'HOLOCAUST OF HINDUS DURING THE MUSLIM OCCUPATION OF INDIA'
Dr. Jai Maharaj
By Sudheer Birodkar
Readers' Voice
Sword of Truth - Issue No. 1999.22
May 31, 1999
Forwarded article
Source - http://www.swordoftruth.com/
"The massacres perpetuated by Muslims in India are
unparalleled in history, bigger than the Holocaust of
the Jews by the Nazis; or the massacre of the Armenians
by the Turks; more extensive even than the slaughter of
the South American native populations by the invading
Spanish and Portuguese."
- Francois Gautier
This article is dedicated to the memory of those men,
women and children who were killed or were captured or
converted by force to Islam over a period of fourteen
centuries in India and in other parts of the globe.
These men, women and children cannot be recalled for
standing witness to what was done to them by the
swordsmen of Islam.
Hence, we are going to rely on Muslim historians, in
India and abroad, who have written hundreds of glowing
accounts of the devastation caused by the progress of
Islamic armies across the world (and in India). As our
focus is India, we are going to look only at what
happened in India during the Islamic invasion and the
following struggle for independence from Islamic rule
that was waged by the Hindus. A pronounced feature of
these Muslim histories is a description - in smaller or
greater detail but always with considerable pride - of
how the Hindus were slaughtered en masse or converted
by force, how hundreds of thousands of Hindu men and
women and children were captured as booty and sold into
slavery, how Hindu temples and monasteries were razed
to the ground or burnt down, and how images of Hindu
Gods and Goddesses were destroyed or desecrated.
Commandments of Allah (Quran) and precedents set by the
Prophet (Sunnah) are frequently cited by the authors in
support of what the swordsmen and demolition squads of
Islam did with extraordinary zeal, not only in the
midst of war but also, and more thoroughly, after
Islamic rule had been firmly established.
Almost all medieval Muslim historians credit their
heroes with desecration of Hindu idols and/or
destruction of Hindu temples. The picture that emerges
has the following components, depending upon whether
the iconoclast was in a hurry on account of Hindu
resistance or did his work at leisure after a decisive
victory:
1. The idols were mutilated or smashed or burnt or
melted down if they were made of precious metals;
2. Sculptures in relief on walls and pillars were
disfigured or scraped away or torn down;
3. Idols of stone and inferior metals or their pieces
were taken away, sometimes by cartloads, to be thrown
down before the main mosque in
(a) the metropolis of the ruling Muslim sultan and (b)
The holy cities of Islam, particularly Mecca, Medina
and Baghdad;
4. There were instances of idols being turned into
lavatory seats or handed over to butchers to be used as
weights while selling meat;
5. Brahmin priests and other holy men in and around the
temple were molested or murdered;
6. Sacred vessels and scriptures used in worship were
defiled and scattered or burnt:
7. Temples were damaged or despoiled or demolished or
burnt down or converted into mosques with some
structural alterations or entire mosques were raised on
the same sites mostly with temple materials;
8. Cows were slaughtered on the temple sites so that
Hindus could not use them again.
This essay is to enable us to remember the sacrifice of
those who attained Veergati (Martyrdom) when faced
against these forces of darkness that represented
religious bigotry that traumatized and tormented India
and other parts of our globe for Fourteen Hundred
years. India has survived as a wounded civilization to
tell the story of this chilling horror. A horror that
seems too cruel to be true. The unfortunate part is
that it was true and this would become true once more
in the future, if the forces of malevolence again get
the upper hand in India or in any part of the world.
This essay has been compiled from the writings of a
cross section of Historians comprising Sir Jadunath
Sarkar , Rizwan Salim, Sita Ram Goel, Ram Swarup, Arun
Shourie, R.C. Mazumdar and a few others.
Epigraphic Evidence of the Construction of Masjids by
destroying Hindu temples
There are many mosques all over India which are known
to local tradition and the Archaeological Survey of
India as built on the site of and, quite frequently,
from the materials of, demolished Hindu temples. Most
of them carry inscriptions invoking Allah and the
Prophet, quoting the Quran and giving details of when,
how and by whom they were constructed. The inscriptions
have been deciphered and connected to their historical
context by learned Muslim calligraphers. They have been
published by the Archaeological Survey of India in its
Epigraphica Indica Arabic and Persian Supplement.
