I love old forts & buildings. Their architecture & their scale of construction attracts me. So does the history & stories, traditions & myths associated with them.
Golkonda fort in Hyderabad fascinates me.
For several centuries this fort has a played a very crucial role in the evolving history of Hyderabad. The walls, edifices & chambers of the fort, or what remain of them, are privy to the tales of rise & fall of many empires, sultanates, grandeur, deceit & valour of people which had an impact, not only in the southern part of India but also bore close relation to the happenings during the period of Mughal Empire & thereafter. A keen observer can feel the sounds of laughter, merriment, of dance & music, sounds of the hoofs of horses & occasional clash of swords, wails & cries of those injured & dying as well as the deafening roar of artillery guns of the Mughals that the walls of the fort must have withstood.
On one of my early visits to Golkonda my guide took me to a huge chamber within the walls of the fort where I was shown figures of Shri Ram, Sita, Lakshaman & Hanuman engraved on a wall of a huge chamber. This portion of the wall is accessible, within the chamber, through a staircase. I was told that the figures were etched by Bhakt Ramadas, using his finger nails. He was imprisoned here by Thana Shah, the reigning Sultan of the time. Bhakt Ramadas spent 12 years of his life in imprisonment in this chamber. A paste of vermilion covers these figures & hence they are prominently visible.
And here starts my story about those times. You may call it history, story, tradition, faith, myth, circumstances or whatever for there is a very thin line dividing all these when it comes to rise & fall of Sultan Thana Shah, the last Sultan of Qutub Shahi dynasty who ruled from Golkonda.
Shah Raju Qattal or Shah Raju, a Sufi saint, had set up his abode near the Fateh Darwaza of Golkonda. He had many disciples in the city & usually in the evenings they would gather in his hospice for listening to his wise words on the matters of religion in particular & society in general. Shah Raju had a young boy staying in his abode, who was his ‘mureed’ & would run small errands for him. The boy was shy, thin & lanky. He had a good voice & could sing prayers in praise of Allah, attracting many people to the hospice. It was also rumoured about him that he belonged to the family of the Sultan but because of some indiscretion on his part was thrown out from the fort. The name of the boy was Abdul Hassan.
Shah Raju had another important ‘mureed’, the Sultan Abdullah of Hyderabad. The Sultan would visit the Saint off & on in search of spiritual peace. Sultan Abdullah was ruling Hyderabad during a period when Aurangzeb was the viceroy of Deccan, initially & later became the King of the Mughal empire. Aurangzeb did not have much love or respect for Sultan Abdullah for he thought Abdullah was a wayward & fun loving person. Sultan Abdullah belonged to the Shia order of Islam & Aurangzeb felt that the Sultan was not a Muslim enough.
Even during his tenure as Viceroy of Deccan Aurangzeb had laid siege to the Golkonda fort & lifted it only after the Queen Mother, Hayat Bakshi Begum, personally visited him outside the fort. The terms of lifting the siege were fixed & the most important of them were the marriage of the eldest daughter of Sultan Abdullah to Mohammad Sultan, the son of Aurangzeb. It was also concluded that Mohammad Sultan would eventually take over the reins of power from the Sultan Abdullah. Additionally, Golkonda would pay Rs. 4.5 million to the Mughals as an indemnity in three instalments. First payment was to be made immediately.
Sultan Abdullah had three daughters. The eldest one was married to the son of Aurangzeb, as per the agreement regarding lifting of siege of Golkonda, second one to Nizamudin, a noble from Mecca & the third was engaged to the Syed Sultan of Najaf, who was a protégé of Nizamudin, initially. The Sultan of Golkonda had no male heirs to the throne.
But circumstances change. They changed for Prince Mohammad Sultan too – to begin with.
Emperor Shahjehan of Mughal empire fell sick & war broke out between his four sons for the throne of Delhi. Prince Mohammad Sultan sided with Dara Shikoh against his own father & when Aurangzeb took over the Mughal throne in Delhi he summoned Mohammad Sultan & imprisoned him. The prince died in captivity.
This aroused the ambitions of Nizamudin to corner the throne of Golkonda. Meanwhile Syed Sultan of Najaf turned his back on Nizamudin & stopped doing his bidding. Nizamudin, who had become important after the exit of Prince Mohammad Sultan from Golkonds, started manipulating the situation so that the engagement between the youngest daughter of Sultan Abdullah with Syed Sultan of Najaf is called off.
