A Short History of the Mughal Empire (I.B.Tauris Short Histories)

by Fisher, H, Michael

  In the actual Panipat battle in April 1526, Babur used his muskets and cannon to anchor his army’s center, protecting them against enemy cavalry with a wall of seven hundred carts linked by ox-hide ropes and interspersed with shielding pylons. Even though the slow firing rate and inaccuracy of muskets and rock-firing cannon were frustrating to Babur, they frightened the enemy as well as killed a few of them. This tactic also assisted Babur at his other major battle in India, at Khanua, but was evidently not the decisive factor in either.

  More effective at Panipat against Sultan Ibrahim’s unwisely immobile army was Babur’s light cavalry, mostly Mongols. They harassed the sultan’s entrenched troops and then, when Ibrahim belatedly advanced his army against Babur’s well-prepared position, this cavalry executed a tulughma maneuver: sweeping around both enemy flanks, thus forcing them to crowd ineffectively together. In the melee, Ibrahim’s war elephants scattered, he died, and his army fled, leaving thousands dead. The remainder of his still armed but demoralized troops dispersed across the region. A vast number of Indian families who lost menfolk at Panipat or who were looted (by victors and vanquished) must have been devastated. The entire north Indian populace must also have dreaded the disorder and lawlessness that accompanied such violent regime change and also earlier Timurid invasions.

  Facing no organized opposition, Babur immediately dispatched Humayun to seize more distant Agra while he himself camped at Delhi (a hundred kilometers from the battlefield). As Babur first entered his new realm, he explored what he considered its major features. At Delhi, he prioritized paying reverence to the major Sufi tombs of Shaikh Nizam-ud-Din Aulia (d. 1324) and Shaikh Bakhtiar Kaki of Fergana (d. 1236), both of the India-based Chishti order. Babur explored the fortress, royal tombs, mosques and gardens of earlier Delhi Sultans. He had the royal treasury sealed for later assessment and dispersal. He directed that the khutba in Delhi’s mosques proclaim his name as sovereign and graciously ‘distributed some money to the poor and unfortunate’ of the city.27 Babur then rushed the two hundred kilometers to Agra where Humayun had entered that city and besieged the inner citadel.

  Humayun had allowed the safe departure of the Hindu royal family that had traditionally ruled Gwalior until seven years earlier, when Sultan Ibrahim had forced their submission and confined them in Agra as royal hostages; the head of the clan, Raja Vikramajit, had died at Panipat in Ibrahim’s army. In exchange for the family’s safe passage out of Agra, Humayun had received ‘many jewels and gems, among which was a famous diamond … that a gem merchant once assessed … at the whole world’s expenditure for half a day’ (the Koh-i Nur diamond, after many travails, is now possessed by the English queen).28 Babur allowed Humayun to keep this treasure. Babur also generously pensioned Ibrahim’s mother and then later pardoned her following her nearly successful attempt to poison him.

  In the mode of a Central Asian warlord on a predatory expedition, Babur lavishly distributed Ibrahim’s hoarded treasuries, without even counting it. He gave the most to Humayun, next to his other major commanders. Babur boasted, ‘All the Afghans, Hazaras, Arabs, and Baluch in the army and every other group were given cash from the treasury in accordance with their station. Every merchant and student, indeed every person who was along with the army took away a large share.’29 Babur continued that he exported to Kabul many gems and dancing women for his womenfolk plus money ‘for every living soul, male and female, bondsman and free, adult and child in the province.’ Further, Babur publicized his triumph widely, as Timur had done when he looted Hindustan, by sending news and booty to the people of Fergana and elsewhere in Mawarannahr, as well as to the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Babur reportedly even dispatched news of his conquest to the Tsar in Moscow.30

  Expecting gratitude from Hindustanis for his just conquest, Babur was disappointed:

  … a strange antagonism and hatred was felt between our soldiers and the natives. The native soldiers and peasants ran away as far as they could from our people. With the sole exception of Delhi and Agra, all the places that had fortresses made them fast and refused obedience … Neither grain for ourselves nor straw for the horses was to be found …. The people had turned to brigandage and thievery.31

  Nonetheless, Babur gradually, by force and threats, subdued these fortresses and extracted submission, tributes and revenues from the regional rulers and landholders of Hindustan. Over the next four years, Babur stayed in north India and ruled there. As Babur and diverse people living in north India gradually came together through contestation and cooperation, they produced the dynamic but still uncertain process that was the Mughal Empire.

