NOTE:- STILL WORK IN PROGRESS.. THIS IS JUST A DUMP OF TEXT FROM VARIOUS SOURCES
The history of Kashmir is intertwined with the history of
the broader Indian subcontinent and the surrounding regions, comprising the
areas of Central Asia, South Asia and East Asia. Historically, Kashmir referred
to the Kashmir Valley. Today, it denotes a larger area that includes the
Indian-administered state of Jammu and Kashmir (which consists of Jammu, the
Kashmir Valley, and Ladakh), the Pakistan-administered territories of Azad
Kashmir and Gilgit–Baltistan, and the Chinese-administered regions of Aksai
Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract.
In the first half of the 1st millennium, the Kashmir region
became an important centre of Hinduism and later of Buddhism; later in the
ninth century, Shaivism arose. Islamization in Kashmir took place during 13th
to 15th century and led to the eventual decline of the Kashmir Shaivism in
Kashmir. However, the achievements of the previous civilizations were not lost,
but were to a great extent absorbed by the new Islamic polity and culture which
gave rise to Kashmiri Sufi mysticism.
In 1339, Shah Mir became the first Muslim ruler of Kashmir,
inaugurating the Shah Mir Dynasty. For the next five centuries, Muslim monarchs
ruled Kashmir, including the Mughal Empire, who ruled from 1586 until 1751, and
the Afghan Durrani Empire, which ruled from 1747 until 1819. That year, the
Sikhs, under Ranjit Singh, annexed Kashmir. In 1846, after the Sikh defeat in
the First Anglo-Sikh War, and upon the purchase of the region from the British
under the Treaty of Amritsar, the Raja of Jammu, Gulab Singh, became the new
ruler of Kashmir. The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or
tutelage) of the British Crown, lasted until 1947, when the former princely
state became a disputed territory, now administered by three countries: India,
Pakistan, and the People's Republic of China.
it is stated that the valley of Kashmir was formerly a lake.
According to Hindu mythology, the lake was drained by the great rishi or sage,
Kashyapa, son of Marichi, son of Brahma, by cutting the gap in the hills at
Baramulla (Varaha-mula). When Kashmir had been drained, Kashyapa asked Brahmans
to settle there. This is still the local tradition, and in the existing
physical condition of the country, we may see some ground for the story which
has taken this form. The name of Kashyapa is by history and tradition connected
with the draining of the lake, and the chief town or collection of dwellings in
the valley was called Kashyapa-pura, which has been identified with Kaspapyros
of Hecataeus (apud Stephanus of Byzantium) and Kaspatyros of Herodotus Kashmir is also believed to be the country
meant by Ptolemy's Kaspeiria. Cashmere is an archaic spelling of Kashmir, and
in some countries it is still spelled this way.
Nilmata Purana (complied c. 500–600 CE) contains accounts of
Kashmir's early history. However, being a Puranic source, it has been argued
that it suffers from a degree of inconsistency and unreliability. Kalhana's
Rajatarangini (River of Kings), all the 8000 Sanskrit verses of which were
completed by 1150 CE, chronicles the history of Kashmir's dynasties from
mythical times to 12th century. It relies upon traditional sources like Nilmata
Purana, inscriptions, coins, monuments, and Kalhana's personal observations
borne out of political experiences of his family. Towards the end of the work
mythical explanations give way to rational and critical analyses of dramatic
events between 11th and 12th centuries, for which Kalhana is often credited as India's
first historian. During the reign of Muslim kings in Kashmir, three supplements
to Rajatarangini were written by Jonaraja (1411–1463 CE), Srivara, and
Prajyabhatta and Suka, which end with Akbar's conquest of Kashmir in 1586 CE.
The text was translated into Persian by Muslim scholars such as Nizam Uddin,
Farishta, and Abul Fazl. Baharistan-i-Shahi and Haidar Mailk's Tarikh-i-Kashmir
(completed in 1621 CE) are the most important texts on the history of Kashmir
during the Sultanate period. Both the texts were written in Persian and used
Rajatarangini and Persian histories as their sources.
Earliest Neolithic sites in the flood plains of Kashmir
valley are dated to c. 3000 BCE. Most important of these sites are the
settlements at Burzahom, which had two Neolithic and one Megalithic phases.
