Ahmed Shah Abdali
Ahmad Shah Abdali (c.1723-1773) (
Persian: احمد شاہ ابدالی), also known as
Ahmad Shah Durrani or simply
Ahmad Shah, was the founder of the
Durrani dynasty of
Afghanistan. He is described by Elphinstone as "Tall and robust, and inclined to beinf ta. His face is remarkably broaad, his beard very black and his complexion moderately fair. His appearence on the whole is majestic and expressive of an uncommon dignity and strength of mind." wrote a Collection of Odes in Pushto his own native tongue, tinged, as usual, with the mysticisms of the sufis, and from that work the following specimens have been taken. The work is scarce, particularly in eastern Afghanistan. He was also the author of several poems in the Persian language.
Ahmed Shah was born into the
Sadozai clan, the second son of Mohammed Zaman Khan, chief of the
Abdali tribe. He was, in his youth, imprisoned in a fortress, with his elder brother Zulfikar Khan, by Husain Khan, governor of Kandahar for the Ghalzis, which powerful tribe of Afghans, after overrunning the whole of Persia, had, a few years previously, trodden the throne of the sufis in the dust, and conquered that mighty empire.
Ahmad Shah and his brother were freed by Nadir Shah after his conquest of Kandahar in 1736-37. The brothers, with a powerful body of their clansmen, after being freed pledged their loyalty to Nadir Shah and soon distinguished themselves in battle.
He quickly rose to command a cavalry contingent estimated at four thousand strong
[Griffiths, John.C (2001) Afghanistan: A History of Conflict p12], composed chiefly of
Abdalis, in the service of
Nadir Shah.
Popular history has it that the brilliant and megalomanical Nadir Shah could see the talent in his young commander. he is reported to have said, "I have not seen in Iran, Turan and Hindustan any mass of such laudable talents as possessed by Ahmed Abdali!".
[ Singer, Andre (1983) Lords of the Khyber. The story of the North West Frontier]Similarly Persian legend has it that Nadir Shah was warned that one day Ahmed Shah would be a great King. Unfazed by the news he is said to have drawn a knife and cut Ahmed Shahs ear saying,"When you become King this will remind me of you". Later on according to Pashtun legend, in Delhi it is said Nadir Shah summoned Ahmed Shah Abdali and said:"Come forward Ahmed Abdali. Remember Ahmed Khan Abdali, that after me the Kingship will pass on to you. But you should treat the descendants of Nadir Shah with kindness." The young Ahmed Shahs response was, "May I be sacrficed to you. Should your majesty wish to slay me I am at your disposal. There is no cause or reason for saying such words."!".
[ Singer, Andre (1983) Lords of the Khyber. The story of the North West Frontier]Nadir Shah's rule abruptly ended in June 1747, when he was assassinated. As the story goes, the Turkoman guards involved in the assassination did so secretly so as to prevent the Abdalis from coming to their Kings rescue. However Ahmed Shah was told that Nadir Shah had been killed by one of Nadir Shahs wives. Despite the danger of attack the Abdali contingent led by Ahmad Shah rushed to either save Nadir Shah or to confirm what happened upon reaching the Kings tent, they were only to see Nadir Shahs body and severed head. Having served him so loyally the Abdalis wept at having failed their leader,
[The Pathans (1981) by Olaf Caroe.] and then fought their way out of the camp, and headed back towards Kandahar.
Ahmed Shah had little trouble in taking charge of much of present-day Afghanistan in the power vacuum that resulted from Nadir's death, and Ahmed Shah personally came into possession of the celebrated
Kohinoor diamond, which was given to him by Nadir's grandson,
Shah Rukh.
Later the same year (1747), when the chiefs of the
Abdali tribes and clans met near
Kandahar at a
loya jirga to choose a new leader, Ahmad Shah was chosen to lead the tribe. His coronation to the throne as the first King of Afghanistan happened in October, 1747, near the tomb of Shaikh Surkh, adjacent to Nadir Abad Fort.
Despite being younger than other claimants, Ahmad had several overriding factors in his favor:
*He was a direct descendant of
Sado, patriarch of the
Sadozai clan, the most prominent tribe amongst the Pashtuns at the time;
*He was unquestionably a charismatic leader and seasoned warrior who had at his disposal a trained, mobile force of several thousand cavalrymen;
*Not least, he possessed a substantial part of Nadir Shah's treasury.
One of Ahmad Shah's first acts as chief was to adopt the title "Durr-i-Durrani" ("pearl of pearls" or "pearl of the age"). The name may have been suggested, as some claim, from a dream dreamt my Ahmad Shah, or as others claim, from the pearl earrings worn by the royal guard of Nadir Shah. The
Abdali Pashtuns have been known thereafter as the
Durrani clan.
