(President, Mathur Association Bombay)
This article has already been published for private circulation in MAB Newsletter of March 1995. Not to be reproduced wholly or partly without author’s permission.
In my last article of March 1994, “ AL’S AND GOTRAS AMONGST “MATHURS” it was brought out that Mathurs originated from Mathura, so is believed most widely. I had also mentioned that some hearsay versions of the presence of Mathurs in Mathura during Mehmood Ghaznavi’s invasions around 1000 AD have been known to our Biradri elders and handed down (verbally, though) from generation to generation. These were not mere concocted bedside stories but as serious narrations of eventful, actual happenings. Many Mathurs who felt interested in the article have asked me to elaborate on this aspect and hence this another write up based on what I used to hear in the 1940’s from some Biradri buzurgs of U.P. and Delhi who were themselves 70-80 year of age then. However, to come to the point of the Mathur Connection with the Ghaznavi invasions, it would be necessary first to give some relevant background from recorded history for due and proper appreciation of the hearsay version.
Mehmood Ghaznavi (971-1030 AD) inherited the kingdom of Ghazni (a town in present day Afghanistan) in the year 997 AD. Thereafter in a period of 26 years (1001-1026 AD) he invaded India a total 17 times (the most widely known invasion was his 16th one at the famous Somnath temple in 1025 AD) each time plundering towns, villages and temples and taking away huge quantities of wealth and large number of men and women as slaves. His 10th invasion in 1018 AD was aimed at Kannauj (then a big kingdom but today a town near Kanpur, U.P., and famous for its oriental perfumes and Attars) whose king Rajpal Parihar was always helping the North-West Frontier king Anandpal against Mehmood’s invasions. So, setting out with a huge army for Kannauj, Mehmood arrived on the west bank of river Jamuna near Mathura on 2nd December, 1018. Here he heard of the fabulous jewels and untold wealth in the thousands of temples in and around Mathura. With an already sweet taste of the earlier rewards of plundering Indian temples, the temptation of trying a hand at Mathura was too great to resist despite the foremost priority of Kannauj invasion. So Mehmood, changing his plans of marching ahead, entered Mathura. Raja Kulachand of nearby Mahaban and his queen committed suicide to prevent capture. (Incidentally, Mahaban to which the origin of “MAHABANI” Al Mathurs is attributed exists as a small town, some 15 km from Mathura even today). Thereafter all hell broke loose, the Ghazni army plundering temples and killing and capturing people en-mass for days together. The people were too dazed and afraid to offer any resistance and fell like sparrows before hawks.
Heaps of jewels, gold and silver and hordes of captured men and women placed before Mehmood were beyond his wildest imagination and left him wondering as to how to handle such a huge acquisition. He did not want to turn back with the loot to Ghazni, abandoning the Kannauj expedition midway. Nor to risk taking it to Kannauj, or to leave it at Mathura for subsequent pick up. He finally detailed a strong contingent of soldiers under a highly trustworthy escort to transport the loot (said to be loaded on hundreds of camels, elephants and captured slaves) to Ghazni and himself turned to Kannauj in January, 1019 (exact date not known) i.e., after a stay of well over a month at Mathura. The Kannauj king on hearing Mehmood’s approach ran away from his capital and Mehmood returned to Ghazni via Bundelkhand ( today’s Jhansi-Bhopal area ) with additional wealth and slaves.
Thus far is generally from recorded history.
It is said that when Mehmood decided to dispatch the Mathura loot to Ghazni under a trusted escort, in his inner self he was not too sure that even his most trusted men would deliver the massive consignment faithfully at the Ghazni treasury or would quietly help themselves to a portion of it. He, therefore wanted to get a detailed pre-dispatch list of all items, weight, etc., prepared with which the consignment could be checked on receipt at destination. Making such a long list in such a short time was, however, no easy task as Mehmood hardly had any literate persons with him on this expedition.
The locals knew only the local language, not understood at Ghazni. What was needed were persons who could write in Persian script and Arabic numerals.
During search amongst the captured populace a man (let us call him Mr.X), trembling with fear and barely able to stand due to exhaustion, offered himself saying that he was a clerk with a local merchant having business dealings with Arab traders*(please see note below) and hence had acquired some knowledge of Persian and Arabic in which he prepared trade invoices and documents for the Arab clients of his master. A few of his kinsmen, he said, were also similarly employed and thus knew Persian and Arabic script. Mr. X was picked out from the rest of the prisoners and ordered to collect all his Arabic / Persian knowing kinsmen whom Mehmood immediately put on the inventory making job under his personal supervision. He was happy at the proper and timely completion of the job by Mr. X and party. Retaining one copy of the inventory with himself, he dispatched the entire loot to Ghazni.
A pleased Mehmood asked Mr. X to name any reward he desired for the critically valuable service rendered. Mr.X submissively requested only for one thing: Persons of his clan may not be harassed any further and all the captured men and women of his community be set free honorably. This was immediately granted and thus the entire community of Mr. X was saved from slavery and torture.
Mehmood, despite his ruthlessness and cruel nature had a strong liking for artisans, men of skill and learning. He restored Mr. X and his kinsmen to honor and asked them to accompany with their families the caravan to Ghazni to settle down there. Mr.X had no option but to comply, perhaps taking consolation from a thought that having to go as a servant with some honor, howsoever small, was far better than the only other alternative of going as captured slaves.
Hold your breath, dear reader: Mr. X was a Mathur of Mathura, so has been believed and heard since generations from our Biradri buzurgs.
What happened to these Mathur families leaving for Ghazni in the chill of January, 1019 AD, nobody knows. Whether they ever returned to their native land, or they perished or settled somewhere else enroute or they stayed put at Ghazni (probably as converted Muslims) is anybody’s guess. However, one great fact that remains is that after this incidence Mathurs got an everlasting stamp of “ AHLE-QALAM “ (men of pen) – a literate class with some sort of Royal patronage – and thus continued to reap respect and recognition in subsequent Muslim Rule period (specially the better chronicled Mughal period of 1526-1857) and even during the British rule thereafter till 1947.
Though a recorded version of this particular incidence may not be available, recorded history clearly indicates that circumstances which could have possibly led to the aforesaid Mathur Connection did develop during Mehmood’s Mathura invasion of the year 1018. No great wonder, therefore, if this hearsay version too was a fact, though now forgotten over the ages and thus no more narrated by today’s Mathur grandfathers to their grand children.
So dear folks, take it or leave it; it is upto you. However, sometimes when in a vacant mood, I do wonder if Mr.X and his kinsmen ever formed the M.A.G. –“ Mathur Association Ghazni “, about a thousand years ago.
Ph: (022) 2746 8573. Krishna Murari,
Member, Managing Committee, Mathur Association Bombay
Email: murarikm@hotmail.com New Panvel (E),March,
NOTE:- Mathura being an ancient pilgrim center had direct routes to many parts of.
India, including to Gujrat. Gujrat, Kathiawad and Sindh had regular trade with Arabs since very long and Gujrati merchants visiting Mathura used to transact lot of business on behalf of their Arab clients. Many Mathura merchants had their offices in Gujrat & vice-versa. Mathura as center was covering business from nearby areas of present day U.P., Rajasthan, M.P., and Haryana. Major items of export through Mathura in those times are said to cotton cloth, metalware, food grain and precious / semi-precious stones.