Persian sources
Three important chronicles were written in this period – Abul Fazl’s Akbarnamah, Abdul Qadir Badauni’s Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh and the Tabaqat-i Akbari of Nizam-ud-din Ahmad. While the Tabaqat-i Akbari is a mundane recounting of events if compared with the other two chronicles, the works of Abul Fazl and Badauni are much more complex, interesting and mark a definite advancement in medieval historiographical traditions. Both provide contrary viewpoints to Akbar and his policies. While, Fazl adopts a more positive outlook towards the emperor whereas, Badauni goes to the extent of portraying Akbar as a destroyer of Islam in India. The reason for such a stark contrast in their opinions can be attributed to their personal lives, education and conception of history.
Badauni was born in 1540 in an orthodox Sunni family, which was remotely connected with the lower ladder of the imperial nobility. He was well-versed in both traditional and rational sciences. Although, he was associated with Shaikh Mubarak’s liberal environment free of fanaticism for nearly 40 years, he considered his education and subsequent leanings to be orthodox. It is this inclination, which shaped his resentful attitude against Akbar and his policies. Badauni gained prominence in the Mughal court because of his literary ability and his success in arguments against the ulama in the Ibadat Khana at a time when Akbar was trying to undermine the ulama. At that time he did not know that he was striking at the very root of the order he would try to defend at a later stage. Once the ulema had been successfully defeated with the signing of the Mazhar Akbar no longer required his service and he himself was feeling disillusioned with the existing situation at the court, which came to be dominated by a large number of “liberals” and non-Muslims. This coupled with the drastic rise of Abu’l Fazl in Akbar’s favour added to Badauni’s discontentment as he believed Fazl to be a dishonest and hypocritical man not worthy of the status he was receiving in court at that time. For Badauni, Islam was naïve and personal. He was over-confident in the correctness of his own notion of what Islam stood for and so he rejected those with a different conception as misguided heretics and infidels. He criticized the ulama, accusing them of creating doubt in people’s minds regarding the Prophet and imams; at the same time, he also hated Abul Fazl and Faizi. He also held Sufism in utter contempt and hated the Shias and Hindus. According to Harbans Mukhia, Badauni shared great scorn for the Ulema; and with the Ulema he shared the hatred for Abul Fazl. He saw the sharia as the final criterion of judgment and opposed all those who deviated from it. Further, he did not want to adapt it to the level of the state. Instead, he wanted the creation of a strong central government, headed by a monarch of unimpeachable Sunni orthodoxy, energetic in his attempts to suppress the Shias, heretics and Hindus and who would neutralize the old orthodox thinking and the new scholars who were hell bent on radicalizing and liberalizing Islam. which would suppress heretics and infidels. This conception was totally different from that of Akbar’s and with the existing conditions, which were marked by a shift towards a new flexibility and more liberal thinking. Badauni, gradually realized that his intense zeal for faith and the consequent adoption of rigid and orthodox attitudes were a complete mismatch in the emerging setup. Thus, while outwardly, by carrying out the emperor’s orders- like participating in the translation of Hindu and secular texts into Persian- it may appear that he tried to compromise with the new situation, but according to Harbans Mukhia in the “inner recesses of his heart he refused to compromise”.
On Akbar’s orders he undertook the translation of a number of existing works such as the Ramayana, Mahabharata, Atharva Veda etc. His first original work was “Kitab-ul-Ahadis” which spoke about the advantages of waging holy wars and archery. Nothing much, however, is known about it. The second was the Najat-ul-Rashid, a socio-ethical treatise interspersed with anecdotes and discussions. In it, he boldly expressed his views and theoretically discussed the problems of Akbar’s reign, without naming the Emperor or any of his supporters. This was a disguised attempt to attack and condemn Akbar’s ‘un-Islamic’ practices. The book serves as an adjunct to Badauni’s third and main work, the Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh. While the Najat-ul-Rashid reiterated the principles on which orthodox Sunnism could be revived, the Muntakhab was an attempt to destroy the faith of the Sunnis in Akbar. Thus these two works supplement and complement each other.
The Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh (‘Selections from Histories’) was written in secret. Badauni himself says that his disgust with the changes taking place during Akbar’s reign, against which he could openly register only limited protest, compelled him to resort to the writing of this book secretly to record the “true” version of the events of the time. Distressed by what he thought was an organized undermining of Islam by Akbar, he wrote the Muntakhab as an alternative to the contemporary histories. At another place, however, Badauni states that he wrote the Muntakhab as a penance for the translation of the “infidels’ works” which he had been compelled to undertake.
The work is divided into three volumes. The first volume deals with the narrative history of the Muslims rulers up to Humayun, which provides neither a background nor a contrast to Akbar’s period. The selection of events, though mostly in a chronological order, is random and haphazard. Also, he makes no formal assessment of the reign of a Sultan or a dynasty as a whole. However, individual events, acts or persons are frequently the subject of his succinct and crisp remarks. In fact, the value of this work lies in his private comments, as well as the epigrams and chronograms written by him, some of which were even nasty. For instance, on the death of Muhammad bin Tughlaq he writes that “The Sultan was relieved of the people and the people were relieved of the Sultan”. Although, Badauni himself may not have acknowledged all his sources it is quite evident that this volume is well researched and he made use of the prominent source material dating back to the early medieval period.
The second volume of the Muntakhab deals with the reign of Akbar and is the most important work of Badauni. It is an annual chronicle where events have been narrated under the head of the year of their occurrence. However, he recorded only “events of a general importance” and omitted “the minor ones.” Mukhia suggests that this was because while Badauni wished to give a “true” account of Akbar’s reign, his response to the contemporary circumstances was “negative”, i.e., he condemned Akbar’s “heresies”, but does not suggest any alternative, not even a return to the past. This object also determined his use of the sources and his attitude towards them. As such, for his account, particularly in the second volume of the Muntakhab, Badauni depends more on his personal testimony than on any documentary research. Badauni’s originality in this work lies in the way in which he evaluates the personalities of the time. He also often intertwines biographical notes with the narrative of events, for example, when he mentions the capture of Nagarkot, he gives a short account of Birbal’s life.
The third volume is in form of a Tazkira in which he gives biographies sketches of the mashaikh and ulama of Akbar’s age, as well as the physicians and poets of Akbar’s court. However, Badauni excludes from this list of “fallen men” like “obscure muslims” and “accursed” Hindus. Further, Badauni passes judgment on the life, art, views, morals, piety and nature of his subjects. But as he himself admits, this judgment is based on their attitude or influence on Islam.
Badauni’s style is naturally informal and unaffected. He writes in a clear and simple language, interspersing his narrative with numerous anecdotes, couplets and elegies, at times misplaced. His chronograms are valuable both for identifying the dates of the occurrence of events as well as for ascertaining his judgment regarding persons and events. For aesthetic expression, Badauni uses poetry. Harbans Mukhia is of the opinion that his verses were a mere formality.
