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

women and men, and to massacre others, to burn, devastate and demolish the Hindu capital cities, their temples, the idols of their Gods, to reduce to ashes their libraries of religious books and do all sorts of wrongs to them were all the ‘holy acts’ of the Muslim Gazis—the defenders of the Muslim faith! All these ‘holy’ acts were done to chastise the kafirs strictly according to the Muslim religious and ethical code, for their inexcusable (unpardonable) sin of being kafirs! When the kafirs call these holy acts atrocities, they must be plainly told that they were not atrocities at all! They were all righteous and virtuous acts! It is the bounden duty of every faithful follower of Islam, that he must thus chastise the kafirs whenever, and to whatever extent, he might be able to do so. 913. “But for the Hindus to call our religious chastisement atrocities and to retaliate against our holy religion as a reaction against our so-called cruelties, to burn our pure masjids because we have burned their temples— it is simply diabolic!—atrocious in the extreme!” 914. It is because the Muslims had this perverted conception of their religious duty that they marched upon Vijaynagar primarily as it was a Hindu State, and as the Hindus stubbornly refused to become Muslims. Even if the Vijaynagar armies had not invaded the Bahamani Muslim States, as they often did, and even if they had not retaliated with equal vehemence against the usual Muslim atrocities by burning their masjids and houses and plundering their property, all the Muslim Sultans would have attacked Vijaynagar Hindus simply for their fault of being Hindus. They would have committed the same inhuman atrocities, even if the Hindus of Vijaynagar had not done them any harm, had they but got an opportunity to do so! Why did the Muslim Armies go back after the Pillage of Vijaynagar? 915. The underlying reason why the Muslim armies drew back after pillaging Vijaynagar and did not pursue the fleeing Hindus is that they dared not do so; for the state of Vijaynagar had broken away from the old Hindu tradition of meek submission and tight-lipped endurance and had begun to reciprocate atrocities with counter-atrocities and reprisals with super-reprisals! 916. As has already been told above, Ramrai’s brother, Commander Tirumalrai, had already left Vijaynagar with his army into the South and was re-forming his forces for another knock. Had the Muslims advanced further they were bound to meet with strong opposition from Tirumal’s

army. Partly owing to this fear, the Muslims retreated from Vijaynagar, content with whatever they could sack there. 917. Another reason that was responsible for this speedy retreat was the opening of the ‘old sores’ among the Muslim Sultans! Their belonging to different sects, like the Shias and Sunnis, had always created bickerings amongst them. Naturally, as soon as the hostilities with the Hindu state of Vijaynagar ended, their temporary alliance went to pieces and fresh warfare ensued. A little later, when their arch-enemies, the Muslims in the North, the Moghal Emperors, Shahjahan and Aurangzeb, invaded them with their invincible armies, they could not help looking for support from the then growing Maratha chieftains and their sturdy followers in Maharashtra. Being most mercilessly hammered from the North by the powerful Moghal armies and being internally eaten away by the very Maratha Sirdars who were called for help, these Muslim powers in the South perished one after another! Shahaji, the Valiant! 918. The most prominent of all these Maratha Sirdars, and the one in whom always blazed the secret ambition to establish a Hindu power was Shahaji, the valiant of the Bhosale family. 919. It has been already stated that after the collapse of Vijaynagar, Tirumalrai and other Hindu princes fled to the South and established another independent Hindu principality at Penukonda in A.D. 1567. Shreerang, Tirumalrai’s son, removed his capital to Chandragiri after his father’s death. Other princes, too, founded their small States, but they were in fact, the fragments of the old Vijaynagar empire, now set adrift after the deluge of the different ‘Nayaks’ (Subhedars) of the Vijaynagar empire; a few now consolidated their power and ruled independently. Some called themselves ‘Palegars’ and founded the states of Jingi, Tanjawar and other ‘small Hindu states. So, even after the collapse of Vijaynagar, the whole region south of the capital right up to Rameshwaram was under the Hindu sway. Later still, with the nominal suzerainty of the Sultan of Vijapur, Shahaji, as a Vijapuri Sirdar, established his “ de facto’ overlordship in the south and brought them all under his unifying control. Shahaji exerted a great influence as an able political and military leader, because of his victories, right from Ahmednagar to Rameshwaram under every Muslim power, from the Moghals of Delhi to the moribund Sultanate of Vijapur. He was equally known everywhere as the staunch supporter of the Hindus! His