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  INDIANS AND EMPEROR BABUR CREATE THE MUGHAL EMPIRE, 1526–30

  … it is agreed that the boundary of a country is the place up to which people speak the language of that country …

  Mughal Emperor Jahangir1

  After four earlier attempts, Babur had finally entered north India, decisively defeating the Lodi army in 1526. Unlike his distant ancestor, Timur, however, Babur did not pillage and withdraw. Instead, he settled and expanded his conquests there until his death. The Mughal Empire thus emerged from the complex interactions between Babur and the people of these diverse lands, initially largely unfamiliar with each other.

  The massive and populous South Asian subcontinent contained various regions, each with its own ecology and complex socio-cultural, economic and political conditions and histories. Never had all the distinct regions of the subcontinent been united under a single language, religion, economy, or ruler. However, with local variations, most of South Asia shared some overarching environmental factors, like extreme rainy and dry seasons, and also cultural features, notably some of the beliefs and social order of Brahminic Hinduism. Further, by Babur’s time, most regions had a substantial minority of Muslims. Many earlier rulers had created trans-regional states; a few had built brief empires that nearly spanned the entire subcontinent. Babur’s political vision, however, did not extend much beyond north India and its neighboring regions.

  The types and depths of the relationships between Babur and the increasing number of his assorted subjects varied considerably over time and space. Some people persisted in resistance. Others paid him revenues and tribute. Some, particularly traditional service elite groups, came to join his army and administration, as they had earlier rulers. The Empire, however, still remained thinly fragile when Babur died in 1530.

  Map 2: South Asian macro-regions and main physical features

  THE ENVIRONMENTS OF SOUTH ASIA

  Neither Babur nor most people living in South Asia conceived of the subcontinent as a single geographical entity, as it appears in today’s maps: an entire peninsula bounded by the Himalayas across the north and oceans on the west and east. Instead, distinct physical environments defined each region. Perennial seasonally swollen rivers, mountain ranges and other geological features created South Asia’s four macro-regions: the Ganges-Jumna River basin of Hindustan and Bengal; the Indus River basin running from the Punjab south to Sind; the Deccan upland plateau; and the peninsular south with both highlands and coastal plains. Each macro-region was the size of a large nation in today’s Europe. Their climates ranged from deserts to fertile plains to dense jungles. Each macro-region also contained ecological micro-regions: each district contained significantly different soil and water conditions. Each macro-region also had particular patterns of rainfall and riverine irrigation, and thus a specific mix of wet and dry agriculture, with profound socio-cultural, economic and political consequences. Nonetheless, some broad characteristics occurred everywhere, albeit with variations.

  Previously unfamiliar to Babur, but all too familiar to people living in South Asia, were the extreme temperature and rainfall variations of the monsoons (literally ‘season’ in Arabic). The subcontinent extends from above the Equator well into the northern hemisphere, with the Tropic of Cancer crossing its midsection. Hence, over the months following the December Solstice, the increasingly d
irect sun’s rays gradually heat the land, creating by June a strong three-month-long updraft that draws in westerly winds from the relatively cooler Indian Ocean. This southwest Monsoon carries extensive moisture onto India’s west coast, where intense rain falls along a coastal belt, squeezed out by a steep ridge of mountains—the Western Ghats. This leaves the interior Deccan with less moisture, closer to the dry lands familiar to Babur, although much hotter. These seasonal winds then continue north up the Bay of Bengal, again picking up moisture and energy, hitting the Bengal coast as cyclones and drenching rains. The southwest Monsoon is then channeled by the Himalayan Mountains westward up the Ganges plain, making the new Mughal heartland of Hindustan fertile, but dropping decreasing amount of rain, until the Punjab is relatively dry and Rajasthan and the Indus plain contain deserts.

