1. Discuss the character and composition of the Sultanate ruling class in the 13th century.

Ans. The Delhi Sultanate in India was established in 1206 A.D. It was the result of a process that had begun with the campaigns of the Ghaznavids and Mahmud of Ghazni; and Muizzuddin Muhammad Ghuri, which led to the conquest of North India. However, the establishment of the empire was not an easy process. In the first phase of its history, i.e., the Ilbari period (1206-1290 A.D.), the territories over which the Muslims had actual control were few, they faced stiff resistance, and there was no administrative structure in place. Thus, this period was marked with the consolidation of Turkish rule in India. In the course of this, a ruling class also emerged, which had a distinct character and composition, and played a formative role in the nature of the Sultanate.

The main sources for the study of the Sultanate period are the Persian political chronicles, of which the most important are Minhaj-us-Siraj Juzjani’s Tabaqat-i-Nasiri, which covers the period up to Balban; Zia-ud-Din Barani’s Tarikh-i-Firozshahi and Fatawa-i-Jahandari which continues the narrative till Firuzshah Tughluq’s period; and later works like Isami’s Futuhus Salatin. But they all suffer from biases. Excessive use of religious terminology, owing to the background of the writers, is another problem. These accounts can be supplemented with the accounts of Arab travelers; mystic or Sufi literature; and local, regional bardic literature, mainly Rajput, which, though they too glorify Rajput resistance, courage and chivalry, yet they give an insight into the period and provide a different point of view. Texts can be used in correlation with archaeological evidence from monuments, coins, inscriptions etc.

The ruling class comprised of four groups – the Sultan or the Crown; the nobility or the umara; the ulama; and the local chieftains. The relationship between all of them was one of conflict and tension, yet marked by cooperation and co-dependence. The word ‘Sultan’ comes from ‘sult’, meaning ‘power’. The nobility held a very powerful position in the state and actually conducted the work of administration and governance. Minhaj describes them as “Arakin-i-daulat wa, Sutun-i-sultanate”, meaning ‘members of the state and pillars of the Sultanate’. The word ‘ulama’ (sing. alim) comes from ‘ilm’, meaning knowledge. It was not an organized group and included anyone who was well-versed in religious learning and Islamic Law. The local chieftains included the displaced political authority, as well as chiefs at the regional, district and village level.

The Ilbari Period of the Delhi Sultanate saw the evolution and gradual changes in the composition of the ruling class. The period was also marked by tensions within the ruling class, especially between the Crown and the nobility, so much so that Nigam has remarked that the “the history of the sultanate period to a great extent is the history of the achievements and failures of the Turkish Nobility”. But in order to understand these tensions, as well as the development of the institutions of the Delhi Sultanate, one must keep in view their background in Islamic history.

The Sultanate was a monarchical institution established by the Muslims. But it is not mentioned either in the Quran or the Hadis. Yet it evolved as a necessary institution, to maintain stability, from the time of the Ummayads, reaching its culmination when Mahmud of Ghazni declared himself as a Sultan, independent of the Abbasid Caliphate at Baghdad. It was influenced by the Pre-Islamic Sassanid traditions. However, the institution was still ‘un-Islamic’. Therefore, to legitimize the Sultan’s position, kingship was associated with divinity. The Adab-ul-Harb by Fakhr-i-Mudabbir says that “whoever obeys the Sultan, obeys God”. Thus, it equates loyalty to the Sultan with allegiance to God, and similarly rebellion against the Sultan as going against divine will. He also invokes the verse from the Quran, which asks people to obey those in authority. The Sultan adopted titles like zillallah (shadow of God on earth). Another form of legitimization was formal recognition from the Caliph, even though actual power remained in the hands of the Sultan. This could be through a letter of recognition (khillat), sikkah or coins issued in their name, or reading the khutbah in their name. Such legitimization was more important in the early years of the Sultanate, when they had no local support in India.

