Indian History Part 66 The Adil Shahis of Bijapur Section II Entrenching the Dynasty

Canberra, 18 May 2018

 

When Yusuf Shah died, his son Ismail Shah was only 13 or 14 years old (some reports state his age as 9 years). On his deathbed, Yusuf appointed a trusted noble, Kamal Khan to be the guardian of the young prince and also the regent till Ismail achieved majority. He also made the other nobles promise to adhere by his decision and to obey Kamal Khan in all matters of state. For the first few years after assuming the regency, Kamal Khan governed well and wisely, and was popular with both the nobles and the common people. He ensured that Bijapur remained friendly and on amicable terms with all its neighbours. He also concluded a treaty with the Portuguese, confirming their possession of Goa, and made sure that both parties adhered to the terms of the treaty.

As the young Sultan was close to reaching majority, Kamal Khan succumbed to the obtrusive intoxication of power and started to entertain ambitions of usurping the throne for himself. As an example to follow he had the action of Qasim Barid who had been the minister for the last few Bahmani kings and then had usurped power. Qasim had thereafter founded a dynasty ruling from Bidar, even though the territory that they controlled was not large. Kamal Khan now initiated decisive action to fulfil his ambitions. He formed an alliance with Amir Barid, son and successor of Qasim, and then incarcerated the young Sultan and his mother Boobaji Khanun in the Bijapur fort. Kamal Khan then went on to lay siege to Sholapur, which was reduced after three months. He then returned to Bijapur in triumph to claim the throne. However, on the advice of few astrologers, he postponed the actual date of the coronation.

Ismail Adil Shah

While the usurper, Kamal Khan, was dithering about the date for his assumption of the throne, the Queen-mother decided to take action and strike back. She colluded with a female slave and Yusuf Turk, a nobleman who had continued to be loyal to Yusuf Shah and was also the foster father of the young Sultan, and had Kamal Khan murdered. For a few weeks confusion prevailed and Kamal Khan’s son, Sufder Khan, made an attempt to capture the palace. He was repulsed by a small group of palace guards who had remained loyal and faithful to Boobaji Khanun. The young Sultan took an active part in the defence and is reported to have been instrumental in killing Sufder Khan, the leader of the revolt. Ismail Shah, now around 17 years old, once again became the Sultan of Bijapur, now in his w right.

During this short period of confusion, Amir Barid had laid siege to Gulbarga. On hearing of the murder of Kamal Khan and the defeat and death of his son in the uprising, Amir discontinued the siege and returned to Bidar. At the same time, the Vijayanagar king, Krishna Deva Raya had attacked Raichur and successfully annexed the fort. Capturing Raichur was only a prelude to a long and successful career for Krishna Deva Raya, who went on to be a victorious and illustrious king of his dynasty.

Military Exploits

Even though he had managed to put down the nascent uprising and assumed the throne, Ismail Shah’s military troubles and adventures continued unabated. Amir Barid who had withdrawn from the siege of Gulbarga was still smarting under the ‘loss of face’ that he had suffered because of his unilateral about-face. Ever the conspirator, he made friends with the kings of Berar, Golconda and Ahmadnagar. These kings were also envious of the large territorial holding and the enhanced prestige that it brought to the Adil Shahis of Bijapur. They agreed to wage a combined war against Bijapur to capture its territory and reduce its stature. Accordingly the four other Muslim kingdoms of the Deccan assembled a large army and marched against Bijapur.

Ismail Adil Shah, although young and fairly inexperienced, marched out of his capital at the head of a force of 12,000 cavalry to meet the advancing forces. He pinpointed Amir Barid’s forces and carried out a vigorous attack on them. The Bidar forces fled the field under this unrelenting attack. Although the Barid’s were ruling Bidar and the surrounding countryside, they had continued to maintain the Bahmani Sultan as the nominal head of the kingdom. When the Bidar forces fled the field, they had abandoned their nominal Sultan, Muhammad, who along with his son Ahmad was captured by the Bijapur forces.

