भारतीय इतिहास के ६ स्वर्णिम पृष्ठ (वीर सावरकर - विदेशी आक्रान्ताओं पर विजय गाथा)

Gujarat, Devaldevi, seem to have borne in their mind not only the memory, but a love, a fascination for their Hindu origin, their Hindu blood, and their essential Hindu make-up—there seems to be rankling in their hearts, intermittently or continuously, the atrocities inflicted on them by the Muslims. It seemed to burst out through their actions. At last, it is because of their irrespressible yearning to avenge the wrongs done to their ‘Hindutwa’ that in Delhi itself, broke out that great conflagration which like the wild fire of Khandav forest of Mahabharat, reduced to ashes the Muslim Sultanate which had under its sway practically the whole of India, if only for a short while! 748. In the very first expedition of Allauddin against Gujarat, after the Gujarat ruler’s defeat, his crowned queen Kamaldevi fell into the hands of Allauddin while she was fleeing for safety. But the ruler, however, could effect his escape along with his princely daughter, Devaldevi, a mere child then. Used to all sorts of royal comforts and pleasures till the very previous day as she was, how hard and unbearable might this tender and beautiful royal princess have found it to undergo all the calamities and privations and exertions of wandering for days together through forest-after-forest, and trying to evade the ever present possibility of capture by the pursuing Muslims, might easily be imagined. In that tender age, hatred for the Muslims must have been engraved deeply on her bosom, because of other people’s and her own actual experience. Her very mother, Rani Kamaldevi, had become the beloved queen of Sultan Allauddin at Delhi, and that very mother of hers was now out to seize her and make her a Muslim! How painful must this news have been to her tender heart! In order to evade this terrible fate, she was married, even a little against her father’s wishes, to Ramdevrao’s son, Shankardev, the staunch follower of Hinduism. But her evil star did not leave her alone there. In one of the invasions of Maliq Kafur against the Hindus, she was caught and carried away to Delhi as a captive. She must have been smarting with pain and humiliation a hundred thousand times in that moment of despair! At last, on reaching Delhi, she was forced to marry Khijrakhan, the eldest son of Allauddin. Some writers vouch that Devaldevi and Khijrakhan greatly loved each other. But this seems to be the flattering way of the courtly writers. Her subsequent course of action makes it abundantly clear! But that shrewd Hindu princess seems to have affected her love for Islam and for her husband till she got the desired opportunity.