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

328. At last, the main forces of the Muslims and the Hindus joined battle at Brahmanabad. The Hindus fought fiercely. Although the Muslims then had no cannon, they had firearms of a new type the Hindus did not possess. Naturally, the latter began to find themselves weaker in strength. Moreover, the Arab platoons that were in the pay of Dahir rebelled, when the Hindu- Muslim armies came to close quarters; the Arabs informed him that they would not fight against Mohammed-bin-Kasim since the latter was a Muslim as they themselves were, and that it was a religious crusade against the Kafirs. What more, they even marched on their Hindu master himself. This artlessness of the Hindus in placing complete faith in the enemy met the same fate, whenever in future a Hindu King employed Muslim soldiers in his army. This very often caused the Hindu strategy to topple down and made their battle-arrays ineffective.
329. Nevertheless, without letting this betrayal of the Arab platoons cause any confusion in his ranks, King Dahir mounted his elephant and kept on fighting in the thick of the fray. But when he himself was killed in the battle, the Hindu army was routed, and the Muslims, in hot pursuit, entered the city.
330. However, the moment she received the horrible news of King Dahir’s death on the battlefield, the Queen and hundreds of other brave Hindu women leapt into a great fire and burnt themselves to death. It was the limit of warlike spirit, the Kshatriya Dharma! The enemy’s attempts to capture and molest the Queen and other women of high-rank were mostly foiled.
331. Even then, in the confusion that was wrought everywhere, Dahir’s two daughters named Suryadevi and Pramiladevi fell into the hands of the Muslims, who had dashed into the city, killing every captive soldier and every citizen. Mohammed Kasim took them and also hundreds of others away as courtesans. The looting and massacre of the Hindus and the large- scale arson in the city went on unhindered. But that was the fate of not only one city, but of every other city or town that the Muslims visited on their onward march through Sindh, which met with the same disaster. But what were the Buddhists Doing in this National Catastrophe?
332. At the news of the fall of King Dahir and the victory of the Muslims, these Buddhists began to ring bells in their vihars to greet the Muslim conquerors, and prayed in congregations for the prosperity of the Muslim rulers!

333. But what they thus asked for as a boon proved to be an inexorable curse for them. After winning the final battle, when the Muslim rushed violently, like a stormy wind throughout Sindh, they went on beheading these Buddhists even more ruthlessly than they did the Vedic Hindus. For, the Vedic Hindus were fighting in groups or individually at every place and so they struck at least a little awe and terror in the minds of the Muslims. But as there was no armed opposition in Buddhist vihars and Buddhist localities, the Muslims cut them down as easily as they would cut vegetable. Only those of the Buddhists who took to the Muslim faith were spared, while all their vihars throughout Sindh and the innumerale shrines in them were knocked down, and hammered to pieces; for the Muslims hated these ‘Buddhparastis’—these shrine-worshippers.
334. The very word, “Buddhaparasta”, which found its way into the Islamic tongue, is itself a corrupt form of the original Sanskrit word of the Buddhists, “Buddhaparsata”. The Muslims began to call the shrine- worshippers “Buddhaparashta” because on their way to India, they first found such numerous shrines nowhere but in the Buddhist vihars. To annihilate such shrine-worshippers was for the Muslims, a sort of religious commandment. Buddhist Ahimsa and Muslim Himsa
335. This is now the place where the question that we have discussed at length in Chapter II (Paras 152 to 159) of this book, about the downfall of Buddhism in India should be chronologically concluded. By the year A.D. 700, of which we are speaking in these pages, that is, before the Muslims could set foot in India towards Sindh, the Buddhists all over India were fast diminishing in numbers and dwindling into non-existence as is already shown in previous chapters. The successful theoretical refutation of the Buddhist philosophy and religious tenet by the stalwart Vedic theologians and ‘pandits’ is not the only cause of the total extinction of the Buddhists in India; many other social and political events also had a fair share in this momentous task. Of them only those, which have not received the proper attention from the historians so far, or which have not been given enough prominence they really deserve, will be conspicuously referred to at their proper places in these brief concluding remarks. The first cause: the Buddhists’ High Treason
336. We have already dwelt at length on this collective high treason of the Buddhists in India against their nation in Ch. II Paras 152 to 159; 182-209,

