Dhar

"This centre became Muhammadan first by him [i.e., 'Abdullah Shah Changal], (and) all the banners of religion were spread. (I have heard) that a few persons had arrived before him at this desolate and ruined place. When the muazzin raised the morning cry like the trumpet-call for the intoxicated sufis, the infidels (made an attack from) every wall(?) and each of them rushed with the sword and knife. At last they (the infidels) wounded those men of religion, and after killing them concealed (them) in a well. Now this (burial place and) grave of martyrs remained a trace of those holy and pious people. When the time came that the sun of Reality should shine in this dark and gloomy night, this lion-man ['Abdullah Shah Changal] came from the centre of religion to this old temple with a large force. He broke the images of the false deities, and turned the idol-temple into a mosque. When Rai Bhoj saw this, through wisdom he embraced Islam with the family of all brave warriors. This quarter became illuminated by the light of the Muhammadan law, and the customs of the infidels became obsolete and abolished. Now this tomb since those old days has been the famous pilgrimage-place of a world. Graves from their oldness became leveled (to the ground), (and)there remained no mount on any grave. There was also (no place) for retirement, wherein the distressed darvish could take rest. Thereupon the king of the world gave the order that this top of Tur [Mount Sinai] be builtanew. The king of happy countenance, the Sultan of horizons (i.e., the world), the visitors of whose courts are Khaqan (the emperor of Turkistan) and Faghfur (the emperor of China), 'Alau-d-Din Wad-dunya Abu'l Muzaffar, who is triumphant over his enemies by the grace of God, the Khilji king Mahmud Shah, who is such that by become adorned like paradise, he built afresh this house with its enclosure again became new."

"This centre became Muhammadan first by him (and) all the banners of religion were spread… This lion-man came from the centre of religion to this old temple with a large force. He broke the images of the false deities, and turned the idol temple into a mosque. When Rãi Bhoj saw this, through wisdom he embraced Islãm with the family of his brave warriors. This quarter became illuminated by the light of the Muhammadan law, and the customs of the infidels became obsolete and abolished. Now this tomb since those days has become the famous pilgrimage-place of the world. Graves from their oldness became levelled (to the ground), (and) there remained no mound on any grave. There was [no place] also for the retirement, wherein the distressed dervish could take rest… The Khaljî king MaHmûd Shãh who is such that by his justice the world has become adorned like paradise; he built afresh this old structure, and this house with its enclosure again became new… From the hijra it was 859 (AD 1455) that its (the building’s) date was written anew…"

"An inscription dated 1455, found over the doorway of a tomb-shrine in Dhar, Madhya Pradesh [mentions] the destruction of a Hindu temple by one Abdullah Shah Changal during the reign of Raja Bhoja, a renowned Paramara king who had ruled over the region from 1010 to 1053. ... Goel does, however, consider it more likely that the event took place during the reign of Raja Bhoja II in the late thirteenth century rather than during that of Raja Bhoja I in the eleventh century."

"Although Indo-Muslim epigraphs are typically recorded near in time to the events they describe, the present one is hardly contemporary, as it was composed some four hundred years after the events to which it refers. ... Central to the story are themes of conversion, martyrdom, redemption, and the patronage of sacred sites by Indo-Muslim royalty, as well as, of course, the destruction of a temple. Whether or not any temple was actually destroyed four hundred years before this narrative was committed to writing, we cannot know with certainty."

"…The mosque itself appears from local tradition and from the numerous indications and inscriptions found within it to have been built on the site of, and to a large extent out of materials taken from, a Hindu Temple, known to the inhabitants as Rãjã Bhoja’s school. The inference was derived sometime back from the existence of a Sanskrit alphabet and some Sanskrit grammatical forms inscribed in serpentine diagrams on two of the pillar bases in the large prayer chamber and from certain Sanskrit inscriptions on the black stone slabs imbedded in the floor of the prayer chamber, and on the reverse face of the side walls of the mihrãb."

"The Lãt Masjid built in A.D. 1405, by Dilãwar Khãn, the founder of the Muhammadan kingdom of Mãlvã… is of considerable interest not only on account of the Iron Lãt which lies outside it… but also because it is a good specimen of the use made by the Muhammadan conquerors of the materials of the Hindu temples which they destroyed…"

"Tradition attributed the Dhar Iron Pillar to Bhoja, who was well versed in iron metallurgy as is attested by his Yuktikalpataru . The pillar was double the height of the Delhi Iron Pillar and weighed at least one tonne more. It was the tallest and heaviest (7000 kg) pillar in the world."

"Outside this fort (of Dhar) there is a Jami Masjid and a square pillar lies in front of the Masjid with some portions embedded in the ground. When Bahadur Shah conquered Malwa, he was anxious to take the pillar with him to Gujarat. In the act of digging out, it fell down and was broken into two pieces (one piece 22’ long and the other 13’). I (Jahangir) have seen it lying on the ground carelessly and so ordered the bigger piece to be carried to Agra, which I hope to be used as a lamp-post in the courtyard of my father’s (Akbar’s) tomb"

"...It is the tallest iron pillar so far anywhere in the world."

"The oldest of the Mosques in Malwa is the Kamal Maula Masjid which was built in Dhar in AH 803/AD 1400. Both this Mosque and the slightly later Jami or Lat Masjid are clearly adaptations of ruined Hindu temple material…"