History Of India

"On Saturday, the 24th January, 1680/2nd Muharram, the Emperor went to view lake Udaisagar, constructed by the Rana, and ordered all the three temples on its banks to be demolished.'...On the 29th January [1680]/7th Muharram, Hasan 'Ali Khan brought to the Emperor twenty camel-loads of tents and other things captured from the Rana's palace and reported that one hundred and seventy-two other temples in the environs of Udaipur had been destroyed. The Khan received the title of Bahadur 'Alamgirshahi'...'Abu Turab, who had been sent to demolish the temples of Amber, returned to Court on Tuesday, the 10th August [1680]/24th Rajab, and reported that he had pulled down sixty-six temples."

"Darab Khan who had been sent with a strong force to punish the Rajputs of Khandela and to demolish the great temple of the place... He attacked the place on the 8th March 1679/5th Safar, and slew the three hundred and odd men who made a bold defence, not one of them escaping alive. [16 October 1678] The temples of Khandela and Sanula and all other temples in the neighbourhood were demolished...'On Sunday, the 25th May/24th Rabi. S., Khan Jahan Bahadur came from Jodhpur, after demolishing the temples and bringing with himself some cart-loads of idols, and had audience of the Emperor, who highly praised him and ordered that the idols, which were mostly jewelled, golden, silvery, bronze, copper or stone, should be cast in the yard (jilaukhanah) of the Court and under the steps of the Jam'a mosque, to be trodden on. They remained so for some time and at last their very names were lost' [25 May 1679]...Ruhullah Khan and Ekkataz Khan went to demolish the great temple in front of the Rana's palace, which was one of the rarest buildings of the age and the chief cause of the destruction of life and property of the despised worshippers Twenty machator Rajputs who were sitting in the temple vowed to give up their lives; first one of them came out to fight, killed some and was then himself slain, then came out another and so on, until every one of the twenty perished, after killing a large number of the imperialists including the trusted slave, Ikhlas. The temple was found empty. The hewers broke the images....."

"“On 6th January 1680 A.D. Prince Mohammad Azam and Khan Jahan Bahadur obtained permission to visit Udaipur. Ruhullah Khan and Yakkattaz Khan also proceeded thither to effect the destruction of the temples of the idolators. These edifices situated in the vicinity of the Rana’s palace were among the wonders of the age, and had been erected by the infidels to the ruin of their souls and the loss of their wealth… Pioneers destroyed the images. On 24th January the king visited the tank of Udayasagar. His Majesty ordered all three of the Hindu temples to be levelled with the ground...."

"Saqi Mustad Khan reported : “On the 7th Muharram Hasan ’AH Khan made his appearance with twenty camels taken from the Rana, and stated that the temple situated near the palace, and one hundred and twenty-two more in the neighbouring districts, had been destroyed. This chieftain was, for his distinguished services, invested with the title of Bahddur.“"

"The Indian kings, all of whom accepted, at any rate in theory, the law of the Dharmastras as inalienable, waged wars according to certain humane rules. 'Whatever the provocation, the shrine, the Brahmata and the cow were sacrosanct to them. War being a special privilege of the martial classes, harassment of the civilian population during military operations was considered a serious lapse from the code of honour. The high regard which all the Kshatriyas had for the chastity of women, also ruled out abduction as an incident of war.... The wars in Central Asia, on the other hand, were grim struggles for survival, for the destruction of the enemies and for appropriating their womenfolk. No code circumscribed the destructive zeal of the conqueror; no canon restrained the ruthlessness of their hordes. When, therefore, Mahmud’s armies swept over North India it saw torrents of barbarians sweeping across its rich plains, burning, looting, indulging in indiscriminate massacre; raping women, destroying fair cities, burning down magnificent shrines enriched by centuries of faith; enforcing an alien religion at the point of sword; abducting thousands, forcing them into unwilling marriage or concubinage; capturing hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, to be sold as slaves in the markets of Ghazni and other Central Asian markets... Mahmud annexed the Punjab, thereby opening the way to the hungry men from the steppes of Central Asia to descend upon this rich and fertile land in search of plunder. Nothing would with- stand the Central Asian raiders eager to plunder and destroy. In a few years, Thaneswar, Mathura, Kanauj and Prabhasa Pattana were smoking ruins. ... However, the destruction and the humiliation inflicted by Mahmud’s raids shocked India’s sense of ancient superiority, bringing into play several political, social and psychological factors. With the Yaminis, the successors of Mahmud, firmly established in the Punjab, the ‘Aryavarta-consciousness’ lost whatever significance it had. The belief that Chaturvarnya was a divinely appointed universal order, characteristic of the land, was shaken; for now a ruling race in the country not only stood outside it, but held it in contempt and sought its destruction."