was the deciding vote in respect of the political manoeuvres in the south. A line from a contemporary poet, which became a common saying in those days, stated that the earth was ruled by the two guardians of directions'; उत शाहजहां इत शाहजी है। (Shahajahan in the North and Shahaji in the South) 920. For Shahaji, thus to conquer the remnants of the Vijaynagar Empire in the name of a Muslim, would at the first sight, seem highly preposterous and would even smell of high treason against the Hindu nation. But it should, at the same time, be remembered that it is because he brought all these scattered and vanquished Hindu states under his unified control, that he could overawe his very Sultan and rule the South like an independent Hindu King at Mysore. That he did this in order to root out all the Muslim Sultans from the Deccan and to found an all-embracing powerful Hindu Kingdom can amply be proved by the act that very soon, one of his sons could set up an independent, powerful and conquering Hindu Empire and that he could help him secretly in that great cause. That this ‘insignificant rebellious’ son of his could not have grown into a successful empire-builder without, not only the benevolent connivance of Shahaji, but also his active but secret assistance and guidance, requires no further elucidation. Although for reasons of chronological sequence, we may not name this illustrious son of Shahaji just yet, it must already have flashed like a lightning in the hearts of the readers! There can be no doubt about it! 921. In similar circumstances during the years A.D. 1316-1322, Khushrukhan commanded the Sultan’s whole army at Delhi as a Muslim, because the Hindu military help was readily available, and conquered and consolidated forcibly the Southern Hindu States, which never united of their own accord, as parts of the vast empire of a Muslim Sultan (Ch XVII). And, only after he succeeded in perfecting the plans for his coup d’etat, did he kill the Sultan of Delhi overnight, ascending the throne himself as a Hindu monarch. He merely brushed aside, as it were, the label ‘Muslim’ from the imperial throne and wrote in bold letters ‘Hindu’ over it. Within a day, the all-India Khilji empire became a Hindu empire! Again, a little later, when Harihar and Bukka were captured and made Muslims and were rotting in captvity at Delhi, they first employed the same Koutileeya code of ethics to win the confidence of the Sultan of Delhi under their Muslim garb. They invaded the rebellious Hindus of the South as Muslim commanders at the

head of a Muslim army and aided by Muslim wealth; but at the earliest opportunity, they joined the rebellious Hindus themselves, and being reconverted to Hinduism, founded a strong independent Hindu empire at Vijaynagar. The same Koutileeya strategy was used by Shahaji in conquering the Hindu States right up to Jingi and Tanjawar with the Vijapur army and at the Vijapuri expenditure, and bringing them under the nominal sovereignty of the Sultan of Vijapur. Immediately after the fall of the Vijaynagar empire, Shahaji was consolidating the Hindu might to overthrow the Muslim domination and to establish a sovereign Hindu government, which was going to be far mightier than any gone before it, and which was destined to bring the final victory for the Hindus. This was the momentous job of laying the foundation of the future Hindu victory that Shahaji was engaged in those perilous times! 922. Because of these heartening events, the indomitable Hindu national aspiration could easily survive the grievous fall of Vijaynagar, whereas the Muslims could not avail of it in the least, so as to shape the future in their favour! ❑

The end of the Sixteenth Century and After 923. After having so far reviewed Indian History from the standpoint of the Hindu nation, we shall now take up some connected events of the sixteenth century and thereafter. Swarm of European Pirates Invade India 924. The first of the European nations to invade India was Portugal. It was Vasco De Gama, the Portuguese navigator, who first rounded the Cape of Good Hope and discovered a straight sea-route to India. He was, however, guided by one of the captains of the Indian mercantile morine. who plied to and fro between the Indian and the African coasts. In A.D. 1498, he first landed in the port of Calikat on the Western coast of India, professing purely commercial interests, which subsequently served to be a very fine pretext for the other Portuguese and European nationals, who followed suit, to camouflage their secret territorial ambitions in India. Accordingly, immediately after two years in A.D. 1500, came Padro Alvaira’s Cabral, another Portuguese admiral with thirteen warships fitted with guns and weapons under his command. Seeing that the Muslim traders had already established themselves well in Cochin, he went there first to undermine their preponderance in inter-continental trade. Since the beginning, the Portuguese had cherished inveterate enmity towards the Muslims as a result of the horrible religio-political aggression of the latter on Spain and Portugal as has already been referred to in Paras 539 to 546. Later in A.D. 1509, Albuquerque was made the Governor of the Portuguese possessions in India. It was he who conquered Goa and the surrounding territory from the Muslim Sultans of Vijapur in A.D. 1510. It was he again who encouraged his Portuguese compatriots to marry, even with force and deceit, if necessary, Hindu girls in order to ensure the permanent Portuguese settlements in India. About this time, the Portuguese priesthood claimed that it was their supreme religious duty to proselytize the Hindus even with force and made their king issue a royal order to that effect. It is under this royal sanction that the Portuguese in Goa perpetrated the indescribable atrocities, rapes and various other outrages on the Hindus—men and women—there as are mentioned in Paras 539 to 546 of this book.

925. The patron-saint directing these blood-curdling Portuguese religious formalities was the Jesuit missionary, Saint Francis Xavier, whom the persecuted Hindus called Satan incarnate! He came to India in 1540. 925.A. This so-called ‘Saint’ Xavier himself proudly states in one of his letters his triumphant success in the devilish persecution of the Hindus (see Paragraphs 539 to 546). He himself and hundreds of other missionaries, who came after him, converted innumerable Hindus to Christianity with all sorts of brutalities and vandalism. Countless Hindu men and women committed suicide to escape this violent persecution. The Portuguese gradually conquered Div, Daman, Sashti, Vasai (Bassein), Choul, Mumbai (Bombay) on the Western coast of India and Saint Tome near Madras, and Hugh in Bengal, of which Mumbai (Bombay) was presented to the English King as a dowry in 1668 (1661-2?) by the Portuguese King Charles II. It was subsequently made over the King Charles II of England to East India Company for a nominal rent of 4-10 a year. The rest of the region round about Bombay in the Portuguese possession was released by the Marathas. Goa was the only major possession left in the Portuguese hands.
926. The Dutch: Quick on the heels of the Portuguese, the Dutch of Holland entered India. The Dutch East india Company was formed in A.D. 1602 for the purpose, but they could not find a firm footing in India. Jawa and Sumatra, however, proved congenial to them. Hence, they directed all their attention to that region and made it their stronghold. When the English began to dabble there, the Dutch cut them all but one at Amboina, and ruled practically the whole of the Indonesian archipelago unhampered.
927. The English: Although the English East India Company was formed in A.D. 1600, it could not open its first factory in India till A.D. 1608. Jahangir gave them permission to open one at Surat in A.D. 1613. After a while in 1689, the monopoly of the British East India Company was cancelled because of many malpractices and rivalries in the Company’s servants and another company was formulated to carry on Indian Trade. But when it was seen that such competition was detrimental to the interests of the British Nation as a whole, the two companies were amalgamated.
928. As the British East India Company was later on to enlarge the scope of her activities to such an enormous extent as to encompass a foreign stupendous Indian empire, it is out of place and even impossible to discuss its extensive history in these introductory remarks. Moreover, as the English were to meet the Marathas on the battlefields amidst the clash of arms, the

