Alauddin Khalji: Conquests, Market Reforms and the Khalji Dynasty

Khalji Dynasty: The Khalji Revolution of 1290

Khilji Dynasty Founder Jalaluddin Khalji (1290 to 1296)

The Khalji dynasty came to power in 1290, when a group of Khalji nobles led by Jalaluddin Khalji overthrew the weak successors of Balban. Jalaluddin had been the warden of the marches in the north-west and had fought the Mongols many times. The Khaljis had come to India with the Ghurid invasion but had never received sufficient recognition at Delhi, and many of them served as soldiers posted in the north-west to meet the Mongol challenge.

Their rise is often called the Khalji revolution. The non-Turkish sections of the nobility welcomed it, and while the Khaljis did not shut the Turks out of high office, their rise ended the Turkish monopoly of it.

Jalaluddin ruled for only six years. He was the first Sultan to say clearly that the state should rest on the willing support of the governed, and that since most people in India were Hindus, the state could not be a truly Islamic state. He tried to win over the nobles by tolerance and mild punishments, but many of his own supporters thought this weak. In 1292 he defeated a Mongol army near Balban's frontier forts, and 4,000 Mongols who had become Muslims settled near Delhi; his attempt on Ranthambhor failed.

How Alauddin Khalji Became Sultan in 1296

Alauddin was Jalaluddin's nephew and son-in-law. As governor of Kara he raided Bhilsa in Malwa in 1293, and Jalaluddin then gave him Awadh as well. In 1296 he marched into the Deccan and raided Devagiri, the capital of the Yadavas, and came back with a vast treasure.

Jalaluddin went to Kara to meet his nephew, hoping to get hold of this treasure. He left most of his army behind and crossed the Ganga with only a few followers, so that his nephew would not take fright. On 20 July 1296 Alauddin had him killed and proclaimed himself Sultan, and won over most of the nobles and soldiers by a lavish use of gold. He was proclaimed Sultan at Delhi on 21 October 1296.

Rebellions followed, some by nobles and some by his own relations, and Alauddin met them with great severity. Most of the nobles who had joined him for gold were killed or dismissed and their property seized. The Mongol converts settled near Delhi, who rebelled over a share of the loot from Gujarat, were massacred, and harsh punishment was given even to the wives and children of rebels.

Alauddin Khalji's Kingship and Control of the Nobles

Alauddin Khalji's Regulations for the Nobles and the Spy Service

Alauddin framed a series of regulations to stop the nobles from plotting against him. They could not hold banquets or festivities, or form marriage alliances, without the Sultan's permission. To discourage festive parties he banned wine and intoxicants, and he set up a spy service to report everything the nobles said and did.

The nobles were cowed, and no further rebellion broke out in his lifetime. In the long run the method harmed his dynasty. The old nobility was destroyed, and the new nobility learned to accept whoever could seize the throne at Delhi, which is what happened after his death.

His view of the state was just as practical. Alauddin told the leading qazi of Delhi that he did not know what was lawful or unlawful, but framed laws to suit the needs of the state. The Sultans supplemented the Muslim law with regulations of their own, called zawabit, which is why the historian Barani refused to call the state in India truly Islamic and saw it as based on worldly considerations, jahandari.

Sikandar-i-Sani: Alauddin Khalji's Coins and Ambition

Alauddin struck coins with the title Sikandar-i-Sani, the Second Alexander, in recognition of his military success. The Khalji rulers issued coins in abundance with such grand titles, and gave the mints honorific names as well.

The title matched his ambition. In his reign the armies of the Sultanate brought Gujarat and Malwa under control, subdued most of the Rajput princes and overran the Deccan as far as Madurai. The same years saw the gravest Mongol attacks the Sultanate had faced, so conquest in the south and defence in the north-west went on together.