and Ch. III Paras 242-246 of this book. Because of this treacherous mentality of the Buddhists, the whole of the patriotic and politically conscious Indian population was up in arms to destroy them root and branch. Being convinced beyond doubt by actual experience, that these Buddhist congregations (Buddhasangha) were inherently anti-national and unpatriotic, and treacherous institutions, the patriotic politicians and the kingly courts gave them hardly any support anywhere in India. Especially in the north about the year A.D. 700 as the new Rajput kingdoms, which were the staunch supporters of the Vedic religion, began to prosper, the Buddhist population and the Buddhist cult were rendered helpless, socially boycotted, weak and invalid everywhere in India. The Second Reason: Fanatic Buddhist Ahimsa 337. Just as the patriotic and politically conscious population of India became impatient with the Buddhist cult, so was the general populace disgusted with the harassment of Buddhist ahimsa. At times—though few and far between—when the Buddhists gained the greatest political power over the major portion of India as in the times of Ashoka and Shree Harsha, they enforced the Buddhist tenets on the Vedic Hindus by misusing their political authority. The writings of the times are replete with copious references to, and illustrations of, the religious persecution carried on by the Buddhists on those occassions. Yet, if passages are quoted from some Vedic books, some over-sensitive soul might doubt their veracity as they occur from an opponent’s mouth. Hence, we are adducing a specimen, to show clearly how vehemently the foreign and non-Vedic historians have criticized it. Vincent Smith in his ‘Early History of India’ has this to say— 338. “It is recorded by contemporary testimony that in the seventh century, King Harsha, who obviously aimed at copying closely the institutions of Ashoka, did not shrink from inflicting capital punishment without hope of pardon on any person, who dared to infringe his commands by slaying any animal or using flesh as food, in any part of his dominion. Kumar Pal, a Jain King of Gujarat, imposed savage penalties upon violators of his (similar) rules. An unlucky merchant who had committed the atrocious crime of cracking a louse, was brought before a special court at Anilhawada and punished with the confiscation of his whole property. Another wretch, who had outraged the sanctity of the capital by bringing a dish of raw meat, was put to death. The special court constituted by Kumar Pal (for this purpose), had functions similar to those of Ashoka’s censors.

And the working of the latter institution sheds light on the unrecorded proceedings of the earlier ones.” The Martyr Louse! 339. Out of the proceeds obtained by selling the confiscated property of the offender, who committed the ‘atrocious crime’ of cracking the said louse, was built a big temple worth lacs of rupees and it was named ‘Yukvihar’—the Temple of Louse! 340. Had this incident been decribed by any other writer, it would have been a parody of the Jain faith. But it is the Jain writers themselves, who cite it with evident pride. Hence, it has to be taken as true. 341. What a paradoxical practice! In order to save a louse in the hair of a man, to cut off the very head of that man! And this is called ‘ahimsa’! As if to kill a man is no ‘himsa’—violence! Man seems to have no life at all! It is because of this ‘ahimsa’, more ruthless and more violent than violence —‘himsa’—itself, that millions of Indian hunters, fishermen, seamen, gamekeepers, foresters and others, who lived by hunting and fishing lost their professions. 342. When these millions of flesh-eaters jointly protested and demonstrated how they and their wives and children would starve to death and how this would spell violence of an enormously grave nature, King Kumar Pal of Gujarat most graciously issued another order that these millions of people, who have been carrying on violent professions, ought to leave those professions themselves. However, as per their demand, the state was to subsidize them for three years. 343. But what after those three years! Starvation could not be completely ruled out in the case of these unfortunate millions. For, flesh and meat was their chief food, which could be had almost for nothing. But because this intolerant ‘ahimsa’ made flesh-eating punishable by death, this common mass of people was antagonized to the Buddhist faith. These millions of people shook off its tyrannical yoke, and sought refuge in the Vedic religion, which had now taken an all-embracing noble form, accepting a relatively considerate ahimsa, which allowed concessions for particular time and place and persons, concentrating mainly on human welfare! Untouchability Aggravated by the Buddhist Religion 344. Even today, not only common people and good many propagandists, but even historians seem to be labouring under the delusion that the Buddhists did not recognize the principle of untouchability, and that no one

was considered untouchable in the Buddhist regime. What is laid down in someone’s religious texts is beside the point. What the actual practice was, is the most pertinent thing. One unavoidable result of the violent way in which the Buddhists tried to establish the principle of ahimsa, and of their declaring animal-hunting and flesh-eating punishable by death, of their over-enthusiastic and relentless efforts to search out such offender and give the harshest capital and other severe punishments, was that the practice of untouchability instead of being wiped out, became still more firmly rooted, widespread and most distressing. The limited space at our disposal prevents any further discussion of it in these pages, and, of course, it is needless! An unimpeachable proof can be found, not in the Vedic, nor in the Buddhist texts of the times, but in the account of the foreign, Chinese travellers who had espoused Buddhism and who had travelled all over India. They avow, “Whichever caste or community—as for example the ‘Chandals’—did not give up the violent professions and did not observe ahimsa, according to the Buddha faith, were banished from the town as untouchables; they had to form colonies of their own outside the towns and cities, like those of the lepers. If at all they had an occassion and were permitted to come to the town on some market-day, these untouchables had to carry in one hand a stick, to the end of which was tied a child’s rattle or a small drum, which they had to beat while going along the road, so that the people in the streets might see them and avoid every possible contact with them.” 345. Those, who ignorantly or maliciously blame the Peshwas for the evil treatment given to the untouchables when they entered the town, should also criticize, equally vehemently and for the same offence Ashoka, Shree Harsha and Buddhist kings, and all the Kshatriya kings right from Vikramaditya to the Rajput rulers, when they see this evidence. For this evil tradition of untouchability was not begun by the Peshwas, for the first time, but it had been prevalent even since the Vedic, the Buddhist and the Jain regimes, and in the Buddhist period, especially, instead of being weakened, it was most scrupulously and mercilessly observed. Even the untouchables themselves treated those below their own ranks as equally or even more untouchable. Those of the untouchables who are still under the delusion, that the Buddhists gave no quarter to untouchability and so extol that sect, should do well to remember that the Chandals, the Mahars and other untouchables were far more miserable under the violently non-violent