Ismail Shah treated the Sultan and his son with great courtesy and also got his own daughter married to Ahmad. [The fact that Ismail at this time was only in his late teens makes this claim of his daughter being married off to the Bahmani prince suspicious and is a bit of a non-starter. There is no further mention of this marriage alliance and could be discarded as fanciful reportage of court chroniclers.] In any case Muhammad, his son and entourage were send back to Bidar with a 5000-horse cavalry escort, as befitting the status of a ruler. On this escorted return of the Bahmani heir, Amir Barid took fright regarding the intention of Ismail Shah and escaped from Bidar. Muhammad became, temporarily, the actual Sultan of Bidar. Having escorted the Sultan to his home, the Bijapur forces departed for their own kingdom. Immediately, Amir Barid returned and Muhammad reverted to his old, and accustomed, puppet role in an abject state of subjugation. Few years of peace prevailed in Bijapur. During this interlude, Ismail received an embassy from the Persian monarch, an explicit acceptance by the Persian king of the independent status of the Adil Shahi dynasty.

Around 1520, Ismail made an unsuccessful attempt to recapture Raichur and Mudgal. The expedition failed because of a tactical blunder committed by Ismail Shah himself. He attempted to cross a flooded River Krishna, the decision for this action being taken while Ismail was under the influence of liquor, after excessive consumption of wine. During the crossing the Sultan himself was almost killed, very narrowly escaping drowning. Ismail then went on to wage war against the other kingdoms—individually and even when they formed coalitions against Bijapur. Amir Barid was staunchly anti-Bijapur and always joined one or the other kingdoms fighting against Bijapur and also against each other. However, even though Barid was almost always the instigator, he did not assume the lead in any of the battles, being content to be in the periphery of the conflict. He thrived on intrigue against everyone else, continually keeping the cauldron of the Deccan bubbling. Even with alliances arrayed against him, Ismail Shah was moderately successful in his military expeditions.

Ismail Shah continued with his father’s policy of creating matrimonial alliances with the other kingdoms. Accordingly he gave two of his sisters in marriage to the sultans of Berar and Ahmadnagar. Honouring these very loosely formed alliances, Ismail Shah send a large contingent of troops and money to assist the Nizam Shahi ruler of Ahmadnagar when that kingdom was attacked by the Sultan of Gujarat, around 1529. The invasion was repelled without much damage being inflicted on Ahmadnagar. Amir Barid had also joined the alliance against Gujarat. On the withdrawal of the Gujarat forces, he attempted to corrupt the Bijapur forces against their Sultan before they started their return home. By now Ismail Shah’s patience was running out with the continuous needling of Amir Barid and he decided to put an end to the intrigues once and for all. With direct assistance from the Imad Shahi ruler of Berar, Ismail Shah attacked and laid siege to Bidar. Amir Barid fled to Golconda and brought reinforcements from there to assist him. In the ensuing battle Ismail Shah defeated the combined Bidar-Golconda army, and captured Amir Barid.

Amir Barid was subsequently ransomed by his sons, who were permitted to leave Bidar with their father and the extended Barid families. Surprisingly, there is no information regarding the fate of the real Sultan—the scion of the Bahmani dynasty. It is presumed that the Barids took him and his family along with them when they were exiled by Ismail Shah. The Adil Shahi dynasty now controlled Bidar and its territories. Ismail went on to distribute a great amount of wealth to the Berar Sultan who had helped him and also to the prominent nobles in his court. An intervention by Imad Shah ruling Berar made Ismail pardon Amir Barid for his activities against Bijapur. Ismail Shah then went on to invade the Raichur Doab, compelling Amir Barid to assist him in the campaign and fight alongside Bijapur forces. The Bijapur army captured Raichur after a three-month siege. After being under Vijayanagar rule for 17 years, Raichur now formed part of the Adil Shahi territories.

After the successful campaign to retrieve Raichur, Ismail Shah reinstated Amir Barid as ruler of Bidar after Amir swore an oath of loyalty to Ismail Shah. The oath did not have any effect on the fundamental nature of Amir Barid, who continued to intrigue against all and anyone who he perceived to be inimical to his personal interests.

A state of internecine conflicts continued unabated in the Deccan, with the kingdoms fighting each other; creating alliances, fighting battles, and then breaking up old alliances to create newer ones—in an ever-changing kaleidoscope of intrigue and wars fought to a stand-still with no clear victors and peace brokered at the end of indecisive battles.