boom of cannons and the swaggering wagers with empires as the tempting stakes, we would rather discuss it a little later so far as it will be possible to do so. 929. The French: Of the European nations that followed suit after the Portuguese and tried their hand at the eastern trade and the overseas empires, the French, were the last to appear on the scene. For the French East India Company was floated as late as A.D. 1664. But they prospered quickly in their commercial activities. Why, if credit is to be given to any European, who thought for the first time of acquiring not only small scattered footholds but large empires in India and who tried to realize these ambitious schemes of his by large-scale military intervention in Indian politics, it was French Governor Dupleix. The next claimant to that honour is that vagabond and tempestuous English youth, Robert Clive, who entered India as a common soldier, but who soon came to command large armies and to lay the foundations of the vast British Empire in India. The basic idea underlying the schemes of these two far-sighted young men was that with proper training, great drilled and well-disciplined armies could be formed here in India out of the very Indian soldiers within a very short time, and that, with competent, efficient and uncorruptible European military officers and commanders at the head of this very Indian army, they could easily build up their strong Empires in India. It will be discussed in its proper place, how great was the harvest that these daring schemes reaped in the years to come. 930. It is, however, proper to discuss the French affairs in India to a certain extent. For, although for a time, the French and the English fought amongst themselves on the Indian soil and although they took opposite sides in the internecine civil wars of the Indian Kings and Princes, in the end the French were on losing grounds. Again their defeat at the hands of the English in the European theatres of war rendered the French authorities in India thoroughly incapable of defending their positions against the ever increasing severity of the English attacks. The leaders like Dupleix, Busie, Suffren and others, who worked hard and spent the best of their energies for the expansion of the French empire in India, were very shabbily treated at home by the French people and the French Govenment. Nobody appreciated their best efforts at the proper times nor gave them any support. Again, this Indian army of the French fought against the Marathas, on a few occasions, only to receive stunning blows and as such when it was clear that

the chances of the French empire in India were almost nil, they began to help the Indian princes and especially the Marathas, particularly in respect of the training of the army and the use of the new guns. The English were very reluctant to help any native ruler create a disciplined army or to sell them newer weapons like the guns and cannons. But the French were only too willing to do that in exchange for large sums of money or substantial grants of land, and especially so, if that purchasing authority was engaged in a struggle with the English. The Marathas, in particular, realized the inevitable greatness of the European type of training of troops and the production of the efficient new weapons of war like the various types of small and big firearms. Hence, they employed veteran French military officers and their satellites in their armies. Ibrahim Khan Gardi, the famous artillery commander in the Maratha army at the battles of Udgeer and Panipat, had received his training in that field in the French artillery divisions. Later on, Mahadaji Shinde (Scindia) employed French officers like De Boyne and M.Perron as the chief commanders of their artillery and other divisions and formed a well-equipped, well-trained, mechanized army of his own. With this well-trained strong army, Mahadaji could overawe the whole of the antagonistic north and vanquish the enemies in various military engagements. But after a while, the European nations working in India had come to a certain unwritten understanding, at least as regards India, that in the event of any Indian ruler fighting against any of the European nationals, no European army leader should take sides with the Indian and help him with his army. As such, later on when Shinde (Scindia) was engaged in a deadly struggle with the English, De Boyne, who had been receiving thousands of rupees by way of salary, and the army trained by him flatly refused to fight. The Marathas, too, were conscious of such a treacherous behaviour on the part of these salaried foreigners some time or the other. Hence, the Marathas, on their part, had begun to open factories to manufacture similar guns and to prepare Indian officers to train and drill the army on European lines. But in those stormy days of incessant warfare, it would have been unwise to depend solely on nothing but such trained army divisions. Even second rate states like the Jats and the Sikhs maintained such battalions. On the whole, the existence of the French military might in India, helped here and there check the onward march of the British imperialistic power, and the Marathas, Tipu, the Sikhs and other Indian rulers did not fail to utilize it to that extent.