Buddhists, than under the Vedic people, who accepted the principle of ahimsa with its limitations. The Buddhist, once again I would like to repeat, aggravated and not mitigated ‘untouchability’. They should examine the validity of this statement in the light of the undisputed evidence cited here and then alone, should they choose whatever is beneficial to them. 346. They should remember that for the above reason, the untouchables like the Chandals and others preferred the Vedic regimes, a more congenial, to the unrelenting and uncompromising Buddhist ones, and those thouands of them who in the past had voluntarily (or helplessly and under pressure) embraced Buddhism, now renounced it and declared their allegiance to the Vedic religion. Thus, even before the Muslims set foot in Sindh, followers of the Buddha had begun to diminish in numbers by millions throughout all ranks of society, right from the highest to the lowest, and because of its inherent weakness, Buddhism had declined to such an extent that the Chinese Buddhist travellers, who had seen its sad plight with their own eyes, had been moved to write that the holy and once prosperous places like Buddha Gaya, Mrigadava, Shravasti, Kushinagar, and the birthplace of Lord Buddha, Kapilvastu, which had been sanctified by the actual residence of the Lord and which had been the place of pilgrimage for the world-wide Buddhist followers, had been sadly rendered desolate and were overgrown with wild and thick forests. 347. Nevertheless, this moribund Buddhism was not altogether wiped out of India, before the advent of the Muslims. The Buddhists were more numerous in the north-western frontier states like Sindh and Kamboj, and even in Bengal in the east, than in the rest of India. It is said that the modern state of Bihar derives its name from the fact that there once existed far too many Buddhist viharas, stoopas and other ‘Buddhaparasthas’. Since the Vedic states were prosperous everywhere, this Buddhist sect had no guts to carry on its traitorous activities or to enforce its religious rites and faith on non-Buddhists, whether it had their will to do so or not. And so long as they followed their religious faith harmlessly, they, their organisations, their institutions, and their viharas were never interfered with in any way by the Vedic kings. That they enjoyed complete religious freedom is admitted by the Chinese travellers open-heartedly. 348. What then made these millions of Buddhists, living in the various states of India before the Muslim onrush, dwindle into non-existence

thereafter? 349. Some time ago, historians, and especially western historians, had a presumption that sometime in the past, or at frequent intervals, the Vedic rulers must have massacred these Buddhists and destroyed them root and branch, or reconverted them to Hinduism forcibly. In order to find some credence to this theory of theirs, they examined the historical records of the times most scrupulously. but even after taking into consideration a few trifling exceptions. they could find no proof to establish any deliberate, pre- planned, or systematic attempt on the part of the Vedic rulers to annihilate the Buddhists completely. 349A. At last, the more conscientious of these historians declared honestly, that this presumption of theirs was totally unfounded and the very idea of forcible extinction of the Buddhists at the hands of the Vedic people was basically wrong. 350. Who then was responsible for this total ousting of the Buddhist faith from India? The historians, foreign as well as native, do not seem to have found an answer to this pressing question, or they have, at least, preferred to be silent on this point. The third cause—Confrontation with Muslims 351 A. We have already briefly described in the foregoing pages how, in spite of their traitorous solicitations of the Muslims, these ‘Buddhaprasthees’—the idol-worshipping Buddhists who preached extreme non-violence—were violently exterminated from Sindh by the Muslim aggressors under Kasim, owing to their innate hatred for that sect. For the same reason, and in the very same manner, the Muslims went on liquidating the Buddhist pockets of influence, as they advanced, conquering province- after-province in India. With a sword in one hand and the Koran in the other, every Muslim military chief broke down, demolished and razed to the ground the Buddhist ‘stoopas’, ‘sangharams’, ‘viharas’, the idols of Buddha, pillars, everything belonging to or relating to the Buddhists. As most of the Buddhists showed, through fear of death, willingness to embrace Islam, they were all converted. Not a single Buddhist remained alive in the northwestern provinces like Gandhar, Kamboj and others; everyone became a Muslim or was silenced by the victor’s sword. On seeing Bakhtyar Khilji march on Bihar, several Buddhists took their religious books and fled to Tibet and China. The rest were polluted and taken over into the Muslim fold. Some might have preferred dying rather to

