominion against various contending powers, and not perpetration of atrocities on hapless subjects, least for conversion.
The Mughals were Turko-Mongols descended from Central Asian tribes and their ‘taming’ and ‘civilising’ under the Timurid princes, a gradual process. (The Mughals’ barbaric ancestors were in fact followers of the Shamanic faith!) It was around the time of Humayun that we see a marked departure from their harsh and barbaric ways of predatory warfare, the remnants of which can however still be witnessed on occasions until the time of Akbar (e.g., the siege and subsequent conquest of Chittor in 1568, when angered by the heavy losses inflicted by the resisting Rajputs, Akbar showed his savage side by ordering a massacre of the surviving non-combatants in the fort which claimed according to contemporary estimates, 30,000 lives). It is testimony to the Rajputs’ valour that even though outnumbered one to ten, they destroyed almost 2/3rds of Akbar’s troops. (It was these military encounters with the Rajputs, including those with the Maharana of Mewar, and witnessing their inherent nobility, coupled with the sage advice of his father*, that instilled in him a grudging admiration for the Rajputs and made him see the wisdom in pursuing a policy of conciliation with the Rajputs rather than being locked in perpetual conflict with them, which would undoubtedly have led to an unending and inconclusive struggle destructive to both powers.)*
Quite early, into the seventh year of his reign, Akbar had started to crack down on generals indulging in the practice during war of indiscriminate massacre of non-combatants, capture and brutalisation of women and children and selling them as slaves. In the history of Islamic conquest, such a categorical statement was unprecedented and unfortunately not emulated either for much longer than Akbar and his direct successor. Although we find that in a few instances this was defied by his generals, he aimed to restrain all types of tyrannical behaviour, sometimes by example, at others by regulation and when necessary by the severest of military punishment. Through the mansabdari system, nobles were accorded numerical ranks and thereby fitted into a formal status hierarchy that expressed uniformity, discipline and cohesiveness, “..an attempt to turn a loose, multi-ethnic and religiously heterogeneous assemblage of post-nomadic military retainers into a discipline service nobility, while establishing a rigid court etiquette as a new force of counter-insurgency.” The 'Ain-i-Akbari' records in detail the measures taken by Akbar towards achieving this shift towards evolving statesmanship and a rigid monarchical code, in order to gain respectability and acceptability in the eyes of the Indian ruling classes as also the Islamic world stage as a legitimate political power. Akbar was rather conscious of this aspect and in this light that his seeking marital alliances with the Rajputs must be seen, and not as lust for women as booty of war. This is evidenced from Akbar’s exercise of moderation in his personal life and helps explain his “extraordinary emphasis on self-mastery and etiquette as a mode of political control.” In fact the ‘Akbarnama’, commissioned by him directly, appears to have been predominantly an image-building exercise, but all the same give us invaluable insight into the emperor’s mind. The kind of profligacy attributed to him in the linked article would have been counterproductive (not to mention, inconsistent with the actual character) given the image he meticulously strove to build to establish the credentials of Mughal statehood.
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* Mentioned in the account of Sheikh Fakhruddin Bhakkari
** In a particular skirmish with the Rajputs in which Khan-I-Khana (later known as 'Rahim Khan') was the Mughal general, some Mughal womenfolk fell into the hands of Pratap’s son, Amar Singh I. When the prisoners were brought to Maharana Pratap (at this point of time, Khan-I-Khana had actually been on a march against Pratap, and was camping at Sherpur preparing for an assault against Pratap) he rebuked Amar Singh for having arrested ladies of the enemy camp and commanded him to arrange for their safe conveyance to the Mughal camp. Khan-I-Khana is said to have been so affected by this incident that he refused to campaign against such a chivalrous monarch and petitioned Akbar to be relieved of his post, uttering the words, “Jo dridh rakhe dharm, ne tahi rakhe kartar”.
The 'Great' Mughals - 2
An important aspect to understand is that the struggle against the Mughals was not an armageddon of Hindus against Islam. In the absence of a centralised power there were several rulers grappling to gain an upper hand as well as being locked in constant internecine conflicts, and alliances were formed not along the lines of religion, but expediency, and many times allegiances swung wildly from one side to the other. Hemu led a confederacy of Afghan-Hindu nobles and some among the Rajput clans allied with the Gujarat sultanate (Bahadur Shah received protection from Chittor when he was hounded out of Gujarat during a war of succession). The Mughals too were fighting on more than one front, having been locked in a prolonged struggle in Central Asia with the Uzbeks and were simultaneously at war against the Safavids of Persia.
