________________
SEPT 6, 1872.)
ON THE BHAR KINGS.
265
Shahjahan in the Dak’hin. The prince, on his return, was sent to Kángrah, and though it was not advisable that Súraj should accompany him he was allowed to join the expedition and marched to Kangrah with Shah Quli Khán Muhammad Taqi, Shahjahán's Bakhshi. Shah Quli was soon compelled to complain of Suraj Mall, but was recalled, and Rajah Bikrámajít was sent instead. The time which elapsed before Bikrámajit could join his commund was used by Suraj Mall for mischief. He allowed a large number of imperial soldiers to return to the jágír on the plea that the war had lasted a long time and their outfit was bad, but told them to return when Bikrámajit should arrive. He then plundered the whole district at the
foot of the hills, which was the jágír of Núr Jahán's father, and when Sayyid Café Bárha opposed him with some of the troops that had not yet left, he killed him. Bikrámajit arrived in the end of the 13th year, and Súraj Mall tried in vain to gain his favour by flattery. He therefore openly attacked Bikrámajít, but was repulsed, and Mau and Núr púr, and the whole district, were occupied by the Imperialists. Suraj Mall fled to the hills and perished miserably soon after.. Fort Kotlah also, which lies between Núrpur and Kángrah, was taken, and Mádhú Singh, brother of Suraj Mall, who commanded it, together with his son, was sent to court (A. H. 1028).
(To be continued.)
ON THE BHAR KINGS OF EASTERN OUDH.
By W. C. BENETT, B.C.S., GONDA. THREE years ago I wrote of Dal and Bal, the manes. Leaving legend for history, we find great Bhar heroes of eastern Oudh, that they that Firishtah, probably drawing from the constantly appeared in the legends of any time Tabakát i Násiri, records that "In 545 (1246-47 between 1000 A.D. and 1400 A. D., and that | "A. D.) Sultán Nasiruddin marched through the though they had eluded all my attempts to "centre of the Duab, and took the Tilsindah (?) saddle them with a date, they probably lived at "fort, and in the same year advancing tothe beginning of the thirteenth century. I have "wards Karra laid waste the villages of Dalki since succeeded in hunting them down, and the "and Malki and took prisoners a number of partial elucidation of a dark chapter of middle "their family and servants. This Dalki and Indian history may prove interesting.
“ Malki were kings in the neighbourhood of the The ancestors of the great Kanhpuria clan of “Jamná, and had formerly royal stations at Rajputs, Sahas and Rahas, are said to have com- " Kálinjar and Karra." pleted the conquest of the western half of the Dalmau is about thirty miles to the west of Pratâbgarh district in Oudh by inflicting a de- Karra, the similarity of the names Dalki, Malki, of cisive defeat on the Bhars, whose kings Tiloki Firishtah, Dal and Bal of the Bais and general and Biloki were left dead on the battle-field. tradition, and Tiloki and Biloki of the KanhA tradition of the Bais of Dhundhia Khera re- purias, the identity of the dates in the Bais, lates that Abhaichand, the founder of that house Kanhpuria, and Firishtah's accounts, and the in Oudh, defeated Dal and Bal on the banks of identity of locality in all, place it beyond doubt the Ganges in the Roy Bareilly district. In my that the Dalki and Malki of history are no others report on the chief clans of the Roy Bareilly than the great Bhar Kings of tradition who fell district I have proved beyond reasonable doubt in the desperate fight with the Muhammadans that Abhaichand and Sahas and Rahas were con- under the walls of the Dalmau fort. The date temporaries and lived early in the 19th century." of their death is therefore 1247 A. D. That A third tradition states that Dal and Bal fell the local account should have substituted Ibrafighting with Ibrahim Shah Sharki of Jaunpur him Sharki for the earlier Muhammadan conat Dalmau on the Ganges, and near the boun- queror presents no difficulty, as such mistakes in dary of the Roy Bareilly and Pratâbgarh dis- tradition are of constant occurrence. tricts. The locality is fixed by the fact that a So much for the date. The next question large crowd of Ahirs collects once a year at a is who were these Bhar Kings? We are helped mound, the reputed tomb of the chieftains, about some way towards an answer by two inscriptions 3 mile from the fort, and offer milk to their discovered at Kálanjar, and criticized by Lassen
* Report on the Family His:ory of Roy Bareilly Clans, pp. 3, 17, and appendix, p. lll.
