Mongols in India: Babur & Humayun: The First two Mughal Emperors

There is volume of literature available on Mughal period of Indian history. Babur as founder of the dynasty has attracted special attention. Of course, Humayun also is an interesting personality. He lost his throne and kingdom to his adversary Sher Shah Suri, a remarkable Afghan genius, and was forced to go into exile. But he did not loose heart. After undergoing extremely hard days and many vicissitudes, he finally dogged his way back to recover a part of his lost kingdom and thus paved the way for his illustrious non, Akbar, to carve out a big Mughal Empire. The historians have been keen to term Babur as a ‘Turk’. I find it hard to digest this contention in the face of study of genealogical tables of his parents who were descendents of the twin sons of the Mongol Khan, Juman Khan. The stock of an individual is determined by his genealogy, by the race his father belongs to. But in case of Babur, his father as well as mother both belong to Mongol race. Hence, it is better to call him a ‘Mongol’. The historians have invariably credited Babur’s victories of Panipat and Khanua to his use of guns. This is very much true. The author, however, ventures to go a step further. The Indians had been self-satisfied and peace-loving people, with no aggressive tendencies. There had been little interest aggressive tendencies. There had been little interest in crossing the boundaries of the country to know and learn the art of warfare adopted by the warlike, turbulent people of the countries beyond the north west of India, as also of the latest development in weaponry. This lack of contacts proved very costly. Also the Indian kings who neglected the safe-guard of their north west frontier, had to pay a heavy price for this criminal neglect as most of the invasions of India had been from that direction. The present volume is a diversion from the trend of history writing. It is not just narration which is hard do assimilate. The author has attempted to incorporate a number of illustrations to make the work easily understandable. If appreciated, the author would like to attempt more works of this kind in the years to come.