It was Rana Sanga who had initially invited Babur to form an alliance against the Lodhis and in the latter period, Sher Shah’s descendent, Hakim Shah Sur, led Rana Pratap’s vanguard against the Mughals in Haldighati. Humayun had been sheltered by the Rajput king of Amarkot when he was being pursued by Sher Shah Suri. There is also the legend of Sanga’s wife, the regent of Mewar after his death, Rani Karnavati, appealing to Humayun for assistance by sending him a rakhi when Chittorgarh fort was besieged by Bahadur Shah of Gujarat in 1535. While one may cast doubts over the historicity of this legend, it is well-documented that Humayun did turn back abruptly from his Bengal expedition against the insistence of his generals and sped back to face Bahadur Shah, though he is said to have arrived too late to save the city or to avert the second of the great jauhars performed in the history of Chittod. Apparently, Humayun faced great reverses on account of this move and an extended period of hardship following this. Ties between Amer and the Mughals were not unprecedented either. Although Bharmal’s father, Prithvi Singh I, had fought alongside Rana Sanga in the battle of Khanua in 1527, in the following period, Humayun came to the aid of the Kachawahas in 1534, in the battle of Bayana against Tatar Khan, Bahabur Shah’s general. It is apparent that these were political manoeuvres between power players and no act of treason against the land or the people since there was never a clear political delineation along the lines of religion or ethnicity. The sole objection of Rajputana rulers to the proposal of Raja Bharmal of Amer to seek a treaty with Akbar had been that until that time the Mughals, unlike the Indo-Afghans, were still seen as foreigners and barbarians.
Sealing political alliances with the dominant power through marriage of a daughter was by no means unknown in any part of the world and had been prevalent all through Indian History. What was however wholly unprecedented in this alliance was initiation of connubial association of Hindus with non-Aryan people. It started (and continued at least for two more generations) a trend of such politically expedient marriages of convenience and an intermingling, the merits of which are still debated and will be till the end of time, but this event was undoubtedly a turning point because until then the Hindus, more specifically Rajputs, had staunchly resisted mixing outside their bloodline, neither giving their daughters, nor accepting daughters (the story of Firoza, Alauddin Khilji’s daughter, and Biram Deo of Gujarat, comes to mind) no matter what the cost. It would however be unfair to say that the Rajputs 'gave away their daughters to concubinage’ (which is what some revisionist accounts allege) in order to save their kingdoms. No reference within any of the Mughal texts to Akbar’s Rajput wives would permit us this inference. The first description of Bharmal’s eldest daughter in the ‘Akbarnama’ reads: “..in whose forehead shine the lights of chastity and intelligence”. (But more on that later.)
Raja Bharmal’s (Bihari Mal) predicament:
The political scene in that period was dominated by four main powers: the Rajputs, Indo-Afghans, Mughals and remnants of the Turkish Sultanate which had receded but still held sway in Gujarat. At the time when Raja Bharmal approached Akbar, Amer was beset from all sides. The once powerful Rajput confederacy had broken down and rulers had been considerably weakened owing to infighting. Amer was in the midst of a war of succession imperilled through the acts of one of its own scions, Shujamal (Bharmal’s nephew) in collaboration with the powerful Mughal governor of Ajmer and Nagour, Sharif-ud-din Hussein Mirza, who was not only holding Bharmal’s son along with two of his other nephews hostage and demanding an impossibly high tribute for their release, but also threatening Amer with proximate annihilation. Amer was further threatened by the expansionist designs of Raja Maldeo Rathore of Marwar who had seized several districts of Amer previously. Though one of the most prosperous kingdoms of Rajasthan, Amer was a small kingdom and militarily in no position to resist these by itself.