He also built on a scale to match. In 1303 he founded a new capital, Siri, near Delhi, dug a great reservoir, the Hauz Khas, to supply it, and began a victory tower meant to exceed the Qutb Minar, which was never finished. In 1311 he completed the Alai Darwaza, the southern gateway of the Quwwat-ul‑Islam mosque, regarded as a representative of the true arch in Islamic architecture.

How Alauddin Khalji Expanded His Empire: The Conquests

Conquest of Gujarat (1299): Anhilwara, Somnath and Cambay

Gujarat and Malwa drew the Sultans for good reasons. They were fertile and populous, they held the western sea-ports and the trade routes to the Ganga valley, and their overseas trade had brought in much gold and silver. Gujarat also promised a better supply of horses, which the Mongol wars had made hard to obtain overland.

Early in 1299 an army under two of Alauddin's generals marched on Gujarat through Rajasthan, taking Jaisalmer on the way. The Gujarat ruler, Rai Karan, was taken by surprise and fled without a fight. Anhilwara and the other chief cities were sacked, and the temple of Somnath, rebuilt in the twelfth century, was plundered.

Even the wealthy Muslim merchants of Cambay were not spared. It was at Cambay that Malik Kafur, who later led the invasions of south India, was captured and presented to Alauddin. Gujarat passed under the control of Delhi, though Rai Karan, with the help of Ramachandra of Devagiri, held on to part of south Gujarat.

Siege of Ranthambhor (1301) and Hamirdeva

Ranthambhor was ruled by Hamirdeva, a Chauhan descendant of Prithviraja, and was reputed to be the strongest fort in Rajasthan; it had already defied Jalaluddin. The quarrel began on the way back from Gujarat, when Mongol soldiers in Alauddin's army rebelled over the share of the booty. The rebellion was crushed, and two Mongol nobles fled to Ranthambhor.

Hamirdeva refused to kill or expel them and sent haughty replies. An army sent by Alauddin was beaten back, and the Sultan had to march himself. The poet Amir Khusrau, who went with him, described the fort and the siege. After three months of close siege the jauhar took place in 1301. The women mounted the funeral pyre, and the men came out to fight to the last. This is the first description of the jauhar in Persian. The Mongol refugees died fighting beside the Rajputs.

Siege of Chittor (1303) and the Padmini Legend

Chittor, the capital of Mewar, was the next most powerful state in Rajasthan. Its ruler, Ratan Singh, had refused Alauddin's armies passage through Mewar to Gujarat, and Chittor commanded the route from Ajmer to Malwa. After several months of resistance Alauddin stormed the fort in 1303. The Rajputs performed jauhar and most of the warriors died fighting, though Ratan Singh seems to have been captured and kept prisoner for a time.

Chittor was given to Alauddin's young son Khizr Khan with a Muslim garrison, and later handed to a cousin of Ratan Singh. The popular story that Alauddin attacked Chittor because he wanted Padmini, Ratan Singh's queen, is not accepted by many modern historians. It appears for the first time more than a hundred years later, and the poet Malik Muhammad Jayasi later made it part of his romance, the Padmavat.

Malwa, Jalor and the Rajput States under Tribute

Alauddin also overran Jalor, on the route to Gujarat, and forced almost every other major state of Rajasthan to submit. He did not try to rule the Rajput states directly. Their rulers kept their thrones but paid regular tribute and obeyed the Sultan's orders, while Muslim garrisons held important towns such as Ajmer and Nagaur. Jalor itself was captured and destroyed, and was restored to the rulers of Marwar only in 1704; the mosque of Malik Shah in Jalor Fort was commissioned during Alauddin's rule there.

Malwa was treated differently. Even before Rajasthan was subdued, Alauddin conquered Malwa, which Amir Khusrau said was so large that even wise geographers could not mark its frontiers. Unlike Rajasthan, Malwa was brought under direct administration, with a governor appointed to run it.

