qAyamkhani

Source: TW

Nyamat Khan or better known as Jan Kavi in his Qayamkhani Rasa, describing the exploits of his father Alif Khan mentions the battle of Kangra. As per Kavi, so fierce was the battle that ash-smeared bhagavan Shiva with his trident, skull bowl came to the battlefield and danced. Yoginis were seen drinking blood & eating the flesh of the slain warriors on the battlefield; a common Rajput war motif. The Khan, though styled as a ghazi, a mujahid, reaches Amarapura (land of Immortal) after his shahadat, before he goes to Vaikuntha (abode of bhagavan Vishnu).

The Qayamkhanis trace their lineage to a certain Karam Chand/Qayam Khan, a Chauhan Rajput who was “turned Turk” by Firuz Shah Tughluq, when the former was a kid. Qayam Khan later went on to become a prominent Tughluqid noble, with his line ruling Fatehpur-Jhunjhunu.

What is interesting is that even ~300 years after Qayam Khan’s conversion, the concept of God, war and afterlife remained the same for the Qayamkhanis, & despite being ghazis, “Holy Warriors” or shaheeds, “Martyrs,” the abode of bhagavan Vishnu was the final destination. Quite similar to the Oghuz and Germanic society depicted in the Book of Dede Korkut and Beowulf; so even though the former praises the ghaza of the Turks against the infidels, strains of pre-Islamic Turkic polytheism are visible (Dede Korkut himself being a shaman-sorcerer).

The Qayamkhanis ruled the region till Sawai Jai Singh conquered it, bringing them under Kachvaha suzerainty; so when Lt. Col. Maharajah Bhavani Singh led the Chachro Raid during Indo-Pak war of ‘71, the Qayamkhanis living on the other side came to pay their respect to the king.