It was in this situation that Bharmal sought Akbar’s intervention in securing the release of the Amer princes. The ‘Akbarnama’ predictably uses profuse phrases to highlight the superior position of the Mughal emperor and descriptions of excessive humility in contrast of those who were in the Emperor’s audience. This is unlikely to have been the case with Bharmal’s demeanour in spite of the relatively weaker political position. Bharmal had apparently approached Akbar not for a military alliance but with the aim to negotiate for help in pressurising Sharif-ud-din (who was also Akbar’s brother-in-law, being married to his half-sister, Bukshi Begum) to surrender his hostages. This was a diplomatic move to neutralise the threat to Amer without bloodletting. Had Akbar not regarded his request favourably, he would have possibly sought alliance with other Rajput rulers to militarily meet the threat posed by Sharif-ud-din. This is where Akbar played the master-stroke. Though ‘Akbarnama’ says that Bharmal had offered his daughter’s hand in marriage, by some other accounts*, the suggestion seems to have actually emanated from the Mughal side.** The Mughals too were in need of steady political alliance for gaining a stronger hold in the region since they were isolated in India. They had a lot to gain by enlisting the abiding support of the prosperous and powerful house of Amer. This was the reason that immediately after the marriage was sealed (in Sambhar, on 6th February, 1562) Bharmal was instantly elevated to a mansabdari of 5000, which was a rank reserved only for Mughal royal princes. The first Mughal empire, according to several analysts, was in fact more a Rajput – Mughal confederacy than a sole Mughal enterprise.
What were the thoughts that weighed Raja Bharmal’s mind on that fateful day when he acquiesced to the proposal for his daughter’s hand is hard to say, but apparently the consideration of his people’s welfare seems to have outweighed the sense of ‘honour’ which would have entailed pushing his people towards certain annihilation, since building a united Rajput front was proving elusive. But the alliance with the Mughals did help the latter strengthen their hold over India for which they were still struggling (the ‘Akbarnama’ in its effusive glorification of the emperor omits to mention the fact that there was a very small territory that the Mughals effectively controlled until that time). While viewing what was/is sneered at as Bharmal’s capitulation unsympathetically, the lack of farsightedness in Hindu rulers of that period ought to be critically regarded as well for their inability to foresee the civilisational impact of and failing to put up a unified front against Islamic incursions. (Were we any wiser even in the subsequent period or for that matter today?) In fact, the defeat of Raja Hemchandra Vikramaditya through cruel fate can be considered as the singlemost unfortunate event in mediaeval history from the standpoint of Hindu India, since he was the only ruler who could potentially have put an early end to Islamic rule in India and arrested the degradation of its civilisational consciousness and achievements and the destruction of its continuous culture. From the title he took at his coronation, it is apparent that he had this clearly in sight. His death following Sher Shah’s in the earlier decade, both by freak chance, almost completely removed the challenge posed to the Mughals by the Afghan-Hindu collaboration leaving a vacuum and allowing the Mughals to consolidate and take on the Rajput kingdoms one by one.
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* Prof. S. Chandra (“Akbar insisted that the Raja should submit to him personally. It was suggested that a daughter of the Raja should be married to him.”)
** Pertinent to mention here is Abul Fazl’s reference to Humayun embarking on a policy of conciliation and winning over of zamindars when he was in Delhi: “..in order to soothe the minds of the zamindars (he) entered into matrimonial relations with them”.
Fakhruddin Bhakkari in his 17th century work mentions the Shah of Iran, Tahmasp’s, advice to Humayun to “rear the Rajputs” and that “without gaining control over the Rajputs, it is not possible to rule Hind”. He writes about Humayun’s advice at the approach of his death to his son that “..this quam should be reared up because they are not given to transgression and contumacy, but only obedience and service.” Interestingly, the very same words are said to have been uttered by Akbar, in an earlier meeting between Bharmal and Akbar in 1556-57 described in ‘Akbarnama’, famously in the elephant pen, in his cryptic message: “nihal khwadim kard” (we will rear you).
The ‘Akbarnama’ carefully details a reading of Akbar’s horoscope where it was said that he would “...in his first youth marry chaste veiled ones from the ruling families in India... ...those chaste, curtained and holy ones will belong to his tributary and wealth-increasing princes.”
after all that here some general thoughts to write a post summarising my position on the Hindi debate:
1) First off, what is being considered is Hindi's status as official language, to replace English, not as a contender for 'national language'.
2) People going on endlessly about "imposition" of Hindi do not realise that it is not Hindi, but English which is the imposed language (apart from being a foreign one), for the simple fact that a vast majority of India cannot understand/speak English. The insistence on English comes from a small-English educated class which refuses to grow out of their slave mentality, due to which the entire system is beholden to English. It must not be so! Sanskrit has well-developed terminology in all scientific fields and with this it is possible to develop *each of the* languishing regional tongues, incl. Hindi. (At least until Sanskrit can be made more prevalent. It is actually Sanskrit which is our most sensible bet in terms of cutting-edge technology.) People's development, career advancement, further education, everything is hindered, not because they're not intelligent enough, but because the medium of all advancement has been made English, which is a terribly hampering condition for Indian masses. The English ecosystem has to be dismantled! But for a few English-besotted sections who do not allow this, raising a hue and cry every time there's a push to strengthen the second official language apart from English (so as to gradually replace it), as if they'll be orphaned and without devices without English! I think it is a shamefully slavish mentality! And selfish (just because they themselves are comfortable with English they insist on its imposition on vast tracts which are not even acquainted with it and find it difficult to master.)