First phase (c. 2920 BCE) at Burzahom is marked by mud plastered pit dwellings,
coarse pottery and stone tools. In the second phase, which lasted till c. 1700
BCE, houses were constructed on ground level and the dead were buried,
sometimes with domesticated and wild animals. Hunting and fishing were the
primary modes of subsistence though evidence of cultivation of wheat, barley,
and lentils has also been found in both the phases. In the megalithic phase,
massive circles were constructed and grey or black burnish replaced coarse red
ware in pottery. During the later Vedic period, as kingdoms of the Vedic tribes
expanded, the Uttara–Kurus settled in Kashmir.
In 326 BCE, Porus asked Abisares, the king of Kashmir, to
aid him against Alexander the Great in the Battle of Hydaspes. After Porus lost
the battle, Abhisares submitted to Alexander by sending him treasure and
elephants. During the reign of Ashoka (304–232 BCE), Kashmir became a part of
the Maurya Empire and Buddhism was introduced in Kashmir. During this period,
many stupas, some shrines dedicated to Shiva, and the city of Srinagari
(Srinagar) were built. Kanishka (127–151 CE), an emperor of the Kushan dynasty,
conquered Kashmir and established the new city of Kanishkapur. Buddhist
tradition holds that Kanishka held the Fourth Buddhist council in Kashmir, in
which celebrated scholars such as Ashvagosha, Nagarjuna and Vasumitra took
part. By the fourth century, Kashmir became a seat of learning for both Buddhism
and Hinduism. Kashmiri Buddhist missionaries helped spread Buddhism to Tibet
and China and from the fifth century CE, pilgrims from these countries started
visiting Kashmir. Kumārajīva (343–413 CE) was among the renowned Kashmiri
scholars who traveled to China. He influenced the Chinese emperor Yao Xing and
spearheaded translation of many Sanskrit works into Chinese at the Chang'an
monastery.
Hepthalites (White Huns) under Toramana crossed over the
Hindukush mountains and conquered large parts of western India including
Kashmir. His son Mihirakula (c. 502–530 CE) led a military campaign to conquer
all of North India. He was opposed by Baladitya in Magadha and eventually
defeated by Yasodharman in Malwa. After the defeat, Mihirakula returned to
Kashmir where he led a coup on the king. He then conquered of Gandhara where he
committed many atrocities on Buddhists and destroyed their shrines. Influence
of the Huns faded after Mihirakula's death. After seventh century, significant
developments took place in Kashmiri Hinduism. In the centuries that followed,
Kashmir produced many poets, philosophers, and artists who contributed to
Sanskrit literature and Hindu religion. Among notable scholars of this period
was Vasugupta (c. 875–925 CE) who wrote the Shiva Sutras which laid the
foundation for a monistic Shaiva system called Kashmir Shaivism. Dualistic
interpretation of Shaiva scripture was defeated by Abhinavagupta (c. 975–1025
CE) who wrote many philosophical works on Kashmir Shaivism. Kashmir Shaivism
was adopted by the common masses of Kashmir and strongly influenced Shaivism in
Southern India.
In the eighth century, Karkota Empire established themselves
as rulers of Kashmir. Kashmir grew as an imperial power under the Karkotas.
Chandrapida of this dynasty was recognized by an imperial order of the Chinese
emperor as the king of Kashmir. His successor Lalitaditya Muktapida lead a
successful military campaign against the Tibetans. He then defeated Yashovarman
of Kanyakubja and subsequently conquered eastern kingdoms of Magadha, Kamarupa,
Gauda, and Kalinga. Lalitaditya extended his influence of Malwa and Gujarat and
defeated Arabs at Sindh. After his demise, Kashmir's influence over other
kingdoms declined and the dynasty ended in c. 855–856 CE. Utpala dynasty
founded by Avantivarman followed the Kakrotas. His successor Shankaravarman
(885–902 CE) led a successful military campaign against Gurjaras in Punjab.
Political instability in the 10th century made the royal body guards (Tantrins)
very powerful in Kashmir. Under the Tantrins, civil administration collapsed
and chaos reigned in Kashmir till they were defeated by Chakravarman. Queen
Didda, who descended from the Hindu Shahis of Kabul on her mother's side, took
over as the ruler in second half of the 10th century. After her death in 1003
CE, the throne passed to Lohara dynasty. During the 11th century, Mahmud of
Ghazni made two attempts to conquer Kashmir. However, both his campaigns failed
because he could not siege the fortress at Lohkot.
In the 14th century, Islam gradually became the dominant
religion in Kashmir. Islamic preacher Sheikh Nooruddin Noorani, who is
traditionally revered by Hindus as Nund Rishi, combined elements of Kashmir
Shaivism with Sufi mysticism in his discourses. The Sultans between 1354–1470
CE were tolerant of other religions with the exception of Sultan Sikandar
(1389–1413 CE). Sultan Sikandar imposed taxes on non–Muslims, forced
conversions to Islam, and earned the title But–Shikan for destroying idols.