"Today the absurd spectacle of the high-stepping soldiers from India and Pakistan who nightly strut their robotic lowering and folding of flags, with their high kicks, stamps and twirls, at a border crossing on the Old Trunk Road between their two countries, draws increasingly large cheering crowds from each side and is a YouTube favourite. It is surely a bit of harmless fun. Or is it? Both countries have nuclear weapons and a long history of conflict and mutual suspicion. And militarism, whether that means elevating the military to a position as the noblest and best of their societies or the leaching of military values, such as discipline and obedience into the civilian world, can lead to trouble for democratic societies."

"Whatever the provocation, the shrine, the Brahman and the cow were sacrosanct.... War being a special privilege of the martial classes, harassment of the civilian population during military operations was considered a serious lapse from the code of honour. The high regard which all Kshatriyas had for the chastity of women, also ruled out abduction as an incident of war."

"The Indian legion is a joke. I believe that if Indians could be used to turn prayer-wheels, they would be the most indefatigable soldiers in the world. But using them in a real life-and-death war is pure madness. They cannot even kill an Englishman."

"The most curious thing was the code of war of those days; as soon as the battle for the day ceased and evening came, the opposing parties were good friends, even going to each other's tents; however, when the morning came, again they proceeded to fight each other. That was the strange trait that the Hindus carried down to the time of the Mohammedan invasion. Then again, a man on horseback must not strike one on foot; must not poison the weapon; must not vanquish the enemy in any unequal fight, or by dishonesty; and must never take undue advantage of another, and so on. If any deviated from these rules he would be covered with dishonour and shunned. The Kshatriyas were trained in that way. And when the foreign invasion came from Central Asia, the Hindus treated the invaders in the selfsame way. They defeated them several times, and on as many occasions sent them back to their homes with presents etc. The code laid down was that they must not usurp anybody's country; and when a man was beaten, he must be sent back to his country with due regard to his position. The Mohammedan conquerors treated the Hindu kings differently, and when they got them once, they destroyed them without remorse."

"The total numbers of men fielded by the various parts of the British Empire [during World War II] were immense. All told, the United Kingdom itself mobilized just under six million men and women. But an additional 5.1 million came from India, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Victories like El Alamein and even more so Imphal were victories for imperial forces as much as for British forces; the colonial commitment to the Empire proved every bit as strong as in the First World War. Especially remarkable was the fact that more than two and a half million Indians volunteered to serve in the British Indian Army during the war - more than sixty times the number who fought for the Japanese. The rapid expansion of the Indian officer corps provided a crucial source of loyalty, albeit loyalty that was conditional on post-war independence."

"India had barely become independent, in 1947, when Pakistan invaded Kashmir, which at the time was ruled by a maharajah. The mahara­jah fled, and the people of Kashmir, led by Sheikh Abdullah, asked for Indian help. Lord Mountbatten, who was still governor general, replied that he wouldn’t be able to supply aid to Kashmir unless Pakistan declared war, and he didn’t seem bothered by the fact that the Pakistanis were slaughtering the population. So our leaders decided to sign a document by which they bound themselves to go to war with Pakistan. And Mahatma Gandhi, apostle of nonviolence, signed along with them. Yes, he chose war. He said there was noth­ing else to do. War is inevitable when one must defend somebody or defend oneself."

"Arthur Schopenhauer (d. 1860), one of the greatest nineteenth-century philosophers, narrates the sordid tale of the Islamic invasion of India as follows: ’…the endless persecutions, the religious wars, that sanguinary frenzy of which the ancients (of India) had no conception! The destruction or disfigurement of the ancient temples and idols, a lamentable, mischievous and barbarous act still bears witness to the monotheistic fury… carried on from Mahmud, the Ghaznevid of cursed memory, down to Aurangzeb… We hear nothing of this kind in the case of the Hindoo.’"