Language skills and other professional skills do not necessarily come together. English is an extra and difficult language to be learnt, Hindi is not, and a vast majority of regional demographies take to it with ease.
So the question is what is the opposition in establishing Hindi as the official language, which is a Sanskrit-born sister language, and most importantly, when it is not supplanting the regional mother tongue? English can be 'phased out' gradually. Regional languages continue to be the medium of education in the respective regions. Hindi would be just an additional medium, as a uniformising factor. It can be learnt just as well as English if education is started in it.
Yet the confounding bigotry of certain sections in some regions, especially South India and Bengal, it is beyond my comprehension!
3) The question: do we need an official language? Yes. A language for standardising official communication is required. While each communication to the state can be in the regional language, owing to potential differential in communication because of mistranslation or varying import, a standard language of communication is required. But the insistence that English be continued as official language comes from those who have not mastered even their mother tongue. They cannot do Maths, Science, Chemistry in Kannada, Tamil or Bengali. It's a different thing that most Indians do not have perfect English either, but what is valued is not excellence through own language, but mediocrity with a foreign language. Those rallying under the respective mother tongues against Hindi are only keen on preserving the mother tongue as a decoration piece, to puff up their regional chauvinism. They do not see that English is a hindrance to progress for masses even in those regions. Truth is, they are themselves handicapped in their mother tongue, and therefore push for English. They know they'll be nowhere without it. It is a selfish motive for preserving own advantage. The average Tamilian or Kannada or Bengali speaking person from among the masses is as lost with English as with Hindi, in fact would grasp the latter much faster since characteristically it is similar to the mother tongue. But then where will that leave the English-speaking snob?
4) Why Hindi you ask? Simply because it has maximum spread as compared to all classical/refined languages in terms of interferences with regional languages and/or dialects. But that aside, Hindi is not the native language of *any* place. No. Not even UP/cow belt. People speak all languages from Braji, to Bhojpuri, to Magahi, to Maithili, Kannauji, Awadhi, Bundeli, Urdu, Bagheli, Angika... There's a difference between Garhwali, Kumaoni, Nepali, Dogri, Kangri, Kinnauri... But all these peoples have maximum ease with Hindi. But for being able to conduct business or study in Hindi even people from the cow belt would have to formally study Hindi. A labourer in UP cannot speak stylised, refined Hindi.
In fact one can also have two or three Indian languages as official language: say Tamil in South, Bengali for East Hindi for RoI. (Even here, will we ever reach a consensus? Will the Ahomiya not contest Bengal's claim? Would a Kannadiga not contest Tamil's claim?) But why primacy to English?
The 'Great' Mughals - 1
While it is of utmost importance to correct the highly distorted narration of Indian history, it is equally essential to keep it from being manipulated to ideological agendas. It requires a high degree of integrity, objectivity and scholarship to tell it ‘as it was’. The (rightful) indignation at the gross misrepresentation of facts, whitewashing of some of the biggest genocides in history and diminution of the true heroes who’s valiance and sacrifices ensured the continuation of Hindu civilisation (the last standing ‘pagan’ bastion) and the struggles and achievements of India’s native people, has resulted in a gaggle of amateur ‘historians’ today, churning out stories and theories each according to individual persuasion and taste. Historical characters eulogised as paragons of secular ideals through exaggerations and selection of facts, are being now blackened as their diametric opposite, diabolical villains. Admittedly, this might actually be close to truth for some characters, given the millennium long violence and destruction brought on by Islamic invasions and British occupation, for some others this is entirely unwarranted. The most recent targets of their ire are the Mughal rulers who may arguably be assessed to have been all shades grey to black, but all of them most definitely were not quite as black as a couple of recent articles/books (I link one of them here: http://agniveer.com/Jodha-Akbar-rape-daughter-name-religio…/) describe them, substituting missing details and ambiguous portions with lurid imagination.