Sultan Zain-ul-Abidin (c. 1420–1470 CE) invited artists and craftsmen from
Central Asia and Persia to train local artists in Kashmir. Under his rule the
arts of wood carving, papier-mâché , shawl and carpet weaving prospered. For a
brief period in 1470s, states of Jammu, Poonch and Rajauri which paid tributes
to Kashmir revolted against the Sultan Hajji Khan. However, they were
subjugated by his son Hasan Khan who took over as ruler in 1472 CE. By the mid
16th century, Hindu influence in the courts and role of the Hindu priests had
declined as Muslim missionaries immigrated into Kashmir from Central Asia and
Persia, and Persian replaced Sanskrit as the official language. Around the same
period, the nobility of Chaks had become powerful enough to unseat the Shah Mir
dynasty.
Mughal general Mirza Muhammad Haidar Dughlat, a member of
ruling family in Kashgar, invaded Kashmir in c. 1540 CE on behalf of emperor
Humayun. Persecution of Shias, Shafi'is and Sufis and instigation by Suri kings
led to a revolt which overthrew Dughlat's rule in Kashmir.
Kashmir did not witness direct Mughal rule till the reign of
Mughal padshah (emperor) Akbar the Great, who visited the valley himself in 1589
CE. The Mughal conquered Kashmir and added it in 1586 to his Afghan province
Kabul Subah, but Shah Jahan carved it out as a separate subah (imperial
top-level province), with seat at Srinagar. During successive Mughal emperors
many celebrated gardens, mosques and palaces were constructed. Religious
intolerance and discriminatory taxation reappeared when Mughal emperor
Aurangzeb ascended to the throne in 1658 CE. After his death, the influence of
the Mughal Empire declined.
In 1700 CE, a servant of a wealthy Kashmir merchant brought
Mo-i Muqqadas (the hair of the Prophet), a relic of Muhammad, to the valley.
The relic was housed in the Hazratbal Shrine on the banks of Dal Lake. Nadir
Shah's invasion of India in 1738 CE further weakened Mughal control over
Kashmir.
In 1753, Abdul Khan Isk Aquasi, a general in Ahmed Shah
Abdali's army, invaded Kashmir and established the rule of the Durrani Empire
of Afghanistan. Afghan rule in Kashmir was extremely cruel and oppressive,
particularly for the Hindus. Locals were extorted from, captured and forced
into slavery during this period. Dominance of Afghans declined after Ahmed Shah
Abdali's death in 1772, but they ruled Kashmir for another 47 years.
In 1819, the Kashmir valley passed from the control of the
Durrani Empire of Afghanistan, and four centuries of Muslim rule under the
Mughals and the Afghans, to the conquering armies of the Sikhs under Ranjit
Singh of Punjab. As the Kashmiris had suffered under the Afghans, they
initially welcomed the new Sikh rulers. However, the Sikh governors turned out
to be hard taskmasters, and Sikh rule was generally considered oppressive,
protected perhaps by the remoteness of Kashmir from the capital of the Sikh
Empire in Lahore. The Sikhs enacted a number of anti-Muslim laws, which
included handing out death sentences for cow slaughter, closing down the Jamia
Masjid in Srinagar, and banning the azaan, the public Muslim call to prayer.
Kashmir had also now begun to attract European visitors, several of whom wrote
of the abject poverty of the vast Muslim peasantry and of the exorbitant taxes
under the Sikhs. High taxes, according to some contemporary accounts, had
depopulated large tracts of the countryside, allowing only one-sixteenth of the
cultivable land to be cultivated. However, after a famine in 1832, the Sikhs
reduced the land tax to half the produce of the land and also began to offer
interest-free loans to farmers; Kashmir became the second highest revenue
earner for the Sikh empire. During this time Kashmiri shawls became known world
wide, attracting many buyers especially in the west.
Earlier, in 1780, after the death of Ranjit Deo, the Raja of
Jammu, the kingdom of Jammu (to the south of the Kashmir valley) was also
captured by the Sikhs and afterwards, until 1846, became a tributary to the
Sikh power. Ranjit Deo's grandnephew, Gulab Singh, subsequently sought service
at the court of Ranjit Singh, distinguished himself in later campaigns,
especially the annexation of the Kashmir valley, and, for his services, was
appointed governor of Jammu in 1820. With the help of his officer, Zorawar
Singh, Gulab Singh soon captured for the Sikhs the lands of Ladakh and
Baltistan to the east and north-east, respectively, of Jammu.
