Sultans of the South: Part 2

Swords, Statecraft, and Stone Carvings: The Many Faces of Bahman Shah

Sultan Bahman Shah visiting Ellora in CE 1352

On 4 December 1352, in the fifth year of his reign, Bahman Shah undertook a journey that does not fit the conventional image of a medieval conqueror. He marched to Ellora, not with siege engines and demolition squads, but with scholars and scribes. Roads leading to the monument complex were reportedly cleared and levelled in advance. As the court chronicler Isami recorded in the Futuh-us-Salatin, the Sultan and his courtiers spent time admiring the scale, artistic excellence, and craftsmanship of the rock-cut caves and sculptures. For a man who had recently led a successful rebellion, founded a kingdom, and was still consolidating power, setting aside time to appreciate an ancient non-Islamic monument is a fascinating glimpse into his personality.

Popular historical memory often reduces the Bahmani rulers to two-dimensional comic-book villains: tyrannical sovereigns locked in eternal combat with the Vijayanagara Empire, overtaxing peasants, lounging in harems, and smashing temples on a whim. History is rarely black and white. While some of his successors certainly had their moments, the founder of the dynasty was an altogether different breed of statesman—pragmatic, politically astute, and surprisingly open-minded. Bahman Shah reminds us that medieval rulers could be warriors, administrators, politicians, and curious patrons of culture all at once.

From Reluctant Migrant to Master of the Deccan

The rise of Bahman Shah was anything but ordinary. Before becoming a king, Hasan Bahman Shah was a noble in the service of the Delhi Sultanate. When Muhammad bin Tughlaq forced the imperial elite south during his capital transfer to Daulatabad, he was a part of that dusty migration. Over time, he rose through the ranks and served as Amir-i-Sadah, holding territories around Miraj, Hukkeri, and Belgaum. One wonders whether, during those uncertain years, Hasan could ever have imagined that he would one day be crowned Sultan in the same Daulatabad where he had reluctantly arrived as a servant of another empire.

Following the rebellion against the Tughlaqs, Hasan, now titled 'Zafar Khan' emerged as its most capable commander. After victories against the imperial forces, the reigning monarch Nasir-ud-Din Ismail Shah voluntarily stepped aside, allowing Khan to assume leadership of the new state. On 3 August 1347, he was crowned at Daulatabad and adopted the regal title Alau-ud-Din Hasan Bahman Shah, establishing what would become the first independent Muslim kingdom of the Deccan.

The coronation of Bahman Shah

"The world became illuminated with the light of his justice,

And tyranny was wiped clean from the face of the realm.

He placed the crown of sovereignty upon his head,

And the Deccan, once withered, blossomed again into a garden of peace."

- Isami in Futuh-us-Salatin

Titles mattered in the medieval world. Bahman Shah styled himself 'Sikandar-i-Sani' (The Second Alexander) and adopted the name Ala-ud-Din, possibly invoking the legacy of the famed Delhi Sultan Alau-ud din Khilji. It was also a direct dig at the Tughlaqs, claiming political legitimacy from the dynasty they had ousted in 1320 CE.

Apparently, his family connections were significant. Hasan, as per Isami, was related to the celebrated Khilji-era commander Malik Hizhbar-ud-Din, known as 'Zafar Khan', who distinguished himself in battles against the mighty Mongols. By retaining this title and later passing it to his son Muhammad, Bahman Shah, it was said, projected continuity with a proud military heritage. However, modern scholarship has cast doubts on this connection.

But medieval dynasties rarely settled for distinguished relatives alone. Like many ruling houses, the Bahmanis claimed a more glamorous ancestry, tracing their descent from the legendary Persian hero Bahman, a figure celebrated in Firdausi's Shahnama. Whether historically accurate or not, it certainly sounded better than 'successful provincial governor turned rebel.'

Setting the House in Order

Winning a kingdom is difficult. Keeping it is harder. Bahman Shah's first challenge was managing the men who had helped create the new state. Instead of sidelining his predecessor Ismail Shah, Bahman elevated him to the prestigious office of Amir-ul-Umara and accorded him exceptional honours at court. This helped smooth the transition of power and project legitimacy. Meanwhile, he appointed Malik Saif-ud-Din Ghori as prime minister, a decision that would have a lasting impact on the stability of the young kingdom, for not only him, four of his successors would also benefit from his wise counsel.

Realizing that the rebel warlords viewed him merely as 'first among equals', Hasan quickly declared his eldest son Muhammad the Crown Prince to establish hereditary rule. A few years later, the capital was shifted to Gulbarga (Ahasanabad). The location was farther from Delhi, closer to the new Sultan's support base, and strategically better suited for defending the new kingdom.