Alauddin's conquests in the north and west came in quick succession, and each was held in its own way:

Alauddin Khalji and Malik Kafur: The Deccan Campaigns

Conquest in the south was left to Malik Kafur, the slave captured at Cambay. In 1306‑07 Kafur led an army against Ramachandra, the Yadava ruler of Devagiri, whose tribute had fallen into arrears; Ramachandra surrendered and was taken to Delhi, where he was restored to his kingdom with the title Rai Rayan, a gift of one lakh tankas and a district of Gujarat, and one of his daughters was married to Alauddin. The alliance with him made Devagiri the base for the next campaigns. Between 1309 and 1311 Kafur led two campaigns further south, against Warangal and then against Dwarasamudra and Madurai, and for the first time an army from Delhi reached Madurai.

Alauddin wanted tribute and treasure from the south, not direct rule. The rulers of Warangal and Dwarasamudra surrendered their treasures and elephants and promised an annual tribute, and Kafur rose to be malik-naib, vice-regent of the empire. The campaigns, the kingdoms and the Mongol wars of the same years are covered in full in Malik Kafur and the Mongol invasions.

Alauddin Khalji's Market Reforms and Price Control

Why Alauddin Khalji Introduced Market Reforms

Alauddin's market control was seen by his contemporaries as one of the wonders of the world. Its purpose was military. The Mongol attacks on Delhi in 1299 and 1303 showed that the Sultan needed a large standing army, but such an army would soon empty his treasury unless prices, and so salaries, could be kept low.

Alauddin was the first Sultan to pay his soldiers in cash. A sawar, a cavalryman, was paid 238 tankas a year, about 20 tankas a month, and was expected to keep himself, his horse and his equipment from it. For a Turkish cavalryman of the time this was a low salary, so the control of the market was necessary to make it enough.

In a series of orders issued after his return from Chittor, Alauddin fixed the price of every commodity, from foodgrains, sugar and cooking oil to a needle, and from costly imported cloth to horses, cattle and slaves.

Three Markets of Delhi, the Shahna and the Fixed Prices

Alauddin set up three markets at Delhi, one for foodgrains, one for costly cloth, and one for horses, slaves and cattle. Each was under a high officer called the shahna, who kept a register of merchants and strictly controlled the shopkeepers and their prices.

• Grain: Wheat sold at 7½ jitals a man, barley at 4 jitals and good rice at 5 jitals, and prices were not raised even in famine. A man was about 15 kg, and 48 jitals made a tanka.
• Horses: Good horses could be sold only to the state. A first-grade horse cost 100 to 120 tankas, and a tattu, a pony unfit for the army, 10 to 25 tankas; the conquest of Gujarat had improved the supply.
• Cloth: Multani traders were advanced money to bring fine cloth to Delhi, which became the biggest market for fine cloth in the country.
• Enforcement: Alauddin kept himself informed of everything, and a shopkeeper who overcharged or used false weights was severely punished.

Grain Supply: Doab Revenue, Banjaras and Warehouses

Cheap grain in the towns depended on what happened in the villages. Alauddin's measures worked in a sequence:

1. Doab revenue to the state: In the doab, from Meerut to the border of Kara, land revenue was paid directly to the state, and no village there was assigned as an iqta.
2. Half the produce, in cash: The revenue was raised to half of the produce, and peasants were generally made to pay in cash, so they had to sell their grain quickly and cheaply.
3. Banjaras registered: Peasants sold to banjaras, grain carriers who took it to the towns and sold it at fixed prices; they were registered, and their agents and families were held responsible for any violation.
4. State warehouses: The state stocked its own warehouses with grain and released it in famine or shortage.

The historian Barani wrote that the permanence of prices in the grain market was a wonder of the age. He thought Alauddin's real aim was to punish the Hindus, since most traders were Hindus. But much of the overland trade was in the hands of Khurasanis and Multanis, many of them Muslims, and all the citizens of Delhi, whatever their faith, gained from cheap food. Whether the controls applied beyond Delhi is not clear.

