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" "The priests of the temple of Govardhan founded by the Valabhacarya sought safety in flight. The idols were removed and the priests softly stole out in the night. Imperial territories offered no place of safe asylum either to the god or his votaries. After an adventurous journey, they at last reached Jodhpur. Maharaja Jaswant Singh was away on imperial errands. His subordinates in the state did not feel strong enough to house the god who might have soon excited the wrath of the Mughal emperor. Damodar Lai, the head of the priesthood in charge of the temple, sent Gopinath to Maharaja Raj Singh to beg for a place to be able to serve his religion in peace. The Sassodis prince exterided his welcome to Damodar Lai. The party left Ghampasani on 5 December, 1671, and was right royally received by MaharSna Raj Singh on the frontiers of his state. It was decided to house the god at Sihar and with due religious ceremony, the god was installed on 10 March, 1672. Mewar thus became the centre of Vaisnavism in India. The tiny village of Sihar has how grown into an important town which is named after the god, is now known as Nathadwara. At Kankroli (in Udaipur State) another Vaisnava idol of Krsna similarly brought down from Bindraban had been housed a little earlier. It forms pother, though less famous, shrine of Vaiinavism in India today. Thanks to Aurangzeb^s religious zeal, Udaipur state became a new Bindraban to the devotees of the Bhakti cult.
Sri Ram Sharma (1900-1976) was a professor, historian and author. He taught history, politics and public administration at the Punjab, Bombay and Poona Universities for many years. He was a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a member of the Indian Historical Records Commission. He was also the Director of the Institute of Public Administration, Chandigarh and Principal of the D.A.V.College. At the time of his death, he was editing a volume on the 'Mughal Culture and Institutions' for the Comprehensive History of India being Published by Indian History Congress, and had almost finished his portion of the work. Historian Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi called his work The Religious Policy of the Mughal Emperors an useful and objective study.
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But Firoz himself claims here that he built only 40 mosques in his entire reign. His language seems to emphasize that whereas his predecessors allowed temples to be built, he razed 40 temples to the ground and built mosques in their places rather than that he destroyed all temples and built mosques in their places.
At Jahangir’s accession, the Muslim theologians, who had not been pleased very much with Akbar’s attempt at secularizing the State, seem to have tried to win back their lost influence, Mulla Shah Ahmad, one of the greatest religious leaders of the age, wrote to various court dignitaries exhorting them to get this state of things altered in the very beginning of the reign because otherwise it would be difficult to accomplish anything later on. His efforts seem to have been successful to some extent. Jahangir gave orders to Shaikh Farid to submit to him names of four scholars who should see that nothing that was against the Shari'at should take place. Here was the rub. Mulla Ahmad protested to Shaikh Farid that this would not work. No four scholars would ever agree. He suggested therefore that only one scholar be appointed for the purpose. Nothing however seems to have come out of this suggestion. The orthodox seem to have greater faith in Jahangir than in his father. He was said to be less favourably inclined to the Hindus, and, the Muslims in general were asked to make persistent efforts to wean him away from Hindu customs and ceremonies.
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But Aurangzeb did not confine his iconoclastic activities to the warring states alone. Orders were given to demolish Hindu temples in the friendly state of Jaipur as well. An imperial agent, Abu Tarab, was sent for this purpose and he set about his task with a thoroughness that soon produced a panic. Most of the temples he was able to destroy easily, but there was some opposition in one temple. Certain Rajputs assumed positions there wherefrom they could easily deal with the masons who were sent to demolish the temple. The imperial agents had soon to beat a retreat. The officer in charge of the party thereupon complained to the Raja’s officials- A fojdar was asked to accompany the imperial agent to insure that the imperial officials were not molested in their task of pulling down the temple. There was a skirmish between the soldiers accompanying the fojdar and the Rajputs in the temple. Not before all the Rajputs had been killed was it possible for the imperial agent to destroy the temple. Abu Tarab reached the court on 10 August, 1680, and reported that he had demolished as many as sixty-six temples in Amber.** A letter from one Bhagwan Das to Raja Ram Singh written probably about this time tells us of the destruction of Karor (?) temple in Amber by Dalair, an imperial messenger.