Firuz Shah Tughlaq

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Firuz Shah Tughlaq
Firuz Shah Tughlaq ibn Malik Rajjab
Hanafi
)

Sultan Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1309 – 20 September 1388) was a

Muhammad bin Tughlaq following the latter's death at Thatta in Sindh, where Muhammad bin Tughlaq had gone in pursuit of Taghi the rebellious Muslim governor of Gujarat. For the first time in the history of the Sultanate, a situation was confronted wherein nobody was ready to accept the reins of power. With much difficulty, the camp followers convinced Firoz to accept the responsibility. In fact, Khwaja Jahan, the Wazir of Muhammad bin Tughlaq had placed a small boy on the throne claiming him to be the son of Muhammad bin Tughlaq,[4] who meekly surrendered afterwards. Due to widespread unrest, his realm was much smaller than Muhammad's. Tughlaq was forced by rebellions to concede virtual independence to Bengal and other provinces. He established Sharia across his realm.[5]

Background

His father's name was Rajab (the younger brother of

Sipahsalar. His mother Naila, a Hindu woman, was a Bhati Rajput from Dipalpur, which is now in the Punjab region of Pakistan.[3][6]

Rule

We know of Firoz Shah Tughlaq in part through his 32-page autobiography, titled Futuhat-e-firozshahi.

Firozabad, Fatehabad.[9] Most of Firozabad was destroyed as subsequent rulers dismantled its buildings and reused the spolia as building materials,[10]
and the rest was subsumed as New Delhi grew.

Religious and administrative policies

Tughlaq was a fervent

Ulema
happy so that they would allow him to rule his kingdom peacefully.

"The southern states had drifted away from the Sultanate and there were rebellions in Gujarat and Sindh", while "Bengal asserted its independence." He led expeditions to against Bengal in 1353 and 1358. He captured

Orissa to pay tribute. He converted Chauhan Rajputs from Hinduism to Islam in the 14th century[citation needed]. They are now known as Qaimkhanis in Rajasthan
.

He laid siege to

Feroz Shah Tughlaq to Raja Kailash Pal of Mau-Paithan from Nagarkot region. Firuz Shah Tughlaq married off his daughter with Raja Kailash Pal, embraced him to Islam[citation needed] and sent the couple to rule Greater Khorasan, where eleven sons known by the caste of 'badpagey' were born to the queen.[12]

Palace of Feroz Shah Kotla, topped by the Ashokan Delhi-Topra pillar (left) and Jamia Masjid (right).

Rather than awarding position based on merit, Tughlaq allowed a noble's son to succeed to his father's position and jagir after his death.[13] The same was done in the army, where an old soldier could send his son, son-in-law or even his slave in his place. He increased the salary of the nobles. He stopped all kinds of harsh punishments such as cutting off hands. He also lowered the land taxes that Muhammad had raised. Tughlaq's reign has been described as the greatest age of corruption in medieval India: He once gave a golden tanka to a distraught soldier so that he could bribe the clerk to pass his sub-standard horse.[14]

Infrastructure and education

Tughlaq instituted economic policies to increase the material welfare of his people. Many rest houses (sarai), gardens and tombs(

Warangal fort, who was captured and converted to Islam.[16] When Tughlaq was away on a campaign to Sind and Gujarat for six months and no news was available about his whereabouts Maqbul ably protected Delhi.[17] He was the most highly favoured among the significant number of the nobles in Tughlaq's court and retained the trust of the sultan.[18] Sultan Firuz Shah Tughlaq used to call Maqbul as 'brother'. The sultan remarked that Khan-i-Jahan (Malik Maqbul) was the real ruler of Delhi.[19]

Hindu religious works were translated from

Ashokan Pillars from Meerut, and Topra near Radaur in Yamunanagar district of Haryana, carefully cut and wrapped in silk, to Delhi in bullock cart trains. He re-erected one of them on the roof of his palace at Firoz Shah Kotla.[20]

Firoz Shah Kotla
, Delhi, 1795.

