Story of the 500-year-old Sambhal mosque: Competing histories, mythology, and legal fights

The Supreme Court was proceeding a plea by the absorption committee of the mosque challenging an bid of the Civil Judge (Senior Division) allowing the survey of the mosque which the Hindu broadside claims was built by destroying a Hindu temple.

The Hindu parties had claimed successful the Sambhal tribunal that a “Shri Hari Har temple made by Lord Vishwakarma Himself” primitively stood astatine the tract and that it was demolished to physique the mosque. They cited a prevalent content that Kalki, the 10th avatar of Lord Vishnu, volition look successful Sambhal successful kaliyug (the existent epoch of the world, according to Hindu mythology).

The existent lawsuit is not the mosque’s archetypal brushwood with a ineligible dispute. A rubric suit by the Hindu broadside was filed implicit it successful a Moradabad tribunal and an entreaty successful the Allahabad High Court successful 1878, but was dismissed by then

Chief Justice Sir Robert Stuart. (Express)

Documents from that case, disposable successful Urdu and seen by The Indian Express, accidental that the Hindu side’s plea was rejected due to the fact that they could not beryllium the Muslims had not been utilizing the tract uninterrupted for 12 years [the grounds of adverse possession], that nary parikrama way for circumambulation of the idol seems to beryllium wrong the mosque, and that the witnesses from the Hindu broadside appeared to beryllium of mediocre prime who had ne'er seen the mosque from inside.

The communicative of the mosque

The Sambhal mosque is known to beryllium the oldest surviving Mughal mosque successful the country, and is simply a protected monument nether the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI).

The past of the mosque is tied to the past of Sambhal. According to the district’s website, “During 5th period BC, Sambhal was location to the Panchal rulers and was subsequently a portion of king Ashoka’s empire.”

Under the Muslim sultanate, Sambhal was a portion of Qutb-ud-din Aibak’s empire, the Tughlaq empire and an important centre nether the Lodis.

Sambhal came nether the Mughals aft Babur defeated Ibrahim Lodi successful the Battle of Panipat successful 1526. The Sambhal mosque was built the aforesaid twelvemonth by Hindu Beg, an authoritative nether Babur. Only 3 mosques built during Babur’s reign survived into modern times — the Jami Masjid successful Sambhal, the Kabuli Bagh mosque successful Panipat (1527-28 AD), and the Babri Masjid of Ayodhya (1529), which was demolished by kar sevaks successful 1992.

The mosque having pre-Mughal features has been noted by historians too.(Express Photo by Gajendra Yadav)

In his probe insubstantial Patronage of Zahir al-Din Babur [published successful Bulletin of the Asia Institute successful 1987], American historiographer Howard Crane says that portion Babur’s memoirs bash not notation the Sambhal mosque, they bash “state that a definite Hindu Beg Qücin, who had accompanied him from Käbul, had been posted to Sambhal successful 1515-16 and again successful 1528-29”. It is Hindu Beg who built the Jami Masjid, according to an inscription astatine the mosque.

American historiographer Catherine Asher has written astir the mosque successful large item successful The New Cambridge History of India’s Architecture of Mughal India, published successful 1992.

Asher writes that the Sambhal mosque was constructed successful 1526 by Mir Hindu Beg, “an important noble successful the tribunal of some Babur and Humayun”.

“Built a twelvemonth earlier Babur’s Kabuli Bagh mosque successful Panipat, the Sambhal mosque is the archetypal extant Mughal gathering successful India. The analyzable is entered done a gross connected the eastbound that opens to a ample walled courtyard. The supplication chamber, similar the 1 of the Panipat mosque, is rectangular with a ample quadrate cardinal bay. Its entranceway is acceptable into a precocious pishtaq, recalling those of Sharqi mosques astatine Jaunpur. The enclosure is flanked connected either broadside by three-bayed double-aisled broadside wings. A azygous dome surmounts the cardinal bay, and a tiny flattish dome surmounts each bay of the broadside wings. The mosque’s pishtaq and different features resembling fifteenth-century Sharqi structures successful adjacent Jaunpur suggest a reliance connected section artisans and designers.”

Asher goes connected to authorities that “even though the Sambhal mosque was renovated astatine slightest doubly successful the seventeenth century, capable of its archetypal authorities remains to amusement that the program and wide quality expect Babur’s Panipat mosque commenced the pursuing year”.

She writes that the mosque astatine Sambhal was the “largest 1 constructed successful the Delhi portion since Timur’s sack of that metropolis successful 1398. This mosque is situated precocious connected a elevation and dominates the metropolis for a sizeable distance”.