Ismail Shah’s last campaign was against the Qutb Shahis of Golconda. From the time that the Telengana forces had aided Amir Barid, Ismail had harboured a distaste for their actions. Mounting a military expedition to punish them was therefore almost inevitable from his point of view. However, before the expedition could be put in motion, Ismail Shah took ill and died in 1534. The siege of Golconda that had started was immediately lifted by the commander-in-chief of the Bijapur army, Assud Khan. The General returned to Bijapur with the Sultan’s body along with the two young princes, Mallu and Ibrahim, who had accompanied their father for the campaign.

Ismail Adil Shah – A Synopsis

Ismail Adil Shah has been described as having been ‘prudent, patient and generous’. It is said that he was always ready to forgive the transgressions of his nobles and the people, so much so that even while this character trait was considered a virtue, people took advantage of the Sultan’s forgiving nature to get out of tricky situations. Ismail was artistic by nature, being a poet and musician in his own right. He was also a skilled saddler. Ismail Khan was extremely polished in his manners, much more so than the Deccani nobles, since he was trained in Turkish and Persian etiquettes, customs and habits.

After establishing his rule over Bijapur, Ismail Shah was acknowledged as the principal Muslim king of the Deccan, a position reinforced by the arrival of the Persian embassy towards the mid-term of his rule. It is also obvious that the other kings of the region accepted the pre-eminent position of the Adil Shahis, even if it was with reservations that were never openly expressed. However, Ismail Shah could not make any headway against the powerful Hindu kingdom of Vijayanagar throughout his 25-year rule. This ‘failure’ must have rankled in the mind of the Sultan during his reign.

The Short Interlude of Mallu Shah

Assud Khan was Ismail Shah’s trusted and able minister as well as a brave and strong commander of the Bijapur forces. After completing the rituals of burial of the late Sultan, he crowned the eldest prince of the dynasty, Mallu, as the Sultan. Mallu Adil Shah was a licentious young man and an incompetent administrator. Many nobles had expressed their opposition to making him the Sultan. In fact, Assud Khan himself had misgivings regarding Mallu’s suitability to be an effective Sultan. However, the loyal General was honour-bound to carry out the last command of his master and therefore dutifully placed Mallu on the throne. Since Mallu was technically still a minor, Assud Khan the devoted and loyal minister, was now the most powerful man in the Bijapur kingdom. At this critical juncture and throughout the rest of his life, Assud Khan proved himself to be a statesman of great integrity and unquestionable loyalty to the Adil Shahi dynasty; rare qualities in those times.

After assuming the throne, Mallu gave himself up to reckless debauchery. Further, he also started to display his inherent vicious nature that had so far been kept carefully hidden. Disgusted by the young Sultan’s behaviour Assud Khan gave up his official positions and retired to his private estates in Belgaum. Mallu continued his immoral and profligate ways and in a short span of about six months had managed to antagonise all the nobles, even the ones that had initially supported his claim to the throne. The kingdom was charging headlong into a crisis. According to a story, the crisis was precipitated by Mallu asking a high ranking and respected noble, Yusuf Khan, to send his young son to the court for Mallu to sodomise him. Obviously Yusuf Khan refused and moved away to his personal estates. Mallu Shah send a contingent of soldiers in pursuit tasked with capturing and beheading Yusuf Khan. However, Yusuf’s personal bodyguards were able to easily beat back the royal forces who fled back to the capital.

At this low point in the affairs of the kingdom, Mallu Shah’s Grandmother Booboojee Khanun, now the grand old matriarch of the Adil Shahis, decided that the decline of the dynasty must be stopped and took action. She asked the venerated noble Yusuf Khan for assistance in deposing the king. Yusuf, ever loyal to the Adil Shahi dynasty, first asked Assud’s permission to take action and obtained the cooperation of the erstwhile minister to do so. Yusuf Khan then gathered a large force and entered the capital, encountering no opposition. Mallu Shah, along with his youngest brother and companion was seized, blinded and imprisoned. Mallu’s younger brother Ibrahim was proclaimed king as Ibrahim Adil Shah.