Military Expansion & Diplomacy

Hasan initially kept a low profile at home, perhaps fearful of an invasion by Delhi Sultanate or an internal revolt while dispatching loyal generals to clear out pro-Tughlaq garrisons across the Deccan. Husain Gurshasp secured Nanded and Kotgir while Qutb-ul-Mulk took Akalkot and seized the later capital - Gulbarga from the pro-Tughlaq chieftain Poccha Reddi by cutting off its water supply. Qir Khan,  the former tyrannical Tughlaq general 'Malik Maqbul' who had joined Hasan after the defeat of the imperial forces, took Basvakalyan after a five-month siege whereas Sikandar Khan captured Bidar and extracted rich tribute and war elephants from Kanya Nayak of Telangana.

Commanders reportedly operated under clear instructions: surrendered opponents were to be treated fairly, unnecessary bloodshed was to be avoided, and property was not to be indiscriminately plundered. Writing several centuries later, Ferishta records the Sultan's advice to his generals:

Bahmani Kingdom under Bahman Shah

"It is better to gain hearts by clemency and kindness than to govern by the sword; 

for he who reigns by terror sits upon a seat of thorns, 

while he who reigns by justice dwells securely in the hearts of his people."

After the death of Muhammad bin Tughlaq in CE 1352, Bahman Shah seems to have felt secure enough to leave the capital; his first campaign as Sultan saw him crush the rebellion of recalcitrant officers at Sagar. Marching next to Jamkhandi, he broke the resistance of local pro-Tughlaq chief Narayan after a fierce assault, then besieged him at Mudhol for four months until Narayan surrendered. Further campaigns reached Mandu, Goa, and Dabhol, though his push into Telangana met fierce resistance from regional Reddy chiefs. Across campaigns, surrendered enemies, regardless of religion, were treated with strict clemency. For Bahman Shah, mercy was a virtue. Treason, however, was another matter entirely.

When his general Qir Khan rebelled, Sikandar Khan was sent to quell the unrest. After Qir Khan was defeated in an open battle and brought to Gulbarga in chains, the Sultan had him beheaded on the spot, despite Sikandar's pleas for mercy. Similarly, fate awaited the ex-Sultan Ismail Shah who was later caught conspiring against the crown, he was executed in court. Yet in typical Hasan fashion, he immediately appointed Ismail’s son to his late father's vacant post of Amir-ul-Umara.

Hasan also appears to have possessed a keen diplomatic touch. While he expanded his kingdom through force when necessary, he was equally adept at cultivating goodwill with neighbouring rulers. The attendance of the Rayas of Telangana, Shakarkhera, and Mudgal at the wedding of Crown Prince Muhammad to Shah Begum, daughter of Vazir Malik Saif-ud-din Ghori, suggests that Bahman Shah enjoyed cordial relations with many of his contemporaries.

Religious Policy

Bahman Shah was undoubtedly a devout Muslim. Contemporary writers emphasise his personal piety. He is said to be particularly fond of his preceptor Shaikh Siraj-ud din Junaidi, the Peshawar born ascetic who would move to Deccan during the shifting of the royal capital to Daulatabad and later take up residence in Bijapur and Bidar. The Sultan is even said to have established a rubat (rest-house) at Mecca in CE 1354.

Yet religious devotion did not prevent him from engaging with other traditions. His reported visit to Ellora, consultation of Hindu astrologers at the time of his accession, and the absence of evidence for systematic religious discrimination during his reign suggest a ruler who was more pragmatic and intellectually curious than later stereotypes often allow.

Final Years and Legacy

Tomb of Bahman Shah and his son and successor - Muhammad I

Bahman Shah died on 10/11 February 1358, aged around sixty-seven. In little more than a decade, he had transformed a fragile rebellion into a durable kingdom that would dominate the politics of the Deccan for nearly two centuries.

He was not a perfect ruler. No medieval king was. But he was clearly more than a mere conqueror. He respected capable advisers, rewarded loyalty, forgave many enemies, built institutions, and displayed a curiosity about the world around him that even modern rulers sometimes struggle to match.

History often remembers founders for the states they create and the battles they win. Sultan Bahman Shah deserves remembrance for something rarer: his ability to look beyond war. Between rebellions, campaigns, court politics, and governance, he somehow found time to visit Ellora and also planned a surprise for his queen Malika-i-Jahan Begum: he arranged for her sister to travel from Multan to attend the Crown Prince's wedding, a journey that reportedly took seven months to complete.

