The Economist has a foolish issue titled 'What have the Mughals ever done for us?'
The answer is- nothing. They lost power 300 years ago. They can't do shit for themselves, let alone anybody else.
How India’s greatest Muslim empire built its most powerful Hindu partyIn speeches to supporters, to parliament and to the nation, Narendra Modi has repeatedly invoked India’s centuries of slavery.
Because Sonia Gandhi was of Italian origin. Modi was saying that the Dynasty was foreign. Manmohan Singh was a 'prone' Minister who had no power of his own. The Congress party was just a bunch of sycophants currying favour with the Ruling Family.
Soon after taking power in 2014, he lamented that “the mentality of 1,200 years of slavery continues to haunt us.
Modi was speaking in Delhi. He was appealing to the indigenous tribes & communities of the region who felt alienated from successive dynasties (including Rajput rulers like Pritviraj, though Modi didn't say so). Modi was from Gujarat but had some how turned himself into a UP-wallah in Benares- where was elected to the Central Parliament- and some sort of Jat or Gujjar in Delhi & Haryana.
'It is often a challenge for us to hold our heads high when speaking to someone of even slightly elevated stature.”
This was a dig at Manmohan- a Sikh who served a Dynasty which had slaughtered his people in Delhi some twenty years previously. Essentially, Modi was presenting himself as restoring 'subaltern' rule to the Capital City which had been dominated by elites & aristocrats who looked down on the toiling masses. Towards this end, he changed the name of 'Rajpath' (King's Way) to Kartavya path (path of Duty) four years ago. It should be mentioned, Modi is the first 'Backward Caste' Prime Minister. He couldn't afford to go to College. Yet, by merit alone, he had been Gujarat's longest serving and most successful Chief Minister. He has now completed an even longer stint as PM. There has been nothing like him in the annals of Indian politics.
Consider his 'missed call' strategy in the 2014 election. Originally this was a voter mobilization technique. But then he pivoted and said 'take my mobile number. If you don't get your entitlement- give 'missed call'. My team will get back to you within a couple of days & solve the problem. This was more than 'approachability'. It was 'customer service'. For the first time, India had a leader who thought his job was to ensure 'last mile delivery'.
The chief target of the grievance is the series of Muslim empires
which had yielded to a Hindu Maratha Empire
that came before British colonialism.
Fuck that. Nehru had presided over massive ethnic cleaning of Muslims. In Delhi their population share plummeted from 33 percent to 5 percent. Muslims who had fled across the border in panic were not permitted to return. They were stripped of citizenship. Reservations or affirmative action of any kind were denied to them. Urdu lost its status as Hindi in Devanagari script was made the official language. The BJP can't compete with Congress when it comes to killing Muslims- or Sikhs, for that matter. Thus Modi was playing up the OBC/Dalit/ST angle. That is why he has had a second Dalit President and now, for the first time ever, a lady President from the 'Tribal' Santhal community. Modi understands that 'Mandal' is more important than 'Mandir'- i.e. empowerment of 'Backward' castes & women is the name of the game. True, building the Ram Temple creates a feel good factor but what really matters is India's ongoing social revolution. The poorer OBC woman is now the decisive swing voter. That's why Modi is betting big on reserved seats for women.
The Mughals were the longest-lasting of those.
They were big for about 200 years. The Sultanate lasted for more than 300 years.
April 21st marks exactly 500 years since the Battle of Panipat, when Babur, a Central Asian descendant of Tamerlane and Genghis Khan (hence “Mughal”, from “Mongol”), defeated the last sultan of Delhi.
Who was of Afghan descent.
The empire he established was, at its height, one of the world’s richest and most powerful.
India, like China, benefitted from Mexican silver but, because it was getting cut out of even Indian ocean trade, it was bound to decline.
Its rulers adopted customs of Indian kingship, married locally and in effect became Indian
like the Sultanate & the Nizamat & so forth
(unlike the Brits).
There were plenty of Eurasians. Joe Biden has an Indian cousin.
Their achievements are Indian achievements.
They were Indian aristocrats. Modi isn't an aristocrat at all. Unlike the Dynasty, his ancestor hadn't served first the Mughals & then John Company. They weren't educated. They were oil pressers by profession living in small towns and villages.
Yet the quincentenary of the empire’s founding will pass without note.
Because they vanished long long ago.
The Mughals, Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) insists, destroyed temples (which is true) and humiliated Hindus (which is contested). They took everything India had. And what, the ideology asks, did they ever give us in return?
Opportunities to get castrated to serve in the harem as eunuchs?
Language, for one thing.
We don't speak Chagatai Turk. We do speak English. Why? The whole world speaks English.
Mr Modi’s speech in 2014 was delivered in Hindi, India’s most spoken tongue. Of the 28 words that made up the original of his quote above, a quarter entered India via Persian,
the Mughals weren't Persian. It was the Sultanate which adopted Persian which in fact was a big lingua franca at one time.
points out Richard Eaton, a historian of Muslim India. The language of the Mughal court infuses the vocabulary of most northern Indian languages.
Urdu, I suppose is a Turkic/Mongol word. It is the same as the English word 'horde'.
