History of Aurangzib/Volume 1/Chapter 6

by Jadunath Sarkar

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CHAPTER VI.

Governorship of Multan and Sindh, 1648-1652.

After sanctioning the retreat from Balkh, Shah Jahan himself returned to India. But steps were taken to guard against any disaster in the rear. Prince Shuja was left behind at Kabul till he should hear that Aurangzib had safely crossed the Hindu Kush again. The expeditionary force was now entirely withdrawn from Afghanistan. But Aurangzib himself, in command of its last portion, was detained at Attock^[1] till March next, without being permitted to cross theAurangzib appointed to Multan. Indus and enter Hindustan. The object of this arrangement evidently was that he should be near enough to hasten back to the defence of Kabul, in case of an invasion from Central Asia. But such a fear vanished in time, and in the middle of March 1648 he was appoint ed Governor of Multan.^[2] This post he held till 14th July, 1652, when he laid it down to take up the viceroyalty of the Deccan for the second time.^[3]

Of Aurangzib's personal history during these four years there is little to tell. He was twice called away to fight the Persians at Qandahar; first leaving Multan on 22nd January and returning in December, 1649, and on the second occasion crossing the Chenab on 20th March 1652 and being sent away to the Deccan directly from Qandahar. On the way back from the first siege he spent a fortnight with the Emperor at Lahore (10th to 26th November, 1649); and heHis movements and promotion. paid another visit to his father at Delhi from 2nd January to 12th February, 1651. Promotion came to him on 16th January, 1649, when his rank was raised by 2,000 troopers of his command being made do-aspa and seh-aspa, and his allowance being increased in proportion, so that he was now a Commander of 15,000 men by rank, (his additional contingent being 12,000 troopers, of whom 8000 were do-aspa and seh aspa.)^[4] In November of the same year the province of Tatta or Sindh was added to his viceroyalty, and the districts of Bhakkar and Siwistan granted to him as his fiefs.^[5]

The Adab-i Alamgiri: its contents and historic value. On the public side of the Prince's career from 1650 a new and copious source of information is opened to the historian by the Adab-i-Alamgiri. Aurangzib took into his service an elegant and facile secretary, Shaikh Abul Fath, afterwards raised to the title of Qabil Khan and the high post of Munshi-ul-mamalik ("Secretary of the Empire") when his master won the throne of Delhi. The scribe served the Prince for 26 years and retired only when failing eye-sight made him unfit for his task.^[6] He kept copies of all the letters he wrote in the name of Aurangzib to the Emperor, the princes, ministers, and generals, and of certain other epistles written to them on his own behalf. These number more than six hundred and fill 427 pages of a foolscap folio manuscript, with 23 lines to the page. They cover the entire period from 1650 to the dethronement and captivity of Shah Jahan. From the commencement of the second siege of Qandahar the letters become more full and frequent, and we get a detailed and most authentic account of Aurangzib's efforts at Qandahar, his feeling at his father's censure, his financial difficulties in the Deccan, the administrative problems that he handled there, the crooked ways of Mughal diplomacy with Bijapur and Golkonda, and lastly, of his hopes and fears, plans and movements during the war of succession, and his relations with his captive father. Half a century later, Sadiq of Ambala collected Qabil Khan's drafts, supplemented them with a history of the war of succession extracted from the Amal-i-Salih and the Alamgir-namah, added 131 letters^[7] which he himself had written as secretary to the luckless prince Muhammad Akbar, and published the whole to the world. In the Khuda Bakhsh MS. the collection forms a folio volume of 586 pages, of inestimable value to the historian of the epoch.^[8]

The province of Multan contained a war-like and unsettled population divided into a number of clans by differences of race, creed, and traditions, and often engaged in war with one another. The addition of Sindh to his charge brought Aurangzib in contact with the wildest and most untractable Afghan and Baluch septs. For many generations past the royal authority had been hardly obeyed in the western borderland even in Sindh its lawless population. name, and the chieftains had lived warred and raided as they liked. Aurangzib was not the man to brook disorder and disobedience. But even he could do no more than make a beginning. The cause of law and order could get no local support among the people governed; everything depended on the strong arm of the ruler. It was impossible for him, in the few years of a viceroyalty, to break to peaceful life and law-abiding habits tribes who had never before known any government and who were in a fluid state of either expansion or extinction. Only justice strictly administered and backed by irresistible force for several generations, could have crushed out the predatory instincts of the Brahuis and Hots and taught them to obey a higher power than their chieftains' will. This moral transformation was reserved for another age and another race of administrators. What Aurangzib, however, could do was to strike down the most notorious brigand chiefs and secure a nominal profession of allegiance to the Emperor from the border clans. The Imperial suzerainty once admitted in theory, its practical working out might be left for better times.

