Wednesday, January 15, 2020

Maratha and Rajput and then Sikhs were savior of Hindus in India

Umaid Bhavan Palace is the abode of Rathore rulers of Marwar

 शूर बाहुषु लॊकॊ ऽयं लम्बते पुत्र वत सदा
     तस्मात सर्वास्व अवस्थासु शूरः संमानम अर्हति ||  17
  न हि शौर्यात परं किं चित तरिषु लॊकेषु विद्यते
     शूरः सर्वं पालयति सर्वं शूरे परतिष्ठितम ||  18

Arms of the brave (kshatriya) always support and sustain the people like (a father his) son.
A brave (kshatriya) is, for this reason, honored by all, in all situations.
There is nothing in all the three worlds, which is beyond (the reach of) bravery.
Brave (kshatriya) sustains all, and all depend upon the brave.
(Mahabharata, Shanti Parva, 99. 17-18)
Rajput(Sanskrit: raja-putra: "son of a king") is a hindu kshatriya caste. The Rajputs trace their origins to the ancientKshatriya dynasties of India. It is estimated that currently there are 12 million Rajputs.
 Although Rajput's bravery is known to many and it is filled from Mahabharat era or before that but here we will talk about few brave Rajputs, Jats King that were ruling parts of Rajasthan during Satanic Muslim rule of Aurangzeb.

Maharajah Jaswant Singh 


In the Battle of DharmatpurJaswant Singh opposed Aurangzeb. The battle was fought on 15th April 1658, fifteen miles from Ujjain. Jaswant could have attacked Aurangzeb but he allowed Murad's armies to join Aurangzeb. He was desirous of beating both Mughal princes at once. This delay allowed Aurangzeb to win over the Mughal general, Kasim Khan, who was sent by Shah Jahan to help Jaswant Singh. Kasim Khan defected as soon as the war started but 30,000 rajputs of Jaswant decided that they would not leave the field. Some prominent generals in Maharaja's army were Mukund Singh Hara of Kotah and Bundi, Dayal Das Jhala, Arjun Gaur of Rajgarh in Ajmer province and Ratan Singh Rathore of RatlamJaswant attacked both Aurangzeb and Murad and they barely escaped. According to James Tod in Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan:

Ten thousand Muslims fell in the onset, which cost seventeen hundred Rathores, besides GuhilotesHaras, Gaurs, and some of every clan of Rajwarra. Aurangzeb and Murad only escaped because their days were not yet numbered. Notwithstanding the immense superiority of the imperial princes, aided by numerous artillery served by Frenchmen, night alone put a stop to the contest of science, numbers, and artillery, against Rajput courage.

जब एक हुए राजपूत जाट ओर मराठा -महाराज अजित सिंह का इतिहास /mharaj ajit singh history




Finally, the unequal contest ended and Aurangzeb named the place of victory Fatehabad. Durga Singh Rathore was wounded bad but recovered. Aurangzeb in meantime killed Jaswant Singh's son Prithvi after offering a poisoned shirt. Later Maharaja Jaswant Singh died.

When Jaswant Singh Rathore died he had no son and this gave Aurangzeb a chance to appoint a Muslim as the ruler of Marwar. This upset Rathore Rajputs a lot. Two of Jaswant Singh's queens were pregnant when he died. One queen gave birth to Ajit Singh and other to Dalathamban. After Ajit's birth, Rathore generals, chief among them was Durga Das Rathore (a KarnotRathore) went to Delhi along with the queens and the infants, and asked Aurangzeb that crown of Marwar should be given to Ajit SinghAurangzeb was very cunning and he had no intention of handing over the throne of Marwar. He suggested that Ajit should grow up in his harem but internally he wanted to kill them all.
Durga Das sensed this and they smuggled Ajit Singh out of Delhi to the outskirts of the city. When the Mughal army came to capture them in DelhiDurga Das and his men attacked the Mughals and started riding out of Delhi. Raghunandan Bhati and others soaked the streets of Delhi in crimson by flowing the blood of Mughal pursuers. There were about three hundred Rajputs with Durga Das and there were thousands of pursuing Mughals. Every so often 15 - 20 Rajputs would fall behind attack the Mughal pursuers and in the process get themselves killed but it allowed the forward party to create some distance between Ajit and the Mughals. This continued till the evening by which time the Mughals had given up and Durga Das was left with just seven men out of three hundred he started with and reached Jaipur along with Ajit Singh.