being Muslims, but no one fought for life and religion. Nowhere, can one find evidence to say that some Indian Buddhist army or some Buddhist organization fought with the Muslim invaders any battle worth the name! Majority of Muslims in East Bengal explained 352. The same is the case with East Bengal, where the majority of the population was Buddhist. With some honourable exceptions, the Buddhists there took to Islam en masse. In Delhi, where the Muslim sultans and emperors ruled for over five hundred years, the Vedic Hindus have all along been in a clear majority. The whole of Uttar Pradesh—the northern India— right upto West Bengal—whether under the Muslim administration or the British or the present one, the Vedic Hindus—has all along maintained its numerical superiority. For, even when the Muslims first came conquering, the Buddhists in these provinces were conspicuously few in number. It is only in East Bengal that the Hindus fell into minority. How? Quite obviously! This province had numerically more Buddhists than the Hindus, and those numerous Buddhists became Muslims! It is natural, therefore, that this province alone should become, since then, a Muslim-majority province. 353. Thus, it is the social extinction of the Buddhists in India, which came to pass all of a sudden, which was the inevitable effect of the armed and ruthless might of the Muslim conquerors. The relentless and uncompromising Buddhist ahimsa was done to death by the equally relentless and bigoted Muslim violence! 354. But what happened to the Buddhist cult and Lord Buddha himself in India in the end? Just as a stream separated from the River Bhagirathi, should flow separately some miles away and once again should leap as a tributary into the same Bhagirathi, the Buddhist cult, born out of the Vedic Hinduism, merged in the end in the same Hindu religion; and Lord Buddha himself was established as the tenth of the Godly Avatars and was Hinduized. The Neglected 300 years of Hindu Valour 355-356. In most of the ‘Histories of India’, by foreign as well as by our own writers, and especially in the textbooks of history for Indian schools, the Muslim invasions of India follow so thickly the one of Sindh in A.D. 711 by Mohammed Kasim, and the accounts of the subjugation of province- after-province of India are narrated so hastily, as in one breath, and the whole account is so cursorily given in a limited space of 20 or 25 pages,

that a common reader or a small pupil is quite likely to think that the Hindus offered practically no resistance worth the name, that the Muslims were never halted in their advance. After the conquest of Sindh, the Muslim victor mounted, as it were, a magic horse and went on conquering the whole of India and never, till they reached Kanyakumari, did they alight from it. This is obviously childish! The Intervening Period 357. To avoid this misconception and to nullify the injustice done to the Hindu nations, a true historian, whose avowed duty is to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, should effectively and proportionately, describe the intervals between any two Muslim invasions and the heroic resistance, successful or otherwise, offered by the Hindus. After the fall of Sindh in A.D. 711, Hindu kings most effectively checked the Muslim advance outside Sindh for more or less 300 years. But this Hindu heroism quite easily escapes the notice of the common reader, because in almost all the textbooks of Indian History, it is not so impressively mentioned. 358. It is because we utter the words ‘three hundred years’ or three centuries within three seconds, that the enormous length of this intervening period quite escapes our notice, unless we are expressly told about it. We should, therefore, measure the period in question by generations of people. Five generations make up 300 years! The British rule over India, for instance, seems too lengthy to the present generation. But measured in centuries, it lasted only for one and a half. Compared with it, the Hindu valour in arresting the Muslim onslaught within the confines of Sindh for more or less 300 years, assumes a greater historical significance. The same holds good with regard to the other intervening periods. 359. One cannot say justifiably that the Muslim vigour or their ambition to conquer the world was on the wane. On the contrary, these both were at their full height during this period. During this very period of three hundred years, these very Arabs had overrun and vanquished nation-after-nation, right from Baghdad to the Mediterranean Sea and thence along the north African coast straight to Gilbralter, whence they subjugated Portugal and Spain and knocked at the gates of southern France. The name Gibralter itself testifies to the unrivalled Muslim conquest of the West Jebal-Tarik, which means the straits conquered by the Muslim Commander Tarik, which is the root of the modern corrupt form ‘Gilbralter’.

359A. At last in A.D. 732, the valiant King of France, Charles Martel, gave a mortal blow to the Muslim aggression and repelled them for ever. It is this monumental triumph of Charles Martel, that saved the whole of Europe! In their triumphant march, the Muslims not only subdued the kingdoms in Western Asia and Northern Africa politically, but with the sharp edge of their sword, they also forced them all to embrace Islam. Even Portugal and Spain were forcibly converted to Islamic faith. Their womenfolk, too, were abducted and violently defiled. But both these nations freed themselves from the Muslim yoke some centuries afterwards. How they did so will be described a little later. Still the fact remains that the nations on the north coast of Africa are even today Muslims. 360. Well, it is not that during the years A.D. 700 to 1000 the Muslims did not try to march out of Sindh and attack the neighbouring Hindu States with the same devilish bigotry. They did try to force themselves on through Sourashtra and Gandhar many times. But every time, they were routed by the Hindus. 361. At that time from the eastern boundary of Sindh to the northern most boundary of north India, there was an unbroken chain of valiant Rajput Rajas which, like a mountain range, very difficult, though not quite impossible to cross, kept on resisting stoutly the Muslim onslaught. Consequently, in Sourashtra and in the north-west provinces, the attacking Muslim armies were put to rout again and again, by the staunch resistance of the Hindus. On the other hand, the mighty Bapa Raval of Chittod once attacked Sindh and after driving the Muslims clean out, annexed it to his own Kingdom. The Arabs did, no doubt, capture it once again, but ultimately, the Sumra Rajputs firmly established their rule over Sindh. 362. If the fanatic Arabs could trample under the horses’ hoofs, the whole northern coast of Africa and two major nations of Europe, why could they not force their way out of Sindh? Thus, put in sharp contrast with contemporary history of the west, the heroism of the Hindus shines out all the more clearly and brightly. 363. Why couldn’t another Chandragupta Maurya or a Vikramaditya channel out the whole of the Indian might, and drive the Arabian Muslims back right into the heart of Arabia, is a fact that disturbs us not a little. ❑