The Simultaneous Attack of all the non-Hindu Nations of the World on the Deccan (South India) 931. When the European powers, mentioned above, invaded India, they all did so by the sea. Naturally, their first tremendous onslaughts had to be borne and resisted by the Deccan and especially by the Marathas. Earlier, North India had to bear for six or seven centuries, the whole brunt of the fierce and marauding attacks of the fanatical Muslims like the Moghals, the Turks, the Afghans, the Arabs and others, and had to offer them the sternest possible resistance. Eventually, all these Asiatic Muslim nationals and the barbaric tribes fell violently upon the South with a view to conquering it for ever. Even while all these enemies were repeatedly invading from the North and the Deccan was engaged with them in bloody and deadly wars, in which thousands of Hindus were offering their precious lives for the sake of defending their religion, as they did in the North, the South Indian people were invaded, by the sea, by the new European Christian nationals, as numerous as the locusts themselves. The enemies crowded in upon the Deccan not only from the north-west or the north-east but also from the west. Not only by land but by sea also, did all the combative, marauding, aggressive and fanatic Muslims and Christian nations had simultaneously attacked the Deccan at the time, to overrun the Hindu states there and to eradicate Hindu religion from the land. 932. North India had to face only the Muslim nations, which itself was not an easy job. The deadly war that the Hindus had been fighting with the Muslims for centuries was as fierce and beset with all sorts of dangers as to exhaust even the Gods who had fought against the demons! But the Deccan had the misfortune of facing not only all those Muslims but also the European Christian nations like the Portuguese and others, who were even greater enemies of Hinduism than the Muslims, and who tried every form of cruelty to proselytize the Hindus. And the South Indian Hindus—and especially the Marathas, who had assumed their leadership in this war— showed the rarest tenacity and irresistible daring to repel single-handed, these waves of aggression rising all round them. While thousands of Hindus had been sacrificing their lives along with those of their wives and children on the religious front against the Muslims and the Portuguese Christians, as many others were fighting battles after battles and wars after wars on the political and military fronts. This exceptional struggle of the Hindus against foreign aggressors is worth a glorious mention in the history of the world.

Hindu Vikramaditya, Hemoo 933. The many Rajput and Muslim states, which had collected together under the leadership of Rana Sang, and who had aspired to re-establish the Hindu empire had joined battle with Babar at Kanvah. But after fierce fighting, Rana Sang was finally defeated and Babar laid the foundation of the Moghal empire at Delhi. Soon in 1530, Babar died and was succeeded by his son, Humayun, who in his turn was overcome by Sher Shah, the founder of the Sur dynasty. As Sher Shah Sur captured Delhi, Humayun had to wander in exile through various countries such as Kabul, Kandahar, Persia and others, of which we need not give any detailed account. It is enough to say that even in the royal dynasty of Sultan Sher Shah, the upheavals, usual and inevitable in every Muslim regime, took place and after violent rebellions and bloodshed, Mohammed Adilshah was at last installed as the Emperor. 934. This Mohammed Adilshah had enturested his administration to an able Hindu Vazir named Hemoo. Hemoo, too, without ever endangering his Hindu religion in the least, appropriated the de facto power of the Sultan to himself and ruled his dominions efficiently. 935. But this roused the jealousy and anger of other Muslim sirdars. In the meanwhile in 1542, while he was yet in exile, Humayun had a son, named Akbar, who was later on destined to be a great emperor. With the help of the Shah of Iran (Persia), Humayun invaded India and burning the eyes of his faithless brother, and inflicting exemplary punishments on other enemies, he reconquered Delhi. But soon after his regaining the throne of Delhi, he slipped over the marble staircase of his palace and died in 1556, giving rise to anarchy everywhere. The last emperor of the Sur dynasty, Mohammed Shah Adil, who was defeated by Humayun, had fled to the north-west frontier. But his able minister, Hemoo, however, lingered on in Delhi itself, trying to avail himself of that opportunity. 936. A very scanty reference has been made in the Muslim historical writings about the past or future life of Hemoo, the valiant Hindu leader. A Hindu historian was an impossibility at that time and whoever tried his hand later on at writing history has not said anything independently about Hemoo. But we have already shown in Chapter Seventeen about Hindu Emperor Dharmarakshak (Nasir-ud-din), that his actual heroic deed is far more important and reliable a proof than any written record. Similarly, we

shall try to give here the account of the Hindu Hero, Hemoo, as far as we can do so with the same unassailable logic. 937. It is to be noted that even while he aspired to form a Hindu Empire, he received help from many Afghan sirdars, who had fallen foul of the Moghal Muslims and especially of the Babar faction. 938. It is obvious that the life and career of the earlier Hindu Emperor, Shree Dharmarakshak (Nasir-ud-din), must have served as an ideal to be followed before Hemoo as regards the original inspiration to found a Hindu empire and the formation of a detailed scheme of his war of independence was concerned. An undying fire of freedom which sought to overthrow the Muslim rule and found a Hindu Empire in its stead had once inspired Shree Dharmarakshak (Nasir-ud-din) to bring about a glorious yet unsuccessful military coup, spurred Rana Sang and other Rajput warriors to cross swords, although not successfully, with Babar at Kanvah and at hundreds of places earlier and later, had stimulated millions of Hindu men and women to undergo all extremities of fortunes, to fight horrible battles or to immolate their lives to save their religion. The same blazing fire of freedom glowed clear and bright in the Hindu heart of Hemoo, the ambitious Hindu leader. 938A. As has been said above, he secretly prepared for a decisive battle, organized the Muslim dissentients against the Moghals and the Hindu army marched against Delhi. All the Hindu-Muslim officers at Delhi had served under him when he was the Chief Minister (Vazir). There, other politicians and the Hindus in general, offered him no opposition worth the name, surrendering to his once dreaded influence as a Vazir. His conquest of Delhi, the chief capital of Moghal empire, caused a great commotion everywhere. 939. Hemoo was born a staunch Hindu. During the Sultan’s regime, he rose to political eminence by sheer dint of his merit without the slightest slur on his Hindu individuality. In the end, assuming responsibility as the weak Sultan’s Vazir, he began to control the whole imperial administration and consolidate power into his own hands. And now he had openly hoisted the standard of Hinduism, boosted up a Hindu imperial power trampling down the whole of the Muslim Sultanate! Quite naturally, the whole of the Muslim world was rocked to the bottom with the cry that Islam was doomed and that kafirs flourished!