Indeed, “Hindi” and “Hindu” both come from “Hind”, the Persian name for the river known in English as the Indus (thus “India”). But what, apart from putting the “Hindu” in “Hindu nationalism”, have the Mughals ever done for us?
Nothing. They descended into destitution long ago. Every other day, some newspaper will pick up some beggar & say they are the heir to the Peacock Throone.
The cuisine known globally as “Indian” is in India called “Mughlai”.
It isn't what Modi eats. He has 'thali' like most Hindus. The fact is you go to a restaurant to eat stuff you don't cook at home.
The tandoor, a clay oven from which emerge flaky naans and charred kebabs, came from the Persianate world, as did samosas, sherbets, various desserts and biryani—India’s most-ordered dish on delivery apps for ten years straight.
So what? Pizza too is popular. As for 'Gobi Manchurian', don't get me started.
The party-pooper wing of the BJP frowns on meat and eggs but even vegetarians enjoy a good tandoori paneer (from the Persian panir, a kind of cottage cheese that probably came via Afghans).
Actually, Indian cuisine owes more to the Portuguese & Spanish who introduced new vegetables, chilis & dishes like ras malai.
Granted, tandoori anything is irresistible.
So are potato chips & tomato ketchup.
But what, apart from language and food, have the Mughals ever done for us?
Does this nutter really think Babur invented Persian or the tandoor?
Four of India’s ten most popular ticketed historical sites for local tourists, and six among foreigners, were built by Mughals.
But, relative to its size & population, Tourism isn't big business in India. The truth is the most visited places are Hindu religious sites.
The Taj Mahal tops both lists. Every year the prime minister delivers an Independence Day speech from the Red Fort, a Mughal monument in Delhi so central to India’s self-image it features on the back of the most common banknote.
Only because the Brits didn't blow it up. But, truth be told, it's a bit shitty.
The sitar, made famous by George Harrison,
who he?
is a product of the Mughal era.
Babur invented sitar. Sadly he tried to turn it into a biryani by cooking it in tandoor.
The sherwani, worn by grooms Hindu and Muslim, evolved from Mughal court dress.
It bears no resemblance to the angarkha. Seeing British soldiers kick ass convinced Indians that men should not wear colourful frocks.
“The popular religions of medieval India, Sufism, the Urdu language, and Indo-Saracen art were the common property of the conquerors and the conquered, and tended to blend them together,” wrote Jadunath Sarkar, a revered Indian historian.
This happened during the Sultanate.
Persian translations of Hindu epics were commissioned by Akbar, a Mughal emperor fascinated by religious practices (a trait Aurangzeb, his great-grandson and a keen demolisher of temples, did not share).
But it was a trait Dara Shikoh, Aurangazeb's elder brother, displayed to a greater degree.
But what, apart from language, food, architecture, music, art and syncretism
all of which already existed before Babur was chased out of the Ferghana Valley
have the Mughals ever done for us?
Mughals invented tandoori sitar biryani. If you smoke a lot of ganja, you will find it very tasty.
They brought the BJP to power.
No. Rahul's yellow streak brought Modi to power. He should have shouldered aside Manmohan, become PM & led his party to victory in 2014.
In 1990, when the party held just 16% of seats in parliament,
In 1985, it had 0.3 %. After Indira was assassinated, her son won by a landslide- a reward for the killing of lots of Sikhs.
it launched a national campaign demanding a temple on the ground said to be the birthplace of Lord Ram, the protagonist of the Ramayana.
Rajiv had opened it to Hindu worship. He should have built the Ram Temple himself & probably would have done if he hadn't been killed. Sonia promised to build it in 2002 when Rahul returned to India.
At that site stood a mosque built during the reign of Babur, the first Mughal emperor. In 1992 a mob demolished the mosque under the gaze of BJP officials, sparking a nationwide conflagration
Muslims acted up & were massacred. Minorities get stomped if they start any rough stuff. File under- sad but true.
that forged the party’s base,
The RSS & 'Sangh parivar' had forged it long ago.
eventually propelling it to office.
It had been part of the Janata coalition in 1977. As the other components of that alliance either imploded or became factionalized, Atal Behari Vajpayee emerged as a popular PM. But his was a coalition government & he himself more than a little senile.
By early 2024, when Mr Modi consecrated the promised temple, his party held 56% of seats.
Thanks to Rahul's utter uselessness. But, under Kharge, Congress was able to make some good pre-poll pacts which is why the BJP no longer has a majority.
It has spent the past decade renaming Mughal cities, rejecting Mughal cuisine, and writing Mughals out of history books.
Nobody gives a flying fuck. What matters is whether 'Backward castes' & women feel they are getting an increasing share of power. Also, cash transfers. Everybody likes money.
It is one thing to raze an edifice of brick and mortar. It is harder to eradicate a culture that
disappeared three hundred years ago.
has over five centuries permeated India’s blood and soil.
Fuck off! India's blood & soil cares only about money- not Mughals or Mauryas or Lord fucking Mountbatten.
That, then, is the best answer to their question of what the Mughals have ever done for them. They gave political Hinduism its eternal, indispensable villain.
No. Akbar wasn't a fucking jihadi suicide bomber. He was too busy baking sitars in the tandoor to serve up as biryani.
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