The Peculiar Nature of the Muslim Atrocities [Sultans of Ghazni] 364. During the long period of nearly three hundred years, in which the Arab menace was being successfully hemmed in Sindh, and was finally overthrown by the Sumra Rajputs, different Muslim tribes were busy founding a strong Muslim power in Ghazni, further north of Gandhar. A Sultan of Ghazni, Sabakhtageen, was now preparing himself fully to attack his contemporary Brahmin king, Jaipal, whose forefathers had all along been ruling the whole of Punjab and Gandhar right up to the Hindukush, ever since the rout of the Huns. 365. Shrewdly anticipating the plan of Sabakhtageen to invade India, Jaipal himself attacked Ghazni, but unfortunately he was repelled, Encouraged by this success, Sabakhtageen boldly fell upon Jaipal, a few years afterwards, with a large army. In order to meet this fierce aggression more determinedly, King Jaipal formed a powerful alliance with the neighbouring Hindu princes, but he was again defeated and the whole region beyond the Indus river, including Gandhar, was lost to the Muslim invader. Soon afterwards, Sultan Sabakhtageen died and was succeeded by his son, Mohammed, a hundred times more fanatical and more crueller than his father, and an arch-enemy of the Hindus. This was the same Mahmud of Ghazni, who styled himself ‘Butshikan’, the Idol-breaker or ‘Iconoclast’. At his accession to the throne of Ghazni, he had vowed in the presence of the highest religious and temporal Muslim authority, the Grand Khalipha, that he would wipe out the Kafir Hindus from India and in order to keep his word, he soon began a series of expeditions beyond the Indus. 366. It is from now onwards—i.e. about A.D. 1000—that the really great wars between the Hindus and the Muslims were to be fought for centuries together. 367. If the Muslim soldiers had gained great confidence, having twice defeated the Hindu forces under Jaipal, King Jaipal and his soldiers, without being disheartened and downcast even after suffering two defeats, speeded up their preparation for a still more determined stand against the Muslims. But fortune once again frowned upon the Hindu King. And when, notwithstanding all his valour and all his efforts to save his religion and his

nation, he was again defeated in 1001 by Mahmud of Ghazni, Jaipal preferred entrusting the kingdom to his son, Anangpal, and burning himself to death in a great pyre, to a disgraceful life and a meek surrender to the enemy. 368. King Anangpal, too, carried on his father’s arduous task of staunchly opposing the Muslim aggression. In A.D. 1006, Mahmud demanded passage through Anangpal’s territory in order to invade Multan; but Anangpal refused to give any, whereupon the Muslim aggressor marched on Anangpal and defeated him. Anangpal had to retreat and when Mahmud went ahead to Multan, Anangpal again organized a united Hindu stand for protecting the Hindu religion. Once again, the Hindu-Muslim armies met in the vicinity of the Indus, in A.D. 1008, when the Hindus fought so furiously that in the afternoon, the Muslim formation was broken through and there was confusion in the Muslim ranks. Even Sultan Mahmud had prepared to leave the battlefield to make a retreat, when all of a sudden, Anangpal’s elephant, scared by the shower of burning arrows, turned round and started running amuck. This was the most unfortunate thing, which had very often brought about the Hindu collapse, but no sufficient precaution was ever taken to prevent it. A great havoc was wrought by this retreating elephant among the Hindu ranks. Mahmud was quick enough to seize the opportunity of this decisive turn of the battle and reorganizing the choicest of his scattered soldiers, he once again fell upon the bewildered Hindu army and in a deadly struggle defeated it. But the Muslim army was no less worsted; so instead of pursuing Anangpal, Mahmud satisfied himself with the success he got and returned to Ghazni. But as it became quite clear to him that unless and until Anangpal was humbled completely, no Muslim power could be established in Punjab, he assailed the latter for the third time. This time unfortunately, Anangpal had nobody to help him. Yet he went to war with the remnant of his loyal army and, as a brave King that he was, he died in the thick of the fray. 369. Thus, King Jaipal and his son Anangpal and thousands of their brave soldiers boldly faced, and fought against the early ferocious Muslim onslaughts in Punjab and laid down their lives for the protection of the Hindu state and the Hindu religion. They did their sacred duty of arresting the enemy thrust.