  These seasonal winds then subside and reverse. From September, the land cools, making the relatively warmer ocean the source of the updraft. Thus, colder and dryer Northeast Monsoon winds blow off the Himalayas across north India, with enough rain to enable some areas to produce a second crop. The peninsula’s south-eastern plain, which was never well incorporated into the Mughal Empire, receives its heaviest rains in December, when these Northeast Monsoon winds sweep inland from the Bay of Bengal.

  While the monsoons follow chronologically predictable patterns, they vary in the annual amount of rainfall in each region. Some years, droughts occur in one or more regions. Transportation of grain from more productive areas to such drought-struck places could be disrupted by wars. Drought-induced disorder and emigration had profound consequences for the local economy, population and administration. Many rulers, including Mughal emperors, provided some charity food-distribution to heavily affected regions, but this was not systematic nor of sufficient scale to alleviate the effects of a famine. Consequently, environmental forces—beyond the power of governments to control, even today—strongly affected the Mughal Empire, year by year. Some reigns suffered more, some less.

  Wherever sufficient rain falls on fertile soil, especially on the lower Gangetic plain and the peninsula’s coasts, people traditionally cultivate highly productive rice and other wet crops. In dryer regions, including western Hindustan and the Punjab, less water-dependent crops like wheat and millet predominated (prior to the twentieth-century’s mechanized irrigation and hybrid plants). In general, wet crops are roughly three times as productive as dry crops, with rural population densities to match. The cuisine of each regional culture also reflected the prevailing crops. The preferred diet of Babur’s court initially highlighted wheat-based breads familiar from Central Asia and Afghanistan, but, as the Mughal court settled in India, its cuisine expanded to include more Hindustani-style rice dishes.

  THE CULTURES AND COMMUNITIES OF SOUTH ASIA

  The substantial majority of the people living in South Asia followed a complex composite tradition that outsiders designated ‘Hindu,’ since its followers lived beyond the Indus River. Babur evidently never inquired extensively about the cultures or internal social divisions of the people he ruled, although he knew that they included many distinct Muslim and non-Muslim groups. In fact, the elite and popular beliefs, customs and life ways of South Asia’s diverse communities varied widely by social class and region.

  At the elite level, the overarching tradition centered on a Brahmin-headed religious and social system which extended across most of South Asia, albeit in differing depths. Its heartland was north India, known as Hindustan (‘land of the Hindus’). However, Brahmins were always an elite minority: present at the top of the ritual order almost everywhere, but in varying small proportions of the population.

  For a thousand years, Brahmin scholars and philosophers using classical Sanskrit-language oral and written texts had been expounding the principle of a universal moral order, dharma. Birth and behavior divided all humans into four varnas (‘social orders’), each with a broadly identified dharma: Brahmins were the highest as priests (although many followed other occupations); next were martial Kshatriyas (including rulers, warriors and landholders); followed by Vaishya merchants and artisans; then Shudra common folk (although historically some Shudras achieved wealth and power). Outside these varnas, and thus considered less human, were various others, including uninitiated children and unmarried women (even those whose parents were in a varna), excommunicated deviants from dharmic practice, forest-dwelling adivasis (‘aboriginals,’ often called ‘tribals’), menial workers, and Asian, European and African foreigners. Each person, divinity and other being had a distinct individual dharma based on ancestry, age, gender and accumulated karma (‘deeds’) from past lives.

  In each area, Brahminic and local social systems overlapped in more specific communities—each a distinct jati (‘birth’ group). Each jati had its own particular dharma, for example as weavers, potters, or warriors, and was customarily endogamous and commensal. In each region, a ranked hierarchy of jatis existed by consensus. However, the exact varna identity (if any) of individual jatis was often disputed (many jatis claimed higher varna status than those around them accepted).

  In Brahminic Sanskrit texts, this varna system appeared stable. But in practice, as jatis, clans and families settled in India or as they rose or fell in economic or political power, they merged into or shifted among varnas. As a particularly prominent example, many clans of the Rajput (‘king’s son’) jati boasted themselves the eternal epitome of the Kshatriya varna with putative ancestry from the sun, moon, fire, or another deity. Rajput clans often dominated politically and militarily across much of northern, western, and central India. In Babur’s time, the two major Rajput ruling clans in Rajasthan were Sisodias based in Mewar and Rathors in Marwar.