Yet, monarchy had no basis in Islam. There were no clear laws of succession. This was significant as it meant that anyone could make a claim to monarchy as long as he had the ability to defend it. Amir Khusrau writes that it depended not on the birth of a person, but his ability to wield the sword. This is where the Crown came into a conflict of interests with the nobility. The nobles all saw themselves as equal and the Sultan as “first among equals”. So the rise of any one from among them to the position of Sultan was resented. This was as most of them were slaves and thus owed allegiance only to their master alone. Also, this was a period of transition. The nobles were still tied to their nomadic traditions; they had no history or tradition of monarchy. They were used to a tribal polity where decisions were taken through consensus and the tribal leader had no superior power except the right to lead military campaigns. So they were unaccustomed to assumption of absolute power by the Sultan and resisted any such attempt.

Since the very inception of Turkish rule in India the Turkish nobility played an important role in carving out a strong empire as well as shaping the government of the empire. Two terms mentioned in the sources are relevant – khwaja-tash, implying that all nobles were equal in power, status and privilege because they were slaves of the same master; and sultani, meaning ‘slaves of the master who they have put on the throne’. This shows that they had a say in matters of succession and came to play kingmakers. Later, some of the Sultans emerged from among the nobility itself, e.g. Balban. Thus, they wielded immense power. Many of the kings after Iltutmish exercised only nominal authority; real power was in the hands of the nobility.

However, the nobility was not one unified group. Traditional scholars like Nizami and Nigam have presented the nobility as consisting of 2 monolithic groups – the Turks and the non-Turks of high lineage (Tajiks). The nobility was undoubtedly dominated by Turkish ghulams. Tajiks were men of Persian speech, mostly free-born. But recent scholarship by Hambly and Sunil Kumar has argued that this is a simplistic representation, and there was a more complex structure in place. We have evidence of the existence of other groups like free-born Turks, Khaljis, Ghuris, Afghans, Mongols, black African slaves (Habashi, literally ‘Abyssinian’), and later Indian converts (shaikhzadas), who gradually became important and competed for power. Also, the Turkish slaves also had their own internal differences. There were often differences between slaves of different Sultans. For instance, between the slaves of Muizzuddin (Muizzi slaves), Aibek (Qutbi slaves), and Iltutmish (Shamsi slaves), who owed allegiance only to their master. There was also a conflict between senior and junior slaves of the same master. Later, dissensions also developed between nobles at the centre (Delhi) and provincial nobles, as is seen in the time of Raziya. Thus nobility consisted of diverse elements, all in competition with each other. Sometimes the Sultan would himself promote these divisions, in order to weaken the nobility and strengthen his own position. The Turks aimed mainly for motives of personal ambition or self-protection and united only in the face of common danger from the non-Turkish faction.

Peter Jackson has done a comparative study between the mamluk institution in Egypt and India. He points out that the bandagan was distinguished by a hierarchy. Sunil Kumar has questioned the use of the word “nobility”. He feels that rather than professional service, it was the personal relationship that existed between a ghulam and his patron that led to a close relationship between them, and their appointment to higher positions. He refers to terms like parwarish (nourishing), parwardan (upbringing) and tarbiyat (to pass on certain values and etiquettes), with regard to the process of fostering the slaves.

The powers and position of the ulama in the state, and its relationship with the rulers has been a matter of continuous debate. The ulama are distinguished from the nobility by using the term ahl-i-saif (wielders of the sword) for the latter, and ahl-i-qalam (wielders of the pen) for the former. The sources refer to 2 categories of ulama – ulama-i-akharat/batini and ulama-i-dunya/zahiri. The former were those scholars who devoted themselves to religious learning and led a simple and austere life, e.g. the Sufis. The latter were associated with the ruling elite and the state and got employment in the government as mufti, qazi, imam etc. The newly-converted Turks paid great deference to the clergy. But they kept effective political control in their hands and confined them to deciding judicial cases, religious matters and education.

There was a tacit relationship between the Sultan and the ulama; one of interdependence. The ulama helped legitimize the actions of the Sultan. In return, the state patronized them. In the initial stages of the establishment of the Sultanate, this relationship was much stronger since the Sultan did not have the support of the local groups and had to rely exclusively on their Muslim support base. The ulama commanded considerable influence among the Muslims and in various ways assisted the Delhi Sultans in consolidating their authority. However, as the Sultanate began to establish close relationships with the local groups, they moved further away from the ulama.