He was ambitious but not merely ambitious, religious but not narrowly so, and powerful yet capable of appreciating beauty carved into stone centuries before his arrival. In an age of swords and sieges, Bahman Shah occasionally paused to be a tourist. And perhaps that is what makes him memorable.

Heads up: The text in this post was embellished with a little AI polish, and the images are AI-generated.

Sultans of the South: Part 1

The Dawn of Bahmani Sovereignty

Election of Ismail Mulk as the First Sultan of Deccan

In CE 1346, the leading nobles of the Deccan assembled at Daulatabad to decide the future of a region that had already begun slipping from Delhi's grasp. Among those present were several powerful Amirah-i-Sadah (Commanders of a hundred villages), including Ismail Mulk, Hasan Gangu, Nur-ud-Din, Nasir-ud-din Taghalchi, and others. Just days earlier, many of them had been marching towards Gujarat under orders of Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq to reinforce imperial forces battling rebels. Instead, they turned back, killed the loyalists, seized the royal treasury at Daulatabad to the utter shock of Viceroy Alim-ul-Mulk and proclaimed the independence of the Deccan. What compelled these men, many of whom owed their positions to the Sultan, to take such a drastic step? The answer lies in two decades of ambitious expansion, administrative experimentation and growing tensions between the Sultan and the Dakhni nobility.

The foundations of Delhi's authority in the Deccan had been laid several decades earlier. While the Mamluk kings concentrated largely on consolidating northern and central India, Alau-ud-din Khalji's famous raid on Devagiri in 1296 opened the door for sustained Sultanate expansion into the Deccan and southern India. Subsequent campaigns, particularly those led by Malik Kafur, brought immense wealth and several southern kingdoms under Delhi's influence. Under Muhammad bin Tughluq, the Sultanate reached its greatest territorial extent, with its direct authority stretching across much of the subcontinent, including Maharashtra, Telangana and the Tamil country. Yet the very scale of this empire created administrative challenges that would eventually undermine imperial control.

Daulatabad and the Rise of the Dakhni Nobility

Portrait of the fortress at Daulatabad 

Expanding the empire was one thing; holding it was another. After savagely suppressing a rebellion led by his cousin Bahauddin Gurshasp and famously ordering him cooked in biryani, Muhammad bin Tughlaq decided in CE 1327 to transfer his capital from Delhi to Devagiri, renaming it Daulatabad. He envisioned this central stronghold as a launchpad to control the south and shield his realm from Mongol raids. The move compelled large sections of Delhi's nobility, officials and religious elites to relocate south. Many suffered greatly during the process, while those who arrived in the Deccan were incorporated into the administrative structure and appointed to influential positions such as Amiran-i-Sadah, officials who exercised fiscal, judicial and military authority over their jurisdictions. Over time, these officers developed independent power bases.

However, after logistical failures, acute water shortages, and northern revolts forced the Sultan to move the capital back to Delhi in CE 1335, the nobility was forced to march back, losing thousands more lives along the way. Those left behind were permanently disillusioned and increasingly detached from the Tughluq regime.

The Empire Begins to Fracture

With the Sultan preoccupied in the north, his southern dominions began to break away. In Madurai, Jalaluddin Ahsan Khan declared independence; even the execution of his son in Delhi failed to deter him. In Kampili, the Sangama brothers - Harihara and Bukka, former Tughlaq loyalists, broke ranks to lay the foundations of the Vijayanagara Empire, while local chieftains across Telangana defied imperial decrees.

The Deccan proper remained tethered to Delhi only through the steady hand of its Viceroy, Qutlugh Khan, who was also the Sultan's former preceptor. Qutlugh Khan quelled several early revolts, including those of Bidar’s governor, Nusrat Khan (CE 1337), and Afghan nobleman Ali Shah Natthu (CE 1340). Ali Shah and some of his brothers were captured and exiled to Ghazni; it is yet unclear if Natthu's brother - Hasan Gangu - the future founder of the Bahmani state, participated in this revolt. But in CE 1345, court factionalism poisoned the Sultan's mind against Qutlugh Khan. He was abruptly recalled to Delhi, stripping the Deccan of its stabilizing force and setting the stage for total collapse.

Paranoia, Purges, and the Point of No Return

Increasingly paranoid, Muhammad bin Tughlaq convinced himself that the old Delhi nobility settled in the south were behind every regional insurrection. He increasingly relied on men of comparatively modest backgrounds and attempted to reduce the influence of the entrenched aristocracy. Several key appointments in the Deccan and neighbouring provinces including Gujarat and Kampili reflected this policy.