The starkest of such bids is in the case of the foremost of the Mughal emperors, Akbar, who has long been touted as the icon of India’s famed (rather, fabled) ‘composite culture’, the assumptions of which have recently come in question. Surprisingly, even the gentle Humayun is not spared, against whom there is no record nor living memory of any atrocities committed upon Indians. The present write-up is not meant to salvage the reputation of characters nor to whitewash brutal massacres perpetrated by the Mughal invaders, but to point out counterposing facts which ought to restore perspective.
Akbar was no benefactor of Hindus/Indians as he is often glorified in Indian history textbooks, but he was not a persecutor of Hindus either. He was simply an astute statesman who evolved the best possible way in those times to hold the divergent factions of Indian polity together and to keep them loyal to the Mughal crown.
It has been pointed out that Akbar ordered mass massacres of defeated Hindu people in at least two well-documented cases. But it may also be noted that Akbar dealt ruthlessly with ALL revolts. He came down equally harshly on the Uzbeks. Most importantly, unlike the earlier Sultanate rulers, these were not inspired by Islamic zeal (it is interesting to note that NONE of the early Mughals were really Islamic bigots in the manner seen in later rulers, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb) and moreover most of these belong to the earlier part of Akbar’s reign when he sought to conquer and campaigned for dominion against various contending powers, and not perpetration of atrocities on hapless subjects, least for conversion.
The Mughals were Turko-Mongols descended from Central Asian tribes and their ‘taming’ and ‘civilising’ under the Timurid princes, a gradual process. (The Mughals’ barbaric ancestors were in fact followers of the Shamanic faith!) It was around the time of Humayun that we see a marked departure from their harsh and barbaric ways of predatory warfare, the remnants of which can however still be witnessed on occasions until the time of Akbar (e.g., the siege and subsequent conquest of Chittor in 1568, when angered by the heavy losses inflicted by the resisting Rajputs, Akbar showed his savage side by ordering a massacre of the surviving non-combatants in the fort which claimed according to contemporary estimates, 30,000 lives). It is testimony to the Rajputs’ valour that even though outnumbered one to ten, they destroyed almost 2/3rds of Akbar’s troops. (It was these military encounters with the Rajputs, including those with the Maharana of Mewar, and witnessing their inherent nobility, coupled with the sage advice of his father*, that instilled in him a grudging admiration for the Rajputs and made him see the wisdom in pursuing a policy of conciliation with the Rajputs rather than being locked in perpetual conflict with them, which would undoubtedly have led to an unending and inconclusive struggle destructive to both powers.)*
Quite early, into the seventh year of his reign, Akbar had started to crack down on generals indulging in the practice during war of indiscriminate massacre of non-combatants, capture and brutalisation of women and children and selling them as slaves. In the history of Islamic conquest, such a categorical statement was unprecedented and unfortunately not emulated either for much longer than Akbar and his direct successor. Although we find that in a few instances this was defied by his generals, he aimed to restrain all types of tyrannical behaviour, sometimes by example, at others by regulation and when necessary by the severest of military punishment. Through the mansabdari system, nobles were accorded numerical ranks and thereby fitted into a formal status hierarchy that expressed uniformity, discipline and cohesiveness, “..an attempt to turn a loose, multi-ethnic and religiously heterogeneous assemblage of post-nomadic military retainers into a discipline service nobility, while establishing a rigid court etiquette as a new force of counter-insurgency.” The 'Ain-i-Akbari' records in detail the measures taken by Akbar towards achieving this shift towards evolving statesmanship and a rigid monarchical code, in order to gain respectability and acceptability in the eyes of the Indian ruling classes as also the Islamic world stage as a legitimate political power. Akbar was rather conscious of this aspect and in this light that his seeking marital alliances with the Rajputs must be seen, and not as lust for women as booty of war. This is evidenced from Akbar’s exercise of moderation in his personal life and helps explain his “extraordinary emphasis on self-mastery and etiquette as a mode of political control.” In fact the ‘Akbarnama’, commissioned by him directly, appears to have been predominantly an image-building exercise, but all the same give us invaluable insight into the emperor’s mind. The kind of profligacy attributed to him in the linked article would have been counterproductive (not to mention, inconsistent with the actual character) given the image he meticulously strove to build to establish the credentials of Mughal statehood.