Sultan Abdullah was unnerved. One day he went to the hospice of Shah Raju for guidance so that he could resolve this riddle. Shah Raju asked him to come after some days & when the courtiers from the Sultan reached the hospice once again some days later they were advised to bring bridegroom’s dress & jewellery to him along with spare horses etc. for the groom to be taken to the fort. Meanwhile Abdul Hassan, the lanky ‘mureed’ of the saint – his errand boy – was given a thorough bath, henna pasted on his hands by the Sufi Saint himself, was properly dressed for the marriage ceremony & despatched to the fort along with the courtiers. At the same time Syed Sultan of Najaf, unaware of the developments in the fort was also preparing for the marriage ceremony in another part of the fort. He was tipped off by some of his friends that his marriage had not to be as the youngest daughter of Sultan Abdullah was already in the process of getting married to Abdul Hassan & there was no need for him to get ready for the event. Syed Sultan of Najaf sensed danger to his life & made good his escape from the fort & took shelter with Aurangzeb.
Over time Abdul Hassan outwitted Nizamudin, took control of the army & the administration & after the death of Sultan Abdullah took over the throne of Golkonda with the help of the Army Chief & the Royal Chamberlain.
While he was still at the hospice of Shah Raju Abdul Hassan was nicknamed Thana Shah by him & when he took over the reins of Golkonda in April 1672 he became famous by the name of Abdul Hassan Thana Shah.
One of the reasons why Thana Shah was able to outsmart Nizamudin & get him arrested was that Thana Shah was a very down to earth person & approachable while as Nizamudin was arrogant & misbehaved with the nobles, military, administration & everyone else who came in his contact. Thana Shah on the other hand was benevolent & generous. He also ensured equal rights to the subjects of his dominion which eventually brought him in conflict with the policies of Mughal King Aurangzeb resulting in his downfall.
The benevolent policies of Thana Shah, political & palace intrigues between the existing army chief, governors & Nobles paved the way for Thana Shah to appoint Madanna as Mir Jumla (Prime Minister) & his younger brother Akkanna was promoted as Revenue Minister. It is said that it was for the first time since the arrival of Alla-u-Din Khilji on Indian scene that a local Hindu was appointed as a Prime Minister. Madanna immediately set out to work & brought about many reforms in the Revenue administration including abolition of the custom to auction villages to collectors for revenue collection. Instead Government officers were deputed for this purpose. The strength of the standing army was raised to 6 lakhs. This action of Thana Shah & not adhering to some of the ‘firmans’ of the Mughal emperor by the Sultan brought him under direct conflict with the Mughal Empire to which Golkonda had become a vasal state in 1636.
Other than this the politics of the Region was very fluid & under a state of flux. During this period the Marathas, under Shivaji Maharaj, were on the rise & the British & the French were looking for a foothold along the sea shores of India.
But this is not the intention of my story. My interest is in Bhakt Ramadas of Bhadrachalam who had etched figures of Ram, Lakshaman & Sita on the wall of his cell in Golkonda during his imprisonment. Aforementioned is actually a backdrop to this.
Gopanna, who later became famous as Bhakta Ramadas was a nephew of Maddana & Akkana. From the childhood he was a devotee of Lord Ram. He was appointed Revenue officer of Husnabad Revenue area, by Sultan Thana Shah, under which fell Bhadrachalam too.
When Gopanna saw the condition of the temple, which was no more than a shed, & the dedication of the tribal lady & the villagers to the lord he organized to construct it so that the ‘murtis’ could have a reasonable place to be in. He mobilized his own resources & also took help from the villagers for construction of the temple. He organized ornaments & jewellery for the ‘murtis’.
While the work of construction of the temple was in full swing the Sultan was informed by some of his courtiers that Gopanna was misusing the Government funds for construction of the temple. They actually wanted to target Madanna & Akanna as their appointment to higher office was not liked by many of the courtiers of the Sultan. The Mughals, who did not like Thana Shah also drumed up the sentiment against Gopanna, Madanna & Akanna. Gopanna became an easy tool for the courtiers to damage the position of Madanna & Akanna.
Gopanna was arrested & placed in one of the chambers in the Golkonda fort. A distraught Gopanna reverted to his ‘aradhaya’ Lord Ram, Sita & Lakshaman & started writing bhajans, kirtans. He would continuously sing them aloud from his prison chamber. It is said that no sentries were required to be placed outside his prison chamber as he would regularly sing bhajans & his presence in the cell continued to be known.