Another bone of contention was the enforcement of the shariah. The ulama wanted the Sultans to take up their cause and implement it in India. However, the Sultans realized that this was not possible, since they were ruling a pre-dominantly non-Muslim state. This can be seen in an incident narrated by Barani, where Iltutmish’s wazir considers such a policy impractical because the Muslims were too few in number, “like salt in a dish (of food)”. Barani also remarks that the shariah was silent about matters pertaining to the state. Moreover, the Sultans had perforce to promulgate zawabit (state law), which was based of the discretion of the Sultan. If there was a conflict between state-law and the shariah, the state-law was to prevail.

Iltutmish honored the ulama as much because of his own piety as because of their influence with Muslim elite and soldiery. But there were also problems – Barani tells us that Iltutmish got some prominent qazis murdered. When he nominated Raziya as his successor in preference to his sons, he did not consult them but afterwards informed them of his decision, so they had no option but to concur. From Bahram Shah’s reign, their influence increased and occasionally they married into the ruling house. But sometimes, they could also be disloyal to the interest of the state and the ruling Sultan, as is seen in the time of Bahram Shah. Due to this, Balban evolved a policy relegating the influence of the ulama to background. At the same time, he cultivated good personal relationships with them. Thus, on the whole, the ulama occupied a position of great prestige throughout this period, and even when they could not influence the Sultan, they could not be easily influenced by him.

The fourth component, the local intermediaries, were crucial for the functioning of the state because they were responsible for land revenue collection, on which the state was based. This was because, unlike the Turks, they had a personal relationship with the peasantry and knowledge of the local agrarian conditions and local languages. And though the state often had to face military resistance from them, they depended on them for provincial administration, as firstly the Turks were limited in number; and secondly the newly-arrived Turks were unfamiliar with the details and problems of day-to-day administration. The administration at the local level was not changed and the Hindus continued to dominate the country-side as khuts, muqaddams, chaudhuri, rana etc. Several defeated Hindu kings were also made vassals of the Sultanate, on the condition of payment of a tribute. However, this depended on the prestige and strength of the king, whose suzerainty, in fact, had to be periodically enforced at the point of sword.

So far, we have seen an overview of the general issues concerning the ruling class that faced the Delhi Sultanate during the 13th century, be it their tensions or composition. But for their proper understanding, it is necessary to trace the circumstances which led to the creation and establishment of the Delhi Sultanate, for the character and the composition of the governing class changed from period to period and ruler to ruler.

The establishment of the Delhi Sultanate was a culmination of the campaigns of Muizzuddin Ghuri, who first invaded India in 1175 and conquered most of North India. Initially his armies consisted largely of the Ghurians and the Khalaj. However, after the Second Battle of Tarain (1192), the Ghurian commanders came increasingly to play a secondary role to his Turkish slaves. The ghulam system, which had begun under the Abbasids, who had started the practice of recruiting and training Turkish slaves for purposes of war and administration, was continued by Muizzuddin. He conducted most of his campaigns in India through his Turkish slaves, mainly Yalduz; Qubacha; and Qutb-ud-din Aibek, in order to keep the territories as his own personal possessions. Thus, the conquest of India was possible only through the joint efforts of these slaves.

After the death of Muizzuddin, there arose a conflict regarding his possessions. He had left no heir and his territories passed down to his slaves. He was succeeded by his nephew Ghiyasuddin Mahmud at Ghur. In India, it was Aibek, the younger slave in charge of Delhi and Lahore, who assumed power and established the Delhi Sultanate. In 1206, he was formally invested and promoted to the rank of Malik. He never referred to himself as Sultan. In inscriptions, no higher titles are used with his name than amir and Sipahsalar. During his short reign, he faced problems from the other Muizzi slaves. Yalduz was in control of Punjab, and Qubacha of Multan and upper Sind. But he did not face any difficulties from his own nobility, mainly because there was no formal administration system in this period. So there were no positions or iqtas to fight over. The nobility was rather like an organized armed camp, whose only interest was to share the tribute/booty got from defeated rulers. Also, the actual power of the Sultanate was confined to a few centers in North India and Rajput resistance was a serious problem.

On Aibek’s death in 1210, the officers at Lahore nominated Aram Shah to be the Sultan. He was supported by the Qutbi nobles. But his accession was not supported at Delhi, where a party of nobles headed by the sipahsalar “invited” Iltutmish, the governor of Budaun and son-in-law of Aibek, to assume the Crown. Aram thereupon marched against Delhi but Iltutmish, who had the support of the Muizzi slaves, found it easy to defeat him. Aram’s reign thus lasted for about 8 months. It is unclear whether he was Aibek’s son or not. But his reign shows that the nobility was beginning to play an important role in succession, with not much regard to hereditary principles.

