MUGHUL-AFGHAN CONTEST FOR SUPREMACY IN INDIA, A.D. 1526-1556

Farid was soon taken to Sasaram by his father, Hasan, who had been granted a jagir there by his master, Umar Khan Sarwani, entitled Khan-i-A’zam, when the latter got the governorship of Jaunpur. Hasan, like the other nobles of his time was a polygamist, and Farid’s step-mother had predominant influence -over him. This made him indifferent to Farid whereupon the latter left home at the at of twenty-two and went to Jaunpur. Thus the Afghan youth was forced into a life of adventure and struggle, which cast his mind and character in a heroic mould.

 For some time he devoted himself to study. By indefatigable industry and steady application, Farid early attracted the attention of his teachers at Jannpur and quickly gained an uncommon acquaintance with the Persian language and literature. He was capable of reproducing from memory the Gulistan, Bustan and Sikandar-namah. Being pleased with this promising youth, Jamal Khan, his father’s patron, effected a reconciliation between him and his father, who allowed him to return to Sasaram and to administer the paraganas of Sasaram and Khawaspur, both then within the jurisdiction of Sarkar. The successful administration of those two places by Farid served to increase his step-mother’s jealousy, and so leaving Sasaram once again he went to Agra.

On the death of his father, Farid took possession of his paternal jagir on the strength of a royal firman, which he had been able to procure at Agra. In 1522 he got into the service of Bahar Khan Lohani, the independent ruler of Bihar, whose favour he soon secured by discharging his duties honestly and assiduously. His master conferred on him the title of Sher Khan for his having shown gallantry by killing a tiger single-handed, and also soon rewarded his ability and faithfulness by appointing him his deputy (Vakil) and tutor (Ataliq) of his minor son, Jalal Khan.

But perverse destiny again went against Sher. His enemies poisoned his master’s mind against him, and he was once more deprived of his father’s jagir. “Impressed by the complete success of Mughul arms ” and with the prospect of future gain, he now joined Babur’s camp, where he remained from April, 1527, to June, 1528. In return for the valuable services he rendered to Babur in his eastern campaigns, the latter restored Sasaram to him.

Sher soon left the Mughul service and came back to Bihar to become again its deputy governor and guardian of his former pupil, Jalal Khan. While the minor king remained as the nominal ruler of Bihar, Sher became the virtual head of its government. In the course of four years he won over the greater part of the army to his cause and “elevated himself to a state of complete independence’. Meanwhile, the fortress of Chunar luckily came into his posession. Taj Khan, the Lord of Chunar, was killed by his eldest son, who had risen against his father for his infatuation with a younger wife, Lad Milika. This widow, however, married Sher Khan and gave him the fortress of Chunar. Humayun besieged Chunar in 1531, but Sher Khan had taken no part in the Afghan rising of that year and saved his position by a timely submission to the Mughul invader.

The rapid and unexpected rise of Sher at the expense of the Lohani Afghans made the latter, and even Jalal Khan, impatient of his control. They tried to get rid of this dictator. The attempt, how ever, failed owing to his ” unusual circumspection”. They then entered into an alliance (September, 1533) with Mahmud Shah, the King of Bengal, who was naturally eager to check the rise of Sher, which prejudiced his own prestige and power. But the brave Afghan deputy inflicted a defeat on the allied troops of the Bengal Sultan and the Lohanis at Surajgarh, on the banks of the Kiul river, east of the town of Bihar (1534). The victory at Surajgarh was indeed a turning-point in the career of Sher. “Great as it was as a military achievement, it was greater in its far-reaching political result…… But for the victory at Surajgarh, the jagirdar of Sasaram would never have emerged from his obscurity into the arena of politics to run, in spite of himself, a race for the Empire with hereditary crowned heads like Bahadur Shah and Humayun Padshah. ” It made him the undisputed ruler of Bihar in fact as well as in name. Sher had an opportunity to increase his power when Humayun marched against Bahadur Shah of Gujarat.  

He suddenly invaded Bengal and appeared before its capital, Gaur, not by the usual route through the Teliagrahi passes (near modern Sahebganj on the E.I. Ry. Loop Line), but by another unfrequented and less circuitous one. Mahmud Shah, the weak ruler of Bengal, without making any serious attempt to oppose the Afghan invader, concluded peace with him by paying him a large sum, amounting to thirteen lacs of gold pieces, and by ceding to him a territory extending from Kiul to Sakrigali, ninety miles in length with a breadth of thirty miles. These fresh acquisitions considerably enhanced Sher’s power and prestige, and, after the expulsion of Bahadur Shah of Gujarat to Diu, many of the distinguished Afghan nobles joined their rising leader in the east. Thus strengthened, Sher again invaded Bengal about the middle of October, 1537, with a view to conquering it permanently, and closely besieged the city of Gaur. Humayun, who on his way back from Gujarat and Malwa had been wasting his time at Agra, in his usual fashion, realized the gravity of the Afghan menace in the east rather too late and marched to oppose Sher Khan in the second week of December, 1537. But instead of proceeding straight to Gaur, by which he could have frustrated the designs of Sher Khan in alliance with the Sultan of Bengal, he besieged Chunar. The brave garrison of Sher Khan at Chunar baffled all the attempts of the assailants for six months, while Sher Khan was left free to utilise that time for the reduction of Gaur by April, 1538. Sher Khan had also captured the fortress of Rohtas by questionable means and had sent his family and wealth there. Baffled in Bihar, Humayun turned towards Bengal and entered Gaur in July, 1538. But Sher Khan, cleverly avoiding any open contest with him in Bengal, went to occupy the Mughul territories in Bihar and Jaunpur and plunder the tract as far west as Kanauj.

Humayun, who was then whiling away his time in idleness and festivities at Gaur, was disconcerted on hearing of Sher’s activities in the west and Ieft Bengal for Agra before his return should be cut off. But he was opposed on the way, at Chaunsa near Buxar, by Sher Khan and his Afghan followers and suffered a heavy defeat in June, 1539. Most of the Mughul soldiers were drowned or captured; and the life of their unlucky ruler was saved by a water-carrier, who carried him on his water-skin across the Ganges, into which he had recklessly jumped.