940. Immediately after capturing Delhi, he publicly ascended the imperial throne as a Hindu emperor with all the adequate pomp and glory and assumed the title of Vikramaditya for himself. Then after stabilizing and introducing efficient management of the affairs of his state, he started new conquests. Formerly as the Sultan’s Vazir, he had won fifteen to sixteen battles, crushing down the revolts of the Muslim and other chieftains. As such, he had a great self-confidence in his abilities, as regards the efficient conduct of war was concerned. At the first stroke, he stormed and seized the second great Moghal fort of Agra, which was considered to be impregnable and the city around it.
941. At this time, the future emperor Akbar was a mere lad of thirteen or fourteen years. His Vazir, Bahiramkhan, was his guardian and the de facto head of his administration. On hearing the news of Hemoo, he at once resolved to crush down this bold rising of the Hindus. But right from Rajputana to the Deccan, numerous Hindu-Muslim states, both big and small, had risen in revolt against this newly-formed Moghal empire. Hence, the other Muslim sirdars advised Bahiramkhan to put these down first and to keep young Akbar at Kabul in safety. But the discreet Bahiramkhan firmly asserted that Hemoo’s rising in the name of a Hindu empire had to be put down firmly. Accordingly, Bahiramkhan marched on Hemoo at the head of a powerful army, and instead of sending young Akbar to Kabul, he took him along to the battlefield. The armies of Bahiramkhan and Hemoo met near Panipat. Vikramaditya Hemoo’s warriors fought with exceptional bravery and skill. It seemed for a time that Hemoo had won the battle, but as ill-luck would have it, in the very hour of glory, Vikramaditya Hemoo was struck in the eye by a stray arrow from the army of Bahiramkhan and he fell from his elephant unconscious! This created a havoc in the Hindu ranks of Hemoo, while the Muslim soldiers in Bahiramkhan’s army, being quite mercenary were in a way let loose. With a determined attack, Bahiramkhan made this confusion worse confounded and vanquishing the leaderless Hindu army, captured Hemoo alive. Taking him to young emperor Akbar, Bahiramhan requested the latter to behead Hemoo with his own royal hands. But young Akbar could not bring himself up to do such a cruel deed. So the enraged Bahiramkhan himself unsheathed his sword and cut off Hemoo’s head.
942. This martyrdom that Vikramaditya Hemoo courted was as obviously (manifestly) done in the cause of Hindu religion, and the greater glory of the

Hindu nation and Hindu welfare as any other. The Hindu nation must always bow down its head in all reverence to this hero, who unfortunately is not so remembered amongst the very few so-called martyrs and warriors in the Hindu world. Well be it so! But even if the millions of these self-deceived and ungrateful Hindus have forgotten him, the Hindu nation as a whole must always remember that the undying Hindu aspiration to free itself, which was kept continually ablaze through a succession of generations and over centuries together and which ultimately rent to pieces the Muslim imperial power, planting on its dead remains the glorious banner of an India-wide Hindu empire, was fed on the now forgotten martyrdom, and the sacrificial offerings of their lives on the altar of war, of the numerous brave heroes like Hemoo, who were दिल्लींद्र पदलिप्सव (ambitious of being the lords of Delhi). 943. Here itself, may we offer our reverential tributes to the glorious memory of Vikramaditya Hemoo, the great, and proceed futher! The Valiant Queen Durgawati 944. Bahiramkhan, thereafter, took Akbar straight to Delhi, later they two together reduced all the rebels up to Gwalior (Gwalher). But they soon fell out and Akbar assumed supreme authority, whereupon Bahiramkhan rebelled, but was defeated. Even then, Akbar did not kill him outright, but sent him away to Makka. Bahiramkhan, however, fell a prey to a revengeful enemy of his of the earlier days. 945. In A.D. 1564, the independent Rajput King in Gondwana, named Veer Narayan, was attacked by Akbar. King Veer Narayan was a minor. Yet his mother, the dowager Qeeen Durgawati, decided not to surrender but to fight the well-equipped imperial army of Akbar, and offered such a tough resistance that for a while, the invaders were astounded. She bravely defended the cause of Hinduism till she was overwhelmed by the vastly superior numbers of the Muslim emperor. But did she sue for peace and lay down arms? Did she ask for the imperial clemency as for a powerless woman? Or, did she send a ‘Rakhi’ to Akbar and abjectly request him to treat her as a sister and show mercy to her as did some other Rajput ladies, off and on? No, not at all! Knowing full well from hundreds of such cases how these Muslim wolves ill-treated and molested the royal Hindu ladies, who fell captives in their hands, Rani Durgawati staunchly refused to do anything of the kind. She, on the contrary, offered her body, along with many other ladies of the court, to the ‘sacred’ fire of the battle. She left strict orders to her

