Tipu ke kaarname, tipu ke holy converts

Death, his dominion

Author: DK Mittal
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: June 13, 2003
In his letter, ’Tipu Sultan: Eye of the tiger’ (May 31), Mr Obaidur Rahman Nadwi alleges a section of religious fanatics (read Hindus) has launched "a campaign to denigrate Muslims, particularly those who played a leading role in India’s struggle against the British. A recent publication. Tipu Sultan was a Patriot or a Religious Bigot? is part of this design". The author, DH Shankara Murty, has reportedly said Tipu invited Afghans and other raiders from Central Asia to invade India with instructions "execute a genocide of Hindus". Mr Nadwi rubbishes the claim. How one wishes what he says were true!

But Tipu himself left behind personal accounts of his atrocities against the Hindus. These details can be found in two autobiographies: Sultan-ut Tawarikh and Tarikh-i-Khudadadi, housed in the India Office Library, London. Noted historian KM Panicker chanced upon Tipu’s correspondence at the India Office Library. These have since been published. Take a letter (March 22, 1788) written to Abdul Khadar: "Over 12,000 Hindus were honoured with Islam ... Local Hindus should be brought before you and then converted to Islam. No Namboodri should be spared."

In a letter (December 14, 1788), he said to his army commander in Calicut: "You should capture and kill all Hindus. Those below 20 years may be kept in prison and 5,000 from the rest should be killed hanging from treetops". Writing on January 19, 1790, to Badroos Saman Khan, he said: "I have achieved a great victory recently in Malabar and over four lakh Hindus were converted to Islam. I am now determined to march against the cursed Raman Nair." Tipu issued orders in different parts of Malabar: "All means, truth or falsehood, fraud or force, should be employed to effect their (Hindu) universal conversion to Islam" (Historical Sketches of the South of India in an attempt to trace the History of Mysore, Mark Wilks Vol II, page 120).

Tipu corresponded with Zaman Shah, grandson Ahmad Shah Abdali and ruler of Afghanistan before the Third Mysore War (1792) and continued to do so till 1798. These letters were translated by Kabir Kausar in The History of Tipu Sultan. In one place, he wrote: "My exalted ambition has for its object a holy war ... In the midst of this land the Almighty protects this trace of Muhammadan dominion like the Ark of Noah and cuts short the extended arm of the abandoned infidel". In a letter dated February 5, 1797: "We should unite in carrying on a holy war against the enemies of our religion.... Thine armies shall ... render us victorious."

What Fra Bartolomaco, a Portuguese traveller and historian, saw in Malabar in 1790, he recorded in Voyage to East Indies: "Most of the men and women were hanged in Calicut ... That barbarian Tipu Sultan tied naked Christians and Hindus to the legs of elephants ... till the bodies ... were torn to prices. Temples and churches were ordered to be burnt down, desecrated and destroyed ... I myself helped many victims to cross the Varappuzha river" (pgs 141-142).

The sword of Tipu Sultan carried an inscription in Persian: "My victorious Sabre is lightening for the destruction of the unbelievers. Thou art our Lord, make him victorious who promotes the faith of Muhammad. Confound him, who refuses the faith of Muhammad and withold us from those who are so inclined" (History of Mysore, CH Rao, Vol III, p 1073). The Mysore Gazetteer also provides details about Tipu’s destruction of over 800 temples in South India. Who should we believe - Mr Nadwi or what Tipu Sultan’s own accounts and other contemporary records?


http://www.hvk.org/articles/0603/146.html