Ibrahim Adil Shah

The first official decree that Ibrahim proclaimed was to change the religion of the kingdom back to Sunni Islam. Ever since his father Ismail had changed it to the Shia creed and later recanted for political reasons, the kingdom had informally favoured the Shia. This practice was officially ended by this proclamation. The second act of the new king was to dismiss all foreigners from royal service. Turks, Persians, Mongols and a miscellany of other nationalities in royal service were relieved of their duties and asked to fend for themselves elsewhere. However, Ibrahim kept a 400-strong special force of foreigners as his personal bodyguard. The dismissed foreigners were replaced by Deccanis and Abyssinians. [It is interesting to note that throughout the medieval history of the Deccan, Abyssinians were never considered ‘foreigners’ and always sided with the Deccanis in the power struggle against the foreigners that bubbled along below the placid surface of the Adil Shahi court. It is also clarified here that the term ‘Deccani’ was used exclusively to indicate the descendants of the first Muslims and some converts to have settled in the Deccan following Ala ud-Din Khilji’s initial foray south of the Vidhya Mountains. The term did not include the Hindus and their nobles who were the majority in the region.]

The large-scale summary dismissal of the foreigners from royal service was detrimental to the kingdom in two distinct ways. First, the foreigners had so far formed the hard core of the Bijapur army, which was almost immediately gutted on their precipitous departure. Second, the Vijayanagar king was quick to take advantage of the sudden availability of a large number of well-trained and hardy soldiers. He immediately employed them, providing them money and even building a mosque in the capital for their worship. . Vijayanagar went on to create a 3000-strong Muslim force, which proved invaluable in later years.

The Vijayanagar Episode

When Ibrahim assumed the throne, Vijayanagar was embroiled in a succession struggle. (This part of Vijayanagar history will be covered in detail in the narrative that covers the history of that kingdom.) The ruling king Rama Raja was on an expedition to the south in order to bring in line the refractory kings of Malabar and Madurai. He had left the capital in the charge of a ‘trusted’ noble—Hoji Perumal Rao. Some discontented nobles had been planning a rebellion and took the absence of the king from the capital as an opportunity to put their plan into action.

The rebel nobles, who were in majority by now, induced Perumal to support them in placing a child king on the throne and to becoming the regent. Within a few months, Perumal had the child king strangled and assumed the throne. Rama Raja was out of power for some time and having collected a strong enough force, started his return to the capital to reclaim his throne.

Perumal realised that he did not have the military strength to withstand the assault being planned by Rama Raja. He invited Ibrahim Adil Shah, his northern neighbour, to assist in the approaching battle, offering him a large subsidy. The subsidy that was promised is reported to have been the equivalent of 40,000 pound sterling at that time’s value. Ibrahim agreed and reached Vijayanagar with a large force and was received with great pomp and ceremony.

The arrival of the Adil Shahi king and the assumption by Ibrahim of a controlling role in the matters of state in Vijayanagar thereafter was disliked by the nobles in court. Further, an alliance with a Muslim king was something that the staunchly Hindu nobles and minor kings, who supported Perumal, was unwilling to countenance. They asked that Ibrahim be send back, a condition they insisted on being fulfilled in return for their continued support for Perumal to remain king. Accordingly, Perumal gave a huge sum of money to Ibrahim and requested him to return to Bijapur. Ibrahim acquiesced and returned to his kingdom a great deal richer than when he had set out—without having done anything to earn the wealth.

Rama Raja returned and reclaimed his throne with ease. Hoji Perumal Rao, the short-term king, committed suicide.

Changing Fortunes

After returning from Vijayanagar a much wealthier person than when he set out, Ibrahim send an army under Assud Khan to capture the fort at Adoni. The attack was repelled by the Vijayanagar forces under Rama Raja’s brother Venkatadri. A peace acceptable to both sides was arrived at after Assud Khan managed to capture the family on Venkatadri in a surprise raid on the Vijayanagar camp.

Even since Ibrahim came to power, Assud Khan’s power in court had been steadily increasing. He was the most important noble in court. This led to other nobles concocting jealous intrigues against him and making assiduous attempts at poisoning the Sultan’s mind. They obviously succeeded, because Ibrahim ordered Assud Khan to come to Bijapur with the undeclared intention of executing him summarily for perceived treason. Assud became aware of the plot and instead of returning to Bijapur, once again retired to his estate in Belgaum.