attendant to burn her dead body and not to let the Muslim infidels touch it. Even after her death, Raja Veer Narayan continued to fight with the Muslims, but his resistance was put down by the vastly superior Muslim forces and in A.D. 1562, his small state of Gondwana was annexed to the Moghal empire. 946. Akbar then began to entice the softer ones of the Rajput rulers, who had been disgusted with incessant warfare with the Muslims over generations, together with very alluring promises of honourable and friendly treatment to the Hindus. But on seeing that, even when these docile Rajput rulers were prone to accept Akbar’s terms, they often hesitated and fought shy of doing so in the face of the high sense of honour and pride in their religious and racial purity, which made the belligerent Rana of Chitod staunchly turn down all overtures of peace from the Moghal Emperor. Akbar decided to subdue the fort of Chitod first and accordingly, laid siege to it in A.D. 1567. The Rana of Chitod at that time was Uday Singh, who had not even a small percentage of the dauntless valour of his celebrated father, Rana Sang, who had earlier fought with Babar. But the one courtesan who was at that time wielding real power in Chitod inspired the Rajputs to extraordinary valour. Even when Uday Singh fled away to the forest, the great feudatory lords of Chitod like Jaymalla, Patta and others continued to fight with the Moghals. Later, when Jaymalla and Patta were killed on the battlefield and defeat was absolutely certain, the Rajput Hindus of Chitod, instead of becoming dispirited and disheartened, were touched to the quick and infuriated to the extreme. All the soldiers desperately entered the battlefield and with the war-cry ‘Har, Har Mahadev’ heaped up mounds of the massacred Muslim warriors. But ultimately, when the Rajputs themselves were almost killed in the battle, all the Rajput ladies of Chitod set ablaze the big fire, which was kept ready for the purpose and leapt therein from the ramparts of the fort, according to their age-long glorious tradition, with small children at their breasts and the acclamations in praise of their religion on their lips. These brave ladies reduced themselves to ashes but did not allow the hateful Muslim-touch to defile their pure bodies! This was the third great self-immolation by the ladies of Chitod. 947. It was the same heartless Akbar who caused such a great havoc amongst the Hindus, but whom the spineless Hindu historians of today call the most liberal of monarchs; the one, they say, who yearned to bring about amity between, and unity of, the Hindus and the Muslims; the one, in their opinion, who treated the Hindus far more honourably than any Muslim

ruler, before or after him; who was according to them a veritable Raja Ramchandra amongst the Muslims! 948. But let it also be remembered that, as if not content with this blood- curdling sacrifice of men, women and children of Chitod, Akbar entered the blood-stained city of Chitod, put to sword every one of the bewailing Hindu citizens that remained there—and mark well—he made no exception for the Hindu women. Thirty thousand Hindus lost their lives in this one battle of Chitod. Eventually, it seems the stones and other inanimate objects of Chitod appeared to him as deadly enemies of the Muslims as the Hindus there, and hence this devilish destroyer Akbar went on pulling down the Hindu temples, prayer halls, palaces, houses—everything that came his way, and reduced them all to heaps of rubble and ashes. The temple of the presiding Goddess of Chitod, likewise, was razed to the ground, the idol of the Goddess and all the courtyard being completely destroyed. The beating drums, the fifes, the lamps, jewellery and ornaments, door frames and every sort of valuable or grand articles of Hindu interest were sent away to Agra. Only after quenching his fiendish fanaticism a little with such an inhuman destruction of the Hindu capital of Chitod, did this Muslim Emperor Akbar return to Delhi, calling himself ‘Gazi’ for this virtuous and pious act of his. 949. On the other hand, Uday Singh, who had been wandering in the forest for four years, unable to avenge the brutal destruction of his kingdom and the capital city of Chitod, died of grief in A.D. 1572. Rana Pratap Singh, the jewel among the Hindus 950. Uday Singh’s son, Rana Pratap Singh, immediately ascended the non-existent, imaginary throne of Chitod! But, as he was offered the truly great throne in the hearts of all the staunch Rajputs and as he was considered the very emblem of their invincible courage and valour, this Rana Pratap Singh shone with more dazzling glory than many enthroned kings. He turned out to be the one such Rajput Rana, who would never, under any odds—even at the peril of his life—leave the traditional high sense of honour of the Rajputs. Instead of seeking the humiliating friendship with Akbar and the moments of peace and ease that it would have offered, he preferred to be the direst enemy of the most powerful of Muslim Emperors, regardless of untold miseries and calamities that such an enmity devolved on him. He considered it to be the hallmark of true Hinduism and true Hindu kingship to do so?