Ahmad Shah began his career as head of the
Abdali tribe by capturing
Ghazni from the
Ghilzai Pashtuns, and then wresting
Kabul from the local ruler, and thus strengthened his hold over most of present-day
Afghanistan. Leadership of the various Afghan tribes rested mainly on the ability to provide booty for the clan, and Ahmed Shah proved assiduous and remarkably successful in providing both booty and occupation for his followers. Apart from invading the
Punjab three times between the years 1747-1753, he captured
Herat in 1750 and both
Nishapur (
Neyshabur) and
Meshed (Mashhad) in 1751.
Ahmed Shah first crossed the
Indus river in 1748, the year after his accession; his tribe sacked
Lahore during that expedition. The following year (1749), the
Mughal ruler was induced to cede
Sindh and all of
Punjab west of the
Indus River to him, in order to save his capital from being attacked by Ahmed Shah. Having thus gained substantial territories to the east without a fight, Ahmad Shah turned westward to take possession of
Herat, which was ruled by Nadir Shah's grandson,
Shah Rukh of Persia. The city fell to Ahmad Shah in 1750, after almost a year of siege and bloody conflict; Ahmed shah then pushed on into present-day
Iran, capturing
Nishapur (Neyshabur) and
Meshed (Mashhad) in 1751.
Meanwhile, in the preceding three years, the Sikhs had occupied the city of
Lahore, and Ahmed Shah had to return in 1751 to oust them. In 1752, he invaded and reduced
Kashmir. He next sent an army to subdue the areas north of the
Hindu Kush. In short order, the powerful army brought under its control the
Turkmen,
Uzbek,
Tajik and
Hazara tribes of northern Afghanistan.
Then in 1756/57, in what was his fourth invasion of India, Ahmed Shah sacked
Delhi looting every corner of that city and enriching himself with what remained of that city's wealth. However, he did not displace the
Mughal dynasty, which remained in nominal control as long as the ruler acknowledged Ahmad's suzerainty over the Punjab, Sindh, and Kashmir. He installed a puppet Emperor,
Alamgir II, on the Mughal throne, and arranged marriages for himself and his son
Timur into the Imperial family that same year. Leaving his second son
Timur Shah (who was wed to the daughter of Alamgir II) to safeguard his interests, Ahmad finally left India to return to Afghanistan. On his way back, Ahmed Shah attacked the
Golden Temple in
Amritsar (1757), and filled its
sarovar (sacred pool) with the blood of slaughtered cows.
Conflict with the Marathas
The Mughal power in northern India had been declining since the reign of
Aurangzeb, who died in 1707; the Marathas, who already controlled much of western and central India from their capital at
Pune, were straining to expand their area of control. After Ahmad Shah sacked the Mughal capital and withdrew with the booty he coveted, the Marathas filled the power void; in 1758, within a year of Ahmed Shah's return to Kandahar, the Marathas secured possession of the
Punjab, and succeeded in ousting Timur Shah and his court from India.
Ahmad Shah therefore had to return to India and face the formidable challenge posed of the Maratha Confederacy. He declared a
jihad (
Islamic holy war) against the
Marathas, and warriors from various Pashtun tribes, as well as other tribes such as the
Baloch,
Tajiks, and Muslims in India, answered his call. Early skirmishes ended in victory for the Afghans; by
1759, Ahmad Shah and his army had reached Lahore and were poised to confront the Marathas. By
1760, the Maratha groups had coalesced into a great army that probably outnumbered Ahmad Shah's forces. Once again,
Panipat was the scene of a confrontation between two warring contenders for control of
northern India. The
Third battle of Panipat (January
1761), fought between largely
Muslim and largely
Hindu armies who numbered as many as 100,000 troops each, was waged along a twelve-kilometer front, and resulted in victory for Ahmed Shah. This battle, coming as it did within four years of the
Battle of Plassey, is of historical importance beyond the garnering of booty, since it left
India without a dominant native power (neither Mughal not Maratha) and thus facilitated
British expansion much easier.
He used to hold, at stated periods, what is termed a Majlis-i-Eeulama, or Assembly of the Learned, the early part of which was generally devoted to divinity and civil law-for Ahmad Shah himself was a Molawi and concluded with conversations on science and poetry. He as a rule did not interefere with the tribes or their customs as long as they did not interfere with his ambitions.
The victory at Panipat was the high point of
Ahmad Shah's and Afghan power. His empire was among the largest Islamic empires in the world at that time. However, this situation was not to last long; the empire soon began to unravel. As early as by the end of 1761, the Sikhs had regained control of much of the Punjab. In
1762, Ahmad Shah crossed the passes from Afghanistan for the sixth time to subdue the Sikhs. He assaulted
Lahore and
Amritsar (the holy city of the Sikhs), massacred thousands of Sikh inhabitants, destroyed their temples and again desecrated their holy places with cow's blood. Within two years, the Sikhs rebelled again, and he launched another campaign against them in 1764.