Iltutmish’s period was significant as it was during his reign that the Sultanate acquired legitimacy. He received a letter of investiture from the Abbasid Caliph in 1229, which formally recognized the independent status of the Delhi Sultanate. A group of jurists like chief qazi Wazih-ud-din Kashani led a challenge doubting the free status of Iltutmish, which he cleverly met with a letter of manumission issued by his late master. This was the first attempt by the ulama to assert their right to the choice of the sovereign.

His period was also important as he gave an administrative framework to the empire by introducing the iqtadari system. This institution too had been prevalent in Turko-Persian states. Iqtas were mainly revenue assignments, which transferred the right to collect revenue from that land to its holder (iqtadar). In return, the iqtadar had to maintain a military contingent, maintain law and order in his region and send a surplus to the centre (fawazil). It was supposed to be a non-hereditary system and iqtadars were supposed to be regularly transferred. This was a way of organizing the nobility and curbing their power. However, it intensified the conflicts between them as there was competition for positions. Some nobles even tried to make themselves substantially independent in their iqtas and so challenged central authority.

Iltutmish’s position was highly precarious initially, as he did not have the support of the Qutbi nobles. He slowly stabilized his position and brought under his control various regions such as Budaon, Awadh, and the Shivalik. He also put an end to the claims of the Muizzi nobles. Yalduz was forced out of Ghazni by the Khwarazm Shah and wrested Lahore from Qubacha. But Iltutmish defeated him in 1216 at Tarain. Iltutmish was diplomatically also able to prevent the Mongols from crossing the Indus into India. He refused refuge to the Khwarazm Prince Jalaluddin Mankabarni, for he knew that the position of the Sultanate was weak. He also feared his own position, as Mankabarni could have got the support of the Tajik nobles.

He also collected a large number of Tajik officers. His wazir Nizam-ul-Mulk Junaidi was a Tajik as well. To counter the aspirations of the nobility, Iltutmish created the Turkan-i-chahalgani, which was a group of 40 Turkish slaves, who owed personal loyalty to Iltutmish, and who had all attained the rank of khan. Traditional writers like Nigam and Nizami wrote that they were a tightly knit group, who held all important positions, and were bound together by their need to protect the monopoly from other factions of the nobility. Recent writers have questioned this view. Peter Jackson notes that in contemporary Egypt there were amirs commanding units of 40 royal mamluks and concludes that perhaps the chahalganis formed a parallel group of commanders within the ranks of Iltutmish’s Shamsi slaves. Hambly points out that Juzjani, who is a contemporary, does not mention the chahalgani. Only Barani does, and this may be because the term was a popular nickname, or an expression of opprobrium which became used in later times. But Minhaj does give a list of 25 nobles of Iltutmish’s period. It is not clear upon what basis he selected the 25 but it may be because they were the core of the chahalgani. Hambly also questions their number. M. Habib says that 40 was merely a formal number, they were most likely lesser. The number may be used in the biblical sense of meaning a large number, as in the Quranic context, 40 is a synonym for many. Barani says that the Turkish chahalgani were equal in privileges and power. He also refers to their unwillingness to submit to any leader, even from amongst themselves. It is significant that Barani makes mention of the bandagan-i-Shamsi as well as the chahalgani. The difference between them seems to be in the phrase which Barani uses when he mentions the chahalgani for the first time, including Balban “among the forty Turkish slaves freed…” Hambly feels that possibly all forty slaves were manumitted at the same time. He concludes that though we do not the know the origin or definite meaning of this term, but they were a group of nobles, very powerful, who assumed a dominant role after Iltutmish’s death and controlled the succession of weak rulers, who were, in effect, mostly puppets in their hands.