Mehrangarh Fort and Jaswant Thada. Fort construction was completed during Maharajah Jaswant Singh's reign. 




Thereby started the 30 year Rajput rebellion against Aurangzeb. Mewar and Marwar forces combined together and almost killed Aurangzeb when he was trapped in the mountains of Rajasthan but the Mewar king out of magnanimity allowedAurangzeb to escape. All the trade routes were plundered by Rajputs and they started looting various treasuries of Rajasthanand Gujarat. To crush them Aurangzeb sent many expeditions but no success. These expeditions and drying up of revenue from trade routes running through Rajasthan had severe effect on his resources. In addition the lion of MaharashtraShivaji, had freed almost all of Maharashtra and was at constant war with AurangzebShivaji had some Rajput ancestry. Finally, on his death-bed Aurangzeb complained that his life had been a complete failure. He was the sole reason for Mughal empire's crumbling. His war campaigns had practically left the treasury dry for his progeny.


Banda Bhadur
Lakshman Dev was born in Kashmir in 1670 A.D. He was a Minhas Rajput and lived as an ascetic at Nander on the banks of Godavari in Maharashtra. 


Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth guru of Sikhs, met Lakshman at his hermitage and encouraged him to give up his ascetic way of life and resume the duties of a real Rajput. Guruji gave Lakshman a new name: Banda Bhadur and asked him to lead Khalsa, the Sikh army to punish the Governor of Sirhind, Wazir Khan, who was personally responsible for the death of Guruji's family and thousands of Sikhs and Hindus. When Banda was on his way to Punjab, Guru Gobind Singh was assassinated by Pathans on the orders of Wazir Khan. Banda Bhadur was not disheartened by this news rather the fire of vengeance started burning stronger in his heart. He continued his journey and raided the Mughal treasuries at Sonepat and Kaithal and used it to strengthen his army. He then destroyed the Mughal armies at Samana, Kunjpura, Ghuram, Thaska and Mustafabad. At Damla the Pathans were routed. When on his way from Mustafabad to Sadhaura (which literally means the abode of Sadhus, was a buddhist holy centre), he heard of indecencies which Qadam-ud-din, ruler of Kapuri, was prone to inflict on the Hindu population, the ascetic Banda decided to punish the Muslim ruler. Kapuri was destroyed and Qadam-ud-din perished.
At Sadhaura the well garrisoned Mughal fort was stormed and the ruler Osman Khan, who committed atrocities against Hindus was killed. In February 1710 he established the first Sikh Kingdom with its capital at Lohgarh, 20 KM south of Nahan. His kingdom was bounded in the north by Shivalik hills, on the west by river Tangri, on the east by river Jamuna and in the south by a line passing through Samana, Thanesar, Kaithal and Karnal. He abolished the Mughal control of land in his kingdom and made the peasants owner of the land. Guru Gobind Singh's dream of political sovereignty was realized by Banda Bhadur within one year of his death.

Banda's name struck terror in the hearts of Muslims, lawless people and dacoits. Robbery, thefts and persecution of Hindus and Sikhs became a thing of the past. His army kept growing and finally he attacked Wazir Khan, the governor of Sirhind. Wazir Khan's army consisted of 30,000 men and Banda had about 15,000 men. Banda first stormed Banur, near Ambala, as the Muslims of this town used to seize cows and oxen of Hindus and slaughter them in there presence. Battle was fought on May 12, 1710 A.D. at Chappar Chiri, 20 KMs from Sirhind. Wazir Khan and several of his commanders were killed in the battle and his army completely destroyed. Khafi Khan, a chronicler of the time records
 

. . . not a man of the army of Islam escaped with more than his life and the clothes he stood in. Horsemen and footmen fell under the swords of the infidels [Sikhs] who pursued them as far as Sirhind.
Sirhind was stormed and thus Banda avenged the murder of Guru Gobind Singh and his sons by killing Wazir Khan. Soon other towns were won by Banda and his army. Rai Kot, Saharanpur, Jalalabad, Ludhiana, Jullundur, Hoshiarpur, Batala, Kalanaur and Pathankot were won. The Mughal King of Delhi tried his best to suppress Banda Bhadur but "There was no nobleman daring enough to march from Delhi against them", comments the Mughal source.