Transfer of capital was the highlight of his reign. When the Qutb Minar was struck by lightning in 1368 AD, knocking off its top storey, he replaced them with the existing two floors, faced with red sandstone and white marble. One of his hunting lodges, Shikargah, also known as Kushak Mahal, is situated within the Teen Murti Bhavan complex, Delhi. The nearby Kushak Road is named after it, as is the Tughlaq Road further on.[21][22]

Legacy

His eldest son, Fateh Khan, died in 1376. He then abdicated in August 1387 and made his other son, Prince Muhammad, king. A slave rebellion forced him to confer the royal title to his grandson, Tughluq Khan.[9]

Tughlaq's death led to a war of succession coupled with nobles rebelling to set up independent states. His lenient attitude had strengthened the nobles, thus weakening his position. His successor

Ghiyas-ud-Din Tughlaq II could not control the slaves or the nobles. The army had become weak and the empire had shrunk in size. Ten years after his death, Timur's invasion devastated Delhi. His tomb is located in Hauz Khas (New Delhi), close to the tank built by Alauddin Khalji. Attached to the tomb is a madrasa
built by Firoz Shah in 1352–53.

Coin gallery

  • Gold tanka of Firuz Shah
    Gold tanka of Firuz Shah
  • Jital of 40 Rati
    Jital of 40 Rati
  • Billon Tanka of Hazrat Dehli Dated AH 771
    Billon Tanka of Hazrat Dehli Dated AH 771
  • Coin of 32 Rati
    Coin of 32 Rati
  • Jital of 40 Rati
    Jital of 40 Rati
  • Jital of 40 Rati
    Jital of 40 Rati
  • Jital of Firoz Shah
    Jital of Firoz Shah

References

  1. ISBN 978-0-521-54329-3
    .
  2. ^ Tughlaq Shahi Kings of Delhi: Chart The Imperial Gazetteer of India, 1909, v. 2, p. 369..
  3. ^
    ISBN 978-8-12500-333-5
    .
  4. ^ Banerjee, Anil Chandra (1983). A New History Of Medieval India. Delhi: S Chand & Company. pp. 61–62.
  5. ISBN 9780521543293
    .
  6. ISBN 978-0-8108-5503-8
    . He was the son of Ghiyas al Din Tughlaq's younger brother Sipah-salar Rajab by a Rajput wife. Firuz was proclaimed sultan by the nobles present in the army at the time of Muhammad bin Tughlaq's death (1351) in Sind during a military campaign
  7. OCLC 45078860
    .
  8. OCLC 10349790
    .
  9. ^
    ISBN 978-9-38060-734-4
    .
  10. ^ "West Gate of Firoz Shah Kotla". British Library. Archived from the original on 27 October 2022. Retrieved 3 June 2010.
  11. ISBN 978-81-269-0123-4
    .
  12. ^ Pathania, Raghunath Singh (1904). Twarikye Rajghrane Pathania. English version, 2004 Language & Culture Department Himachal Pradesh Govt.
  13. ISBN 978-0-521-40477-8
    .
  14. ISBN 978-81-269-0123-4
    .
  15. ^ Tibb Firoz Shahi (1990) by Hakim Syed Zillur Rahman, Department of History of Medicine and Science, Jamia Hamdard, New Delhi, 79pp
  16. OCLC 5220076
    .
  17. ISBN 0-415-15482-0
    .
  18. ISBN 978-0-521-40477-8
    .
  19. ISBN 978-81-241-1064-5
    .
  20. ^
    ISBN 81-7450-359-5
    .
  21. ^ "Indian cavalry's victorious trysts with India's history". Asian Age. 6 December 2011. Archived from the original on 19 January 2012.
  22. ^ "King's resort in the wild". Hindustan Times. 4 August 2012. Archived from the original on 17 June 2013.

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to Firuz Shah Tughlaq.
Preceded by
Muhammad bin Tughlaq
 Sultan of Delhi
1351–1388 		Succeeded by
Ghiyas-ud-Din Tughlaq II
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