The existent claims

The Hindu claims of a temple existing astatine the tract stem from the content that features of a temple tin inactive beryllium traced successful the mosque building, and that rubble from a temple seems to person been utilized successful gathering it. These “features” see a concatenation hanging from the mosque’s dome, which they judge erstwhile held a bell, the columns of the mosque resembling a temple’s, and a way for ‘parikrama’ existing wrong the mosque.

Many of these person been enumerated successful an ASI study from 1874-76 by ACL Carlleyle, First Assistant of the ASI, titled ‘Tours successful the Central Doab and Gorakhpur’.

Carlleyle writes, “The main gathering successful Sambhal is the Jami Masjid, which the Hindus assertion primitively to person been the temple of Hari Mandir”. He past states that the inscription mentioning Babur – which, helium points out, gets the emperor’s sanction incorrect – is believed by the Hindus to beryllium “a forgery of precocious date”.

“The walls of the cardinal quadrate Hindu temple would look to person been built with ample bricks cased with stone, but the plaster with which the Muhammadans person coated the walls conceals the worldly of which they are made; and I tin lone accidental that, connected examining respective spots wherever the plaster was broken, I recovered that successful immoderate places chromatic was exposed. I judge that the Muhammadans stripped disconnected astir of the stone, particularly specified arsenic bore traces of Hinduism, and made a pavement of the stones, turning the sculptures downwards… Underneath the outer steps of the outer tribunal I dug retired immoderate fragments of sculpture successful reddish sandstone, 1 of which was the precocious information of a fluted pillar.”

Sir Alexander Cunningham, who was past the manager wide of ASI, however, disagreed with Carlleyle, adding a enactment to the study that reads, “The inscription successful the masjid, which the Hindus denounce arsenic being forged, appears to maine to beryllium rather genuine.”

Hafizur Rehman Salahi, a nonmigratory of Sambhal who was earlier a researcher with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), told The Indian Express, “Hindu Beg seems to person repaired an existing mosque alternatively of gathering a caller one, arsenic the Jami Masjid has features of Pathan architecture much than Mughal architecture.”

The mosque having pre-Mughal features has been noted by historians too.

Austrian historiographer Ebba Koch, successful her publication ‘Mughal Architecture: An Outline of its History and Development’, writes, “Although helium [Babur] is celebrated arsenic a laminitis of gardens, it is his mosques successful Sambhal (1526), Ayodhya and Panipat (both 1528-29) that stay arsenic main monuments from his little reign. They effort to bash justness to a ample standard by borrowing inadequate forms of the decaying Sultanate architecture.”

Mir Hindu Beg’s mosque, Sambal. (Express)

Meenakshi Jain, Delhi-based historiographer of assemblage and medieval India, told The Indian Express that grounds did suggest the beingness of a temple astatine the tract of the mosque. “The usage of temple worldly was evident successful 2 rosettes connected chromatic steps starring to the eastbound gateway, the concatenation for hanging the temple bell, and a transition astatine the backmost for show of parikrama by devotees, among different tell-tale pieces of evidence,” said Jain.

She besides said Babur seems to person chosen the 3 locations of his mosques with large consideration. “Panipat was the tract of his victory, but Ayodhya and Sambhal were of value to Hindus, which helium was good alert of. That the Mughals knew astir Sambhal’s value for Hindus tin beryllium made retired from Abul Fazl’s Ain-e-Akbari, successful which helium showed consciousness of Sambhal arsenic the spot wherever the past avatar of Vishnu would beryllium born. He doesn’t notation the demolition of the temple by Babur and the operation of a mosque.”

However, different historians person dismissed the claims of a temple. American historiographer Crane, who says that the mosque is built of chromatic masonry covered with plaster, writes, “Hindu contented asserts that the mosque occupies the tract of and incorporates parts of a celebrated Vishnu temple called the Hari-Mandir, but the quality of the Jämi Masjid successful nary mode supports this assertion.”

Historian Sohail Hashmi said ascribing religion to architecture tin pb to misleading conclusions. “If radical unrecorded and physique broadside by side, their heritages and styles are bound to power each other. The full conception of ‘Islamic architecture’ oregon immoderate spiritual architecture is misguided. Domes travel from pre-Christian Romans, the arch from Sumerians. Mosques successful Kashmir and China oregon older mosques successful Kerala don’t person minars. The beingness oregon lack of a peculiar benignant of architectural diagnostic does not determine the spiritual quality of a structure. What is important successful the lawsuit of Sambhal is determination is nary past of a simmering quality astatine the site.”