Dahir of Aror

Raja Dahir (663 – 20 June 712 ) was the last Hindu Maharaja of Sindh from 695 to 712. A Brahmin ruler, his kingdom was invaded in 711 by the Arab Umayyad Caliphate, led by Muhammad bin Qasim, where Dahir died. According to the Chach Nama, the Umayyad campaign against Dahir was due to a pirate raid off the Sindh coast that resulted in gifts to the Umayyad caliph from the king of Serendib being stolen.

Raja Dahir was born in 663 into the Brahman dynasty of Sindh, a family deeply rooted in Hindu traditions and governance. His father, Chach of Aror, who ruled from 631 to 671, was a Brahmin who ascended to the throne after marrying the widowed Queen Suhandi. This event established the Chach dynasty, which would rule Sindh for nearly a century.

He fought three battles successfully, but was killed in the final one after being betrayed by the Buddhists who resented him during the Battle of Aror. He died defending his region at Sindh which took place between his dynasty and the Arabs at the banks of the Indus River, near modern-day Nawabshah at the hands of the Arab general Muhammad bin Qasim.

Reign in the Chach Nama The Chach Nama is the oldest chronicle of the Arab conquest of Sindh. It was translated into Persian by an Arab named Muhammad Ali bin Hamid bin Abu Bakr Kufi in 1216 from an earlier Arabic text believed to have been written by the Thaqafi family (relatives of Mukhtar al-Thaqafi).

War with the Umayyads

Throughout his reign, Maharaja Dahir had to face invasions from the Umayyad Caliphate which had grown quite powerful by that time.

According to Chachnama and the Arab historian Biladhuri, Dahir defeated the Arabs twice in pitched battles during the twin battles of Debal in which the invading Arab commanders Ubaidullah and Budail or Bazil were killed by Sindhis under Dahir's son Jaisiah.

Jaisiah later appointed his own chief or Thakur who governed on his behalf. According to Chachnamah, when the news of Bazil's death was relayed to Hajjaj, he became very sad and full of rage.

This led to the fateful expedition by Muhammad bin Qasim. Before the Battle of Aror, Maharaja Dahir is said to have given this speech as per Chachnama

The primary reason cited in the Chach Nama for the expedition by the governor of Basra, Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, against Raja Dahir, was a pirate raid off the coast of Debal resulting in gifts to the caliph from the king of Serendib (modern Sri Lanka) being stolen.

Sometime before the final battle, Dahir's vizier approached him and suggested that Dahir should take refuge with one of the friendly kings of India. "You should say to them, 'I am a wall between you and the Arab army. If I fall, nothing will stop your destruction at their hands.'" If that wasn't acceptable to Dahir, said the vizier, then he should at least send away his family to some safe point in India. Dahir refused to do either. "I cannot send away my family to security while the families of my thakurs and nobles remain here."