Banda Bhadur attracted a lot of people from the plains of Haryana and Punjab to the fold of Sikhism as he gave them an opportunity to fight against the tyranny and unjust oppression of the Muslim rulers.

it was the strength of Rajput sword and later Maratha and Sikh swords that kept Hinduism alive in India. If there were noRajputsMarathas or Sikhs in India, then India would be just like IraqIranTurkey, or Pakistan in terms of religion of the population. Every month, in the 1000 year presence of Muslims in India there were bloody wars between Hindus and Muslims. This is quite unlike other countries like Iran, where non-Muslims, after loosing a couple of wars gave the Muslims a free hand in converting there population to Islam.
Presence of Rajput generals in Mughal army was a blessing in disguise for the Hindu population as the Mughal army when headed by a rajput general could not engage in wanton destruction of Hindu temples as well as mass conversion of Hindus to Islam. The preservance of Hinduism in India by the Rajput sword against the entire might of Islamic rulers is the most glorious achievement by a race in the annals of world history and every one should know this fact, more so Indians and most definitely each and every Rajput.
In his Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan James Tod wrote:

What nation on earth could have maintained the semblance of civilization, the spirit or the customs of their forefathers, during so many centuries of overwhelming depression, but one of such singular character as the Rajpoot? . . . Rajasthan exhibits the sole example in the history of mankind, of a people withstanding every outrage barbarity could inflict, or human nature sustain, from a foe whose religion (Islam) commands annihilation; and bent to the earth, yet rising buoyant from the pressure, and making calamity a whetstone to courage. . . . Not an iota of their religion or customs have they lost. . . .
Contrast this to how Muslims converted entire Iranian kingdom, where a very ancient religion of Zoroaster flourished, on the edge of the sword in a very short amount of time and Spain which was conquered and ruled by Islam for 700 years was majority Muslim state till Spanish Christian Kings began driving out the moors and reconverted Muslims back to Christianity. In India, Hindu religion has no concept of conversion. One has to be a born Hindu. (Though of late as a reaction to conversion of tribals by missionaries some Hindu groups have concocted a recipe to make a person Hindu!)
This section is from Page 3 of: The Parsees, Their History, Manners, Customs & Religion. Dosabhoy Framjee. Pub: London: Smith, Elder and Co., 65, Cornhill: 1858.

Suffice it to say, that with Yezdezird, the forty-fifth king in the descent of the race of Kaimurs, ended the ancient Persian monarchy. The neighbouring and wealthy empire of Persia presented too tempting a prize to the fanatic and ambitious spirit, evoked by Mahomed, to remain long unmolested, and in the middle of the seventh century of the Christian era, the Arab sword invaded Persia, under Caliph Omar. In a fierce and well-contested battle with the Persians at the village of Nahavand, about fifty miles from the ancient city of Ecbatana, the fate of the empire was decided.....Yezdezird, abandoning his kingdom as lost, fled the country; and after wandering in solitude and disguise for a period of ten years, was at last treacherously slain by a miller to whom the secret of his identity had been confided (651 AD). ....

Thus on the conquest of Persia, the Mahomedan soldiers of the Caliphat of Baghdad traversed the length and breadth of the country, presenting the alternative of death or the Koran, and compelling the conquered nation to accept the one or the other. By these oppressive and cruel means, a hundred thousand persons are said to have daily abjured the faith of there forefathers; and the fire-temples and other sacred places were destroyed or converted into mosques.
To escape the sword of Islam some Zoroastrians landed on the coast of Gujarat in 716 A.D. Rajput king of Gujarat gave them land to settle and put no religious restriction on the Zoroastrians. The magnanimity of the Hindu King allowed the Zoroastrian religion to flourish. In modern era some of the top industrialists of India e.g. J.R.D. TataArdeshir Godrej, symphony conductorZubin Mehta, etc. belong to the the Parsi (Zoroastrian) community.