Iltutmish also started the practice of nominating his successor, and for sometime after his death, the Crown did remain in his family. But the period was marked with great instability, as Sultans came to power in quick succession and mostly for a brief period. Of the sovereigns, only Balban is known with certainty to have died a natural death. Power was increasingly being controlled by the Turkish nobility. Initially, Iltutmish had nominated Raziya as he felt that none of his surviving sons was competent enough. Later, though, he seems to have changed his mind in favour of his eldest son, Ruknuddin Firuz Shah. His mother, Shah Turkan, wielded real power during his 7-month reign, which was dominated by a revolt on the part of a group among Iltutmish’s senior amirs, including the wazir. According to Isami, Firuz tried to curtail the power and even physically eliminate prominent Turkish slaves, and excessively relied upon Tajiks, whom the Turks massacred in the course of the Sultan’s campaign against the rebel Kabir Khan. So he was deposed and Raziya was enthroned in his place.

Raziya’s period is important for several reasons. Not only was she the first and only female Sultan, but her period also saw the emergence of a new kind of factionalism within the nobility – between the Delhi nobles and the provincial nobles. She had come to power mainly with the support of the former. This was resented by the latter, who felt that they too should be consulted in matters of succession. As a result, she had to face many rebellions in places like Bhatinda. Raziya resorted to creating divisions in the hostile camp by cleverly turning them against each other. She also tried to strictly implement the iqtadari regulations, which also made them resentful. Her accession can be taken to show the indifference of the ulama, as the elevation of a woman to royal authority was contrary to Islamic practice. It can also be attributed to the Central Asian background of the ruling class, where women enjoyed greater freedom. Also, perhaps the nobles felt that being a women, she could be a puppet in their hands. Many junior slaves of Iltutmish were promoted, e.g. Balban, who became the amir-i-shikar (incharge of hunting expeditions). But Raziya soon began to exercise independent authority and tried to break the Turkish nobles’ monopoly by introducing new elements in the nobility. A prominent Tajik, Khwaja Muhazzuddin, was appointed the wazir. Her appointment of Yaqut, an Abyssinian slave to the rank of chief of cavalry (amir-i-akhur) alienated the Turks, in particular, the amir-hajib, Aitigen. She was then deposed in favour of her brother Bahram Shah and was killed in 1240 in a vain bid to recover the throne, despite entering into a matrimonial alliance with an important noble Altunia.

Bahram Shah was involved in the conspiracy against Raziya. But his elevation to the throne was conditional to his agreeing to create a new office, the naib-i-mamlikat (regent) to whom he was made to delegate all his powers by a written proclamation. Aitigen was appointed to this post, Muhazzabuddin, was the wazir. But when Aitigen assumed some royal prerogatives, like keeping an elephant and playing the naubat at his gate, Bahram had him executed. Not only did he threaten the nobles, he also became unpopular with the ulama, who participated in an abortive conspiracy to dethrone him. Bahram Shah was overthrown in 1242 when, under the influence of one of his courtiers, he contemplated the wholesale removal of the Turkish slave officers. The fact that the ringleaders were not punished but were in fact rewarded suggests that the new Sultan, Masud Shah, was behind them.

A noble and son-in-law of Iltutmish, Kishli Khan, tried to assume sovereignty in the confusion. But the other nobles did not accept him as the king and Ala-ud-din Masud, the very young son of Firoz, was raised to the throne, precisely on the same conditions as his uncle. Soon the wazir came to exercise all power and so he was murdered. A more submissive wazir was found and the amir-i-hajib’s office was given to Balban, where he appropriated all power. Masud tried to build support from his own family and other minor ranks of nobility; and also promoted the Abyssinians. He was deposed and was succeeded by his uncle Nasiruddin Mahmud. Balban and Mahmud probably had a hand in this. Balban was, by now, very powerful. He even thought of directly assuming power but stopped when he realized that the nobility was as yet not ready and it could lead to an even more serious conflict between the Tajiks and the Turks.