A large Baluch tribe name Hot had migrated The Hot tribe. into Sindh and the Panjab under Mir Chakar Rind of Sibi, and split up into branches. One section held the upper Derajat for two centuries with Dera Ismail Khan as their capital. Their chiefs bore the title of Ismail Khan from generation to generation and stretched their lordship over Darya Khan and Bhakkar east of the Indus. In the Sind Sagar Doab stood Mankera, another Hot stronghold, and the capital of a principality which in the beginning of the 17th century stretched from Bhakkar to Leiah on the Indus. In course of time the Hots have become assimilated to their Jat and Rajput neighbours, and their power and number have declined.^[9] But the seventeenth century was the period of their greatness. Their chief, Ismail Hot, sent presents to Shah Jahan and secured a patron in Dara Shukoh. Taking advantage of his position on

the boundary between the two provinces, he now claimed to be subject to the Governor of Lahore and refused to admit the jurisdiction of the Subahdar of Multan. Aurangzib was prepared for this subterfuge. He had mentioned the case in an audience with the Emperor and got his answer that Ismail Hot was in future to be subject to Multan. The Hot chief, on the strength of a letter of Dara's, refused to wait upon the new Governor of Multan, and continued in his career of aggression. He took three forts from Mubarak of Babri, another Baluch chief.Its aggressions put down. Aurangzib, armed with the Emperor's sanction, at once asserted his authority and sent a force to restore the forts to their rightful owner. But during Mubarak's absence, Ismail conquered the forts again. Severer measures were now taken against him; he was compelled to surrender Mubarak's possessions and to pay his respects to the Prince at Multan (20th June, 1650). Aurangzib now conciliated him, as he was a rich chieftain with a good body of armed retainers, and could assist the Imperial government in subduing the Nohani tribe and also supply provisions during the Qandahar war.^[10]

Another Baluch tribe, which has now strangely The Nohani tribe. declined and almost disappeared, is the Nohani,^[11] the hereditary enemy of the Hots. But their power in the 17th century was strong enough to cause anxiety to the government. Aurangzib at first tried to win over Alam, the Nohani chief, whose lands adjoined those of the Hots and lay across one of the shortest roads from Multan to Qandahar. But his friendly letter produced no effect; the proud chieftain refused to wait on the Governor at Multan. So Aurangzib took steps to expel him by force, after getting sanction from the Emperor.^[12]

In the Kirthar and Lakhi hills separating Sindh from Baluchistan, dwelt many lawless men of the Nahmardi and Jukia tribes.Imperial authority recognised in the Baluch hills beyond the Indus, In Akbar's time the former clan could place in the field more than 7,000 men.^[13] Their strongholds were Bela, (the capital of the district of Las), and Kahra, from which they sallied forth to rob and to slay. No ruler of Sindh, from the days of the Tarkhan dynasty, had extorted even a nominal submission from these border brigands. Aurangzib sent his able lieutenant, Malik Husain of the Abdali clan, against them. The force marched for ten days beyond the frontier of Lower Sindh, exacted promises of submission and tribute from Harun and Khatartal (the Nahmardi chiefs), and Murid (the headman of the Jukias), and caused the Emperor's name to be read from the pulpit as a public mark of his suzerainty. This show of strength evidently had a good effect on the neighbours, for Jafar Nahmardi, a kinsman of the zamindar of Panjghur^[14] and Kech Makran,and in Makran and four other chiefs offered and in Makran. their allegiance to the Imperial government.

Another Nahmardi chief named Madh, had descended from the hills of Southern Afghanistan to raid Bela and Kahra. But Malik Husain with the Imperial troops made a forced march of 140 miles, and surprised the robber's camp, slaying him and bringing away his daughter and forty of his retainers as captives. Thus the Emperor's suzerainty was publicly declared throughout the coast tract of Makran, and the army returned to Tatta with flying colours.