The following few inscriptions have been selected in
order to show that:
destruction of Hindu temples continued throughout the
period of Muslim domination;
it covered all parts of India - east, west, north, and
south; and
all Muslim dynasties, imperial and provincial,
participated in the "pious performance".
1. Qu'wat al-Islam Masjid, Qutub Minar, Delhi:
"This fort was conquered and the Jami Masjid built in
the year 587 A.H (Hejira Era) by the Amir Qutub-ud-din
Aibak the slave of the Sultan, Shahabuddin Ghori.
According to the Epigraphica Indica Arabic and Persian
Supplement (1909-10, pp.3-4): "The materials of 27 idol
temples, on each of which 2,000,000 Delhiwals had been
spent were used in the (construction of) the mosque..."
The year 587 H. corresponds to 1192 A.D. "Delhiwal was
a high-denomination coin current at that time in Delhi.
2. Masjid at Manvi in the Raichur District of Karnataka
by Firuz Shah Bahmani:
"Praise be to Allah that by the decree of the
Parvardigar, a mosque has been converted out of a
temple as a Sign of religion in the reign of...the
Sultan who is the asylum of Faith Firuz Shah Bahmani
who is the cause of exuberant spring in the garden of
religion" (1962, pp.56-57). The inscription mentions
the year 1406-07 A.D. as the time of construction.
3. Jami Masjid at Malan, Palanpur Taluka, Banaskantha
District of Gujarat by Khan-i-Azam Ulugh Khan:
"The Jami Masjid was built by Khan-i-Azam Ulugh
Khan...who suppressed the wretched infidels. He
eradicated the idolatrous houses and mine of
infidelity, along with the idols...with the edge of the
sword, and made ready this edifice... he made its walls
and doors out of the idols; the back of every stone
became the place for prostration of the believer"
(1963, pp.26-29). The date of construction is mentioned
as 1462 A.D. in the reign of Mahmud Shah I (Begada) of
Gujarat.
4. Hammam Darwaza Masjid at Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh in
the reign of Akbar, the Great Mughal:
"Thanks that by the guidance of the everlasting and
living (Allah), this house of infidelity became the
niche of prayer. As a reward for that, the Generous
Lord constructed an abode for the builder in paradise"
(1969, P 375). Its chronogram yields the year 1567 A.D.
in the reign Akbar, the Great Mughal.
A local historian, Fasih-ud-Din, tells us that the
temple had been built earlier by Diwan Chaman Das, an
official of the Mughal Government.
5. Jami Masjid at Ghoda in the Poona District of
Maharashtra by Mir Muhammad Zaman:
"O Allah! O Muhammad! O Ali! When Mir Muhammad Zaman
made up his mind, he opened the door of prosperity on
himself by his own hand. He demolished thirty three
idol temples (and) by divine grace laid the foundation
of a building in this abode of perdition" (1933-34,
p.24). The inscription is dated 1586 A.D. when the
Poona region was ruled by the Nizam Shahi sultans of
Ahmadnagar.
6. Gachinala Masjid at Cumbum in the Kurnool District
of Andhra Pradesh by Muhammad Shah:
"He is Allah, may he be glorified...During the august
rule of...Muhammad Shah, there was a well-established
idol-house in Kuhmum...Muhammad Salih who prospers in
the rectitude of the affairs of the Faith...razed to
the ground, the edifice of the idol-house and broke the
idols in a manly fashion. He constructed on its site a
suitable mosque, towering above the buildings of all"
(1959-60, pp.64-66). The date of construction is
mentioned as 1729-30 A.D. in the reign of the Mughal
Emperor Muhammad Shah.
Though sites of demolished Hindu temples were mostly
used for building mosques and Idgahs; temple materials
were often used in other Muslim monuments as well.
Archaeologists have discovered such materials,
architectural as well as sculptural, in quite a few
forts, palaces, maqbaras, Sufi khanqahs, madrasas, etc.
In Srinagar, Kashmir, temple materials can be seen in
long stretches of the stone embankments on both sides
of the Jhelum.
The inscriptions on the walls of the Gopi Talav, a
stepped well at Surat, tell us that the well was
constructed by Haidar Quli, the Mughal governor of
Gujarat, in 1718 A.D. in the reign of Farrukh Siyar.
