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The Deccan sultanates is a historiographical term referring to five medieval Persianate Muslim kingdoms based in the Deccan Plateau between the Krishna River and the Vindhya Range. They emerged after the disintegration of the Bahmani Sultanate and were ruled by various dynasties: Ahmadnagar, Berar, Bidar, Bijapur, and Golconda. Ahmadnagar was the first to declare independence, in 1490; followed by Bijapur and Berar in the same year. Bidar became independent in c. 1492, and Golconda in 1512 CE.
Although the five sultanates were all ruled by Muslims, their founders were of diverse origins: the Nizam Shahi dynasty, the ruling family of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate, was founded by Malik Hasan Bahri, a Marathi Muslim of Brahmin origin; the Berar Sultanate by a Kannadiga Muslim of Brahmin origin; the Bidar Sultanate by a Georgian slave; the Bijapur Sultanate by a foreigner who may have been a Georgian slave purchased by Mahmud Gawan; and the Golconda Sultanate by a slave of Iranian Turkmen origin.
All the Deccan sultanates based their legitimacy on being the successor states of the Bahmani Sultanate, and continued to use Bahmanid coins instead of issuing their own coins. Although generally rivals, the sultanates did ally with each other against the Vijayanagara Empire in 1565, permanently weakening Vijayanagara in the Battle of Talikota. Notably, the alliance destroyed the entire city of Vijayanagara, with important temples being razed to the ground.
In 1574, after a coup in Berar, Ahmadnagar invaded and conquered it. In 1619, Bidar was annexed by Bijapur. The sultanates were later conquered by the Mughal Empire: Berar was stripped from Ahmadnagar in 1596; Ahmadnagar was completely taken between 1616 and 1636; and Golconda and Bijapur were conquered during Aurangzeb's 1686–87 campaign.
The Ahmadnagar Sultanate was founded by Ahmad Nizam Shah, who was the son of Nizam ul-Mulk Malik Hasan Bahri, prominent in Bahmanid politics as the leader of the Deccani Muslim party at the court. Nizam-ul-Mulk Bahri was a military slave, formerly a Hindu Brahmin from Vijayanagar originally named Timapa who converted to Islam, although the Brahmin lineage might have been a genealogical topos rather than fact, which, along with military training, Persian education and conversion by patronage, was meant to share with the origin of the Bahmanid dynasty. He became the regent of Muhammad Shah Bahmani after the former had devised the execution of Mahmud Gawan. As the head of the Sunni Deccani party, Nizam-ul-Mulk led the wholesale massacre of the Shi'a foreigners, especially the Turks and Georgian population in Bidar, by the orders of the Bahmani Sultan. After the politically charged murder of Nizam-ul-Mulk Bahri, and frustrated with the weakened Bahmani Sultan and the factionalised administration at Bidar, the outrated son, Ahmad Nizam Shah, the governor of Junnar, defeated the Bahmani army led by general Jahangir Khan on 28 May 1490, declared independence and established dynastic rule over Ahmadnagar. The territory of the sultanate was located in the northwestern Deccan, between the sultanates of Gujarat and Bijapur. Initially, his capital was in Junnar. In 1494, the foundation was laid for the new capital of Ahmadnagar. Malik Ahmed Shah, after several attempts, secured the fortress of Daulatabad in 1499.
After Malik Ahmed Shah's death in 1510, his son Burhan, a boy of seven, was installed in his place. In 1538, under the influence of Shah Tahir, an Imam, he would establish Nizari Shi'ism as the state religion. Burhan Shah I died in Ahmadnagar in 1553. He left six sons, of whom Hussain succeeded him. After the death of Hussain Shah I in 1565, his son Murtaza (a minor) ascended the throne. While Murtaza was a child, his mother, Khanzada Humayun Sultana, ruled as a regent for several years. Murtaza Shah annexed Berar in 1574. On his death in 1588, his son Miran Hussain ascended the throne; but his reign lasted only a little more than ten months, as he was poisoned. Ismail, a cousin of Miran Hussain was raised to the throne, but the actual power was in the hands of Jamal Khan, the leader of the Deccani group in the court. He led the massacre of foreign nobles at Ahmadnagar, causing all the Persian nobles to flee and take service at Bijapur, including the historian Firishta himself.
