Khan Jahan Lodi

Pir Khan (died 3 February 1631), known by the name Khan Jahan Lodi, was an ethnic Afghan who served as a noble of the Mughal Empire. Entering the Mughal service during the reign of Mughal emperor Akbar, he enjoyed a meteoric rise under emperor Jahangir, becoming one of the empire's highest-ranking nobles. Lodi was the leading example of Afghan recruitment during Jahangir's reign, as Jahangir attempted to conciliate this group that was hitherto hostile to Mughal rule. Khan Jahan Lodi fell out of imperial favour with the accession of Shah Jahan and rebelled against the ruler, resulting in his capture and execution in the early 1630s. His rebellion was a major event of Shah Jahan's early rule. During his lifetime, Khan Jahan Lodi sponsored the Tarikh-i-Khan-Jahani, a written ethno-history of the Afghans which was highly influential on subsequent works about the topic.

Origins Khan Jahan Lodi, originally named Pir Khan, was the son of Daulat Khan Lodi, a minor noble during the reign of Akbar. According to his biography in the Tarikh-i-Khan-Jahani, he was descended from a clan in the region of Roh in present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan, and his ancestors migrated to the Indian subcontinent during the rule of Sikandar Lodi. They subsequently served in the offices and military of different Indian rulers, facing difficulties from the fall of the Lodi dynasty. On the other hand, the emperor Jahangir in his memoir Tuzuk-i-Jahangiri identifies Khan Jahan Lodi as a descendant of Daulat Khan Lodi, a governor of Lahore who betrayed the Lodi dynasty by inviting the conquest of the first Mughal ruler Babur. Jahangir's assessment may have been incorrect or fabricated to justify the promotions that Khan Jahan Lodi was receiving under his rule.

Pir Khan spent a number of his formative years in the Deccan, while his father served under two consecutive Mughal governors of the region (Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khanan and prince Daniyal).

Career

Reign of Akbar During the rule of Mughal emperor Akbar, Pir Khan participated in the final stages of the conquest of Bengal, fighting under the command of Raja Man Singh. He later became a favourite of prince Daniyal. In the period 1599–1604, prince Salim (later emperor Jahangir) staged a rebellion against Akbar from Allahabad. During this time he attempted to court Pir Khan's employment, and between 1600 and 1603 the latter threatened to leave Daniyal's service in the Deccan multiple times. He did not follow through, due to his connections in the Deccan and multiple gifts from Daniyal. This was part of a larger effort on Salim's part to recruit Afghans to his cause, on account of their hostility to Akbar's rule; Salim's interest in Pir Khan convinced other Afghans to join his cause. Following Daniyal's death, Pir Khan entered the service of Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khanan. In 1611, he was deputed to lead an army against the Nizam Shahi city of Daulatabad, but failed to capture it. In 1620, his influence increased when he was appointed governor of Multan. During his tenure, Qandahar was captured by the Safavids in 1622. After the fall of Qandahar, a number of Afghan tribesmen approached Khan Jahan Lodi and offered their support in leading a retaliation against the Safavids. Khan Jahan Lodi refused, fearing imperial backlash at the idea of Afghan forces clustering under his name. He did advise Jahangir to immediately send an army to recover Qandahar, but this did not come to fruition. and pursued by Mughal forces, he survived a battle near Dholpur by the Chambal River, but several of his relatives and his retinue perished. With his two remaining sons, and the aid of Jhujhar Singh Bundela, he reached the court of Murtaza Nizam Shah II, who accepted him and made him commander of the Nizam Shahi armies. John F. Richards has characterised Khan Jahan Lodi's rebellion as one of the most serious from a noble in Mughal history, albeit successfully quelled. During the height of his career as a noble of Jahangir, he sponsored a work of history in the Persian language titled Tarikh-i-Khan-Jahani , written by Nimat Allah al-Harawi, which described the ethnogenesis of the Afghans. This work was the first systematic attempt to present the history of the Afghans, and inspired several later Persian-language histories in the genre. The work includes a biography of Khan Jahan Lodi himself.