Such internal strife led to a slow bleeding of power in Bijapur. Three other Deccan kingdoms—Bidar, Ahmadnagar and Golconda—took advantage of the situation and joined together to invade Bijapur territory. They invested Sholapur and then marched to Belgaum where they forced Assud Khan to join them against Ibrahim’s army. In an astute disinformation move the coalition army used Assud Khan’s name and stature to garner support for their invasion into the Bijapur territory. The people of the Adil Shahi kingdom still held Assud Khan in great esteem because of his unwavering loyalty to the Adil Shahi dynasty. Even as he was forced to join the invading forces, he invited the Imad Shahi ruler of Berar to assist Bijapur in this time of its extreme threat. Once this was achieved Assud Khan himself joined the combined forces of Berar and Bijapur. The invading forces could not stand up to the combined army with Assud Khan also joining them and decided to retreat from the invasion. The change of scenario was unanticipated and therefore the invading army had not planned it as a contingency. During the retreat, Amir Barid of Bidar died on his way to his capital. The alliance was forced to return Sholapur and promise to not invade Bijapur again. As usual such promises were not worth the paper it was written on. An uneasy peace prevailed for a few months before conflict broke out again.

The very next year there was a three-pronged attack on Bijapur. Ali Barid who had succeeded his father in Bidar, the Nizam Shahi king of Ahmadnagar and the king of Vijayanagar attacked the Bijapur kingdom simultaneously. Assud Khan, once again reconciled with the king, took the lead in repelling the invaders. He craftily made individual peace with both the Vijayanagar king and Nizam Shah and then defeated the Bidar army in the field. Even with this victory, Bijapur was not able to stabilise the situation. The next year, the anti-Bijapur trio attacked again and were again defeated. This time Ibrahim Shah personally led the Bijapur army and fought at its head with great bravery. This victory and the role that he had played as a military commander combined to make Ibrahim arrogant. He ill-treated the ambassadors that Nizam Shah of Ahmadabad had send to the Bijapur court—reason enough for war to breakout afresh.

During this war fortunes that had for many years favoured Bijapur, changed. Ibrahim was soundly defeated in battle twice within a short span of six months. Although he was more than willing to take the credit for victories, Ibrahim was unwilling to accept the responsibility for the repeated defeats of his army. He blamed the Hindu officials in his service and had a number of them publicly executed. The extreme cruelty with which the Hindu nobles were treated disgusted Assud Khan who, as was his wont in similar circumstances, once again retreated to his estate in Belgaum.

With the departure of Assud Khan from active participation in matters of state, Ibrahim’s power was considerably reduced. Taking advantage of these circumstances, Ibrahim’s brother Abdullah made an attempt at usurping the throne. On the palace coup being unsuccessful, Abdullah fled to the Portuguese territory of Goa and took refuge there. The Portuguese attempted to create an alliance to place Abdullah on the throne of Bijapur. They also attempted to get Assud Khan on-side to help with the plan. However, the ever faithful Assud Khan refused to be part of this attempt. The importance of this incident is not the fact that an attempt was made to replace the ruling king, but the fact that this was the first time that a European power had made an attempt at directly interfering with and trying to influence local politics.

Assud Khan died soon after he thwarted the first Portuguese attempt at influencing the course of events in an Indian kingdom. Ibrahim Shah was now left with no capable, trustworthy or loyal advisor. Wars, conflicts and skirmishes continued in the Deccan without a break; and alliances were made, broken and new ones formed. The Vijayanagar kingdom continued to make inroads into the territories of the Deccan kingdoms and also kept them divided by intervening in their internecine conflicts in an opportunistic manner. By siding astutely with one or the other of the Shahi kingdoms, Vijayanagar managed to keep them disunited.