Nasiruddin Mahmud, Iltutmish’s son, had a very long reign (20 years). This was probably because by his time, most members of his family had been eliminated. So the nobility had to continue with him. His was a nominal rule; Ulugh Khan Balban wielded the real power. Balban’s daughter married the Sultan in 1249 and soon he was appointed as the naib. All key positions came to be held by his men. Minhaj speaks of Mahmud as a saintly king, who devoted his life to religion. But he also had some political ambitions. In 1253, he dismissed Balban and, in order to further reduce the power of the Turkish nobility, redistributed other offices to important Tajiks. He also appointed Imad-ud-din Raihan, an Indian convert, as his wakil-i-dar. This shows that the Indian element in the nobility, though small, was becoming important. Indian converts were considered even more dangerous as they could get local support. So the Turkish amirs, though jealous of Balban’s power, now rallied around him in order to protect their interests, although there were some who also joined Raihan. The Sultan compromised and Balban was reappointed. This amounted to a virtual surrender of royal authority to Balban and his clique. Barani even says that Balban was given the royal chatr. It is not known how Mahmud’s reign came to an end, for Minhaj died before the event and Barani’s account opens with Balban’s accession. It is not clear whether he was poisoned by Balban as mentioned in the 14th century accounts of Ibn Battuta and Isami, or died a natural death. It is also unclear what became of his sons.

Balban assumed power in 1266 A.D. This did not evoke a very strong reaction from the nobility as in the case of Kishli Khan, because by now Balban had built up a sizeable support base for himself in the nobility. Moreover, he was also been related to Iltutmish’s family, having married his daughter. He also claimed to be from the ruling line of khans of Iltutmish’s own clans. His reign is significant for several reasons – the consolidation of the Sultanate, as opposed to expansion; his theory of kingship; further development of administrative institutions like the iqtadari system; and his tackling of the Mongol problem by building a strong defence on the north-west frontier.

Balban had been a part of the powerful nobility himself and knew the extent of their influence and authority. Barani describes their attitude as “tu keeste keh man na am, wa tu ke baashee ke man nabaash am”, which meant ‘what are you that I am not and what have you been that I have not been’. This implies again that they saw themselves equal in status. So, to curtail their power and assert royal authority, he developed a theory of kingship. He associated divinity with kingship and adopted titles like niyabat-i-khudai (vice-regent of God). This was to show that the king derived his authority from God, not the nobles, and was above them in position. According to Barani, he also maintained a distinction based on birth, and kept distance from the masses. However, Peter Hardy has shown that these views may well be those of Barani himself, found in his Fatawa-i-Jahandari. He sought to increase personal prestige by claiming descent from the mythical Turkish hero, Afrasiyab. He also re-organized the court etiquette and insisted on the sijda and the paibos (prostration and kissing the monarch’s feet). He displayed the grandeur of his court to inspire awe among nobles.

Balban also took certain measures to centralize authority in the hands of the Sultan. He freely eliminated his rivals, like his cousin Sher Khan, through the use of ‘dagger and poison’. He tried to build his own group of loyal nobles, whether Turks or Khaljis, and employed a network of spies and informers to monitor the activities of his amirs. He also strictly implemented the iqtadari regulations. Fawazil was also regularly collected. When he found that many of the iqtas were held by people either no longer rendering state service, or by the family members of original wajhdar who had died, he cancelled all such iqtas and gave grants to only those who had title deeds. This was to convey to the nobility that the iqtas could be enjoyed by them only as long as the state desired it; and so they derived their power from the king. The army was also re-organized to enable the state to regulate the governing class.

Balban also faced many rebellions in this period. In dealing with these, for the first time, we also hear of the use of Afghan military commanders. Although they were confined to the lower levels, there is now evidence of their involvement in administration as well. Towards the latter half of his reign, he also faced a rebellion from his iqtadar in Bengal, Tughril Khan, who declared independence in 1275. This was a serious challenge to the king’s authority. Balban sent 2-3 expeditions to bring him to submission. However, all were defeated. Balban led the fourth expedition personally. This was successful and the rebel was killed. Bughra Khan, his son, was appointed to the province and also warned him of the consequences of rebellion against Delhi.

Thus, we see that Balban was able to consolidate the Sultanate and resolve the conflict between the Crown and the nobility during his reign. However, the solution had no permanent basis. In his time he faced no serious challenge from the nobility. But after his death, the problem returned again and the disintegration of the empire began. Moreover, it is said that his extreme racialism led him to make the Sultanate an exclusively Turkish concern. On one occasion, he revoked the selection of a native Muslim, Kamal-i-Mahyar, for a clerical post in Amroha. Yet the number of pure-born Turks was steadily declining due to the Mongols severing Delhi’s contact with Turkestan. So it was impossible for them to maintain predominance. The composition of the ruling class certainly broadened under Balban. The kotwal of Delhi, Fakhruddin, was a Tajik. There was an influx of Mongol notables in this period. He also had to recruit the Khaljis under Jalaluddin Khalji to fight the Mongols. We also hear that his servitors included a certain Hatya Paik, presumably a Hindu aristocrat. After a campaign in the Salt Range, Balban brought back with him two sons of their Raja, who adopted Islam. The appearance of these princes, together with Kamal-i-Mahyar, among the maliks of his successor, can be seen to show the rise of an Indian Muslim aristocracy, even prior to the Khalji era, with which it is traditionally associated.