370. Soon after the death of Anangpal, Mahmud annexed Punjab to his kingdom of Ghazni, as he had formerly done with the north-west frontier province. Sultan Mahmud then marched on Thaneshwar and Mathura, the most renowned of the holy places of the Hindus; and after demolishing and burning as many of the Hindu temples, and killing as many of the Hindu male population as possible, and violating the chastity of hundreds of Hindu women and abducting them, Mahmud, like a ferocious wolf returned to his den, Ghazni. He also took with him immeasurable booty of gold and jewellery. In A.D. 1019, he pounced on the Pratihari capital of Kanouj and destroyed it in the same brutal fashion. The result was that the surrounding Hindu population took such a fearful fright for him, that when in A.D. 1023, he once again paid his sinister visit to Gwalior and Kalinjar, the princes there helplessly and meekly accepted his overlordship. His Dash on Somnath
371. Next, when in A.D. 1026, Sultan Mahmud assailed the famous temple of Somnath in Sourashtra, he did it with such a huge army and with such terrible vows and declarations that Raja Bheem of Sourashtra and Gujarat fled away, leaving the kingdom exposed to every sort of humiliation and destruction at the hands of this appalling enemy, tainting his own name of Bheem with everlasting shame. Naturally, the Hindus had no army left, sufficiently well-equipped and well-organized to face this formidable Muslim assault. Nevertheless, even at this critical time, the priests of the Temple of Somnath offered to shoulder the responsibility of protecting the sacred temple as best as they could. They called upon the surrounding Hindu population to run to their aid in the sacred cause of defending the temple and their religion, and thousands of Hindus from far-off regions also, answered their call and ran to the rescue of the Temple of Somnath. The battle was to be fought not for any ruler or king; no Hindu soldier was to profit by it individually. It was a crusade, pure and simple. Moreover, these thousands of Hindu soldiers were not a trained and well-formed army. It was a conglomeration of Hindu crusaders that was collected at the eleventh hour. Even then, they fought ferociously and desperately for the sacred cause without intermission or relaxation, by day and even by night, with the well-organized and stalwart Muslim soldiers! While the Muslim army climbed right upto the ramparts and barricades over the high walls of the temple, and even after it forced itself into the very temple, the toughest of Hindu resistance continued unmitigated. Muslim blood, too, was shed

profusely. Not before did Sultan Mahmud completely put down all resistance, could he ever force his way right into the innermost chamber of the temple and break the idol of Somnath with his own hands. In order to celebrate this fanatical act, he took for himself the title, ‘Butshikan’ — Iconoclast! Martyrdom of fifty thousand brave Hindu Soldiers 372. Even Muslim historians write that at least fifty thousand Hindus fell fighting in the defence of their temple. Had someone of these fifty thousand Hindus said, “I am willing to be a Muslim”, he would have been spared by the Muslims, because it was one of their tactics in the religious war. But scorning such a base and defiled life, the Hindu volunteer force courted martyrdom; not one, not even a thousand, but fifty thousand of them sacrificed their precious lives on the altar of this holy battle! 373. While eulogizing an ancient Roman hero, Horatius, who fought with the enemy on a similar occasion, an English poet writes: Thus outspake brave Horatius the Captain of the gate, “To every man upon this earth death cometh soon or late, And how can a man die better than by facing fearful odds For the ashes of his fathers and the temple of his Gods?” 374. Which Hindu will be reluctant to shed his grateful tears for these fifty thousand martyrs, who died defending their religion and temples with the same fervour as is expressed in this verse? 375. But the most disgusting fact is that while narrating this invasion of Mahmud on Somnath, not only the foreign historians but many Hindu historians, ungrateful as they too are, have mocked at the simple faith of the priesthood and other Hindu population of the place, and have not uttered a single word in praise of those Hindu warriors who made such a huge sacrifice, ‘facing fearful odds, for the temple of their Gods’! If the wiseacres are not wise enough to appraise the jewels properly, can it be said that the fault lies with those jewels? 376. Even if it be neccesary to condemn the blind faith of those Hindus, yet those who do so, should also remember that, albeit blind, the Hindu belief in the mysterious divine power of their Gods was not a diabolic, fanatic,

bloodthirsty religiosity like that of the Muslims, who attacked religious places of others with deadly weapons of war, slew the innocent men and women, young and old, forced them to embrace Islam at the point of the sword, and ran frantically, causing death and destruction everywhere. But such a statement born of boldness cannot be expected of these immature childish and cowardly writers! If the Muslim writers of ‘Tarikhs’ and the Mullah-Moulvis boast that the Hindu Gods were not the true Gods because they did not prevent the Muslim warlords from breaking idols and demolishing temples, and that theirs was the only true religion, they should be enlightened that the arch heretic Changizkhan and his deputies not only desecrated the very city of the Muslim-Khalipha, but ravaged it, killed the Khalipha, burned several masjids, turned others into stables for their horses, reduced the Bible to ashes and trampled the Koran under their horses’ hoofs! The Muslim Allah could not stop the ravaging hands of Changizkhan! Hundreds of such instances can be cited. Are the Muslims ready to grant, on this account, the imbecility and falsehood of their Allah? Even when Shivaji slew the ‘Butshikan’—idol-breaker—Afzalkhan, and offered his ‘goat like head with thirty-two teeth’, as a sacrificial offering to the Goddess Bhavani of Tulzapur, his hands were not staved off from doing so by the Muslim Allah! 377. After demolishing the temple of Somnath and loading the camels with the immense wealth, looted from it, when Mahmud set out for Ghazni, he learnt that instead of being cowed down into submission because of his wholesale destruction of the temple at Somnath, the Hindu population was even more enraged, and that the King of Malava with his large army was preparing to block his way back to Ghazni and had already entered the battlefield. As Mahmud was not prepared to risk this new battle, he took an unexpected and difficult route through the sandy deserts of Sindh, abandoning the usual way through Malava. While crossing the deserts of Sindh and Baluchistan, his army had to face many dangers and unspeakable misery. Hardly within three or four years of reaching Ghazni, he died in A.D. 1030. 378. This fanatic but brave Sultan of Ghazni undertook at least fifteen major expeditions to India. Hindus too fought furiously on the battlefield every time. But no Hindu king could defeat him. But these invasions of Mahmud and his political conquests did not so much harm the Hindus, as did the forcible conversion of millions of Hindus in North-West Frontier

