The Punjab Chiefs - Volume 2

· 1890 · Text public domain; the scan hosted non-commercially, with credit · archive.org ↗

1RAWALPINDI DISTRICT. $53

2Kashmir for thirteen generations previous to 987 A.D.,

3when Kabil fled tothe Court of Sabaktagin, it is probable

4that Kashmir would not require to be re-converted to Islam-

5ism in 1327, as it certamly was during the reign of

6Shah Mir, otherwise known as Shamsudin. It may

7indeed be doubted whether the Gakhars are of Persian origin

8at all. The chief point in its favour is that, asa rule, the

9Gakhars are of the Shia sect, while all the other Mahomedan

10tribes of their part of the country are Sunis. It has again

11been thought that the Gakhars are a branch of the Gujar

12tribe; but this theory, which is supported by rather obscure

13philological argument, is not sufficiently interesting to be

14more than noticed here. As early as 682, according to

15Farishta, the Gakhars were resident in the Panjab, and

16about that year made an alliance, offensive and defensive,

17with the Afghans, who aided them against the Raja of Lahore.

18That the Gakhars were then resident on the Indus seems

19probable, though their own history contradicts it; but it is not

20_ likely that the Afghans, then new converts to Mahomedanism,

21fierce and enthusiastic, would have formed an alliance with an

22idolatrous tribe.*

23Kabil Khan obtained employ under Sabaktagin, and his

24second son, Gakhar Shah, from whom the tribe derived its

25name, accompanied Mahmud of Ghazni to India at the begin-

26ning of the eleventh century, and obtained leave to settle

27with his tribe, then very numerous, at Chana Punir, now

28Ram Kot,on the Jhilam. He soon became possessed of a

29* The early history of the Gakhars, as related by themselves, is necessarily given

30here. Butit seems purely fabulous. The probability is they were emigrants from

31Khorasan or Afghanistan, and settled inthe Panjab not later than 800 A.D. Raja

32Hodi, a Gakhar Chief, is indeed said to have married the daughter of Risalu,

33the HKajput Chief of Sialkot, and one of Salvahan’s sixteen sons, who reigned

34aboot 120 A.D. This may be false, but it shows that the traditions of the country

35point tothe Gakhars as baving been long resident in the Panjab. Again, where

36Gakhar history makes the founder of the tribe to be an officer in Mahmud Shah’s

37army, Farishta records that this very Mahmud was in 1008 attacked in the neigh-

38bourhood of Peshawar by a force of 80,000 Gakhars, who penetrated the Mahomedan

39camp, and were only repulsed with the greatest difficulty, Mahmud losing 5,000 men.