One of them says that its bricks were taken from an
idol temple". The other informs us that Hiaider Quli
Khan, during whose period tyranny has become extinct,
laid waste several idol temples in order to make this
strong building firm...'' (1933-34. pp.37-44).
The Temple Of Khandoba At Jejuri
This was one of the many temples that had been
destroyed and converted into a Mosque by the Muslim
aggressors.
Shivaji Maharaj reconverted it into a temple. Even
today, the temple structure displays a mix of Hindu and
Muslim architecture. But in spite of the trying
circumstances of religious bigotry of the Muslim
aggressors in which he operated, Shivaji Maharaj never
disrespected the Muslim faith. Whenever a copy of the
holy Koran fell into the hands of Maratha troops,
Shivaji Maharaj had given strict instructions to treat
it with utmost respect and hand it over to the local
Maulavis (Muslim priests).
Literary Evidence
Literary evidence of Islamic iconoclasm vis-a-vis Hindu places of worship is
far more extensive. It covers a 1onger span of time, from the fifth decade of
the 7th century to the closing years of the eighteenth. It also embraces a
larger space, from Transoxiana in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south, and
from Afghanistan the west to Assam in the east.
Deception practiced by some Historians
Pseudo-secularist "historians" and Muslim apologists would have us believe
that medieval Muslim annalists were indulging in poetic exaggerations in order
to please their pious patrons. But archaeological explorations in modern times
have, however, provided physical proofs of literary descriptions.
The vast cradle of Hindu culture is literally littered with ruins of temples
and monasteries belonging to all sects of Sanatana Dharma- Buddhist, Jain,
Saiva, Sakta, Vaishnava and the rest.
The literary sources, like the epigraphic, provide evidence of the elation
which Muslims felt while witnessing or narrating these "pious deeds". A few
citations from Amir Khusro will illustrate the point. The instances cited
relate to the doings of Jalalud-Din Firuz Khilji, Alaud-Din Khilji and the
latter's military commanders. Khusro served as a court-poet of six successive
sultans at Delhi and wrote a masnavi in praise of each after he had murdered
his predecessor. Khusro was the dearest disciple of Shaikh Nizamud-Din Awliya
and has come to be honoured as a great sufi himself.
In our own times, Khusro is being hailed as the father of a composite
Hindu-Muslim culture and the pioneer of secularism. Dr. R.C. Majumdar, whom
the Pseudo-secularists malign as a "communalist historian" names him as a
"liberal Muslim'.
Here is what Amir Khusro has written:
1. Jhain: "Next morning he (Jalal-ud-din went again to
the temples and ordered their destruction ... While the
soldiers sought every opportunity of plundering, the
Shah was engaged in burning the temples and destroying
the idols. There were two bronze idols of Brahma, each
of which weighed more than a thousand mans (a measure
of weight). These were broken into pieces and the
fragments were distributed among the officers with
orders to throw them down at the gates of the Masjid on
their return (to Delhi)" (Miftab-ul-Futub)
2. Devagiri: "He (Ala-ud-Din) destroyed the temples of
the idolaters and erected pulpits and arches for
mosques" (ibid).
3. Somanath: "They made the temple prostrate itself
towards the Kaaba. You may say that the temple first
offered its prayers and then had a bath (i.e. the
temple was made to topple and fall into the sea)...He
(Ulugh Khan) destroyed all the idols and temples, but
sent one idol, the biggest of all idols, to the court
of his Godlike Majesty and on that account in that
ancient stronghold of idolatry, the summons to prayers
(Azzan)was proclaimed so loudly that they heard it in
Misr (Egypt) and Madain (Iraq)" (Tarikh-i-Alai).
4. Delhi: "He (Ala-ud-Din) ordered the circumference of
the new minar to be made double of the old one (Qutub
Minar)... The stones were dug out from the hills and
the temples of the infidels were demolished to furnish
a supply" (Ibid).
5. Ranthambhor: "This strong fort was taken by the
slaughter of the stinking Rai. Jhain was also captured,
an iron fort, an ancient abode of idolatry, and a new
city of the people of the (muslim) faith arose. The
temple of Bahir (Bhairava) Deo and temples of other
gods, were all razed to the ground'' (lbid).