951. As Chitod was in the hands of the Muslims, he kept his capital moving with him through villages and towns, in those perilous times, and gradually rescued a large portion of his lost kingdom. He also formed a staunch army of desperate but devoted followers, who held their lives at naught. It is a pity that we cannot describe his thrilling exploits and pitched battles here, for want of space.
952. In the end, his influence grew so powerful and so widespread, that Akbar himself had to send his imperial army to subdue him. Shameful as it is, Raja Mansingh of Jaipur, who had surrendered himself to Akbar and the Rajput convert Mahabat Khan, committed an unpatriotic act of joining Prince Salim's army, marching against Rana Pratap at the Emperor's orders. And at this time, it was that the celebrated battle of Haldighat was fought. In the heat of fighting, Rana Pratap rode his horse straight at the elephant of Prince Salim and that unrivalled horse, Chetak, without the slightest hesitation, made straight at the trunk of the Prince's elephant and planted his front feet on it. With lightning speed, Rana Pratap's spear whizzed past Prince Salim's throat so dreadfully as to stun the latter for a moment. But seeing that his dart missed the mark, Rana Pratap retreated with equal speed and got mixed up with the army the very next moment, and was not to be singled out.
953. Soon he retreated from this undecided battle with thousands of daredevils for his faithful followers, who were sworn to his cause and captivated by his valour and carried the swift guerrilla warfare throughout Mewad, destroying the Muslims and freeing the whole of Mewad except for the capital city of Chitod. In the end, Rana Pratap stabilized his moving capital at Udepur, which never till the end, fell to Akbar. The latter dropped peace-feelers, but Rana Pratap never paid any heed to them. His regime is so replete with chivalrous and romantic adventures, deeds of exceptional valour done by common folks, as those by the great warriors and the Rana himself, that our young generation should delve deep into them and learn them by rote as reverentially as they would, the stories from the Ramayan and the Mahabharat. Fortunately, the romantic Rasos of Rajput Bhats up to the date of the great poet Bhooshan, are still available, which should really be appointed in the secondary schools as compulsory textbooks. But alas! in this critical historical survey of ours, there is no place for citing any passages from them.

954-955. Nor now in the fading light of my last days, is any time left for them! This Rana Pratap Singh, a great ornament to the Hindu society, died in A.D. 1581. The rise of the Sikhs in Punjab—a new awakening of the Hindu might 956. A saintly person, by name Guru Nanak, started a new religious sect in Punjab by the end of the fifteenth century, the followers of which soon organized themselves into a homogeneous group calling themselves Shikh [Sikh— शिष्य—The disciples of Guru Nanak] Shree Guru Nanak was not a sanyasi—a recluse—but a man with a family to bring up. He preached that the worship of God and the service of humanity was possible through devotion. “Every man can follow this path of devotion!”, he asserted. 956A. At that time not only in Punjab but throughout the whole of India, the Muslims had waged a total war against Hinduism and resounded the whole country with the clash of swords, the twang of arrows and the beat of drums. But throughout the whole of India, Hindu rulers and the Hindu populace had been bravely resisting the Muslim aggression on every battlefield. Allauddin’s almost completed India-wide conquest and the consequent Muslim empire, was precipitately broken into numerous fragments and free and strong Hindu States like the Vijaynagar empire had already been established. In Rajputana and Gondwana, too, the Hindu Kings with their daring armies had frequently worsted the Muslim forces! 957. But in Punjab alone, there was left no Hindu strong enough to challenge the Muslim government. At such a dark hour SHREE GURU NANAK began to preach in the Punjab that from the point of view of God, both the Hindus and the Muslims were the same. Both the communities could attain bliss through his path of devotion. Both the communities were one common fraternity. In his sect, he said, he did not recognize any distinction between the two. Yet with all his preaching of this common accord, very few Muslims could be found amongst his disciples. All the others were Hindus. Shree Guru Nanak himself was a Khatri. He died in A.D. 1538. Although he had sons of his own, they did not follow his tenets. So, he installed his disciple Angad as the chief priest after himself. This sect of Shree Guru Nanak, however, was at least up to his death, nothing more than a mere devotional group, a singing choir of devotional songs and mattered very little politically. Still, his grief at the miserable plight of the Hindus, found echoes in some of his writings. For example:

958. क्षत्रियां ही धरम छोड़ियां, मलेच्छ भाषा गही। सृष्टि सब इकबरन हुई, धरम की गति रही॥ नील बरन के कपड़े पहने, तुरक पठानी अमल भया॥ The Kshatriyas have left their religious duties (of protecting the land), as the Muslims have flourished. The whole universe has taken on itself one colour, and religion is in danger; people have begun to wear blue garments and so the Turks and Pathans have become rulers.
959. Many other similar lines ascribed to him have been very popular. Like all other Hindu saints, he also has condemned many blind superstitions and foolish customs.
960. After Guru Angad, the third was Guru Amardas (A.D. 1574) and the fourth Guru was Ramdas. It is said he had an interview with Akbar, and the emperor is said to have bequeathed a large tract of land to him. On the same land, Guru Ramdas dug out a beautiful lake and built a temple on its bank, which is now known as ‘Amritsar’. Guru Ramdas died in A.D. 1581. The fifth Guru was Arjundev, in whose times Sikhism grew rapidly, for they now had a central rendezvous at Amritsar. Moreover, the growing need of a religious text for this growing sect was satisfied by him by collecting whatever sayings of Guru Nanak he could get hold of along with those of other contemporary saints, and thereby creating an authorized religious book for the Sikhs! This very authorized religious textbook was called by him ‘Gurugranth’ or ‘Adigranth’. In it are to be found the sayings of Kabir as also those of the Maharashtrian saint, Namdev. While the Maharashtrian saint, Namdev, was on a pilgrimage of Punjab, his teaching of the path of devotion (भक्ति मार्ग) and his ‘Abhangs’ (hymns) had a widespread influence there. The striking similarity between his teachings and those of Guru Nanak prompted the inclusion of some of Sant Namdev’s Marathi poems in this ‘Gurugranth’. This ‘Gurugranth’ is in Prakrut, which is now called in Punjab as Punjabi. It was not written in the Devnagri script, which was then called ‘Shastri Lipi’, as it was mostly employed by the learned ‘Pandits’ for writing about scientific topics. Just as for ordinary day-to-day affairs, ‘Modi’ script was employed in Maharashtra till very recently, similarly in Punjab at that time in general correspondence of the common people, a Prakrut script was employed and it served for this ‘Adigranth’. The script was commonly called ‘Lundimundi’. But after the ‘Gurugranth’

