Harking back: Need to analyse Lahore’s history in a scientific manner

Such has become our mindset that we have ceased to analyse historical events outside our ‘official’ narrative. Facts no longer matter. As time passes events become more and more bizarre, leading to a situation where we have no idea where our actions are leading to.

To the west of Pakistan a new dispensation has come about, those violent sprinkling exist within our beautiful country. To the east is a country where the majority cleanse Muslim praying places. To think in broader patriotic terms without a communal sprinkling seems impossible. The result is that we have ‘single syllabi’ and admissions have become a major legal minefield what with 1,800 Matric students getting 1,100 out of 1,100 marks. No other place on earth has this ever happened. If that is not a laugh then what else is. Our legislators support such bizarre happenings. Learning is almost a crime in such circumstances.

Let us look at events at Lahore over the centuries keeping in mind our current mindset. Take the Afghan invader Mahmud of Ghazni who invaded our land 17 times and enriched his own land. When he defeated the ruler of Lahore Raja Jayapala at Peshawar in 1001 AD, the proud but defeated Rajput returned home and committed ‘Johar’ - a Rajput ritual of self-immolation - outside Mori Gate where once the River Ravi flowed. Any other self-respecting people would declare him a national hero. Not in present-day Lahore where his faith determines his status.

But what about the foreign invader? In 1021 the Afghan conquered Lahore and completely flattened it. In the process he removed all the pots and pans of the walled city, killed almost everyone and took as slaves all the young women, men and children he found on his invasion path. In that invasion of 1021 alone he collected 600,000 slaves and sold most of them in faraway markets of Samarkand and even Constantinople (Istanbul). So his interest was in slaves, gold, brass pots and pans, textiles and the entire food stores of Punjab. Yet he is known as a hero among Pakistanis today.

What this invader did with the temples of the sub-continent (mosques did not exist till then) and their gold and silver idols is another story. Yet it is glossed over with so much praise that it is nothing but self-denial of the truth. Let us consider another two national heroes of Punjab and Lahore and see what we make of them today.

The Mughals were foreign invaders of Mongol origin from Uzbekistan. Today their Arabic-Persian corrupted name for ‘Mongols’ is the Mughals. The greatest among them Akbar (1556-1605) ruled Punjab and Lahore with ruthless vigour. They taxed the poor to such a degree that he faced rebellion in Punjab. That is where we hear the name of Abdullah, better known as Dulla Bhatti. He was duped by the emperor to come for negotiations, but was arrested and skinned alive and for a full one week his skinned body hung from the Lahore Fort’s Akbari Gate. Do we ever consider that aspect of this ‘great’ emperor. But then so were the skinned bodies of his father, uncle and cousins. It was to set an example in barbarity. Do we mourn that today? Not a chance in Hell.

But how do we see Akbar today? He was after all a foreign person who pillaged the poor. The Lahore Fort and the walls of the old city were built by him after a famine broke out. Almost 25,000 starving people of Lahore and its surrounding areas were used as free labour and brick makers for a square meal a day. Yet the ‘Akbarnama’ written in his praise does not mention this atrocity. History needs to be rewritten in terms of what actually happened, and the sources, what to speak of common sense, are all there. After all one day the truth must come forth.

Let us move on to study just how after the death of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb (1658-1707) we see that the Afghans again started invading Punjab and trying to take over Lahore. As we have more sources of this period available we can analyse just who and what were the forces at work. By this time the Punjab and Lahore had a fair mix of Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs. The Sikhs had been persecuted for their anti-establishment role, more so derived from a leadership that believed in all humans being equal.

But the struggle against new Afghan invaders led to a combined patriotic effort to oust all foreign forces. We never study the role of the Marathas who helped the Sukerchakia and Ahluwalia Misls of Punjab in the great ‘1759 Battle of Lahore’ when the Durrani Empire of Afghanistan were roundly beaten and forced to return to their country. Here the Hindu Marathas, the Sikhs of the two major Misls and the Muslim soldiers with both the forces defeated the foreign invaders that the Durranis were.

Even more important is the fact that the Maratha commanders Tukoji Holkar and Sabaji Shinde actually became the rulers of Lahore. How many school and college textbooks tell us this amazing fact? But the best one is that the Muslim and Hindu traders of Lahore, crushed under Afghan taxes and wanton raids on their stocks, actually assisted the patriotic forces of the land. In a way everyone collectively defeated the foreign invaders, and communal feeling did not play a role at all.

For that matter we all know that the Muslim and Hindu traders of Lahore, especially of Arain origin, played a major role in the victory of the Three Sikh Triumvirate rulers in 1766. The three were Lehna Singh Majithia, Gujjar Singh Bhangi and Sobha Singh Kanhiya. These three had led a prolonged guerrilla war against Ahmed Shah Abdali, ultimately defeating the Afghan invader.

Again it was economic exploitation of the people by the Three Sikh rulers that saw the Muslim Arain traders for a second time open the gates of Lahore for Ranjit Singh in 1799. So we have scores of examples where the patriotic forces, surely with their economic interest in mind, worked against foreign invaders. Today in the hearts and minds of the people of Lahore Maharajah Ranjit Singh has a special place because of his fair and equitable non-communal role in the lives of the people of Punjab. For that matter his army had more Muslims than Sikhs (have you ever read about this fact), and they all showed exemplary bravery and loyalty in battle and in affairs of State.

Yet today given the 1947 British imperialist moves to Partition the sub-continent, we have a situation where today the entire sub-continent is increasingly becoming extreme in matters of faith. All it shows is a lack of understanding of the basic facts of our history. In old Lahore toleration was the hallmark of the literate and well-groomed. That is no longer the case.

Take the case of the ‘Lal Khoo’ inside Mochi Gate where Guru Arjan was imprisoned in the house of a Hindu and where the Muslim sage Mian Mir prayed for his release. It is an amazing Lahore cultural landmark. Yet today it has been taken over, and as expected collects money. This needs to be stopped. But then is this possible in the environment of today?