  Historically, however, many martial immigrants (from elsewhere in South Asia or from Central Asia) claimed Rajput status after they had settled or conquered and became local landholders or rulers. Some Rajputs originated from rising families within communities of indigenous pastoralists, agriculturalists, or adivasis. To demonstrate their Rajput status, these upwardly mobile groups ‘Sanskritized’: they imitated established Rajput jatis in diet and deportment, employed Brahmin priests, had Kshatriya-specific rituals performed for themselves, and ‘rediscovered’ long-forgotten descent from legendary Rajputs. When the aspirant clan’s daughters were accepted as brides by established Rajputs, this meant recognition as subordinate allies with legitimately Rajput status. Particularly successful rising Rajput clans convinced other Rajputs to give them brides; under hypergamy, bride receivers held higher status than bride givers.

  Many established Rajput clans also recognized some non-Hindu martial immigrants as also following the dharma of the warrior and ruler. These newcomers included some Muslim clans, like Babur’s dynasty, who were thus partly incorporated into the Indic social order, without being considered Hindu. Indeed, many Rajput and other Hindu oral and written texts identified Turks as a jati, rather than classifying all Muslims collectively as a single community. Additionally, some Rajput families converted to Islam, while still retaining much of their traditional dharma and social status.2 From Babur’s grandson onward, the Mughal dynasty accepted brides from some leading Hindu Rajput families (but never gave brides to Rajput families), thus proclaiming the relatively higher social rank of the Mughal imperial family.

  Separate minority communities following other Indic religious traditions also functioned as jatis, even when they did not intermarry or interdine with Hindus. For instance, Jains emerged from Indian origins like Hindus, but formed a small endogamous and commensal religious community. Jains held significant roles in banking and commerce. They were widely respected for their non-violent beliefs, including the avoidance of killing and vegetarianism. Jain practices contrasted deeply with Mughal warrior traditions but Jain leaders and religious teachers attended Mughal emperors and claimed to have influenced their policies toward non-violence.

  Similarly, Zoroastrian Parsis traced their origin to pre-Islamic Iran but had long settled in India,
particularly as merchants. They regarded the elements of fire, earth and water as sacred, and viewed the cosmos as a Manichean battle between good and evil. They remained a small endogamous and commensal community living among but apart from Hindus.

  Each South Asian region also produced thriving popular devotional movements. Some considered themselves broadly within the Hindu tradition but others did not, sometimes explicitly attacking both Brahmin and Muslim religious authorities. For example, the Punjab was the main base of the monotheistic Sikh religious movement. Although Babur did not record this, in his 1520 raiding expedition, he briefly captured (and may have conversed with) Guru Nanak (1469–1538), founder of Sikhism.3 Followers of the Sikh Gurus were mostly Khatris (a merchant and scribal jati) or Jats (a farmer jati). While in many ways a distinct religion and social community, Sikh families also occasionally intermarried with their equivalent Hindu jatis. The Sikh movement would become a powerful regional political force that increasingly challenged Mughal rule, especially during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

  Some immigrants, including Muslims and Christians, tried to fit into their own conceptual categories all these complex Indic systems. Many Muslims differentiated themselves collectively from all others in India, including Hindus, Jains and Sikhs. Further, some orthodox Muslims regarded these Indic communities as not ‘People of the Book,’ meaning that God had never chosen for them a prophet to convey the Qur’an. In contrast, Christians, Jews, and some other non-Muslim communities had once been selected by Allah to receive the Book. For Muslims, the final Prophet, Muhammad, had conveyed the Qur’an directly in Arabic. However, Babur—like some Delhi Sultans and other Muslim rulers in India—pragmatically reinterpreted the theological status of these Indic communities to permit them to be zimmi (‘protected subjects’) as if they were People of the Book, in exchange for their paying jizya (a tax in lieu of service to the Muslim ruler). Further, many Muslim rulers never actually collected jizya from their non-Muslim subjects. However, to Babur, the distinctions among the different Indic traditions apparently remained immaterial except that they were clearly not Muslims.