"When Alexander had asked a Brahmin as to what they taught which inspired Hindu warriors to such high heroism, the Brahmin had replied in one sentence – “We teach our people to live with honour.”"

"Its water is dark; its fruit is bitter and poisonous; its land is stony, and its earth is saltish. A small army will soon be annihilated there..."

"At most periods of her history India, though a cultural unit, has been torn by internecine war. In statecraft, her rulers were cunning and unscrupulous. Famine, flood and plague visited her from time to time, and killed millions of her people. Inequality of birth was given religious sanction, and the lot of the humble was generally hard. Yet our overall impression is that in no other part of the ancient world were the relations of man and man, and of man and the state, so fair and humane. In no other early civilisation were slaves so few in number, and in no other ancient lawbook are their rights so well protected as in the Arthasastra. No other ancient lawgiver proclaimed such noble ideals of fair play in battle as did Manu. In all her history of warfare Hindu India has few tales to tell of cities put to the sword or of the massacre of non-combatants…There was sporadic cruelty and oppression no doubt, but, in comparison with conditions in other early cultures, it was mild. To us the most striking feature of ancient Indian civilisation is its humanity."

"While the Greek and Roman historians have not failed to point to Alexander's weaknesses and the difficulties encountered by him, Vincent Smith has extolled him as a hero. Out of the 501 pages of his 'Early Hiostory of India', 70 pages are devoted to Alexander's campaign. ... Basham admits... that 'at least in his approach to Alexander's Indian campaigns, Mookerji is a more impartial historian than the hero-worshipping Smiths and Tarns, who had never been able to view history from the angle for the East."

"Hindus could not, even in the wildest stretch of their imagination, conceive of a war that defied description. Until then, the code of war ethics that they had inherited since the Vedic period rested upon a rather tempered, three-tiered categorisation, given, for example, by Kalidasa50, which was later elucidated by the Kashmiri scholar, Vallabhadeva. The first was a Dharmavijayi, which refers to a conqueror who after defeating his enemy, allows him to rule the territory as before but exerts administrative control over him. The second was a Lobhavijayi—a conqueror who, after defeating his enemy, snatches both his territory and his treasury but spares the defeated king’s life. And the third was an Asuravijayi—a conqueror who not only grabs his vanquished enemy’s territory and treasury but puts him to death and takes his entire family, including women and children, as slaves. Needless to say, the Hindu tradition holds the Asuravijayi as the most despicable form of military victory."

"No Indian ever went outside his own country on a warlike expedition, so righteous were they."

"No military unit in recent years has undertaken a more delicate and demanding peacetime mission than that faced by the Indian forces in Korea. The vast majority of prisoners placed in their charge had from months of imprisonment and uncertainty become highly nervous and volatile. The confidence inspired by the exemplary tact, fairness and firmness shown by the Indian officers and men led by their two able commanders, Lt. General Thimayya and Major General Thorat did much to alleviate the fears and doubts of these prisoners. The performance of these officers and their troops was fully in keeping with the high reputation of the Indian Army. They deserve the highest commendation."

"Although conquest and conflict are by no means absent from dharmic traditions, these conflicts stemmed from an entirely different psychology and political programme than did the huge colonial endeavours of the West."

"Anticipating war the hero should train himself to master archery, swordsmanship, cavalry and also fight on elephants and chariots, to emerge victorious when the battle breaks out . . . If the warrior’s training is incomplete and inadequate, he would not be able to face the fierce enemy, but if it (the observance of the vows) is perfect and complete, he would successfully quell the enemy and emerge victorious . . . One who panics on the battlefield is bound to face defeat and humiliation."