Bhakt Ramadas had a unique distinction of writing, singing & also composing bhajans to music. His bhajans were very simple & common village folks took to them very easily as they could understand & relate to them. It is during the period of imprisonment in Golkonda fort that Bhakt Ramadas engraved the images of Ram, Sita, Lakshaman & Hanuman using his finger nails.
His bhajans expressed his pain. He would constantly ask the Lord as to what had he done so as to get this punishment. In some of the bhajans he would complain to Lord Rama & sometime beseech Sitaji to request Lord Rama on his behalf to let him go off this prison cell. At times he would be very angry with the Lord & ask him through his bhajans as to whether the ornaments he had put around his neck were provided by Raja Dashrath or Janak & at the same time look for pardon for using such a language.
It is said that Tyagaraja, the great poet, singer & composer of Karnatak music, who was born 200 years after Bhakt Ramadas took inspiration from him. However, the bhajans of Ramadas, being very simple & understandable, are popular even today.
Finding that His Bhakt is not going to get out of this situation any day soon, it is said that Lord Rama & Lakshaman appeared to him in his prison chamber with their bows & arrows. Ramadas was busy in his recitation & he did not notice them till his name was called. Lord Ram told him that they had come to the prison cell on his summons & his problems will be over soon. Both the brothers disappeared from the prison cell. The same night Lord Ram & Lakshaman appeared to Thana Shah in his sleeping chambers. He was told to release the Bhakt. Lord Ram placed a bag full of gold ‘ashrafies’ with the seal of the Lord on them, near the bed of the Sultan & told him that this is what Ramdas owed him & he should release him immediately.
Next day, in the morning, Thana Shah himself went to the prison cell & released the prisoner. He was told that he could go back to his old job but the Bhakt refused & devoted later part of his life in the service of Lord Ram at Bhadrachalam temple.
The temple is located on a hill near River Godavari. The outer walls on the back side of the temple are very high giving it the look of a fort. However, the atmosphere around the sanctum sanctorum is very serene & ‘satvik’. My feeling is that this is normally the case whenever you visit a Ram temple.
In the sanctum are the ‘murties’ of Shri Ram, Sita & Lakshaman which were found by Pokala Dommakka. The devotees are made to rush through for ‘darshan’. This is the case in every temple now. However there is a reasonably big space around the sanctum & sitting here is a great experience.
There is a very small museum too where the gold jewellery donated by the Bhakt is also displayed. It is the same jewellery that brought misery to the Bhakt as it was rumoured that this jewellery had been procured from funds stolen from the government exchequer. There is also a painting of Thana Shah in the museum.
Bhadrachalam is located 350 km (approximately) from Hyderabad. Banks of River are only 500 m from here.
Once an archer of Golkonda forces saw Aurangzeb praying at a shooting distance from him & wanted to kill him but Thana Shah did not permit him for he did not want to kill anyone while he or she was in prayers.
Finally, treachery & bribes worked. Practically all the nobles & military commanders of Thana Shah defected to the Mughal forces except General Abdul Razzak Lari who continued to be on the side of the Sultan till the end of the siege. One of the other commanders, Abdul Khan Panni opened the gates of the fort on 21.09.1687. The Mughal troops rushed in & took over the fort & Thana Shah was arrested. Even in his arrest he was dignified. He went for prayers & offered the victors breakfast. He comforted the ladies in the fort & finally departed. He was locked up in Daulatabad fort where he died after 14 years of imprisonment.
Thana Shah had an unusual life. For first 14 years of his life he lived in Golkonda, another 14 years in the service of his peer, 14 years thereafter with Sultan Abdullah. After the death of the Sultan Thana Shah ruled for 14 years & there after lived a prison life of another 14 years.
He rose from the position of a pauper to become a Sultan. He ruled justly but some would say extravagantly over one of the biggest kingdoms of the time & was finally imprisoned after giving Aurangzeb a stiff resistance. It is no small matter that Aurangzeb had to lead the siege & intervene in the battle himself. The siege lasted 8 months.
Thana Shah was just & God fearing too. That is the reason why he did not allow his shooter to kill Aurangzeb while he was in prayers.
The episode of Bhakt Ramadas is another interesting matter of his time.
These days there is usually a lot of noise about history, story, tradition, myth & matters of scientific. Depending upon which side of the political divide the people are they tend to score brownie points accordingly. The life of Thana Shah gives an appropriate insight into all these aspects of life.
JAGMOHAN SHARMA 