Hinduism Under Delhi Sultanate

      Beginning 700 CE, the areas of central Asia saw a big jump in their military powers and many people from that area started eyeing riches of India with increasing confidence that these can be had. The area of today's Afghanistan was largely under the Buddhist influence experiencing non-violence and flower power rather than military power. Northwestern India (mainly Punjab) was at the next forefront and India of the day was largely fragmented into smaller kingdoms with very poor stability. Situations were rather apt for foreign aggressors.

Delhi Sultanate

      Inspite of all this, the conquest over India has been slow and fragmented, perpetrated over many long years by many different people from Persia to Mongol. A number of advances and inroads were made into Indian territories mainly by Pashtun armies from Central Asia but footholds were not easily gained. But Indian kingdoms on the front were getting weak by every aggression and finally started caving to the increasing power of the Mongols. Ultimately it was in 998 CE that Mahmud of Ghazni conquered the area of Punjab. Again in 1019, Mahmud Ghazni attacked north India and destroyed Kannauj, the capital City of Gurjara-Pratihara Empire. Later, in 1192 Muhammad of Ghori defeated Prithvi Raj Chauhan and soon established the first Muslim Sultanate at Delhi.

      Over 320 years between 1206 CE and 1526 CE, India got ruled by Delhi Sultanate which was a Turkish Muslim dominated rule under four separate Dynasties named Mamluk, Khilji, Tughlak, Sayyid and the fifth dynasty that ruled in the last was Lodhi from Afghan. This period saw many rulers, of which Qutub-uddin-Aibak who was a slave of Muhammad Ghori was the first Sultan. But all of these rulers can be classified under a single band so far as their impacts on Hinduism are concerned.

      All of these are blamed for indiscriminate destruction and desecration of ancient Indian temples after looting them of all their riches. All of these rulers were Muslims and greatly promoted Islam in all-important spheres of society, military and administration. They were almost on the move all the time and heading to either east of India, or central India or South of India (largely to Deccan) or to West of India with a single mission of looting temples, destroying temples, killing all those who were expected to rise against their rule (needless to say that most of the people killed were Hindus). The rulers of this period also encouraged converting to Islam by increasing taxes on non-Muslims, providing preferential treatment in administration positions. Another marked feature of Delhi Sultanate was recycling of sculpted stones for construction of Mosques and such other structures which got built by them (for example, the Qutub Minar complex in Delhi).

      It all started in 997 CE with Mahmud Ghazni from central Asia raiding and plundering kingdoms of north western India as many as seventeen times between 997 and 1030. That process remained on in by and large similar fashion for next five hundred years. The only silver line can be called is introduction of Islamic Architecture in India which got used for most state sponsored construction of forts, monuments, palaces etc. The first female ruler, Razia Sultana who ruled from Delhi between 1236 and 1240, also belonged to this period. But her brief rule was laced with her own survival rather than any other distinct mark on history.

      The background explained above is a clear proof that nothing much can grow under such conditions as the entire Hindu culture was living just for survival. On the reverse, Hindus saw many killings at the hands of these aggressors and rulers as well as large amount of forced and induced conversions to Islam that again were at the cost of Hinduism.

      Again in 1398 CE, Timur, the Turkish king of Samarkand, invaded India and plundered lots of temples and treasuries, killed over 200,000 Hindus, looted most Hindu areas of Delhi for days together, carried back wealth, slaves, women and artisans with him to Samarkand. His brief aggression will always be noted as one of the most barbarian attacks on Hindu interests.

      Most rulers from the Delhi Sultanate not only looted and destroyed Hindu temples; they banned repairs, reconstructions or new constructions. So much so that when some Chinese ruler sent his people to help rebuild damaged Buddhist Stupas, they were denied by imposing unreasonable amount of Zazia tax for such works. Temples, in that period were the symbols of religion and were used not only for worships but served as major focal points of all social gatherings and carried the best of art, sculpture, and prosperity of the kingdom which ruled over the lands where these temples were located.

      The only noticeable development on Hinduism was the Bhakti movement that largely started and flourished under these testing times. More about it is taken up in the next section.