Muhammad Ghori

Timeline

1. 1175 Captures Multan and Uch
2. 1178 Defeated near Mount Abu by the Chaulukyas (Solankis) of Gujarat
3. 1186 Takes Lahore from Khusrau Malik — Ghaznavid rule in Punjab ends
4. 1191 First Battle of Tarain — defeated by Prithviraj Chauhan
5. 1192 Second Battle of Tarain — Prithviraj defeated; Qutbuddin Aibak left in charge of the Indian conquests
6. 1194 Battle of Chandawar — Gahadavala king Jaichand of Kannauj killed
7. c. 1193–1205 Bakhtiyar Khalji raids the monasteries of Bihar and seizes Nadia in Bengal
8. 1206 Ghori killed near the Jhelum; Aibak becomes independent at Lahore

The Ghurids

• Late 12th century: the Ghurids replaced the Ghaznavids. Ghur is a hilly region in central Afghanistan.
• Muhammad Ghori (Shihabuddin, later Muizzuddin Muhammad bin Sam) led the Indian campaigns while his elder brother Ghiyasuddin ruled from Ghur.
• Unlike Mahmud of Ghazni, he aimed to conquer and govern north India.

Early campaigns

• 1175: captured Multan and Uch — his first Indian conquests.
• 1178: defeated near Mount Abu (at Kayadara) by the Chaulukyas (Solankis) of Gujarat, under the boy-king Mularaja II. After this he avoided the Gujarat route and turned to Punjab.
• 1186: took Lahore from Khusrau Malik, ending Ghaznavid rule in Punjab.

The battles of Tarain

• Tarain (modern Taraori) lies near Thanesar in Haryana.
• 1191 — First Battle of Tarain: Ghori was defeated by Prithviraj Chauhan (Prithviraj III of the Chahamanas, ruling Ajmer and Delhi) and was wounded.
• 1192 — Second Battle of Tarain: Ghori returned with a larger army of mounted archers; Prithviraj was defeated, captured and later killed. This is regarded as the decisive battle that opened north India to Turkish rule.
• After this, Qutbuddin Aibak was placed in charge of Delhi and the Indian conquests.

After Tarain

• 1194 — Battle of Chandawar (near Etawah, on the Yamuna): Ghori defeated the Gahadavala king Jaichand of Kannauj, who was killed.
• Ghori issued gold coins with the image of Goddess Lakshmi on one side and his name on the other.
• 1206: Ghori was killed near the Jhelum (tradition blames the Khokhars). His Indian territories passed to Aibak.

Bakhtiyar Khalji in Bihar and Bengal

• Ikhtiyaruddin Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji, a Turkish commander, raided Bihar in the 1190s and early 1200s.
• He sacked the Buddhist monasteries of Odantapuri, Nalanda and Vikramshila. Minhaj-us-Siraj describes his men attacking what they took for a fort, only to find it was a vihara — the region later came to be called Bihar.
• He then surprised Lakshmana Sena of the Sena dynasty at Nadia (c. 1204–05) and set up his base at Lakhnauti in Bengal.

Sources

The Prithviraj Raso legend

• The legend says the blinded Prithviraj killed Ghori with an arrow shot by sound alone (shabdbhedi baan), guided by Chand Bardai’s couplet:
• “Char baas, chaubis gaj, angul asht praman / Ta upar Sultan hai, mat chuke Chauhan.” — Four bamboo lengths, twenty-four yards and eight finger-widths away sits the Sultan: do not miss, Chauhan.
• This is poetic tradition, not history — Ghori actually died in 1206, fourteen years after Tarain.

Source check

• Where the mindmap differs from standard textbooks. Use the standard version in the exam.