"There were massacres (qatl-e 'ām) twice in the city, in the course of which not a single person from abroad was left alive. The killing spree lasted for three days. Good people like learned men and traders, who had assembled here in this period, were all slain, and their houses were destroyed."
Jamal Khan also enforced the Mahdawi religion on the state. He was killed in the battle of Rohankhed in 1591 and soon Ismail Shah was also captured and confined by his father Burhan, who ascended the throne as Burhan Shah II. He reinstated Shia Islam as the state religion. After the death of Burhan Shah, his eldest son Ibrahim ascended the throne. Ibrahim Shah died only after a few months in a battle with the Bijapur Sultanate. Soon, Chand Bibi, the aunt of Ibrahim Shah, proclaimed Bahadur, the infant son of Ibrahim Shah, as the rightful Sultan; and she became regent. In 1596, a Mughal attack led by Murad was repulsed by Chand Bibi.
After the death of Chand Bibi in July 1600, Ahmadnagar was conquered by the Mughals, and Bahadur Shah was imprisoned. But Malik Ambar, and other Ahmadnagar officials, defied the Mughals and declared Murtaza Shah II as sultan in 1600 at a new capital, Paranda. Malik Ambar became prime minister and vakīl-us-saltanat of Ahmadnagar. Later, the capital was shifted first to Junnar and then to a new city called Khadki (later Aurangabad). After the death of Malik Ambar, his son Fath Khan surrendered to the Mughals in 1633 and handed over the young Nizam Shahi ruler Hussain Shah, who was sent as a prisoner to the fort of Gwalior. In a last stand, Shahaji, with the assistance of Bijapur, placed an infant scion of the Nizam Shahi dynasty, Murtaza, on the throne but acted as regent. In 1636, Aurangzeb, the Mughal viceroy of Deccan, finally annexed the sultanate to the Mughal empire, after defeating Shahaji.
The Berar Sultanate was founded by Fathullah Imad-ul-Mulk, who was born a Kannadiga Hindu, but was captured as a boy by the Bahmani forces, which were on an expedition against the Vijayanagara empire, and reared as a Muslim. In 1490, during the disintegration of the Bahmani Sultanate, Imad-ul-Mulk, then governor of Berar, declared independence and founded the Imad Shahi dynasty of the Berar Sultanate. He established the capital at Achalpur (Ellichpur), and the Gavilgad and Narnala were also fortified by him.
Upon his death in 1504, Imad-ul-Mulk was succeeded by his eldest son, Ala-ud-din. In 1528, Ala-ud-din resisted the aggression of Ahmadnagar with help from Bahadur Shah, Sultan of Gujarat. The next ruler of Berar, Darya, first tried to ally with Bijapur, to prevent the aggression of Ahmadnagar, but was unsuccessful. Later, he helped Ahmednagar on three occasions against Bijapur. After his death in 1562, his infant son Burhan succeeded him; but early in Burhan's reign Tufal Khan, one of his ministers, usurped the throne. In 1574, Murtaza I, Sultan of Ahmadnagar, annexed Berar to his sultanate. Burhan, Tufal Khan, and Tufal's son Shamshir-ul-Mulk, were taken to Ahmadnagar and confined to a fortress where all of them subsequently died.
Bidar was the smallest of the five Deccan sultanates. The Sultanate was founded by Qasim Barid I, who was a Georgian enslaved by Turks. He joined the service of Bahmani ruler Mahmud Shah Bahmani (r. 1482–1518) as a sar-naubat (commander), and later became a mir-jumla (governor) of the Bahmani Sultanate. In 1492, he became de facto ruler of Bahmani, although Sultan Mahmud Shah Bahmani remained as the nominal ruler.