"In order to implement its programme of Direct Action, which, it must be noted, was not to take the form of Ahimsa, the Muslim League began to make brisk preparations for attack on Hindus and equally well, Sikhs. The Muslim League private army called the Muslim National Guards, which has already been referred to, began to expand. All kinds of Muslim riff-raff, disbanded members of the Civic Guards, and such other elements were the favourite recruiting ground for this body. The Muslim criminal elements found in the National Guard a new scope for their criminal proclivities as providing opportunity both for their anti-social acts and the satisfaction of having done something meritorious in the service of Islam. The Police, which in several provinces was overwhelmingly Muslim, helped in this recruitment, which was not so much of a secret, and in the collection of arms, equipment and petrol (this last for purposes of incendiarism). Jeeps and lorries were possessed by the National Guard in the larger towns; they had stocks of steel helmets purchased from the Disposals Department... Besides, large numbers of lethal weapons, such as knives, daggers, swords and spears were made and stocked by the Muslim National Guards. Well-to-do Muslim firms and individuals were reported in the months of August and September, 1946 to have distributed daggers and knives among Muslims of Lahore and Amritsar... Parcels of knives were frequently intercepted by the Railway Police... As the Calcutta and Eastern Bengal Riots showed, the Muslim preparation for attack and destruction had been terribly widespread and efficient."

"Besides lethal weapons, there were fairly large quantities of firearms and means of incendiarism in the possession of Muslims. In the Punjab, besides smuggling arms from India with the help and connivance of the Muslim Police, the Muslims with the same facility to hand, could do successful gun-running from the tribal areas in the North-West. While a Hindu or Sikh carrying illegal weapons on him would be hauled up under the Arms Act, Muslims were comparatively safe in so doing, unless they happened to be detected by some non-Muslim police officer. Large quantities of petrol were obtained and conserved by the Muslims at a time when petrol rationing had been in force for several years, and this hoarded petrol was used in setting ablaze whole localities of non-Muslims with fiendish rapidity and efficiency, and thousands were trapped in the rapidly spreading flames and burnt alive."

"There are already indications that the Guards are being used as secret messengers, and their general activities are becoming less open, and in some places, they are active in arming the Community5. It has been reported that financial aid from the Centre has been promised, particularly for the Western Districts which are to act as recruiting grounds for the entire Province. Enlistment in the Rawalpindi and Campbellpore Districts has been particularly brisk and efforts have been made to enlist the services of ex-soldiers. The increase in membership is noticeable in all districts however and it is estimated that the number of Muslim League National Guards in the Province now is in the neighbourhood of 39,000."

"The Muslim National Guards recruitment proceeded with very increased speed during all the months after the Direct Action Resolution of the Muslim League was passed. So great and ubiquitous was the organisation of the League Private Army, the Muslim National Guards, that every Muslim mohalla, every small town, sometimes every considerable village, had its own National Guard contingent and its commander, called Salar. One would be surprised to find the organization existing very often in unlikely and out-of-the-way places. The Guard collected arms and petrol-almost everywhere. They received secret instructions from head-quarters, and had a quasi-military, fascist kind of organization, with the rule of implicit obedience to the orders of the leader. (57)"

"The Muslim National Guards did not owe any formal allegiance to the Muslim League, though it had the same flag as the Muslim League had. It is well-known that the National Guards was the secret arm of the Muslim League. Its membership was secret and it had its own centres and headquarters, where its members received military training and such instruction as would make them affective in times of rioting, such as using the lathi, the spear and the knife. The Unit Commander of the Muslim National Guards was known as Salar, over whom were higher officers, but all functioning secretly and with clearly such instructions as would make them formidable in rioting against unarmed non-Muslims populations. When in January, 1947 the Lahore office of the Muslim National Guards was raided by the Punjab police, a good deal of Military equipment including steel helmets ant badges were recovered. The National Guards had their own jeeps and lorries, which helped them in swift mobility for attack on Hindu and Sikh localities, in sniping and stabbing lonely passers-by and in carrying away loot. One of the articles the Muslim National Guards prized and stored was petrol, which would be used not only as fuel in transport, but as an excellent means of incendiarism on a large and devastating scale. This use of it the Muslims of the Punjab, and earlier of Bengal made very thoroughly and effectively, and hundreds of burnt town and villages in the two provinces are tragic evidence of how thorough the preparations of the Muslim League had been for its war on Hindus and Sikhs."

"During the period the Muslim League was preparing, as is now evident from what happened in 1946 and 1947, for a large-scale struggle against Hindu India, and in the Punjab inevitably against the Sikhs and Hindus, the Muslim League had been gathering a private army of its own, to which training was being imparted in fighting, stabbing and assaults. Arms were being collected, and demobilized Muslim personnel of the Indian Army were freely enlisted in the League army. This army, begun about the year 1938, continued to expand and grow better equipped.... Still more important and more dangerous was the Muslim National Guards, which by the bye, is now converted into the Pakistan National Guards."

