Day of Empire_ How Hyperpowers Rise to Global Dominance--And Why They Fall - Amy Chua [103]
Reversing earlier policies of religious tolerance, Aurangzeb imposed Sharia (Islamic law) throughout the empire. He razed thousands of Hindu temples and shrines, including the great temple of Mathura. Land that had formerly been granted to Hindu institutions was redistributed to Muslim clerics. In 1679, Aurangzeb revived the jiziya, the punitive tax imposed on non-Muslims, provoking heated protests across the empire.
Aurangzeb's intolerance was an imperial catastrophe. To begin with, the persecution of Hindus was bad for business. When one of Aurangzeb's henchmen forcibly converted a Hindu clerk in Surat, the heads of eight thousand Hindu trading families left the port city in anger, bringing commerce to an effective halt.
But far more destructively, Aurangzeb's Muslim zealotry tore the fragile religious and political unity of the Mughal Empire to pieces. His vicious campaign to eradicate Sikhism—including the destruction of temples and the execution of a revered Sikh holy man (on charges of converting Muslims)—earned the Mughals the hatred of tens of thousands in northern India and paved the way for Sikh militarism.
Meanwhile in the south, a number of Hindu Maratha clans banded together to fight Mughal supremacy. Their leader was Shivaji, a now legendary warrior viewed by many as the founder of guerrilla warfare in India. Shivaji successfully drove the Mughal armies out of Deccan (in the modern state of Maharashtra), becoming king of the Maratha confederacy in 1674. For the next two decades, Aurangzeb expended enormous resources trying to hold his ground against the Marathas, who, using their guerrilla tactics and familiarity with the terrain, bled the mighty Mughal army. Instead of strengthening his ties with the Hindu Rajputs—who might have remained his allies and who had formerly served as great empire builders for the Mughals—Aurangzeb sacked their temples and eventually turned them against him too.
Not only Hindus faced the might of Aurangzeb's Islamic orthodoxy. Shiite Muslims did too. A devout Sunni, Aurangzeb sent conquering armies to Bijapur and Golconda, where the ruling families had for centuries been Shiite.
Until his death in 1707, Aurangzeb kept the empire intact, ruthlessly deploying enormous marauding armies to crush enemies, stamp out heretics, and extend Mughal rule over Shiite and Hindu lands. When he died, the Mughal Empire was larger than it had ever been or ever would be again. But because of all his constant warring—external and internal—the empire was also bankrupt. More than that, the hatreds and divisions he sowed made India easy prey for the divide-and-conquer stratagems that the British would soon deploy to great success, turning India from a subcontinental Muslim empire to a jewel in the crown of the largest Western empire the world had ever seen.
Perhaps the devout Aurangzeb understood his own legacy. On his deathbed, he wrote to his son: “I came alone and I go as a stranger. I do not know who I am, nor what I have been doing. I have sinned terribly, and I do not know what punishment awaits me.”24
EIGHT
“Rebel Buggers” and the “White
Man's Burden”
Take a view of the Royal Exchange in London, a place more venerable than many courts of justice, where the representatives of all nations meet for the benefit of mankind. There the Jew, the Mahometan, and the Christian transact together as tho’ they all profess'd the same religion, and give the name of Infidel to none but bankrupts. There the Presbyterian confides in the Anabaptist, and the Churchman depends on the Quaker's word. And all are satisfied.
— VOLTAIRE, 1733
A man should, whatever happens, keep to his own caste, race, and breed. Let the White go to the White and the Black to the Black.
— RUDYARD KIPLING, Beyond the Pale, 1888
Intolerance betrays want of faith in one's cause.
— MAHATMA GANDHI, 1921
When we left Britain two chapters