Development of new languages and faiths

Modern Indian languages have developed drastically during the medieval period. Urdu perhaps originated around Delhi. It developed as a camp language in the army of Allauddin Khilji when they were stationed in the Deccan around fourteenth century AD. In fact, the states of Bijapur and the Golconda in the Deccan became the cradles of Urdu literature. The language soon developed its own grammar and became a distinct language.

As time passed, it came to be used by the elite as well. The famous poet Amir Khusrau, who composed poetry in this language, also played some part in making it popular. Besides poetry, beautiful prose, short stories, novels and drama were written in Urdu during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In the first half of the ninteenth century Urdu journalism played a very important role during the struggle for independence.

Along with Urdu, nearly all other modern Indian languages like Bengali, Assamese, Oriya, Khari Boli, Punjabi, Gujarati, Marathi, Sindhi, Kashmiri as well as the four South Indian languages -Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam – came to acquire their present form and developed during this period.

New Faiths

During this period, two new religious faiths flourished in India. They were Sikhism and Zoroastrianism. To bring the established reforms within religion various reform movements also started in India.

Sikhism

The Sikhs, who mostly belong to Punjab, form a sizable group of our population. The orthodox Sikhs believe that their religion was revealed by God to Guru Nanak, whose spirit entered the second and the subsequent gurus till the tenth Guru. Guru Gobind Singh, ordained the Sikhs to treat the Adi Granth, popularly known as the Guru Granth Sahib, as their Guru.

But the students of history and religion think that the seeds for the birth and growth of this religion were present in the Bhakti movement, in its nirguna branch. The Sikhs basically believe in a formless God, equality of all mankind, need of a guru and the pahul tradition. Sometimes, the gurudom was conferred on the son and sometimes on the best disciple. The fifth guru, Guru Arjun Dev, gave the Sikhs three things. The first was in the shape of the Adi Granth, which contains the sayings of five gurus and other allied saints.

The second was the standardised script for Gurmukhi in which the Adi Granth was first written. And finally, the site and the foundation of the Har Mandir sahib or the Golden Temple and the Akal Takht at Amritsar, the highest seat from where the dictats for the entire Sikh community are issued.

The tenth guru, Guru Gobind Singh created the Khalsa, which means “the pure”, in 1699. He also ordained the Sikhs to take five vows, namely, keeping of kesh (long hair and a beard), kangha (comb), kada (a metallic bangle), kirpan (a sword) and kaccha (an underwear extending to a little above the knees). Consequently, these symbols became the distinguishing marks of a Sikh.

He further added that after his death the Adi Granth will be the guru of the Sikhs and they have to pay obeisance to this holy book. Music has always been an important feature of Sikhism and they believed that through music one can attain ecstacy or samadhi.

Zoroastrianism

The Parsi or Zoroastrian religion was founded by Zarathushtra or Zoroaster, in the eighth century BC. He preached monotheism in the region now known as Persia. He taught the worship of fire and the presence of good and bad in the form of Ahura Mazda and Ahura Man. He also taught the ethical doctrine of kindness and charity.

These doctrines are enshrined in the Zend Avesta. The Zorastrian religion spread over the whole of Persia and remained the dominant religion till the eighth century AD when Muslims conquered this region. Most of the Parsis migrated to different parts of the world. They also came to India and settled at Navsari in Gujarat, and later on spread to almost all parts of India. They have contributed a lot to Indian culture.

It was Dadabhai Naoroji, the famous nationalist leader and a Parsi, who exposed the hollowness of the British claim of civilising India and not exploiting it. Another outstanding figure, who belonged to this community, was Jamshedji Tata, a pioneering Indian industrialist. He established an iron and steel industry in India in the face of the toughest competition posed by the British steel mills and yet continued to prosper.

The Parsees also established a large number of public charities. Zorastrianism is not a proselytising religion and no new entrants are accepted into its fold under any circumstances. Thus, we can see that the cultural stream in India continued to assimilate all the newcomers and the resulting cultural interaction gave Indian culture its characteristic multidimensional, multilingual, multireligious and yet composite nature.

Developments in South India

Between the ninth and eleventh centuries AD, a dynasty known as the Cholas was ruling the Cholamandalam region in Southern India. The Cholas developed a strong army, besides a powerful navy. Rajendra Chola is said to have conquered some Indonesian islands. They also developed democratic institutions at the village level. Even Buddhism and Jainism flourished in this region.

Literature, fine arts, sculpture and metal castings of the highest order flourished under their patronage. The fourteenth century saw the rise of a new state called Vijayanagara now called Karnataka. To the north of this state across the Tungabhadra river rose a new Islamic state, called the Bahamani, now known as Andhra Pradesh.

The Bahamani and Vijayanagara kingdoms were pitted against each other over the rich Raichur Doab. In the Cholamandalam region, the Tamil language was popular. In Karnataka, Kannada, in Andhra, Telegu and in Kerala, Malyalam flourished, all having different scripts. It is just possible that originally the entire region spoke Tamil, as it is a very old language.

But by the middle ages, the four languages had come to have distinct identities. However, between the fourteenth and the sixteenth centuries, Vijayanagara achieved great heights. Some foreigners, who visited these areas in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, have praised the kings, the town and the people. The remains of Vijayanagara found in Hampi dazzle the world even today. During the Chola period, Kanchi became a great seat of learning. The Vijayanagara kings also became great patrons of art and leaming.