The Mughal Empire and Historical Reputation: Crash Course

[dalsingh101]

[amardeep]

Interesting. There should be made videos of Sikh history like this

[dalsingh101]

Interesting. There should be made videos of Sikh history like this

Why?

[amardeep]

People enjoy these kinds of short introductory videos nowadays. They are short, cover a wide range of topics, graphical etc. Leaving the lame humour aside, its quite good.

[dalsingh101]

What would be our objective?

[amardeep]

To teach about Sikh history

[dalsingh101]

Who we teaching?

[amardeep]

Gore and non-sikhs in generel

[dalsingh101]

What do you think we should be trying to achieve with this?

[amardeep]

Position the history of the Sikhs into the history of India. When you read books about 18-19th Century India the SIkhs are most often just mentioned in a few notes thats about it.

Take a book on the history of colonization of India. The mentioning of Sikhs is very limited. A mainstreaming needs to be done. Popular media can contribute to this alongside other more "serios" efforts.

 

[dalsingh101]

When you look at that vid in the OP, they've sort of positioned Sikhs already, albeit indirectly, as one of the regions in the north that expressed their own own aspirations during the period that Aurengzaab was busy trying to Islamify the south.  

[amardeep]

Yep thats my point. The Sikhs are always positioned as a side note in the history of India.

[dalsingh101]

So what are you suggesting?

 

That we try to make ourselves centre stage?

[dalsingh101]

Been thinking about it. You know what the problem is:

The fact that Sikhs (1) fought and defeated Islamic fundamentalism and (2) the anti-imperial nature of the original Khalsa movement. 

 

The first brings to mind the SERIOUS situation in the mid-east and Europe today. Let's be frank, the situation is tense. A terrorism attack and an unpredictable reaction to it can take place any minute.  

And the second point is scary for some because it is a perfect example of a successful, armed ground-level uprising that broke the hold of a powerful government over a region.

 

 

[amardeep]

There is much in Sikh history for others to learn about - especially in terms of military history. The Afghans are known as a people who've never been defeated - "the grave of empires" etc. Yet the Sikhs were able to kick their asses out of Punjab, Kashmir and parts of Sindh. If it were not for the SIkhs, the map of India would look entirely different today. Prior to to misl rule, the borders of Afghanistan went all the way down to the suburbs of New Delhi. After 1818, the Sikhs had cut the Afghan empire in half. This is something for military historians to ponder about.

In terms of fighting jihadists, the Sikhs destroyed many jihadist movements during the 1820s - the most famous being the jihadi revolt of Syed Ahmad Barelvi (the Jihad most likely inspired from him meeting other jihadists in Saudi arabia)

No, not that we put Sikhs in center stage, but rather to put them into their rightful state. ... Most hindus dont even know about Sikh contribution to Indian history.

[dalsingh101]

I'm not into this teaching outsiders. I'd prefer focusing on our own lot. 

 

But then we have the persistent problem of our own lot using their ancestors achievements to make themselves feel like they are the best thing since sliced bread. lol

[amardeep]

Forget about the Punjabis. We've had Sikhi for the past 500 years, - no point in keep trying to educate us loosers we still dont get it.

[dalsingh101]

Okay. 

 

But even then, from a purely historical perspective (not mine), it will be pretty hard to counter the established narrative. 

 

Remember, that narrative was developed by Europeans whilst they were eyeing up the Sikh kingdom from the parts of India that they had already subjugated. Rattan Singh Bhangu says as much, and so do many of the early Euro sources from Ranjit Singh's time. 

Besides, bigging up the past in that way usually serves to highlight our current state.....the less said about the better. 

 

I think it would be better to focus on analysing history in a critical fashion and trying to show apnay the lessons to learn from it. Not focus on how great we are but what political and social mistakes we made (as well as highlighting the successes of course).

 

I think threads like:

 

How multiculturalism can be very transient thing in a region. One minute we have a multicultural, relatively open society, then polarisation takes place (i.e. under Jahangir and Aurenga), then there is foreign interventions and colonialism and being co-opted. The loss of wealth through being colonised. The identification with and manipulation of the foreign imperial machine. The move from a might is right society, to one where numbers start to take precedent. 

How strong willed people who aren't particularly religious usually get themselves into positions of power.

 

How political and demographic circumstances change rapidly and how these impact on a people are better avenues to explore rather than, check out how bad ass we were. 

 

That whole 'golden era' and trying to re-achieve it in a modern context is problematic. 

 

 

Edited September 11, 2015 by dalsingh101

[amardeep]

Sher:

Afghans have been defeated so many times and their country has been under foreign rule for so long. even today when i write this post, Afghanistan is under NATO control.

some of the invaders and colonists included Indians (Maurya empire and a Brahmin dynasty around 11th century AD)  Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Timur, many Persian empires, Mughals, British colonists, Marathas, Sikhs (both won and controlled border areas like Peshawar, Attock, Khyber), Soviets, Uzbeks, and now NATO.

There is a saying that it is easy to invade Afghanistan but difficult to keep it subjugated. A large majority of the ones you mention above managed to invade it but never to subjugate the Afghans. There were constant uprisings and the amount of tax they deduced from the areas were limited. Even today, NATO and western powers only have power over Kabul... The president is more like the mayor of Kabul than he is the president of Afghanistan... Even the Mughals could'n subjugate the Afghans for longer periods of time... Read up on history and you'll see.

Yes Sikhs played their part in keeping NW India free from Afghans and other Muslim invaders for some time but how successful they were, just have a look at the map today. in other words, over 2/3 of Punjabi population converted. other border states like Rajasthan and Gujarat (next to Sind which fell to Muslims in 8th century) did pretty well in comparison.

Now you're mixing up conversions to islam and keeping/kicking invaders out. These are two different things. Besides, a majority of Punjabis had already converted to islam prior to Misl rule.

What!! how did Sikhs do that? Under Maharaja Ranjit Singh' command? But Maharaja himself controlled just western half of Punjab himself so this claim sounds too bombastic.

Read up on history and see.

Once again, Sikhs did fight against Jihadis and did beat them in some battles but Marathas deserve a pat on their backs for getting rid of mughals (Aurangzeb fought for over 25 years against them and emptied shahi khazana in the process) and crushing jihadi spirit for all times to come.

I never said the Marathas did'n contribute with anything so im not sure why you're bringing this up then.

It's up to you to provide highlight some of the major contributions and for that you need to study REAL history. You cannot kearn history through Taksali comic books or Youtube videos of fake historians like Udhoke or Ajmer singh

Oh damn, I always assumed comic books were the way forward!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 20, 2015 by amardeep

[asingh10]

Afghanistan has been conquered several times, it was only during mughal times that these Pathans started to rebel against Mughals and then later during Abdali they asserted themselves as a separate nation. Before that, Abdali was serving under Nadir Shah, an Iranian. Afghanistan had no identity, it was piece of land that was wrestled over between various Indian and Iranian empires, until Jahangir lost it to Safavid Iranians for good.

lol Indians buy into the Islamist propaganda of Afghans being undefeated without doing any research.

All of those marauders like Ghaznavi and Ghori were not Pathans, they were Turks from Central Asia who conquered Afghanistan first and then made it their base to launch attacks into subcontinent.

Edited September 25, 2015 by asingh10