In one of these battles, Ibrahim Shah was defeated in the battlefield because of some tactical blunders that he himself has committed. However, as was usual for him, Ibrahim immediately blamed his defeat on his commanding general, Ain-ul-Mulk. Fearing retribution, the general retired to his estate, pursued by Ibrahim’s forces. Ain-ul-Mulk defeated the forces send to capture him. At this juncture, Ibrahim asked the Vijayanagar king for assistance in bringing the, now rebel, general to book. The Hindu forces surprised Ain-ul-Mulk and on being defeated in the battlefield, he fled to Ahmadnagar. Unfortunately he was assassinated in Ahmadnagar. Once again the interference of Vijayanagar to create divisions within the Deccan Muslim kingdoms is seen to have borne fruit.

Even though victorious in an oblique manner, Ibrahim Shah could not countenance the fact that he had been defeated in battle and that his prestige thereafter had been re-instated by his arch enemy, monarch of Vijayanagar. To add to the embarrassment, the monarch was the central pillar of the Hindu religion, holding the spread of Islam at bay. Devoid of any sage and sane advice after the death of Assud Khan, Ibrahim gave himself up to debauchery and fell ill soon after. Although a team of doctors started to look after him, he ill-treated the doctors who could not bring any relief, even having some of them executed in public. The rest of the palace medical team fled from the capital. With no treatment available, his medical condition deteriorated rapidly. Ibrahim Shah died in 1557 after ruling the Bijapur kingdom for 24 years.

Conclusion

Although Ibrahim Adil Shah was a passionate ruler, he was also headstrong and impulsive. Assud Khan had managed to give him sagely advice and kept him on track, ensuring a prosperous rule for a long time. However, Assud’s death turned Ibrahim into a licentious tyrant, very similar to his elder brother who he had replaced. Ibrahim was almost constantly at war, barring few brief spells of respite. However, he did not possess noticeable military talent to ensure that the wars went in his favour. He did display personal bravery in some battles, but even that character trait was not a constant and rose and fell with his moods. Personal bravery was not always on show in Ibrahim. Therefore, the battlefield victories that he has claimed as his personal victories have to be credited to the capable generals in his service. In fact the final military debacle that led to his debauchery and eventual death was brought on by his own tactical incompetence.

Throughout Ibrahim’s rule the Muslim kingdoms of the Deccan remained in complete disharmony. Vijayanagar took full advantage of the situation and kept them divided while increasing its own power, territorial hold and influence. Ibrahim instituted three important changes in the administration and rule of the kingdom that had long-lasting impact on the Deccan as a whole. First, he employed Hindus to the clerical positions in the administration, especially in the revenue and accounts branches. Gradually they managed to get an unbreakable stranglehold on the finances of the kingdom. Second, he started to use the vernacular, instead of the foreign Persian language, in keeping the royal records. This made the records easily accessible to the broader population that in turn also produced contradictory records, making it easier for later-day historians to better understand the progress of past events. The embellishments that court historians made to the actual events and the ‘white-washing’ of despicable deeds of the king and/or the battlefield debacles that took place became more difficult to achieve.

The third change was of the greatest consequence. He started to recruit the ‘bergees’, a derisive term used to indicate the Maratha, into the military forces. A majority of them belonged to the Bijapur and Ahmedabad region and almost all of them were mercenaries, providing their own horses and equipment. The Marathas were more ‘gentlemen soldiers’ rather than the generic rank and file soldiers. These soldiers, who were also tactically well-schooled and thinking men, brought with them a new style of warfare that was perfected in later days by their illustrious king Shivaji. Their favoured method for the conduct of a campaign was to avoid standing battle against another army in traditional combat by eluding the enemy as far as possible while continually harassing them in every way possible while they were on the march. The Marathas excelled in cutting the enemy’s supply lines and in following a scorched earth policy as soon as the enemy moved forward into their territory. They conducted what in modern times would come to be called Guerrilla War or Irregular War.

Ibrahim Shah brought about changes in the Adil Shahi religious policy, declaring the Sunni or the Shia sects as the state religion alternating them at regular intervals. Although these changes seem to have been made at the whim of the Sultan, some good came out of it. This policy ensured that the kingdom started to entrench a sense tolerance between the two sects, which gradually percolated also to the treatment of the Hindus. This made the Bijapur kingdom better religiously integrated in relative terms with the other Muslim kingdoms.

 

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