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Telugu Historyతెలుగు చరిత్ర

Daud Khan Panni

Afghan general of Aurangzeb and his successors (died 1715). He served under Zulfiqar Khan at the siege of Jinji. He held the Kurnool country as a jagir (land grant) and Arcot as faujdar (military governor), and his Afghans captured the rebel prince Kam Bakhsh near Hyderabad in 1709. As Zulfiqar Khan's deputy he governed the six provinces of the Mughal Deccan until 1713. He was sent against the new viceroy Husain Ali Khan and was killed near Burhanpur. His brother Ibrahim Khan, Bahadur Khan Panni, held Kurnool until he fell at Shakar Kheda in 1724. Their successors were the Nawabs of Kurnool, whose line ended in 1839. Kirkpatrick's sketch of the family makes his father, Khizr Khan Panni, its founder, and Ibrahim his nephew.

Daud Khan, of the Panni tribe of Afghans, was one of the Mughal generals who held the southern Telugu country for the empire after the conquest of Golconda.12 The Kurnool district manual calls him “a Patan general of great talent”.12 The Nellore manual calls him “a Patan officer already distinguished in Aurungzib’s wars”.12 See the Mughals in the Telugu country and the Nawabs of Kurnool.

Kurnool and the Karnatak

According to the Kurnool manual, Aurangzeb’s officers had taken Adoni and Kurnool.1 Then, through the help of Ghiyas-ud-din Khan, the Kurnool territory “was conferred as a jaghire” on Daud Khan.1 He was sent as deputy to Zulfiqar Khan in the invasion of the Karnatak, and he passed through the Kurnool district without opposition.1

Grant Duff writes about the long siege of Jinji.3 Inebriety means drunkenness. He says that the fighting “would probably have been bloodless, but for the inebriety of Daood Khan, Zoolfikar Khan’s lieutenant, who, when intoxicated, always turned out his men to storm the fort”.3

In 1707–08 the rebel prince Kam Bakhsh sent his general against Arcot.4 Daud Khan was then its faujdar (military governor).4

Kam Bakhsh and the Deccan

Daud Khan joined the emperor Bahadur Shah’s camp on 7 December 1708.5 He paraded his troops with a hundred elephants.5 He brought eleven lakhs of rupees and nineteen elephants for Zulfiqar Khan.5

The battle near Hyderabad was fought on 13 January 1709, and his troops were in the right wing.67 Kam Bakhsh’s charge threw some of them into confusion.67 But in the end “Daud Khan’s Afghans surrounding his elephant on all sides succeeded in capturing him”.67

Bahadur Shah went back north, and Zulfiqar Khan was made viceroy of the Deccan.82 But Zulfiqar Khan stayed at court and “left Daood Khan Punnee as his deputy in the six Soobehs of the Deccan”.82

Removal and death

Farrukhsiyar came to the throne in 1713.91011 Daud Khan was moved from Burhanpur to Gujarat to make room for Nizam-ul-Mulk’s deputy.91011 In Gujarat he replaced Mubariz Khan, who was then sent to Haidarabad.91011

Gribble says that Husain Ali Khan was made viceroy of the Deccan.12 The emperor secretly ordered Daud Khan, “a brave man” with “considerable influence with the Mahrattas”, to oppose him.12 Daud Khan was beaten and killed in the battle.12 His body was dragged round Burhanpur at the tail of an elephant.12 The Kurnool manual gives the same end.13 Irvine dates his death to AH 1127 (1715–16; AH is the Islamic way of counting years).10

His brother at Kurnool

The Kurnool manual says that when Daud Khan died, his brother Ibrahim Khan seized the fort of Kurnool from its imperial commander by a trick.13 He hid soldiers in palanquins said to carry his women.13 Then, through the subahdar (provincial governor) Mubariz Khan, he got a grant of the jagir (land grant) from the emperor.13

Irvine names him Ibrahim Khan Panni, with the title Bahadur Khan, “brother of the well-known Daud Khan Panni” and faujdar of Kurnool.141516 He led Mubariz Khan’s right wing at Shakar Kheda and was killed there in 1724.141516 Khafi Khan also names “Bahadur Khan, brother of Daud Khan Pani” among Mubariz Khan’s allies.17

Kirkpatrick wrote a sketch of the Pathan state of Kurnool (1811), based on the Persian of Mir Husain.1819 It says that Daud Khan was the son of Khizr Khan Panni, the founder of the Kurnool house.1819 Khizr Khan was killed in a quarrel at the emperor’s court.1819

Muhammad Burhanuddin’s history of the Carnatic and Kurnool (1905) also calls Daud Khan the son of Khizr Khan.2021 It prints an order of Aurangzeb, from his twentieth year of rule, giving the young Daud Khan a mansab (rank) of 4,000.2021 It dates the grant of the Kurnool jagir to about 1698.2021

Kirkpatrick’s sketch makes Ibrahim Khan the nephew of Daud Khan.22 In it, Daud died without children, and his only brother, Ali Khan Panni, followed him and ruled five or six years.22 Ali Khan was followed by his son Ibrahim.22 Kirkpatrick adds that Ibrahim rebuilt the citadel of Kurnool in masonry, since its wall had been of mud.22 See Kurnool and Himmat Bahadur Khan.