At the same time, harsh measures against suspected rebels heightened tensions. The old Amirah-i-Sadah viewed this as an existential threat. Their worst fears were realised when Aziz-ud-din Khammar, the new governor in Malwa, pre-emptively executed around 80 local amirs in Dhar, accusing them of harbouring secessionist tendencies. Shortly after, when the new administration ordered the Deccan amirs to march to Gujarat to suppress rebels, they knew compliance meant walking straight to the executioner's block. Choosing survival, they revolted.

Ismail Shah, the First Sultan of the Deccan

The insurgent nobles declared Abul Fath Nasiru’d-din Ismail Mulk as their first Sultan. Ismail was a respected veteran whose brother, Malik Yel Afghan was stationed in Malwa and was expected to provide vital northern reinforcement in case of an attack from the Tughlaqs. While Ismail Shah became the symbolic head of the movement, military leadership increasingly rested in the hands of Hasan Gangu and other experienced commanders who would have to defend the fledgling state. The new Sultan promptly assigned key titles: Nur-ud-din became Khwaja-i Jahan, while Hasan Gangu was given the title of Zafar Khan and appointed as Amiru’l-Umara (Commander-in-Chief). Demonstrating tactical foresight, Ismail granted asylum to Gujarati rebels under Qazi Jalal, who was given the title of Qadr Khan.

Zafar Khan besieging the Gulbarga fort

The infant state's first task was securing its borders by reining in Kandhra, a Tughlaq loyalist holding the key fort of Gulbarga. As initial efforts by rebel commanders failed to achieve a breakthrough, Zafar Khan took charge without waiting for formal orders. Meanwhile, news arrived that Sultan Muhammad bin Tughlaq was marching south with a massive force and the Daulatabad leadership panicked, ordering the Khan to retreat immediately and defend the capital. Accusing the capital's nobles of cowardice, Zafar pressed the siege until Gulbarga’s defenses were crippled, and only then returned to face the main imperial army. His determination enhanced his reputation among both soldiers and nobles, reinforcing his image as the rebellion's most capable military strategist.

In a bid to rein in the rebels and recapture Daulatabad, the Sultan  engaged the rebel army outside Daulatabad in a fiercely contested battle. The rebels were on the brink of pushing back imperial lines when disaster struck: a stray arrow killed rebel commander Khwaja-i Jahan. Despite valiant counter-charges led by Zafar Khan, panic swept through the rebel ranks, turning the fight into a total rout.

The survivors regrouped inside Daulatabad and adopted a divide-and-conquer defense: Ismail Shah would hold the nearby citadel of Dharakhera to pin down imperial siege forces, while Zafar Khan and other commanders would retreat to their regional fiefs to rally fresh troops. The Sultan dispatched victory missives to Delhi, but before he could finish off the insurgency, a massive revolt broke out in Gujarat. Forced to rush north, he left general Malik Jauhar to maintain the siege of Dharakhera and sent Imad-ul-Mulk Sartez to secure Gulbarga and counter Zafar Khan. Jauhar’s brutal treatment of both rebels and civilians only galvanized local resistance.

Zafar Khan Turns the Tide

Zafar Khan

With Dharakhera near collapse, rebel leaders met at Sagar and resolved to break the siege of Daulatabad. Learning of this move, Imad-ul-Mulk Sartez rushed his army north from Gulbarga to intercept them. Zafar Khan outmanoeuvred the imperial troops, smashing their advance guard outside Daulatabad before marching south to confront Sartez directly at Sindtan. In a decisive pitched battle, Khan decimated the imperial force; Sartez was captured and beheaded. With the main Tughlaq army shattered, he returned to Daulatabad as an undisputed liberator, receiving a royal welcome from the Sultan and the general population.

Shortly after these successes, Ismail Shah voluntarily relinquished power in favour of Zafar Khan The decision reflected political realities. While Ismail was a capable defensive figurehead, Zafar was a battlefield mastermind who led from the front. Furthermore, Ismail’s brother had sided with the Tughlaqs during the war, clouding his family’s reliability. Zafar, by contrast, carried revolutionary legitimacy as the brother of the rebel Ali Shah and had repeatedly demonstrated the decisive leadership required of a monarch. Unanimously backed by the army and nobility, he ascended the throne in CE 1347 as Sultan Alau-ud-din Bahman Shah, marking the official birth of the Bahmani Sultanate, the Deccan's first independent Islamic empire. The crescent moon has risen in the Deccan and the remnants of Bahmani state would continue to rule parts of the region for over three centuries.

Heads up: The text in this post was embellished with a little AI polish, and the images are AI-generated.