6. Brahmastpuri (Chidambaram): "Here he (Malik Kafur)
heard that in Brahmastpuri there was a golden idol ...
he then determined on razing the temple to the
ground..lt was the holy place of the Hindus which Malik
dug up from its foundations with the greatest care. And
the heads of Brahmans and idolaters danced from their
necks and fell to the ground at their feet, and blood
flowed in torrents.
The stone idols called Ling Mahadeo which had been
established a long time at the place and on which the
women of the infidels (Hindus) rubbed their vaginas for
(sexual) satisfaction. (Mark the extent of the
derogatory tone of the Islamic Saint Amir Khusro -
Author). These, up to this time, the kick of the horse
of Islam had not attempted to break. The Musalmans
destroyed all the lingas, and Deo Narain fell down.
The Kutub Minar built by Kutub-ud-din Aibak. The Kutub
Minar is one of the earliest Islamic monuments in
India. This Minar was built from the columns of
destroyed Hindu and Jain temples. It stands at the site
of Pithoragarh which was the capital of Prithiviraj
Chauhan, the last Hindu ruler of Delhi.The damaged
motifs in this picture show clear Hindu origins - a
testimony to the vandalism of the Muslim aggressors.
There are many such temples which had been converted
into mosques like the Bhoja Shala Mosque, the Gyan
Vyapi Mosque, the Krishna Janmabhoomi Idgah, apart from
the now liberated Ramjanmabhoomi at Ayodhya. The total
runs to 3000 (Three Thousand).
In the opinion of the author, all such controversial
structures should be taken possession of by a national
educational trust and be converted into schools for
humanist and rationalist education. This could be the
first step in the long journey for converting all
places of religious worship all over the globe into
schools for humanist and rationalist education where
humans can finally be taught the futility of
worshipping human ignorance termed as God and the
stupidity of fighting each other due to the different
names we have given to human ignorance.
What Hiuen Tsang had seen in pre-Islamic India Some
historians say that the Hindu temples in North India
had been destroyed not by the Muslim invaders but by
the White Huns who had invaded India in the 5th
century, i.e. 500 years before the first Muslims set
their foot in north India in the 10th century.
Hiuen Tsang, a Buddhist pilgrim, who came from China,
after the invasion of the White Huns, found many
monasteries in pre-Islamic India. He said they were in
a splendid state. In his days the White Huns had
invaded north India and had even established their rule
over Kashmir where Hiuen Tsang saw 500 monasteries
housing 5,000 monks It is, therefore, difficult to hold
them responsible for the disappearance of Buddhist
centres in areas where Hiuen Tsang had found them
flourishing.
An explanation has to be found elsewhere. In any case,
the upheaval the White Huns caused was over by the
middle of the sixth century. Moreover, the temples and
monasteries which Hiuen Tsang saw were only a few out
of many. He had not gone into the interior of any
province, having confined himself to the more famous
Buddhist centres.
What Really Happened to Hindu Temples
So what was it that really happened to thousands upon
thousands of temples and monasteries? Why did they
disappear and/or give place to another type of
monuments? How come that their architectural and
sculptural fragments got built into the foundations,
doors, walls and domes of the Islamic edifices which
replaced them? These are crucial questions which should
have been asked by students of medieval Indian history.
But no historian worth his name has raised these
questions squarely, not to speak of finding accurate
answers to them. No systematic study of the subject has
been made. What we have is stray references to the
demolition of a few Hindu temples, made by the more
daring Hindu historians while discussing the religious
policies of this or that sultan.
Sir Jadunath Sarkar and Professor Sri Ram Sharma have
given more attention to the Islamic policy of
demolishing Hindu temples and pointed an accusing
finger at the theological tenets which dictated that
policy. But their treatment of the subject is brief and
their enumeration of temples destroyed by Aurangzeb and
the other Mughal emperors touches only the fringe of a
vast holocaust caused by the Theology of Islam all over
the cradle of Hindu Culture and throughout more than
thirteen hundred years of Muslim occupation of India.
What the Muslim Historians have to Say
Muslim historians, in India and abroad, have written
hundreds of accounts in which the progress of Islamic
armies across the cradle of Hindu culture is narrated,
stage by stage and period by period.
A pronounced feature of these Muslim histories is a
description - in smaller or greater detail but always
with considerable pride - of how the Hindus were
slaughtered en masse or converted by force, how
hundreds of thousands of Hindu men and women and
children were captured as booty and sold into slavery,
how Hindu temples and monasteries were razed to the
ground or burnt down, and how images of Hindu Gods and
Goddesses were destroyed or desecrated.