Some historians hold Balban responsible for sapping the roots of Turkish power in India. It is said that his policies weakened the Turkish nobility. This paved the way for the rise of the Khaljis as there were no powerful Turkish nobles left to seriously counter-challenge their authority. But Balban can only in part be held responsible for the ‘Khalji Revolution’. Jalaluddin’s rise to power appears to have been a product of compromise. As Barani admits, a number of Turkish maliks and amirs had thrown in their lot with him, and there had been negotiations with the Ghiyasi party, headed by Balban’s nephew Malik Chajju.

Balban had nominated his eldest son, Muhammad, as successor. But he died fighting against the Mongols in 1286. His other son, Bughra Khan was irresponsible, so he had no choice but to nominate Muhammad’s young son for succession. But after his death, a party headed by the influential Fakhruddin, who had been on bad terms with Muhammad, ignored Balban’s nomination and enthroned Bughra Khan’s son Kaiqubad. Bughra Khan advanced westwards to challenge Kaiqubad, but was reconciled with his son at a meeting on the banks of the river Sarju. Under Kaiqubad, the non-Turkish elements increased significantly in power. Barani refers to Mongol converts who had settled in Delhi and had close family ties with leading Turkish nobles and held high position in Kaiqubad’s court. But it was the dadbeg (amir-i-dad), Nizamuddin, who dominated the state. After Kaiqubad had him poisoned, he himself was deposed. For Barani, the execution or exile of the chief men of Balban’s reign by Nizamuddin, followed by the Sultan’s deposition in favour of his son Kaiumars, undermined the regime – there was a rivalry among the maliks, with none strong enough to triumph. The regency was only a transitional arrangement; the 13th century Sultanate had, for all practical purposes, come to an end. Jalaluddin Khalji rallied his followers, seized control of Kaiumars and became naib, and after a short interval, occupied the throne himself. Thus, the Ilbari period came to an end, and the Khalji Period began. In the early years, though there was a reduction of the power of the Turks, their presence never diminished. However, a dramatic shift in the composition of the ruling class came only with Ala-ud-din Khalji, when the process of Indiaizaiton began.

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  10. Irfan Habib (Ed.) – Medieval India 1, Researches In The History Of India (1200-1750)
    1. Formation Of The Sultanate Ruling Class Of The Thirteenth Century – Irfan Habib
    2. Social Mobility In The Delhi Sultanate – Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui
  11. Daniel Pipes – Slave Soldiers And Islam: The Genesis Of A Military System
  12. ARTICLES –
    1. The Mamlūk Institution In Early Muslim India – Peter Jackson
    2. Role Of The Ghūlams In The Ghaznavid And Seljūqid States: A Consideration Of Some Aspects – Sunil Kumar
    3. When Slaves Were Nobles: The Shamsi Bandagan In The Early Delhi Sultanate – Sunil Kumar
    4. Who Were The Chihilgānī, The Forty Slaves Of Sultān Shams Al-Dīn Iltutmish Of Delhi? – Gavin Hambly
    5. The Islamic Frontier In The East: Expansion Into South Asia – F. Richards
    6. Epic And Counter-Epic In Medieval India – Aziz Ahmad
    7. Trends In The Political Thought Of Medieval Muslim India – Aziz Ahmad (From – Studia Islamica, Volume 17, 1962)
    8. The Early Turkish Nucleus In India – Aziz Ahmad (From – Turcica, Volume 9, 1977)
    9. The Role Of Ulema In Indo-Muslim History – Aziz Ahmad (From – Studia Islamica, Volume 31, 1970)
    10. Mongol Pressure In An Alien Land – Aziz Ahmad (From – Central Asiatic Journal, Volume 6, 1961)
    11. The Early Ghaznavids – E. Bosworth (From – Cambridge History Of Iran, Volume 4)