THOUSAND YEARS OF LAHORE 1014-2013 – THREE YEARS UNDER HINDU RULE

THOUSAND YEARS OF LAHORE 1014-2013
THREE YEARS UNDER HINDU RULE

An all revealing statistics

court of mahmud of gazni
court of mahmud of gazni

The amazing history of Lahore is actually never analyzed. People talk of things here and there but never look at the big picture. Media hype is that it was a Hindu city, but to this day the Hindu city has not been traced. Some place it on Icchra, others like Anjum Rahmani reject the conjecture. In any case there are no Hindu ruins in later, more than a couple of hundred years old. At most we may have temples made around 1780s. Certainly there were Hindus in the city, but always as a minority. We hear of the Hindu Slave boys brought by Ghaznavids to the city, as told to us by historian Baihaqi and poet Sulaiman bin Masood. And a lot of Hindu nobility patronized by the Mughals. It is worth while looking at a 1000 years of Lahore and the Hindu rule in this long period.

The first hint of a Hindu in possession of Lahore is when the central government in Delhi as well as Multan had broken down due to assaults by conquerors. In that period, we hear of a Hindu Shaikha Ghakkhar ruling Lahore in 1394. He was then driven out, and fled to Kashmeer. In 1398 he took possession of Lahore again, and Amir Timur had him put him in chains and he was taken to Samarkhand for an unsavoury death. His brother Jasrat Ghakkhar took control, and Sayyid Mubarak himself came from Delhi, and routed him out. So in total Hindu rule in that period of total calamity, less then two years. One year or less in 1394, and the same period in 1398. And mind this there were not in total control of the territory or governing properly in any way.

Then we jump ahead to 1759. There was infighting going on between the army of Timur Shah Durrani and the local ruler. The Qazilbaschs of Timur Shah ‘s army captured the ruler, and asked help from Jankuji, leader of the Mahrattas, by offering all sorts of bribes to him. Jankuji sent SAMA the Mahratta, who also ruled Lahore for less than a year in 1759, but could not govern it, and was routed out of existence.

So here is the history of Lahore for a thousand years:

1. MUSLIM RULE IN LAHORE various eras 1014-1768
2. SIKH RULE IN LAHORE without Central Government 1768-1798
3. SIKH RULE IN LAHORE with Ranjit Singh 1799-1839
4. SIKH RULE IN LAHORE assorted rulers 1839-1849
5. BRITISH RULE IN LAHORE with various rulers 1949-1947
6. MUSLIM RULE IN LAHORE with Pakistan 1947-2013 onwards

Besides 98 years of official British rule from 1849 to 1947. Forty years of Ranjit Singh from 1799 to 1839. 10 years assorted Sikh chieftains. And 30 years of lawlessness under various Sikh chieftains. Total Hindu rule over Lahore in 1000 years, less than 3 years. And that is a fact.

This present city was founded as Mahmudpur, by Sultan Mahmud of Ghazna. The Hindu city of Lahore undiscovered to this day with only conjectures of its existence. We have more on that later on. But the greatest trial of Lahore was when all the Hindu chieftains got together to take Lahore under the Ghaznavids, and were defeated in the heroic battle for Lahore. More on that later.

One thought on “THOUSAND YEARS OF LAHORE 1014-2013 – THREE YEARS UNDER HINDU RULE”

Leave a Reply to Arif Rahman Chughtai Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.