In 1845, the First Anglo-Sikh War broke out, and Gulab Singh
"contrived to hold himself aloof till the battle of Sobraon (1846), when
he appeared as a useful mediator and the trusted advisor of Sir Henry Lawrence.
Two treaties were concluded. By the first the State of Lahore (i.e. West
Punjab) handed over to the British, as equivalent for (rupees) ten million of
indemnity, the hill countries between Beas and Indus; by the second the British
made over to Gulab Singh for (Rupees) 7.5 million all the hilly or mountainous
country situated to the east of Indus and west of Ravi" (i.e. the Vale of
Kashmir). The Treaty of Amritsar freed Gulab Singh from obligations towards the
Sikhs and made him the Maharajah of Jammu and Kashmir. The Dogras' loyalty came
in handy to the British during the revolt of 1857 which challenged British rule
in India. Dogras refused to provide sanctuary to mutineers, allowed English
women and children to seek asylum in Kashmir and sent Kashmiri troops to fight
on behalf of the British. British in return rewarded them by securing the
succession of Dogra rule in Kashmir. Soon after Gulab Singh's death in 1857,
his son, Ranbir Singh, added the emirates of Hunza, Gilgit and Nagar to the
kingdom.
The Princely State of Kashmir and Jammu (as it was then
called) was constituted between 1820 and 1858 and was "somewhat artificial
in composition and it did not develop a fully coherent identity, partly as a
result of its disparate origins and partly as a result of the autocratic rule
which it experienced on the fringes of Empire." It combined disparate
regions, religions, and ethnicities: to the east, Ladakh was ethnically and
culturally Tibetan and its inhabitants practised Buddhism; to the south, Jammu
had a mixed population of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs; in the heavily populated
central Kashmir valley, the population was overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim,
however, there was also a small but influential Hindu minority, the Kashmiri
brahmins or pandits; to the northeast, sparsely populated Baltistan had a
population ethnically related to Ladakh, but which practised Shi'a Islam; to
the north, also sparsely populated, Gilgit Agency, was an area of diverse,
mostly Shi'a groups; and, to the west, Punch was Muslim, but of different ethnicity
than the Kashmir valley.
Ranbir Singh's grandson Hari Singh, who had ascended the
throne of Kashmir in 1925, was the reigning monarch in 1947 at the conclusion
of British rule of the subcontinent and the subsequent partition of the British
Indian Empire into the newly independent Union of India and the Dominion of
Pakistan. An internal revolt began in the Poonch region against oppressive
taxation by the Maharaja. In August, Maharaja's forces fired upon
demonstrations in favour of Kashmir joining Pakistan, burned whole villages and
massacred innocent people. The Poonch rebels declared an independent government
of "Azad" Kashmir on 24 October.Rulers of Princely States were
encouraged to accede their States to either Dominion – India or Pakistan,
taking into account factors such as geographical contiguity and the wishes of
their people. In 1947, Kashmir's population was "77% Muslim and 20%
Hindu". To postpone making a hurried decision, the Maharaja signed a
standstill agreement with Pakistan, which ensured continuity of trade, travel,
communication, and similar services between the two. Such an agreement was
pending with India. Following huge riots in Jammu, in October 1947, Pashtuns
from Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province recruited by the Poonch rebels,
invaded Kashmir, along with the Poonch rebels, allegedly incensed by the
atrocities against fellow Muslims in Poonch and Jammu. The tribesmen engaged in
looting and killing along the way. The ostensible aim of the guerilla campaign
was to frighten Hari Singh into submission. Instead the Maharaja appealed to
the Government of India for assistance, and the Governor-General Lord
Mountbatten agreed on the condition that the ruler accede to India. Once the
Maharaja signed the Instrument of Accession, Indian soldiers entered Kashmir
and drove the Pakistani-sponsored irregulars from all but a small section of
the state. India accepted the accession, regarding it provisional until such
time as the will of the people can be ascertained. Kashmir leader Sheikh
Abdullah endorsed the accession as ad-hoc which would be ultimately decided by
the people of the State. He was appointed the head of the emergency administration
by the Maharaja. The Pakistani government immediately contested the accession,
suggesting that it was fraudulent, that the Maharaja acted under duress and
that he had no right to sign an agreement with India when the standstill
agreement with Pakistan was still in force.