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* Mentioned in the account of Sheikh Fakhruddin Bhakkari
** In a particular skirmish with the Rajputs in which Khan-I-Khana (later known as 'Rahim Khan') was the Mughal general, some Mughal womenfolk fell into the hands of Pratap’s son, Amar Singh I. When the prisoners were brought to Maharana Pratap (at this point of time, Khan-I-Khana had actually been on a march against Pratap, and was camping at Sherpur preparing for an assault against Pratap) he rebuked Amar Singh for having arrested ladies of the enemy camp and commanded him to arrange for their safe conveyance to the Mughal camp. Khan-I-Khana is said to have been so affected by this incident that he refused to campaign against such a chivalrous monarch and petitioned Akbar to be relieved of his post, uttering the words, “Jo dridh rakhe dharm, ne tahi rakhe kartar”.
The 'Great' Mughals - 2
An important aspect to understand is that the struggle against the Mughals was not an armageddon of Hindus against Islam. In the absence of a centralised power there were several rulers grappling to gain an upper hand as well as being locked in constant internecine conflicts, and alliances were formed not along the lines of religion, but expediency, and many times allegiances swung wildly from one side to the other. Hemu led a confederacy of Afghan-Hindu nobles and some among the Rajput clans allied with the Gujarat sultanate (Bahadur Shah received protection from Chittor when he was hounded out of Gujarat during a war of succession). The Mughals too were fighting on more than one front, having been locked in a prolonged struggle in Central Asia with the Uzbeks and were simultaneously at war against the Safavids of Persia.
It was Rana Sanga who had initially invited Babur to form an alliance against the Lodhis and in the latter period, Sher Shah’s descendent, Hakim Shah Sur, led Rana Pratap’s vanguard against the Mughals in Haldighati. Humayun had been sheltered by the Rajput king of Amarkot when he was being pursued by Sher Shah Suri. There is also the legend of Sanga’s wife, the regent of Mewar after his death, Rani Karnavati, appealing to Humayun for assistance by sending him a rakhi when Chittorgarh fort was besieged by Bahadur Shah of Gujarat in 1535. While one may cast doubts over the historicity of this legend, it is well-documented that Humayun did turn back abruptly from his Bengal expedition against the insistence of his generals and sped back to face Bahadur Shah, though he is said to have arrived too late to save the city or to avert the second of the great jauhars performed in the history of Chittod. Apparently, Humayun faced great reverses on account of this move and an extended period of hardship following this. Ties between Amer and the Mughals were not unprecedented either. Although Bharmal’s father, Prithvi Singh I, had fought alongside Rana Sanga in the battle of Khanua in 1527, in the following period, Humayun came to the aid of the Kachawahas in 1534, in the battle of Bayana against Tatar Khan, Bahabur Shah’s general. It is apparent that these were political manoeuvres between power players and no act of treason against the land or the people since there was never a clear political delineation along the lines of religion or ethnicity. The sole objection of Rajputana rulers to the proposal of Raja Bharmal of Amer to seek a treaty with Akbar had been that until that time the Mughals, unlike the Indo-Afghans, were still seen as foreigners and barbarians.
Sealing political alliances with the dominant power through marriage of a daughter was by no means unknown in any part of the world and had been prevalent all through Indian History. What was however wholly unprecedented in this alliance was initiation of connubial association of Hindus with non-Aryan people. It started (and continued at least for two more generations) a trend of such politically expedient marriages of convenience and an intermingling, the merits of which are still debated and will be till the end of time, but this event was undoubtedly a turning point because until then the Hindus, more specifically Rajputs, had staunchly resisted mixing outside their bloodline, neither giving their daughters, nor accepting daughters (the story of Firoza, Alauddin Khilji’s daughter, and Biram Deo of Gujarat, comes to mind) no matter what the cost. It would however be unfair to say that the Rajputs 'gave away their daughters to concubinage’ (which is what some revisionist accounts allege) in order to save their kingdoms. No reference within any of the Mughal texts to Akbar’s Rajput wives would permit us this inference. The first description of Bharmal’s eldest daughter in the ‘Akbarnama’ reads: “..in whose forehead shine the lights of chastity and intelligence”. (But more on that later.)