Province and Punjab. That the Kingdoms, which were lost to the Muslims, were reconquered by the Hindus sooner or later, is plain history. But the Hindus could never bring back the millions of Hindus who were converted to Islam willy-nilly. We could free from the foreign yoke our geographical regions, but the enormous numerical loss of population could never be made up by the Hindu nation. Change of Religion means Change of Nationality 379. We are now going to discuss at some length some of the religious concepts of the Hindus of those times; of the course of conduct and practices that were considered decent and in conformity with the religious laws of the Hindus of those times, and those that were declared to be against them; and particularly those that deeply concerned the large-scale forcible defilement and conversion of the Hindus that took place during the Hindu-Muslim war. It can be very briefly said here that if the millions of forcibly converted Hindus have remained Muslims even to this day, it is because of the perverse religious concepts of the Hindus of those times, which ultimately proved highly detrimental to the best interests of the Hindu community, viz.—caste-system, the fantastic ideas of pollution, the extravagant ideas of religious tolerance and many other silly notions. Why, these Hindu converts went on increasing enormously generation-after- generation and, as the later generations were born and brought up under the Muslim influence, they began to be more-and-more fanatical—so bitterly fanatical that they formed an appreciable part of the armies of the Iranian, Turkish, Mongol and other foreign Muslim invaders and, with equal hatred and bitterness, they attacked the Hindu Kafirs with a view to destroying them completely or force them to change their own religion and embrace Islam. One out of hundreds of such facts can be cited here to bear out the above remarks. A Hindu tribe, named Ghuri which lived, during the period under discussion, beyond the Indus and which was forcibly made to change over to Islam under precisely the same perilous conditions, became later on, the bitterest enemy of the Hindus. The Hindu-hater, Sultan Mohammed Ghori, belonged to this very Ghuri tribe. In fact, the majority of the Muslim populations of Afghanisthan, Pathanisthan (Pakhtoonistan), Baluchistan were the converted descendants of the original Hindu natives of those places. But, later on, they did not even have the slightest idea that their ancestors were, once upon a time, Hindus. On the contrary, they were enraged at any mention of such descent of theirs and would say: “Bygones

are bygones; today we are born Muslims and are Muslim nationals. We recognize no other relation with the Hindus than the one of utmost hatred and animosity." Such thoughts had turned their heads completely. Theirs was not merely a change of religion, but it was the inevitable change of nationality which necessarily forced itself upon the later generations of such converts. During the five or six centuries of the initial Muslim invasions of India, right up to Rameshwar to which we are referring here, the change of religion today generally proved to be the change of nationality for the future! But what does Religion mean here? 380. But the terms 'religion' and 'religious conversion' in the above maxim, viz. the 'the change of the religion means the change of nationality', should first be defined clearly. They are not used here in the sense of comparative study of the various philosophical ideas and systems in different religions or the adoption of some of the agreeable ones in an individual capacity. The word 'religion' in the present context relates solely to the dogmatic and fanatical practices of those aggressive religious institutions, which insist that a particular book is apocalyptic, that whatever is told in its pages—and that alone and nothing else—is truly religious, that everything else is completely false and sinful. It then tries to enforce on people of other religions the strict observance, if not by advice and peaceful discourse and persuasion, even by skilful craftiness, cruelty and coercion, of not only the so-called philosophy in those religious books, but of the rules and regulations, of rites and rituals, of the language and social dealings prescribed by them. The religious conversion effected by such thoughtless and fanatical religious institutions is, in effect, the conversion of nationality. Retaliatory Weapon of Ostracism 381. The Hindus could find no retaliatory weapon for this religious aggression of the Muslims. The weapon of ostracism, which they used for retaliation, turned on themselves like a boomerang. 382. In order that the reader should have a clear idea of this weapon of social ostracism, so far as it concerns the Hindu-Muslim war and how it affected, not favourably, but adversely the defence of the Hindu religion and Hindu community, it is essential to give first of all an account of the caste-system as briefly as it is possible to do so. Since such an account is absolutely esential for an analysis of the Muslim pollution of the Hindus.

