No ruler in Medieval India has earned so much controversy regarding his character and policies as Muhammad Tughlaq. One controversy regarding Muhammad is that “Whether he was a mixture of opposite”? Dr. V. A. Smith maintains, “He was a mixture of opposite as Jahangir was in his later life.” Dr. Ishwari Persad, however, contradicted this view. He writes, “Only when viewed superficially Muhammad appears to be an amazing comprised of contradictions but he was not really so”.

In the history of India, if there was any strange ruler, it was Tughlaq. It was difficult to form a correct estimate of his character and personality not only today but also he remained a problem for his contemporaries too.
Dr. V. A. Smith maintains, “His character has exercised the scholar ever since and to determine his place in history is a difficult task, was he genius or lunatic? An idealistic or visionary? A blood thirsty tyrant or benevolent being? A heretic or devoted Muslim? Muhammad Tughlaq was mixture of two opposites like Jahangir.”


Dr. K. A. Nizami does not accept him as a mixture of opposite. According to him the inconsistency of Barani’s statement has created wrong impression about the Sultan among modern historians.


To see the real picture, we have to analyze the different aspects of his life. In the following lines, different aspects of his life are narrated in order to reach a conclusion whether he was a mixture of opposites. Some modern historians have described the Sultan as mixture of opposites on following grounds:


1. He was extremely humble but at the same time extremely arrogant.

2. At one time, Sultan appeared before the court of the Qazi and asked to treat him as an ordinary person and accepted his judgment but at the other time, he inflicted death penalty for ordinary offences.

3. Similarly at times, he was extremely generous and at other times, an extremely narrow minded. According to Sir Wolsley Haig, “Some of his administrative and most of his military measures give evidence of the highest order, other are the acts of madness”.


To establish further opinion whether he was a mixture of opposites or not, both the bright and the dark sides of his personality will further enable to have a particular opinion about Muhammad bin Tughlaq.


BRIGHT SIDE OF HIS CHARACTER

He possessed some rare qualities as were not to be found in any other ruler of that period.


LEARNED SCHOLAR & VERSATILE GENIUS

He had mastery over different sciences like politics, astronomy, mathematics, logic, medicine etc. He was also able in logic that people called him “Aristotle of that age”. Thomas called him the prince of Moneyers.







Lane Pool says, “M. Tughlaq was most striking figure of medieval India. He was perfect in humanities of his days, a keen student of Persian poetry, the Loin of Indian education, a master of style, supreme eloquent in an age of rhetoric.”


GENEROUS

He always helped the poor with money; opened free and charitable hospitals and treated the foreigners kindly.


RELIGIOUS & PIOUS MAN

He used to say his five prayers regularly and punctually and punished those who did not do so. Ibn-e-Batuta says, “He follows the principles of religion with devoutness and performs the prayers himself and punishes those who neglect them”.


But he did not act upon the advice of the Muslims like his cousin. That is why, certain historians called him witched.


TOLERANT TOWARDS THE HINDUS

He treated them kindly and gave them high posts and tried to stop sati system.


JUST MONARCH

He dealt equally with the Muslims and the Hindus: Shia and Sunni. Once he appeared in the court of Qazi and received 21 strokes of taking cane willingly.


GREAT GENERAL

He established peace and order in his country. In short, there were many admirable qualities possessed by him.


In words of Lane Pool, “In short he was complete in all that high culture could give in that age and he added to the finish of the training a natural genius for original conception a marvelous memory and an indomitable will”.


Lane pool, “Among the salve kings it was Balban the man of action, among the Khiliji’s it was Ala-ud-Din the crude and daring political economist, among the Karamtes it was Muhammad Tughlaq the man of ideas”.
Muhammad Tughlaq ascended the throne in 1325. He is an attractive figure in medieval history. He inherited it to the extent that no other Sultan of Delhi ruled so vast empire. He believed in absolute power of Sultan. Neither Ulma nor ministers were allowed to advise him.


DISTINCTIVE FEATURE OF ADMINISTATIVE STRUCTURE

The distinctive feature of his administrative structure is that he distributed state officers on merit and gave these to the Muslims and the Hindus alike.


EXTERNAL RELATIONS

He was liberal in religious affairs and developed diplomatic relations with the countries like China, Iran and Egypt.


REFORMS

He introduced certain reforms; displeased his subjects; faced many revolts and ultimately failed. Following were the reforms introduced by Muhammad Tughlaq. According to Barani, taxation was raised by ten to twenty times. Frishta states that it was increased three fold or four fold.


TAXATION IN DOAB

The cumulative effects of migration to Doulatabat from Delhi, heavy expenditure of Khurasan, Qarahal expedition and failure of token currency seriously affected the finances of the state. In order to replenish his treasury and also to chastise the rebellions population in Doab, the sultan increased taxation in Doab from the very days of his reign.


It is fact that revenue increased due to these taxes but when there was drought and scarcity of goods, people of Doab became highwaymen. In spite of this, tax collectors continued to collect tax. They opted oppressive measure to collect the taxes. Due to this, there were widespread revolt but all these were curbed with an iron hand.


Tax was normal and Barani’s version that tax was increased ten to forty times is exaggeration. Other side of the picture is that Sultan gave seeds and bullocks etc. to the cultivators and arranged for the digging of wells for irrigation but it was too late. The tax imposed by Sultan was not heavy and the people suffered more because of drought and famine rather than from heavy taxation.


This policy of Sultan met with complete failure and there were revolts in the country. The issue became prominent for two reasons. First, Barani as a direct effectee, exaggerated the sufferings and misery of the people. Secondly, this revolt of Doab was a turning point of Tughlaq dynasty and proved the beginning of the downfall of his rule (According to Dr. Mehdi Hussain).


AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT

Tughlaq established a separate department of agriculture and appointed a minister to look after it. The main object of this department was to increase land under cultivation. According to Dr. A.H.Srivistana, “A large trake of land, sixty square miles in area was chosen for state farming”.
The government spent nearly seventy lakh Tankas in three years. But the experiment failed and the scheme was abandoned after three years. Corruption of officers, poor quality of land chosen for farming and indifference of the cultivators were responsible for the failure of the scheme. Besides it, the scheme was abandoned in haste. Three years duration was quite inadequate to get any fruitful result.


TRANSFER OF CAPITAL (1323-27)

Another important measure by the Sultan was the transfer of capital from Delhi to Devagiri which he named Dulatabad. Following were the reasons in the transfer of capital:


1. Deccan was a new conquered territory and the Muslims were in small number.

2. Empire of the Sultan was extended and Daulatabad was in the center and strategically important as compared to Delhi.

3. The desire to keep capital safe from Mongol invasions.


The point of controversy is that whether all the people of Delhi were ordered to move to new capital or only the elites and learned. Contemporary historians like Barani, Ibn-e-Batuta and Isami have given terrible accounts of the events. They maintain that whole the population was compelled to leave the city and city was devasted. According to Dr. T.H Qureshi, the entire population of Delhi was not asked to leave.
Only the upper classes consisting of nobles’ elites, Ulma and Shaikh of Delhi were shifted to Dulatabad.



Sultan arranged all positive measures for the comforts of the people during their journey to Dulatabad. Shady trees were planted all over the routes; free food and water was supplied to the people after every two miles during the journey. All were provided with means of transport and compensated for the losses which they incurred in leaving their assets at Delhi and all were provided free residence at Daulatabad. But the people returned to Delhi in 1335.


According to administrative viewpoint, scheme of the Tughlaq met with complete failure, but positive impacts i.e. cultural impacts were of great importance.


But it is really that one cannot ignore the fact that the foundations and maintenance of independent Muslim kingdom in Deccan would not have been possible if he had not planted a long Muslim colony there.


The Baranis’ version seems correct that whole population was asked to shift in Daulatabad. In fact, so heavy arrangements made by the king during the course of migration cannot be for the limited number of people but for a large section of population.


THE TOKEN CURRENCY (1230 A.D.)

Tughlaq introduced various kinds of coins during his reign and fixed their relative value. The notable feature of this coinage system is the introduction of token currency and issuance of copper and brass coins. According to Baranis, Sultan introduced token currency because treasury was empty which he wanted to fill with his schemes. It may be said that due to Sultan’s generosity, treasury was badly affected. Another cause of issuing token currency might be examples of Iran and China. Although this experiment failed in Iran, yet later Qublai Khan attempted the same measure successfully.


Modern historians have given another reason that there was worldwide shortage of silver at that time and India too faced shortage. Muhammad Tughlaq himself introduced the coins of gold and increased the weight of gold and silver. Sultan issued the coins of gold and silver and later copper and brass and made these token coins legal and kept their value at par with gold and silver.


According to Barani, “The house of every Hindu became a mint; market was flooded with fake coins; farmers paid their revenues in token currency; the people paid their taxes in it and traders also desired to give token currency and each of them tried to hoard in their houses silver and gold coins”.
Sultan released the failure of his scheme and ordered to withdraw all token currency. Following were the reasons of its failure:


1. The citizen failed to discriminate between genuine and fake coins. (Prof. Habib)
2. There was no special machinery to mark the difference between the royal mint and the handiwork of the moderately skilled artisans.
3. The people misused the opportunity and themselves minted token coins.
4. The love of people for gold and silver was great. They thought that Sultan wanted to deprive them of their gold and silver.
5. Unstable political government and uncertain economic policies also deterred the masses to have faith in this scheme.


PLAN TO CONQUER KHURASAN & IRAQ

The unstable political condition of Central Asia and instigation of these nobles, who had fled from Persia and Iraq, made Sultan’s mind conquer Khurasan. The Sultan raised a huge army of 370,000 soldiers and paid it one year salary in advance. But very soon conditions in Central Asia and Iran improved, Sultan gave up the scheme and army was dispersed. According to Ishwari Persad, “It was an act of wisdom on the part of the Muhammad Tughlaq to abandon the scheme and to concentrate his attention upon India.”


EXPEDITIONS OF QARAJAL

According to Frishta, Sultan’s primary motive was conquest of China. But according to Barani, the design of Sultan was to conquer the mountains of Qarajal which was situated between the territories of India and China. Ibn-e-Batuta has also supported the view point of Barani but modern historians maintain that Sultan wanted to bring under his suzerainty those hills chiefs who used to provide shelter to rebels against Sultan.
Besides this, the conquest protected his northern frontiers.



A large army was sent under Khosru Malik. The first attack of the army was a success but when, according to K.A. Nizami, “Khosru Malik proceeded towards Tibet against the wishes of the Sultan; he met the fat of Bakhtiyar Khiliji”. All army was killed and, as according to Ibn-e-Batuta, only three officers could come back alive. But Sultan gained the object of the expedition. The chief prince made peace with the Sultan and agreed to pay tribute. The establishment of Sultan’s authority over the mountains region of Qarajal between China and subcontinent led to a friendly overture of the past of the Chinese Mongol.


All his reforms remained unsuccessful without result. They brought havoc to the mighty empire of Tughlaq dynasty. V. A. Smith summarizes his opinion about Muhammad Tughlaq, “Not withstanding that Muhammad bin Tughlaq was guilty of acts which the pen shrinks from recording and that he brought untold miseries during his reign, he was not wholly evil, he was mixture of opposite”.


Actually, Sultan was not a mad man. All his plans and castles were built in the air and were not based on any bad intention. The reality was that all of them were much in advance that people were not able to understand them.