India has a very complex but interesting history. Many Kingdoms have emerged in the Indian subcontinent showing its tradition of rich diversity. During ancient times, Mauryan and Gupta empires had united the entire Indian subcontinents into a single great empire. In the Medieval period, the Mughal Empire emerged as the single biggest empire in 1526. Babur established the Mughal empire by defeating Ibrahim Lodhi which lasted for the next two centuries. Mughal invasion of India was an outcome of political dynamics in Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. By the end of the 14th Century, Delhi Sultanate had become weak. When the Mughals invaded there was no “India” as a country that existed like the present. The entire area which the Mughals invaded was not united as a country rather than the whole sub-continent was ruled by various rulers.
The Mughal Empire was the empire that had dazzled the contemporary world with its extensive territories, military might, and cultural achievements. Ruling as large a territory as the Indian subcontinent with such a diversity of people and cultures was an extremely difficult task for any ruler to accomplish in the Middle Ages.
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We have two major Muslim dynasties that ruled over India before the Mughals arrived, the Bahmani Kingdom and the Delhi Sultanate. These two had ruled over Southern India & Delhi respectively and they were limited in this domain only. But the Mughals had ruled all over India. The Mughal Empire was stretched from the outer fringes of the Indus basin in the west, northern Afghanistan in the northwest, and Kashmir in the north, to Assam & Bangladesh in the east also Deccan plateau in South India. The Mughal period is not blamed for all points of its vast ruling of more than 200 years, but on certain specified points, it is blamed. It is blamed for the execution of Sikh Gurus like Guru Arjun Dev, Guru Teg Bahadur & also for the reinforcement of tax like Jizya tax which was paid by non-Muslims to remain in their religion failure which led them to adopt Islam. They are also blamed for destroying the Hindu temples and sculptures. Also, they are blamed for cruelty over the native citizens.
But we have to always see both sides of the coin. There are pros & cons which run parallel. The pros of this prestigious empire can be counted as that this empire brings the centralized governing structure & this period can be counted as Golden period of arts. Monuments like Taj Mahal, Red Fort, Buland Darwaza, Agra Fort, Panch Mahal, Humayun Tomb & Lahore Fort, etc. become synonymous with India in the World.
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