The caste-system based on birth and Parentage and the National Penalty of Ostracism 383. Much earlier than the Muslim invasions of India, i.e. just after the Hindus conquered the Huns completely, hundreds of Hindu leaders tried on all sides all over India to restore political, religious and social stability in the society and the nation. The Hindu leadership of the time naturally devolved on them rising warrior class of the Rajput royalty, who were staunch devotees of the Vedic Hindu religion. In this very attempt at reconstruction, the vast Hindu community was being moulded with meticulous care into the framework of the parentage-dominated caste system. Slowly but surely, this caste system became an inherent and essential feature of Hinduism. Not only in the four former classes (वर्ण), but in more or less four thousand castes, born out of those four classes and many other accidental sources, sanctioned by the religious law, was the whole Hindu community everlastingly and almost unanimously divided internally. In a sense, the social transition of the Hindu nation was occosioned by the historical neccesity of the time. 384. The main principle underlying this caste-system was this: Only he who was born in a particular caste, could remain in it. To have food or to drink even water with or from one of another caste was considered liable for penalty. Is it any wonder then that the inter-caste marriages of boys and girls were strictly prohibited? To these very religious practices of the time, we have ascribed, in our various articles on the caste-system, the names ‘Lotabandi (prohibition of drinking water), Rotibandi (prohibition of food), Betibandi (prevention of inter-caste marriages), Sparshbandi (untouchability) and the ones that we are going to discuss hereafter viz., Shuddhibandi (prevention of purification of religious converts), Sindhubandi (ban on sea voyage) etc. These seven ‘bandis’—or bans— which arrested not only the progress of the Hindus but also impaired their normal way of life were, in fact, seven fetters. These fetters were not forcibly fastened to the feet of the Hindu nation by any Muslim, Christian or other foreign power; they were so fastened by the Hindus themselves, in their extreme anxiety for the protection of their religion. That is why we have been calling them through spoken as well as written words not foreign shackles, but as ‘seven native fetters’. 385. It is not necessary here in this book to discuss fully the caste-system of the Hindus, nor is this the place for it. Those desirous of getting

themselves acquainted with our thoughts on this subject may profitably read the book, “Janmajat Jatyutchhedak Nibandha” (The Eradication of the Parentage-dominated Caste-system). Here, while describing the religious aggression of our foreign enemies, we shall discuss it only so far as it is absolutely necessary to do so. 386. First of all, it should not be forgotten that this caste-system must have facilitated the stupendous consolidation and remarkable stability of the Hindu Society under certain peculiar circumstances and in particular contexts. In evaluating it, it would be ungrateful only to point to the eventual harm that it has caused in its later stages. 387. It must also be admitted that the Hindus of those times created, or voluntarily allowed to be created, this caste-system with the sole object of protecting their racial seed and blood, preserving their caste-life and tradition, and keeping them absolutely pure from any contamination. 388. The structure of the caste-system was based on the principles of heredity, of the economy based on the division of labour, of social co- existence and of social ethics, so far as these principles were comprehended by the writers of different ‘Smritis’. Thousands of years have rolled by, the Hindu nation has faced innumerable calamities and catastrophes, yet the hold of the caste-system and the influence that it has wielded upon billions and billions of Hindus throughout these tens of centuries, could never have been possible, if the roots of this birth-dominated caste-system had not gone deeper into the very foundation of this colossal edifice of the Hindu society. The Hindu faith—that the religious duties prescribed for the particular castes and sub-castes like Pariyas, Bhangis, Kolis, Bhils were the pious ways of attaining their earthly welfare, and heavenly bliss and Godly grace for them—would never have otherwise remained so steadfast through all these perilous centuries, if the lifeblood, which ran through the veins of the Hindu Society, apparently most heterogenous and miserably disorganised, had not animated its diversified elements with some undying and unifying force with a certain conciousness of its true self. 388A. This powerful unifying national sentiment which so unmistakably held together these different and apparently autonomous elements of the Hindu society and fused them together was HINDUTWA! AND HINDU DHARMA. 389. What we should like to call today the seven native shackles, viz. Untouchability (स्पर्शबंदी) ban on dining together of the people belonging

to different castes (रोटीबंदी), ban on inter-caste marriages (बेटीबंदी), and so on), did never appear to be shackles or fetters to the Hindus of those times, when the Muslims had begun invading India. To them, they were but the charmed amulets or protecting bands! Every caste, whether of the Brahmins or of the sweepers, was immensely proud of its separate entity. 390. These various castes and sub-castes of the Hindus punished even the slightest violation of the caste-laws with social ostracism—even if such a violation of caste-law was voluntary or involuntary, knowingly or unknowingly! 391. Today, we are apt to take this social ostracism quite lightly, but at the time of Muslim aggressions and thereafter, the very mention of such social ostracism would have unfailingly shocked to death every Hindu—whether he was a prince or a pauper—to be cut off from one’s own caste, was to be cut off from the whole world and from life itself. So severe was this punishment of social boycott that the unfortunate person at once lost his parents and brothers, his kith and kin—the people of his own flesh and blood—and was thrown into abysmal gloom. It should be sufficient to say here briefly that this social ostracism was far more dreaded than any physical torture or a heavy fine involving any financial loss or even death. Consequently, the tendency to observe scrupulously, and in strict conformity with the prevalent social practices, the traditional caste-laws, sanctioned by the sacred religious books and the writers of the various Smritis, was ingrained into the very texture of the Hindu society for generations together. 392. Although we can gratefully cite many other things regarding the caste-system that brought about cohesiveness of the diversified Hindu society and had lasting effects on it, it would be equally ungrateful on our part if we desist from criticising with sufficient severity, the unlimited harm done by this caste-system and the irrational and obstinate pride that the Hindus took in it, when the Muslims began to knock at their doors. 393. As a means of beating down the religious aggression of the Muslims, this counter-stroke of the Hindu caste system proved to be most ineffectual and useless like a blunted sword. On the contrary, these very caste-laws and the strict adherence to them brought about a series of disasters on the Hindu religion and the Hindu nation, making the conversion of the millions of Hindus far too easier for the Muslims than can be imagined, while it cannot