Raja Bharmal’s (Bihari Mal) predicament:
The political scene in that period was dominated by four main powers: the Rajputs, Indo-Afghans, Mughals and remnants of the Turkish Sultanate which had receded but still held sway in Gujarat. At the time when Raja Bharmal approached Akbar, Amer was beset from all sides. The once powerful Rajput confederacy had broken down and rulers had been considerably weakened owing to infighting. Amer was in the midst of a war of succession imperilled through the acts of one of its own scions, Shujamal (Bharmal’s nephew) in collaboration with the powerful Mughal governor of Ajmer and Nagour, Sharif-ud-din Hussein Mirza, who was not only holding Bharmal’s son along with two of his other nephews hostage and demanding an impossibly high tribute for their release, but also threatening Amer with proximate annihilation. Amer was further threatened by the expansionist designs of Raja Maldeo Rathore of Marwar who had seized several districts of Amer previously. Though one of the most prosperous kingdoms of Rajasthan, Amer was a small kingdom and militarily in no position to resist these by itself.
It was in this situation that Bharmal sought Akbar’s intervention in securing the release of the Amer princes. The ‘Akbarnama’ predictably uses profuse phrases to highlight the superior position of the Mughal emperor and descriptions of excessive humility in contrast of those who were in the Emperor’s audience. This is unlikely to have been the case with Bharmal’s demeanour in spite of the relatively weaker political position. Bharmal had apparently approached Akbar not for a military alliance but with the aim to negotiate for help in pressurising Sharif-ud-din (who was also Akbar’s brother-in-law, being married to his half-sister, Bukshi Begum) to surrender his hostages. This was a diplomatic move to neutralise the threat to Amer without bloodletting. Had Akbar not regarded his request favourably, he would have possibly sought alliance with other Rajput rulers to militarily meet the threat posed by Sharif-ud-din. This is where Akbar played the master-stroke. Though ‘Akbarnama’ says that Bharmal had offered his daughter’s hand in marriage, by some other accounts*, the suggestion seems to have actually emanated from the Mughal side.** The Mughals too were in need of steady political alliance for gaining a stronger hold in the region since they were isolated in India. They had a lot to gain by enlisting the abiding support of the prosperous and powerful house of Amer. This was the reason that immediately after the marriage was sealed (in Sambhar, on 6th February, 1562) Bharmal was instantly elevated to a mansabdari of 5000, which was a rank reserved only for Mughal royal princes. The first Mughal empire, according to several analysts, was in fact more a Rajput – Mughal confederacy than a sole Mughal enterprise.
What were the thoughts that weighed Raja Bharmal’s mind on that fateful day when he acquiesced to the proposal for his daughter’s hand is hard to say, but apparently the consideration of his people’s welfare seems to have outweighed the sense of ‘honour’ which would have entailed pushing his people towards certain annihilation, since building a united Rajput front was proving elusive. But the alliance with the Mughals did help the latter strengthen their hold over India for which they were still struggling (the ‘Akbarnama’ in its effusive glorification of the emperor omits to mention the fact that there was a very small territory that the Mughals effectively controlled until that time). While viewing what was/is sneered at as Bharmal’s capitulation unsympathetically, the lack of farsightedness in Hindu rulers of that period ought to be critically regarded as well for their inability to foresee the civilisational impact of and failing to put up a unified front against Islamic incursions. (Were we any wiser even in the subsequent period or for that matter today?) In fact, the defeat of Raja Hemchandra Vikramaditya through cruel fate can be considered as the singlemost unfortunate event in mediaeval history from the standpoint of Hindu India, since he was the only ruler who could potentially have put an early end to Islamic rule in India and arrested the degradation of its civilisational consciousness and achievements and the destruction of its continuous culture. From the title he took at his coronation, it is apparent that he had this clearly in sight. His death following Sher Shah’s in the earlier decade, both by freak chance, almost completely removed the challenge posed to the Mughals by the Afghan-Hindu collaboration leaving a vacuum and allowing the Mughals to consolidate and take on the Rajput kingdoms one by one.
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* Prof. S. Chandra (“Akbar insisted that the Raja should submit to him personally. It was suggested that a daughter of the Raja should be married to him.”)
** Pertinent to mention here is Abul Fazl’s reference to Humayun embarking on a policy of conciliation and winning over of zamindars when he was in Delhi: “..in order to soothe the minds of the zamindars (he) entered into matrimonial relations with them”.
Fakhruddin Bhakkari in his 17th century work mentions the Shah of Iran, Tahmasp’s, advice to Humayun to “rear the Rajputs” and that “without gaining control over the Rajputs, it is not possible to rule Hind”. He writes about Humayun’s advice at the approach of his death to his son that “..this quam should be reared up because they are not given to transgression and contumacy, but only obedience and service.” Interestingly, the very same words are said to have been uttered by Akbar, in an earlier meeting between Bharmal and Akbar in 1556-57 described in ‘Akbarnama’, famously in the elephant pen, in his cryptic message: “nihal khwadim kard” (we will rear you).