Land Revenue and the Army under Alauddin Khalji

Measurement of Land and the Khuts and Muqaddams

Alauddin was the first ruler of the Sultanate to insist that land revenue in the doab be assessed by measuring the land under cultivation. Measurement meant that the rich and powerful in a village, who held more land, could no longer pass their burden on to the poor.

He aimed at the village landlords, the khuts and muqaddams. They had to pay the same taxes as others, including taxes on milch cattle and houses, and give up the illegal cesses they used to collect. Barani says they became so poor that they could no longer ride fine horses or chew betel.

Direct collection needed honest officials, so the accounts of the amils and other local officers were audited strictly, and small defaults were punished with beatings and prison. The policy was harsh and must have touched ordinary cultivators too, but it was aimed mainly at the privileged sections of the countryside and did not drive the peasants to revolt or flight.

Alauddin Khalji's Standing Army: Cash Salaries and Branded Horses

The point of all these measures was a large, efficient standing army. Its soldiers were paid by the Sultan in cash, and the market reforms let them live on their pay.

To stop fraud at the reviews, his government kept a descriptive roll of every soldier and introduced the branding of horses, so that no horse could be shown twice or swapped for a poor one. Barani credits the reforms with giving Alauddin the large, efficient cavalry that defeated the later Mongol attacks with great slaughter and drove them beyond the Indus.

Death of Alauddin Khalji and the End of the Khalji Dynasty

Alauddin Khalji's Death (1316) and Tomb

Alauddin fell ill in the last years of his life and left the administration to Malik Kafur. He died on the night of 4 January 1316; Barani reports that some people believed Kafur had murdered him. His tomb and the madrasa dedicated to him stand at the back of the Qutb complex at Mehrauli in Delhi.

His market regulations died with him, but the results were real. They paid for the cavalry that ended the Mongol danger, his revenue reforms marked a closer relationship between the state and the villages, and some of his measures were continued and later built on by Sher Shah and Akbar.

Last Rulers of the Khilji Dynasty: Kafur, Mubarak Shah and Khusrau

The weakness Alauddin had built into the nobility showed at once. Malik Kafur raised a young son of Alauddin to the throne and imprisoned or blinded his other sons, and no noble opposed him. Kafur was soon killed by the palace guards, and Alauddin's elder son Qutbuddin Mubarak Shah seized power, the last Khalji Sultan.

Mubarak Shah was killed in a plot by his favourite, Khusrau Khan, a Hindu convert, who took the throne. The chroniclers accuse Khusrau of many crimes, though he was no worse than earlier rulers, and even the Sufi saint Nizamuddin Auliya accepted his gifts. In 1320 a group of officers led by Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq rebelled, and Khusrau was defeated and killed outside Delhi. The Khalji dynasty was over, and the Tughlaqs took its place, as told in the Tughlaqs: Muhammad bin Tughlaq and Firoz Shah.

Sources

• NCERT: Medieval India (Satish Chandra, Class XI, earlier edition), The Delhi Sultanat
• Reserve Bank of India: Medieval Coinage
• Delhi Tourism (Govt of NCT of Delhi): Siri
• Rajasthan Tourism (Govt of Rajasthan): Chittorgarh
• Rajasthan Tourism (Govt of Rajasthan): Jalore
• Wikipedia: Alauddin Khalji
• Wikipedia: Khalji dynasty
• Wikipedia: Jalaluddin Khalji
• Wikipedia: Market reforms of Alauddin Khalji
• Wikipedia: Alai Darwaza
• Wikipedia: Siri Fort
• Wikipedia: Siege of Chittorgarh (1303)
• Wikipedia: Siege of Ranthambore (1301)
• Wikipedia: Malik Kafur
• Wikipedia: Qutb ud din Mubarak Shah
• Wikipedia: Khusrau Khan
• UPSC: Civil Services Examination question papers