Soon afterwards, Ahmed Shah had to hasten westward to quell an insurrection in Afghanistan. He had to buy peace with the Uzbek emir of
Bukhara by agreeing that the
Amu Darya would mark the division of their lands. Meanwhile the Sikhs rose yet again, and Ahmad was now forced to abandon all hope of retaining the command of the Punjab. By the time of his death, he had lost all but nominal control of the Punjab to the Sikhs, who remained in charge of the area until defeated by the
British in the
First Anglo-Sikh War in
1846.
In
1772, Ahmad Shah retired to his home in
Maruf in the mountains east of
Kandahar, where he died in October the same year. He was succeeded by his son,
Timur Shah Durrani.
Ahmad Shah's successors, beginning with his son
Timur, proved largely incapable of governing the Durrani empire and faced with advancing enemies on all sides it was at an end within 50 years of Ahmed Shah's death. Much of the territory conquered by Ahmad Shah fell to others in this half century. By
1818, Ahmad Shah heirs controlled little more than
Kabul and the surrounding territory. They not only lost the outlying territories but also alienated other
Pashtun tribes and those of other Durrani lineages. Until
Dost Mohammad Khan's ascendancy in 1826, chaos reigned in
Afghanistan, which effectively ceased to exist as a single entity, disintegrating into a fragmented collection of small units.
Ahmed Shah's own achievements were however considerable. He had succeeded to a remarkable degree in balancing tribal alliances and hostilities, and in directing tribal energies away from rebellion. Although he was ultimately only another in a lengthy line of successful Afghan warlords, Ahmed Shah was aggressive, energetic, and tenacious; a bold but careful general and a conqueror who created a large empire. Even today there are thousands of people each year named their sons Ahmad Shah in tribute to the first Emir of Afghanistan. Ahmed Shah and his heirs were the first Pashtun rulers of Afghanistan, and according to some interpretations, the nation of Afghanistan and the basis of a pashtun identity began to take shape under his rule following centuries of fragmentation and exploitation.
[Taizi, Sherzaman (2006) Daily The Statesman, Peshawar, 24 February 2003 Pakhtunkhwa] His love for his land and his people were both something which ensured his position in the collective memory of Afghan and Pashtuns as exemplified by the quote attributed to him "Nowhere in the world can replace the ground on which one crawled in childhood".
At the same this policy ensured he did not continue on the path of other conquerors like Babur or Muhammad Ghauri and make India the base for his empire. What he did accomplish was create the basis for Afghanistan as a modern day Nation-state. Indeed, the name "Afghanistan" finds official mention for the first time ever in history, in the Anglo-Persian peace treaty of 1801. Ahmed Shah has therefore earned recognition as "Ahmad Shah Baba", the "Father" of Afghanistan.
His victory over the Marhatas also influenced the history of the subcontinents and in particular British policy in the region, his refusal to continue his campaigns deeper into India (and inevitably clash with the East India company) that pause allowed the East India Company to continue to acquire power and influence after their acuqistion of Bengal in 1757. However fear of a another Afghan invasion was to haunt British policy for almost half a century after Panipat. The acknowledgement of Abdalis military accomplishments are reflected by British intelligence reports on the battle of Panipat, which referred to Ahmad Shah as the 'King of Kings'.
[Sources for the study of Afghanistan, 1747-1809[1]] Fear of an alliance between the French and Afghans led in 1798 to a British envoy, to the Persian court, being instructed to stir up the Persians against the Afghan Empire.
[Summary: the emergence of the Afghan Kingdom and the Mission of Mountstuart Elphistone, 1747-1809 [2]]* Ahmad Shah Durrani, 1722-1772: Founder and first king of modern Afghanistan : revolutionary reformer, poet or feudal lord by Nabi Misdaq
* Diwan-i Ahmad Shah Abdali by Ahmad Shah Durrani
*Panipat ki akhiri jang (Unknown Binding) by Kashi Raj
*Marathas : Rise and Fall (ISBN: 8171698867)B R Verma and S R Bakshi
*
Pakhtunistan*
History of Afghanistan*
Abdur Rahman Khan*
Ranjit Singh*
North-West Frontier Province*
Mir Waiz*
Khushal Khan Khattak*
Sher Shah Suri*
Shah Shuja*
Anglo-Afghan wars*
Invasions of Ahmad Shah Abdali*
Detailed genealogy of the Durrani dynasty*
Famous Diamonds: The Koh-I-Noor*
Abdali Tribe History*
Chronology: from the emergence of the Afghan Kingdom to the Mission of Mountstuart Elphistone, 1747-1809