The ‘Akbarnama’ carefully details a reading of Akbar’s horoscope where it was said that he would “...in his first youth marry chaste veiled ones from the ruling families in India... ...those chaste, curtained and holy ones will belong to his tributary and wealth-increasing princes.”
after all that here some general thoughts to write a post summarising my position on the Hindi debate:
1) First off, what is being considered is Hindi's status as official language, to replace English, not as a contender for 'national language'.
2) People going on endlessly about "imposition" of Hindi do not realise that it is not Hindi, but English which is the imposed language (apart from being a foreign one), for the simple fact that a vast majority of India cannot understand/speak English. The insistence on English comes from a small-English educated class which refuses to grow out of their slave mentality, due to which the entire system is beholden to English. It must not be so! Sanskrit has well-developed terminology in all scientific fields and with this it is possible to develop *each of the* languishing regional tongues, incl. Hindi. (At least until Sanskrit can be made more prevalent. It is actually Sanskrit which is our most sensible bet in terms of cutting-edge technology.) People's development, career advancement, further education, everything is hindered, not because they're not intelligent enough, but because the medium of all advancement has been made English, which is a terribly hampering condition for Indian masses. The English ecosystem has to be dismantled! But for a few English-besotted sections who do not allow this, raising a hue and cry every time there's a push to strengthen the second official language apart from English (so as to gradually replace it), as if they'll be orphaned and without devices without English! I think it is a shamefully slavish mentality! And selfish (just because they themselves are comfortable with English they insist on its imposition on vast tracts which are not even acquainted with it and find it difficult to master.)
Language skills and other professional skills do not necessarily come together. English is an extra and difficult language to be learnt, Hindi is not, and a vast majority of regional demographies take to it with ease.
So the question is what is the opposition in establishing Hindi as the official language, which is a Sanskrit-born sister language, and most importantly, when it is not supplanting the regional mother tongue? English can be 'phased out' gradually. Regional languages continue to be the medium of education in the respective regions. Hindi would be just an additional medium, as a uniformising factor. It can be learnt just as well as English if education is started in it.
Yet the confounding bigotry of certain sections in some regions, especially South India and Bengal, it is beyond my comprehension!
3) The question: do we need an official language? Yes. A language for standardising official communication is required. While each communication to the state can be in the regional language, owing to potential differential in communication because of mistranslation or varying import, a standard language of communication is required. But the insistence that English be continued as official language comes from those who have not mastered even their mother tongue. They cannot do Maths, Science, Chemistry in Kannada, Tamil or Bengali. It's a different thing that most Indians do not have perfect English either, but what is valued is not excellence through own language, but mediocrity with a foreign language. Those rallying under the respective mother tongues against Hindi are only keen on preserving the mother tongue as a decoration piece, to puff up their regional chauvinism. They do not see that English is a hindrance to progress for masses even in those regions. Truth is, they are themselves handicapped in their mother tongue, and therefore push for English. They know they'll be nowhere without it. It is a selfish motive for preserving own advantage. The average Tamilian or Kannada or Bengali speaking person from among the masses is as lost with English as with Hindi, in fact would grasp the latter much faster since characteristically it is similar to the mother tongue. But then where will that leave the English-speaking snob?
4) Why Hindi you ask? Simply because it has maximum spread as compared to all classical/refined languages in terms of interferences with regional languages and/or dialects. But that aside, Hindi is not the native language of *any* place. No. Not even UP/cow belt. People speak all languages from Braji, to Bhojpuri, to Magahi, to Maithili, Kannauji, Awadhi, Bundeli, Urdu, Bagheli, Angika... There's a difference between Garhwali, Kumaoni, Nepali, Dogri, Kangri, Kinnauri... But all these peoples have maximum ease with Hindi. But for being able to conduct business or study in Hindi even people from the cow belt would have to formally study Hindi. A labourer in UP cannot speak stylised, refined Hindi.
In fact one can also have two or three Indian languages as official language: say Tamil in South, Bengali for East Hindi for RoI. (Even here, will we ever reach a consensus? Will the Ahomiya not contest Bengal's claim? Would a Kannadiga not contest Tamil's claim?) But why primacy to English?
