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The Mughal Impact to India

There are many political, cultural and economic histories that abound regarding Mughal

Sultanate and these are commensurate with the Islamic nature of the state’s auspices. The

greatest territorial extent of the Mughal Empire at its zenith covered majority of Indian

subcontinent, Afghanistan and Baluchistan. During this era of the Mughal Empire between 1526

and 1857, the fundamental subject of religion took elemental changes that included a shift from

the mixture of Islam, Hindu, and Sikh during the reigns of Babur and Akbar (Britannica, 2017).

Aurangzeb was zealous about Islam and the Sharia law. Consequently, during this time in the

empire more Islamic mosques were established in place of the destroyed Hindu and Sikh

temples. The actions of the Islamic Mughal Empire contributed to the spread and consolidation

of Islam in the Hindu concentrated South Asia including Muslim art and socio-cultural elements.

Mughal Muslims and the Islam religion brought with them an emphasis on belief and

brotherhood and the accentuation of equality for all before Allah. The impact such Islamic

principles thereof was rife extending from mere belief to cultural influence that included

establishment of law, order, trade systems, and political culture that birthed capital-holding

sections of the state of India.

rules that dominated the observation of certain ceremonial purifications, marriage, diet, and the

observance of dharma duty. The Indian cultural system existed in normative hierarchies that

demystified other earlier outsiders’ and assimilated them into Hinduism. However, the advent of

Islam brought with it a complete religious outfit that encompassed decoded language,

documented scripts, laws and customs that established a theory of state. The pre-Islamic states

became Islamized and a mixture of the Persian Islamic culture and Hinduism birthed Urdu.

During the Mughal period, the Islamic influence in India resulted in the Sufi and Bhakti

movements that delivered a strong socio-cultural change throughout the subcontinent. During

this medieval period, religion took a mixed emblem where the Sufi Muslims influenced the

Bhakti Hindu preachers to embrace the oneness of the religions as different paths that lead to the

same path of revering the one true God of power or Allah in a Hindu-Muslim mixture. The

Muslims dedicated themselves to spread the Islamic religion but were cautious not to undermine

what the Indians believed in while accomplishing the mission. The emperors preached religious

tolerance and propagated the idea of the belief in God-ism as described above (Britannica, 2017).

The enhanced religious cohesion favored the leadership of Akbar through peaceful governance

and allowed assimilation of aspects of each culture to be borrowed by all the major religions in

the land.

The introduction into the Indian administration of the Arabic- Persian language by the Mongol

rulers influenced the Indian languages that resulted in the transformation of the literary tradition

of India including the arts and historical accounts. There was military necessity to comprehend

each other and this resulted into a culture of Urdu speaking among Hindu militia and the Muslim

soldiers. Urdu contained synthetic elements of both cultures Hindi language and the Islamic
Persian language. Islam brought with it great artistic impressions that included new architectural

patterns of arches, peaked minarets, spherical ball domes that were adopted by the indigenous

Hindu culture. The Hindu craftsmen fused an Indo-Islamic traditional art to produce imperial,

provincial, and Hindu religious and secular architecture like the Quota Minar and Fort

Kumbhalgarh (Pelsaert, 1925). Moreover, the Islamic touch was impressed on Hindu music

culture to produce new musical regulations, instruments, and styles. The Hindu and Islam social

customs were similar in some aspects such as marriage, polygamy, use of charms, belief in

astrologers, as well as dressing and etiquette. Today, the Hindu weddings and ceremonies

contain aspects heavily borrowed from the Islamic cultures of Persia and Turkey that

characterized the Mughal era. The Mughal court manners that were largely Islamic were

borrowed by the Hindu aristocrats and adopted by their subordinates. Mughal Muslims thrived

in textile making and were responsible for the textile industries in India. It is Islam therefore, that

introduced the new kinds of delicate and comfortable clothing that the Hindu took up including

the use of perfumes and beautiful fragrant use.

Politically, Islam brought during the Mughal era a system of centralized governance that has

delegations mimicking the Indian Caste system. The Mughal created titles that beheld

occupational meaning of the caste system such that they were strengthened and made ruling the

Indians easier (Balabanlilar, 2012). The natives from high caste continued to rule various

sections with historical assertions that Mughal Empire tightened the caste bonds. Before the

advent of the Mughals, each caste had its own administrative method that was independent.

However, the Mughal era and Islam brought with it the idea of equality for all that favored a

centralized government where other smaller kingdoms were answerable to the emperor and

represented him in a delegated system that emphasized the reverence of human rights. The
politics also shifted from caste settings to a militarized system that was characteristic of Muslim

kingdoms of Persia.

All Mughal leaders had an inherent interest in trade that involved local batter trade and the

foreign seaborne commercial activities. The Muslim Mughals welcomed foreign traders in their

securitized trading systems and levied friendly custom duty for transactions done within the

Mughal Empire which included India (BBC, 2009). Indian exports constituted of farm produce,

manufactured materials, and mineral ornaments. The Arabs and their Islamic practice thrived in

trading between Mughal and the 16th century Ottoman Empire, Persia, and other kingdoms of the

Middle East (Turkistan) and this was brought to India. The leadership of the Mughal Empire

created workshops, indigenous industries, and factories. In the course of time the economy of

India opened up to the foreign traders, industrialization and low tax regimes that favored

favorable trading amongst the locals and foreigners. The city government of the period

encouraged trade which cemented the flourishing commerce among the traditional Indian

merchants. Moreover, the caste system restructuring by Islam cemented economic activities of

the Indian nation by providing avenue for the business community to seek redress and air

disputes. The sultanate was characterized by Muslim dominance in handicraft industries and

Hindu dominance in banking and book keeping. Trade augmentation improved the economy of

all Indians and India as a country contrary to the British who controlled and monopolized

industries, trade and civil service.

Therefore the Islamic impact left an enduring influence on the various elements of the Indian

culture, politics, religion, and economy from the era of the Mughal rule through the colonial

period to modern day India. The indigenous culture and tradition went through a metamorphosis
secondary to Islamic contact and the impacts of such interaction have become integral parts of

the culture of Indians.

Bibliography

BBC. (2009, September). Mughal Empire (1500s, 1600s). Retrieved Oct 16th, 2017, from

bbc.co.uk: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/history/mughalempire_1.shtml

Balabanlilar, L. (2012). Imperial identity in the Mughal Empire: Memory and dynastic politics in

early modern South and Central Asia. London: I.B. Tauris.

Britannica. (2017, July). Mughal dynasty INDIA [1526-1857]. Retrieved Oct 2017, from

Encyclopeia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Mughal-dynasty

Pelsaert, F. (1925). Jahangir's India, trans. by W. H. Moreland and Peter Gey. Cambridge: 079.