Islamic Iconoclasm Today
A gigantic image of the Great Master - Buddha at
Bamiyan near Kabul in Afghanistan. It is this image
which has been threatened to be blown up by the
Taliban, the Islamic militia that rules Afghanistan.
The statue faced its first defilement at the hands of
Islamic invaders when they invaded pre-dominantly
Buddhist Afghanistan in the 8th century Incidentally
the name Afghanistan is derived from the Sanskrit terms
Upa-gana-stan which means "Lands where the Allied
tribes live".
Commandments of Allah (Quran) and precedents set by the
Prophet (Sunnah) are frequently cited by the authors in
support of what the swordsmen and demolition squads of
Islam did with extraordinary zeal, not only in the
midst of war but also, and more thoroughly, after
Islamic rule had been firmly established.
Islamic Theology supports the Destruction of ALL Non-
Muslim Places of Worship
A reference to the Quran and to the Theology of Islam
as perfected by the orthodox Imams, leaves little doubt
about the violent and aggressive nature of Islam.
Jihad is Allah's command to the Muslims to destroy the
non- Muslims. It is not at all necessary that the non-
Muslims need have wronged the Muslims, for them to be
attacked by the Muslims. The "crime" that the non-
Muslims do not believe in Islam is enough for the
Muslims to attack the non-Muslims. Here is what the
Islamic text says:
"I have been commanded by Allah to fight the
unbelievers until they believe in Allah and His prophet
and follow the laws of Islam. It is only then that the
safety of their lives and property may be guaranteed."
(Sahih Tirmzi, Vol. 2: 192)
And why should they persecute and annihilate the non-
Muslims? The Koran explains the point:
"God has bought from the believers their selves and
their possessions against the gift of paradise; they
fight in the way of God; they kill, and are killed;
that is a promise; binding on God.... And who fulfills
his covenant truer than God? So rejoice in the bargain
you have made with Him that is the mighty triumph..."
(Repentance: 192)
Jihad, as can be seen, is a covenant between Allah and
the Muslims; the former offers paradise to the latter
for killing and plundering the non-Muslims without
having any moral qualm in return for Paradise.
Obviously, according to Islamic theology the massacre
of the fellow-beings and the plunder of their
possession is an act of great righteousness because it
attracts the highest reward - that is, paradise. The
Quran justifies booty, the plunder of the infidels in
the following words:
"It is not for any prophet to have prisoners, until he
make wide slaughter in land.....
Eat of what you have taken as booty, it is lawful and
good."
(The Spoils: 65)
Here is the essence of Islamic Jihad: Invade the non-
Muslims in the name of Allah for the sheer crime of not
believing in Him; first carry out an extensive carnage
of the people then all their property including women
and children become legally and morally the possessions
of the Muslims, who are at liberty to use them as they
think fit.
The Physical Evidence - Mutilated Hindu Architecture
The apologists for Islam - the most clogged among them
are some Pseudo-secularist historians and politicians -
have easily got away with the plea that Muslim court
scribes having succumbed to poetic exaggeration in
order to please their pious patrons. Their case is
weakened when they cite the same sources in support of
their speculations or when the question is asked as to
why the patron needed stories of bloodshed and wanton
destruction for feeding their piety.
There are, however witnesses who are not beyond recall
who can confirm that the Muslim court scribes were not
at all foisting fables on their readers. These are the
hundreds of thousands of sculptural and architectural
fragments which stand arrayed in museums and drawing
rooms all over the world, or which are awaiting to be
picked up by public and private collectors, or which
stare at us from numerous Muslim monuments.
These are the thousands of Hindu temples and
monasteries which either stand on the surface in a
state of ruination or lie buried under the earth
waiting for being brought to light by the
archaeologist's spade. These are the thousands of
Muslim edifices, religious as well as secular, which
occupy the sites of Hindu temples and monasteries
and/or which have been constructed from materials of
those monuments. All these witnesses carry
unimpeachable evidence of the violence that was done to
them, deliberately and by malevolent Muslim hands.
You can find more information at the following pages:
http://members.tripod.com/~sudheerb/holocaust1.html
http://members.tripod.com/~sudheerb/holocaust2.html
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