"The National Guards were provided with army helmets purchased from the Military Disposal Department and many of them were given firearms They wore uniforms and were taught army drill Group physical training was also undertaken by members of the Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh on an increasing scale though there 1s no evidence of the members of this organization possessing any arms at this stage During December 1946 and January 1947 processions of National Guards in military formation began to parade the streets of Lahore, shouting provocative slogans This display of what can only be called a hostile private army compelled the Punjab Government to declare the National Guards and the Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh unlawful bodies on January 24, 1947 The Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh submitted to the order and allowed its premises to be searched and locked up, but the Muslim National Guards took up a refractory attitude and, when the police arrived at their Lahore headquarters, they offered resistance."

"The necessity for recruitment and re-organization of the Muslim League National Guards is occupying the attention of the Provincial Salar. An increase of 5,630 Guards has been reported and accelerated activity has been noticeable in the western and north-western Punjab. In the eastern Punjab, active training has been confined mainly in Simla, Ambala Cantt. and Panipat where Guards have been exercising secretly in Lathi Fighting and in the Central Punjab and in Jullundar District, where Khaksars have undertaken their training. Open activity has been confined to the collection of Relief Funds, and in the Rawalpindi area to warning Muslims to destroy looted property and refrain from giving evidence in connection with the recent disturbances."

"In war the Indians were by far the bravest of all the races inhabiting Asia at that time."

"When we remember their wonderful military success in other parts of the world, the comparatively insignificant results the Arabs achieved in India certainly stand out in marked contrast. The cause of this, however, does not lie in the religious and social peculiarities of India as old historians like Elphinstone vainly attempted to establish. The cause lies undoubtedly in the superior military strength and state-organisation of the Indians as compared with most other nations of the time. However incredible this might appear in the light of subsequent events, this is the plain verdict of history. page 175"

"Again, the problem of determining how far the various religions of India are mutually exclusive and how far they overlap one another - above all, of deciding where Hinduism begins and where it ends - has always been well-nigh insoluble.... it is largely a matter of chance how the religion of these primitive and semi-primitive tribes is recorded in the census schedules, and little value can be attached to the statistics."

"The final segregation of the aborigines in the Census of 1931 from the main body of the Hindus considered along with the recommendations of the Simon Commission which were incorporated in the Government of India Act, 1935 apparently set the stage for the demand of a separate State of Jharkhand on the lines of Pakistan.” ... “This attempt of the Adiwasis, initiated by the Christian section thereof is a feature which is common to the developments in Burma, Assam and Indo-China among the Karens, Nagas and Amboynes. This is attributed to the spirit of religious nationalism awakened among the converted Christians as among the followers of other religions. But the idea of change of religion as bringing about change of nationality appears to have originated in the Missionary circles… Thus while the Census officer isolates certain sections of the people from the main bodies, the Missionaries by converting them give them a separate nationality so that they may demand a separate State for themselves.”"

"The Hinduism of the Central Provinces is largely tinctured by nature and animal worship... there are usually a number of village gods, for the worship of whom a special priest belonging to the primitive tribes called Bhumka or Baiga is supported..."

"Every stratum of Indian society is more or less saturated with Animistic conceptions…."

"The line is hard to draw between Hinduism and tribal religions."

"There is little to distinguish the religious attitude of the Gond or the Bhil from that of a member of one of the lower Hindu castes. Both are essentially animistic…. It is obvious, therefore, that the term Animist does not represent the communal distinction which is the essence of the census aspect of religion. ... the “Vedic religion” [is also equally] “essentially animist”."

"Swami Shraddhananda quotes from the 1911 Census Report (para 172 ff.) to show the reasons why the Muslim populat­ion is growing faster than the Hindu population, whose per­cent­age of the total population is steadily declinin­g. The Census Direc­tor had writ­ten: "The number of Muham­mada­ns has risen during the decade [1901-11] by 6.7 per cent as compared with only 5 p.c. in the case of Hindus. There is a small but continuous accession of converts from Hinduism and other religions, but the main reason for the relatively more rapid growth of the followers of the Prop­het is that they are more prolific.""