Sata Hala, the son of the zamindar of Kakrala, paid a visit to Aurangzib at Multan, but in the meantime his rival crossed over from Cutch and seized his lands.Lawless men put down. A detachment from Malik Husain's force, assisted by a gunboat, drove away the usurper, who fled without standing a battle.^[15] Everywhere lawless men and frontier clans felt that they had got a new master, who could not be safely defied.

While thus securing internal peace, Aurangzib was equally mindful of developing the trade of the province and increasing its revenue. Early in the century Tatta had been one of the chief commercial centres of India, and trade of great value used to pass up the Indus. But accumulations of sand at the mouth of the river increased year by year and closed the passage to ocean-going ships.^[16] Tatta ceased to be an emporium. Aurangzib now set about reviving the commerce of the province by affording facilities to the maritime trade. He opened a new port at the mouth of the Indus, and built there a fort and dock to give it at the mouth of security and usefulness. But it Aurangzib opens a new port at the mouth of the Indus. took time for the new harbour to become known to mariners, and for some months the only ship that used it was a vessel belonging to the Prince. The Emperor excused the duty on merchandise in order to attract trade to it.^[17]

We read of his financial difficulties at this time. His jagirs produced little revenue, as the result of drought, the locust plague, and floods, in three successive seasons. He begged for financial assistance from the Emperor, saying that he had no hoard of gold pieces, but had spent all his income in keeping his army efficient, as he did not care to buy jewels like other princes. But the Emperor gave him an angry refusal.^[18]

Aurangzib's administrative capacity, however, must not be judged from these few achievements

in Sindh. He lived in the province for barely three years, and in the very first year of his vice-royalty Qandahar cast its shadow over his work. Home affairs were subordinated to foreign, and every other question was neglected for the supreme one of recovering Qandahar. Multan became one of the two bases for the war with Persia, and, amidst the bustle of military preparations on a vast scale, the attention and resources of its ruler were necessarily diverted from the internal administration.

1. Waris, 4a, 8b, 12a.
2. Waris, 12a.
3. Waris, 66a and 67a.
4. Waris, 24a, 39b, 48a, 49a, 59a. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 3a, 4b, 9a & b.
5. Waris, 39b.
6. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 1b, 209b.
7. These contain many details of the Mughal war with Maharana Raj Singh, and come to a close only a month before Akbar broke into rebellion against his father.
8. The Adab-i-Alamgiri was compiled in 1115 A. H. (1703-1704 A.D.) by Sadiq at the request of his son Md. Zaman, (2a and b).
9. Dames's Baloch Race, 48 and 55, Imperial Gazetteer, xi. 262, 270, xvii. 198, xxiii. 286.
10. Abdul Hamid, ii. 233, (Ismail presents horses and camels, 26 May, 1641.) Waris, 85a. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 2b, 3a.
11. "Noh or Nuhani.—Not now found. Said to have been on the side of the Lasharis against the Rinds" (Dames's Baloch Race, p. 56). "Throughout the Brahui, Baloa, and Lasi tribes, and even among the Sibi Afghans, sections or sub-sections called Nodh, Nodhani, and Nothani, &c. are to be found" (H. Buller's Census of Baluchistan, p. 83).
12. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 3a, 3b, 4a, 5a.
13. Ain, ii. 337. The Adab-i-Alamgiri mentions Kahra and Bela as 10 stages from the frontier of Tatta, and as the refuge of these two clans. The Ain speaks of a range of mountains named Karah, evidently west of Bhakkar. (ii. 337).
14. The Adab-i-Alamgiri, 3b, has Banchur or Panjur "and Kaj and Makran". I take the place to be Panjghur, 27°30 N. 63°E., north north-east of Kaj (or Kech), described in Masson's Kalat, 219. The chief objection to the indentification is that it is more than 300 miles away from Tatta.
15. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 3b.
16. "There is no city of greater trade in all the Indies than Tatta in Sindh; its chief port being Larry Bunder, three days' journey nearer the mouth of the river. From Tatta they go in two months by water to Lahore and return down the river in one... Great trade is carried on at Tatta and ships of 300 tons might be brought up to Larry Bunder" Whittington in 1614, Purchas, 1, quoted in Kerr's Voyages and Travels, ix. 131 and 130. For the silting up, Tavernier, i. 12.
17. Adab-i-Alamgiri, 6a.
18. Adab, 172a.