Ishwari Prasad

Dr. Ishwari Prasad at his residence in Agra (Dec 1979)

Iswari Prasad Upadhyaya (1888 - 1986) was an Indian historian. He was an alumnus of Aligarh Muslim University, and very first graduate of the university. He dealt mainly with the Muslim rulers and governments of India, especially with the Mughal and Tughluq dynasties. He did extensive work on rulers such as Muhammad bin Tughluq, the Sultan of Delhi, Humayun, and Aurangzeb.

Quotes

• 'There was persecution, partly religious and partly political, and a stubborn resistance was offered by the Hindus' The state imposed great disabilities upon the non-Muslims' Instances are not rare in which the non-Muslims were treated with great severity' The practice of their religious rites even with the slightest publicity was not allowed, and cases are on record of men who lost their lives for doing so.'
  • Ishwari Prasad, History of Medieval India (Allahabad, 1940 Edition), pp.509-513. Quoted in K.S. Lal, Legacy of Muslim rule in India

• The religions of the two (Muslims and Hindus) are so fundamentally different that coalescence is only possible when some parts of their orthodox religions are forgotten and their place is taken by liberal tolerance.
  • Hindu-Muslim Problems, 1974

• Exasperated by this outbreak of lawlessness, the implacable Sultan proceeded towards Katehar with the main body of his army, and in his usual relentless manner gave orders for the des- truction of the rebels. Terrible carnage followed and "the blood of the rioters ran in streams; heaps of the slain were to be seen near every village and jungle, and the stench of the dead reached as far as the Ganges.” The whole district was ravaged, and the royal army seized a vast amount of booty. ; Woodcutters were sent into the jungles to cut roads, and road- making proved more efficacious in establishing order than punitive expeditions. Having suppressed the outlaws, the Sultan led an expedition into the mountains of Jud and chastised the hill tribes.
  • medieval india (quoting Barani [1])

About

• In his History of Mediaeval India (1925) written for Indian college students, Professor Ishwari Prasad devotes himself mainly to political history, sees the political issues of the medieval period indeed in terms of Hindu-Muslim relations and betrays pride in the resilience of Hindu culture under Muslim political domination ; but the latter had merits over that of the British as the Muslims made their per- manent home in India and did not drain the wealth of the country abroad.
  • Peter Hardy - Historians of medieval India_ studies in Indo-Muslim historical writing. (1960)