DEFINITION

Rajputs (Rajaputra) are a sub-group of hindu Kshatriya varna. They have a hindu Jati (an endogamous group within the Hindusocial system). Rajputs are literally sons-of-kings. They are divided into 36 major clans, names of which are recorded in several texts including the Kumarpala Charita of Jayasimha, and Prithviraj Raso of Chandbardai.
The Rig Veda is the first and most important of the four Vedas and rajput rishis (rajrishi) are mentioned in it. To each of its hymns the name of the seer or Rishi to whom it was revealed is prefixed. It thus becomes evident on the authority of these very names (such as VasishtaViswamitra, Agastya, etc.), all of which belong to men born in various manvantaras, that centuries, and perhaps millenniums, must have elapsed between the dates of their composition. The Gayatri, the most sacred hymn of the Rig Veda, is taken from the third of the ten cycles of hymns, the cycle of the Rajaputra Sage Viswamitra.
     राजपुत्रौ कुशलिनौ भरातरौ रामलक्ष्मणौ
     सर्वशाखा मृगेन्द्रेण सुग्रीवेणाभिपालितौ


The two brothers, rajaputra Rama and Lakshmana, fare well protected by Sugriva, the lord of all monkeys.
(Mahabharata, Ramopakhayana, 3.266.61)
Bhagwan Ram and Lakshmana are referred to as Rajaputra in MahabharataBhagwan Buddha was also referred to as Rajaputra in Buddhist texts. Dr. Rhys Davids in his "Buddhism, Its History and Literature: Page 27" says about Lord Buddha: 
The family name was certainly Gautama.......It is a curious fact that Gautama is still the family name of the Rajput chiefs of Nagara, the village which has been identified with Kapilavastu.
स राजपुत्रो ववृधे आशु शुक्ल इवोडुपः

आपूर्यमाणः पितृभिः काष्ठाभिरिव सोऽन्वहम्

As the moon, in its waxing fortnight, develops day after day, so the rajaputra [Parikshit] very soon developed luxuriantly under the care and full facilities of his guardian grandfathers.
(Srimad Bhagavatam, 1.12.311)
Abhimanyu's son Parikshit is called Rajaputra in Bhagvat Purana. Rajaputras have also been referred to in Kautilya's (350-283 B.C) Arthashashtra, Kalidasa's (1st century B.C) MalvikagnimitraAsvaghosha's (80-150 A.D.) SaundaranandaBanbhatta's (7th century A.D.) Harshacharita and Kadambari and Kalhana's (12th century A.D.) Rajatarangini.
Damodarpur copper-plate inscription of Kumaragupta III (533 A.D) records that the Governor of Bhukti of Pundravardhana,Rajaputra-Dev-Bhattaraka, was a son of the emperor, bearing the title Uparika Maharaja and 'rendering his homage to the king'. Rajputra are also mentioned in Sumandala Copper Plate inscription of Prithvigraha, Gupta era (570 A.D). There are Rajputra references in many Licchavi inscriptions (Recorded in D.R. Regimi's, Inscriptions of Ancient Nepal, Abhinav Publications, ISBN 0391025597). Rajputra Vajraratha, Babharuvarma, and Deshavarma are mentioned in the inscriptions of Sikubahi (Shankhamul) which describe the reigns of Licchavi kings Gangadeva (567-573 A.D) and Amshuvarma (605-621 A.D) respectively. The inscriptions of Sanga mentions the name of Rajputra Vikramasena, Gnoli inscription mentions Rajaputra Jayadeva, inscription of Deopatan mentions Rajputra Shurasena, and the inscriptions of Adeshwar mentions the RajaputrasNandavarma, Jishnuvarma and Bhimavarma.

In 606 A.D. King Harshavardhana of Kannauj was crowned as Rajaputra Siladitya. Following excerpt from Page 146, ofAdvanced History of India written by R.C. Majumdar, H.C. Raychaudhuri, and Kaukinkar Datta, ISBN 0333 90298 X:
It is however, certain that Harsha found himself at the head of the kingdom of his brother as well as that of his brother-in-law. But he contended himself at first with the modest title of Rajaputra Siladitya.
Apshad inscription of Adityasena (8th century A.D) mentions Madhavagupta who is identical with Madhavgupta, the Malawa Rajaputra of Bana's Harshacharita. Nadol Plates of 1161 A.D. mention Rajaputra Kirtipal, the progenitor of Songara (Svarnagiri)Chauhan dynasty of JaloreDelhi Shivalik Pillar inscription, dating to A.D. 1163 of Chauhan King Virgharaj IV (Bisaldev) refers to his Mahamantri (Chief Minister) as Rajaputra Sallakshanpal.







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