Canberra, 9 January 2023 The Arrogance of Ignorance Vasco da Gama was the first European to reach the western coast of India by sea direct from Europe. He had expected to find a ‘backward’ country that had to be ‘civilised’, since the Europeans of the 15th and 16th centuries illogically and erroneously assumed that their […]
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Tag Archives: Islam
Europeans in India The Portuguese Part 4 Governance, Policies and Operations
January 5, 2023 
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Canberra, 5 January 2023 There are two viewpoints regarding the Portuguese attempt to establish a ‘State’ in the Indian sub-continent, headquartered at Goa. One, a sort of sweeping assessment, states that the defeat of the Arab coalition at Diu in 1509 by Almeida ended all threats to Portugal’s hegemony in the Indian Ocean region. The […]
Continue readingThe Marathas Prelude: The Indian Sub-continent in the 16th Century – Politics & Religion
May 26, 2021 0 Comments
Canberra, 26 May 2021 Geographically, the 16th century Indian sub-continent was similar to modern India, with the inclusion of Afghanistan and Baluchistan within its borders. [In this series of books ‘From Indus to Independence: A Trek through Indian History’ that narrate the history of the Indian sub-continent, the countries of Pakistan created in 1947 and […]
Continue readingThe Marathas Part 2: Framing the Maratha Identity
May 21, 2021 1 Comment
Canberra, 21 May 2021 By late 13th century, the Hindu revolt in Peninsular India against the invading Muslim forces was bitter and widespread. Even the learned heads of various Hindu ‘Maths’, monasteries, were involved in attempting to repel the Muslim invaders. Shankaracharya Madhav Vidyaranya, the head of the famous and powerful Sringeri Math, was one […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 61 Section III: The Mingling Mysticism
December 18, 2017 0 Comments
Mumbai, 18 December 2017 In early 14th century the religious make up of India was gradually altering. Buddhism had almost vanished from the land of its birth; Jainism was confined to a narrow area in the west of the sub-continent; and Islam was in its infancy, spread across scattered settlements in North India and […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 60 The Encroaching Islamic Influence Section I Governance of the Sulatanate
November 24, 2017 0 Comments
Canberra, 24 November 2017 From its very beginning, the Delhi Sultanate was governed in accordance with the Islamic Law, as laid down in the Sharia. Even though there were few exceptions to the strict adherence to the laid down norms, successive Sultans largely followed the injunctions of the Sharia in the administration of their kingdom. […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 51: The Origins of Arab-Muslim Conquest
June 12, 2016 0 Comments
Canberra, 12 June 2016 The armies that burst out of the Arabian Peninsula with the message of the Prophet Muhammad and the initial teachings of a fledgling religion were numerically small, seldom more than 20,000 soldiers and often much smaller. However, they were a homogeneous group, fully comprised of Arabs who had embraced the […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 46 MAHMUD OF GHAZNI: THE HAMMER OF IDOLATERS
November 9, 2015 0 Comments
Canberra, 09 November 2015 The Rise of the Ghaznavids On coming to power in 977, Sabuktigin set about placing the Ghazni sultanate on firm footings, laying the foundation for the administration of the land and the raising of revenue on a regular basis. He could be considered the founder of the Ghaznavid dynasty rather than […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 45 ISLAM IN INDIA: AN OVERVIEW OF THE EARLY DAYS
October 28, 2015 0 Comments
Canberra, 28 October 2015 Analysing and explaining the arrival of Islam and its deepening thrust into the Indian sub-continent is an endeavour in Indian historiography that is fraught with difficulty, primarily because of the confrontational rhetoric associated with any discussion of the religion in the 21st century, both in India and elsewhere in the world. […]
Continue readingIndian History Part 44 THE ADVENT OF ISLAM
October 12, 2015 0 Comments
Canberra, 12 October 2015 Enough and more has been written about the creation of the religious faith known as Islam, derived from the teachings of the Prophet Muhamad (570-632). Prophet Muhammad lived in a polytheistic society and received a revelation in visions that he explained in the holy book of Islam, the Koran. He called […]
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