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In the dark age of a millennium of Muslim tyranny in India every ruler was born and bred to a prototype of violence and villainy, treachery and tyranny. The name of the ruler hardly made any difference. Whether it was Akbar or Aurangzeb, Ahmadshah or Allauddin, one was as bad as the other to any diligent student of history. But even in this dismal history some names impinge on the lay man's consciousness with a specter-like weird horror of their own. One such is that of Allauddin Khilji - a brute of unalloyed and unrelieved villainy.
After having treacherously lured away his uncle-cum-father-in- law from Delhi, Allauddin had him assassinated at Karra in July, 1296 A.D. Allauddin then set out from Karra toward Delhi. Ganga and Yamuna were in flood and the monsoon particularly heavy. His army had to wade through mud and mire. Thus Allauddin gingerly plodded his way toward Delhi. Allauddin was apprehensive of resistance from the late sultan's army as well as from Arkali Khan. But Arkali Khan preferred to play the mouse.
Jalaluddin's widow, Malika-i-Jahan, summoned her army and sent it out to stem Allauddin's advance but to no avail. She then left for Multan with her young sultan-son to take shelter under the wing of Arkali Khan.
The late sultan's mercenary army saw the writing on the wall. They had no will to fight for a woman. Allauddin, in his turn did not want to provoke a fight. He marched at his easy pace toward Delhi while plundering the countryside, he devastated Hindu homes, tore away jewelry from the noses and ears of Hindu women and then distributed the largesse to win over the Muslim noblemen of Delhi, erstwhile supporters of the late sultan.
Five months had elapsed between the late sultan's murder and Allauddin's entry into Delhi. Blundering Indian text-books credit Allauddin with having built Siri (Shree) and the later Moghul king Shahjahan to have built Old Delhi. Both these assertions must be treated as howlers. Siri is where Allauddin (and before him, Jalaluddin) had encamped, which was located outside the precincts of Old Delhi. Both were afraid to enter Old Delhi without first determining what kind of ovation they were going to receive.
"Toward the end of the year 1296 A.D.," records the Tarikh-i- Firoz Shahi (Pg. 160, Vol. III, Elliot & Dowson), "Allauddin entered Delhi with great pomp and a large force. He proceeded to the 'Kushk-i-Lal, the Red Palace', where he took up his abode." Scholars and students of Indian history should awake to this observation of the chronicler Ziauddin Barni. This Red Palace is no other than what we know today as the Red Fort in Delhi. But that does not prevent the idiots to assert that Shahjahan had built the Red Fort in the 17th century!
Author : Shri Purushottam Nagesh Oak
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