had been written in it, the Sikhs began to call it Gurumukhi, as it was adopted by their Gurus! 961. When Jahangir became the emperor, his eldest son, Khushru, rebelled against him, and fled to Punjab. As the Sikh Guru Arjundev gave him shelter, the enraged Jahangir captured the Sikh Guru and slew him. In the Sikh history, Guru Arjun was the first heroic martyr who laid down his life while fighting with the Muslims in the cause of his religion. In the days of this very Arjundev, a separate organization was set afoot and a tradition of compulsory religious tax to be paid to the Guru by every Sikh was established, and in order that Sikh sect might grow powerful, a military front was also initiated. 962. The violent death of Guru Arjun secretly rankled in the hearts of the Sikhs, giving rise to inveterate hatred for the Muslims. Most of the Sikh followers in those times, as also later on, were Hindu Jats by caste. As these Hindu Jats were the main support of the Sikh sect and that too, quite strong, the Punjabi Hindus in general had affection for, and a feeling of oneness with them. The militant tendencies and the military organizations began to grow amongst the Sikhs and as a sect of the Hindus, they happened to be staunch defenders of Hinduism against the increasing ferocity of the Muslim religious persecution. So, the Moghal government began to look upon that sect as a troublesome centre of Hindu resistance. 963. Soon the son of Guru Arjun, Guru Hargovind refused to pay taxes to the emperor. He was, therefore, captured and interned in prison for twelve years. Later on, when he was released from captivity, he rebelled against the then Moghal emperor, Shahjahan, who dispatched a small detachment to crush this apparently meagre opposition. But at Sangram, the Sikhs fought with such fierceness that the Muslim detachment was completely vanquished. Although this astounded and pleased the Hindus in Punjab, the Emperor did not mind it. Guru Hargovind died in A.D. 1645 and was succeeded by Harrai, Harkrishan and Teg Bahadur as the high priests of the Sikhs. But it is the exceptional and glorious sacrifice of Teg Bahadur in the cause of religion, that has given dignity and splendour to the seat of the high priest of the Sikhs. 963A. Guru Teg Bahadur lived at Anandpur. Whenever the atrocious conversions of the Hindus to Islam took place in Punjab, Guru Teg Bahadur, with his Sikh warriors, had often fought and opposed them fiercely. And then Aurangzeb, the veritable demon in human form, vowed to root out the whole

Hindu world. Naturally, throughout the whole of India, the Hindus too, opposed him violently. Aurangzeb, particularly, aimed at the top-ranking Brahmins of Kashmir, and enforced on them the Jizia tax, if they did not opt for conversion. This caused a great commotion everywhere. At this time, Guru Teg Bahadur told the Hindus boldly not to pay any such taxes and preached that they should sacrifice their lives rather than forsake their religion. When the Hindus began to give such bold replies, Aurangzeb was aflame with rage. He captured Guru Teg Bahadur and commanded him to court Islam on pain of death. Guru Teg Bahadur thereupon staunchly refused to be a Muslim and defied Aurangzeb, who immediately had him beheaded. This horrible tragedy took place in A.D. 1675. Along with Guru Teg Bahadur, several of his Hindu disciples also were caught and they all suffered horrible deaths after all sorts of atrocities and torments, but they defied the tyrannical Muslim emperor by boldly refusing to be Muslims. The heads of some of the prominent Hindus were actually cut asunder with a big saw. Among these martyrs was Bhai Matidas, whose family was lovingly given the title ‘Bhai’ by the Sikh Gurus and in this very family was born the latter day Hindu patriot, Bhai Parmanand. The son of this very brave Guru was the holiest of the holies, the Hindu national hero, Shree Guru Govind Singh! The Hindu National Hero—Shree Guru Govind Singh 964. To Shree Guru Govind Singh goes all the credit of militarizing Sikhism and to create out of that sect, a militant and invincible organization, which gave a strong impetus to the establishment of a strong and independent Hindu government in Punjab at the time of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. He was called Tenth Emperor— दशम बादशाह —because he was the Tenth Guru from Shree Guru Nanak, not only by the Sikhs but even by all the Punjabi Hindus. From innumerable daring and thrilling events in his life, which well illustrate the above remark, only one might suffice here for want of space for others! 965. As inevitably happens in the case of every big religious organisation, Guru Nanak’s disciples also came to be divided into many sections and sub- sections, but they were all living a Hindu way of life. In respect of marriages and other religious rites and social customs, they were not in any way separated from the Hindu society. In the ‘Gurugranth’ itself, the sayings of Hindu saints like Sant Namdev and Kabir were incorporated along with those of Guru Nanak himself. And from the beginning till this