After Mahmud Shah Bahmani's death in 1504, his son Amir Barid controlled the administration of the Bahmani Sultanate. In 1528, with the flight of the last Bahmani ruler, Kalimullah, from Bidar, Amir Barid became practically an independent ruler. Amir Barid was succeeded by his son Ali Barid, who was the first to assume the title of shah. Ali Barid participated in the Battle of Talikota and was fond of poetry and calligraphy.
The last ruler of the Bidar Sultanate, Amir Barid Shah III, was defeated in 1619, and the sultanate was annexed to the Bijapur Sultanate.
Located in southwestern India, straddling the Western Ghats range of southern Maharashtra and northern Karnataka, the Bijapur Sultanate was ruled by the Adil Shahi dynasty from 1490 to 1686. The founder of the dynasty, Yusuf Adil Shah, may have been a Georgian slave who was purchased by Mahmud Gawan. Other historians have mentioned him as of Persian or Turkmen origin. Yusuf was originally a provincial governor of the Bahmani Sultanate; in 1490, he attained de facto independence. In 1510, a Portuguese colonial expedition succeeded in conquering the Adil Shahi port of Goa. Ismail Adil Shah, Yusuf's son, and his successors embellished the capital at Bijapur with numerous monuments.
Ibrahim Adil Shah I switched to a Deccani Muslim identity, and converted strongly to Sunni Islam, the religion of the Deccani Muslims. He deviated from the traditions of his predecessor and introduced many innovations in the political and religious policies, discontinuing previous Shia practices and restoring the exercise of the Sunni Islamic practices. He degraded most of the Afaqi (foreign) faction (with a few exceptions), and in their place enrolled the Deccani Muslims to services. Consequently, he brought Sunni Muslims to power and ended Shia domination by dismissing them from their posts
The Adil Shahis fought the Vijayanagara Empire, which lay to the south, across the Tungabhadra River, but fought the other Deccan sultanates as well. Four of the five sultanates combined forces to decisively defeat Vijayanagara at the Battle of Talikota in 1565. After the battle, the empire broke up, and Bijapur seized control of the Raichur Doab. In 1619, the Adil Shahis conquered the neighbouring sultanate of Bidar, which was incorporated into their realm.
Later in the 17th century, the Marathas revolted successfully under Shivaji's leadership, captured major parts of the sultanate, and its capital, Bijapur. The weakened sultanate was conquered by Aurangzeb in 1686 with the fall of Bijapur, bringing the dynasty to an end.
The dynasty's founder, Sultan Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk, migrated to Delhi from Persia with some of his relatives and friends in the beginning of the 16th century. Later he migrated south to the Deccan and served the Bahmani Sultan Mohammed Shah I. Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk conquered Golconda and became the governor of the Telangana region in 1518, after the disintegration of the Bahmani sultanate. Soon after, he declared his independence and took the title of Qutb Shah.
The dynasty ruled for 175 years, until the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's army besieged and conquered Golconda in 1687.
The rulers of the Deccan sultanates made a number of cultural contributions in the fields of literature, art, architecture, and music.
An important contribution was the development of the Dakhani language, which, having started development under the Bahamani rulers, developed into an independent spoken and literary language during this period by continuously borrowing from Arabic-Persian, Marathi, Kannada, and Telugu. Dakhani later became known as Dakhani Urdu to distinguish it from North Indian Urdu.
Deccani miniature painting—which flourished in the courts of Ahmadnagar, Bijapur, and Golconda—is another major cultural contribution of the Deccan sultanates.
Architectural splendours of the Deccan such as Charminar and Gol Gumbaz belong to this period. A number of monuments built by the Deccan Sultanates are on a tentative list for nomination as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The religious tolerance displayed by the Nizam Shahi, Adil Shahi, and Qutb Shahi rulers is also worthy of mention.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Deccan sultanates”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.