"[Converts from among the four tribes - Oraons, Mundas, Kharias and Santhals-] account for nearly nine-tenths of the Indian Christians."

"In the case of all other religions there is one main underlying difficulty, namely the difficulty of saying where Hinduism begins or ends, for all these religions represent either off-shoots from Hinduism or the great outlying mass of tribal religions from which by insensible degrees converts to Hinduism are continually being recruited.... Persons who are certainly Animists join in Hindu festivals, but persons who are equally certainly Hindus and even Muhammadans join in propitiating the local spirits through aboriginal priests...."

"The dividing line between Hinduism and Animism is uncertain"

"[Hinduism was itself] “Animism more or less transformed by philosophy”, “no sharp line of demarcation can be drawn between Hinduism and Animism”."

"The classification 'Animist' has never been satisfactory and it would be much better if it were to disappear altogether. It is never possible to say where the Animist begins and the Hindu ends ...... It would be an advantage if this very indifferent classification ('Animists') was to vanish ... The return is too artificial to be useful...."

"[Besides, wherever Muhammadan rule existed slavery was developed,] “and during the centuries of misrule and oppression, through which Bengal passed, slavery was accepted by the Hindus as a refuge for their troubles. Delhi court obtained not only its slaves [in thousands, as for example under Firoz Tughlaq] but also eunuchs from the villages of Eastern Bengal [a wide-spread practice which the Mughal Emperor Jahangir tried to stop). The incursions of Assa¬ mese Maghs, the famines, pestilences and civil wars...drove them in sheer desperation to sell their children as Musalman slaves”. ... [The Census of India Report of 1901 says that ] “the tyrannical Murshid Kuli Khan enforced a law that any Amal, or Zamindar, failing to pay the revenue that was due...should, with his wife and children, be compelled to become Muhammadans"... “The present Raja of Parsount in Darbhangn is descended from Raja Pud Singh, who rebelled against the Emperor and became a Muhammadan by way of expiation. The family of Asad Khan of Baranthan in Chittagong, has descended from Sjam Rai Chowdliari who was fain to become a Musalman....The Diwan families of Pereana Sarail in Tippers, and of Haibatnacar and Jangaibari in Mymcnsingh, the Rinnans of Majhauti in Darbhangha [all sprang from old Hindu houses.]"

"“It is curious how markedly for evil is the influence which conversion to even the most impure form of Mahomedanism has upon the character of the Panjab villager; how invariably it fills him with false pride and conceit (…) and renders him less well-to-do than his Hindu neighbour (…) When we move through a tract inhibited by Hindus and Musalmans belonging to the same tribe, descended from the same ancestor, and living under the same conditions, we can tell the religion of its owner by the greater idleness, poverty, and pretension, which marked the Musalman, it is difficult to suggest any explanation of the fact.”"

"[There is a] “difficulty of distinguishing a Hindu from an Animist”... “I have, therefore, no hesitation in saying that Animism as a religion should be entirely abandoned, and that all those hitherto classed as Animists should be grouped with Hindus in the next census”."

"It is well known that the primitive tribes of the province furnish the most fruitful field for Christian missionaries... In 1931 these four communities [Oraons, Mundas, Kharias and Santhals] provided as much as 88 per cent of the total number of Indian Christians in Bihar and Orissa, and in 1921 the percentage was almost exactly the same."

"Fluctuations in the figures of earlier censuses show how much the proper classification of tribal religions has depended upon the whim of the enumerator."

"The third inscription, … running in as many as 20 lines, is found engraved on a 5ft. long, 2ft. broad and 2.5 inches thick slab of buff sandstone, apparently a very heavy tablet … Three-fourths of the first line is found obliterated anciently. The last line is also not complete since it was anciently subjected to chipping off. A portion of the central part is found battered, maybe some one tried to deface it anciently. The patination is, however, uniform all over the surface ..."

"According to Ajay Mitra Shastri, ―The inscription is composed in high-flown Sanskrit verse, except for a very small portion in prose, and is engraved in the chaste and classical Nāgarī script of the eleventh-twelfth century A.D. … It was evidently put up on the wall of the temple, the construction of which is recorded in the text inscribed on it."