Footnotes

  1. Narahari Gopalakristnamah Chetty, A Manual of the Kurnool District (1886), p. 29 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6

  2. John A. C. Boswell, A Manual of the Nellore District (1873), p. 444 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  3. James Grant Duff, A History of the Mahrattas, Vol. I (1826), p. 384 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  4. William Irvine, ed. Jadunath Sarkar, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 52 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  5. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 60 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  6. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 62 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  7. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 63 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  8. Grant Duff, History of the Mahrattas, Vol. I (1826), p. 422 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  9. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 262 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  10. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. I (1922), p. 263 and note (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  11. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. II (1922), p. 138 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  12. J. D. B. Gribble, A History of the Deccan, Vol. I (1896), p. 356 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  13. Chetty, Kurnool District (1886), p. 30 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  14. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. II (1922), p. 140 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  15. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. II (1922), p. 146 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  16. Irvine, Later Mughals, Vol. II (1922), p. 148 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2

  17. Khafi Khan, Muntakhabu-l Lubab, in H. M. Elliot and John Dowson (eds.), The History of India as Told by Its Own Historians, Vol. VII (1877), p. 526 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩

  18. William Kirkpatrick (tr.), Select Letters of Tippoo Sultan (1811), Appendix G, p. li (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  19. Kirkpatrick, Select Letters of Tippoo Sultan (1811), Appendix G, p. liii (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  20. Muhammad Burhanuddin Siddiqui, The Carnatic & Kurnool, their Last Muhammedan Rulers (Madras, 1905), p. 56 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  21. Burhanuddin, The Carnatic & Kurnool (1905), p. 57 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  22. Kirkpatrick, Select Letters of Tippoo Sultan (1811), Appendix G, p. lv (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

Dynasties

Nawabs of Kurnool

c. 1690–1839 CE

A Pathan family of the Panni tribe who held Kurnool, where the Tungabhadra meets the Handri, as a jagir (land grant) from the Mughal conquest of the 1680s until the British annexed it in 1839. The Mughal general Daud Khan Panni received the jagir. His kinsman Ibrahim Khan seized the fort in 1715 and died fighting the first Nizam in 1724. Himmat Bahadur Khan helped to kill two Nizams, Nasir Jang and Muzaffar Jang, in 1750–51 and died in the second fight, after which the French stormed Kurnool. His brother Ranmast (Munawwar) Khan won it back in 1752 and paid tribute to the Nizam and to Haidar Ali and Tipu Sultan. In 1800 the Nizam gave the tribute to the East India Company. The last Nawab, Ghulam Rasul Khan, was deposed in 1839 after troops found a secret store of arms in his fort, and Kurnool became a British district.

References

Sources (9)
  1. Narahari Gopalakristnamah Chetty, A Manual of the Kurnool District in the Presidency of Madras (opens in a new tab), Government Press, Madras, 1886, pp. 29–30. [Public domain]
  2. William Irvine (ed. Jadunath Sarkar), Later Mughals, Vol. I: 1707-1720 (opens in a new tab), M. C. Sarkar and Sons, Calcutta; Luzac and Co., London, 1922, pp. 52, 60, 62–63, 262–263. [Public domain]
  3. William Irvine (ed. Jadunath Sarkar), Later Mughals, Vol. II: 1719-1739 (opens in a new tab), M. C. Sarkar and Sons, Calcutta; Luzac and Co., London, 1922, pp. 138, 140, 146, 148. [Public domain]
  4. James Grant Duff, A History of the Mahrattas, Vol. I (opens in a new tab), Longmans, Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, London, 1826, pp. 384, 422. [Public domain]
  5. J. D. B. Gribble, A History of the Deccan, Vol. I (opens in a new tab), Luzac & Co., London, 1896, pp. 356. [Public domain]
  6. John A. C. Boswell, A Manual of the Nellore District in the Presidency of Madras (opens in a new tab), Government of Madras, 1873, pp. 444. [Public domain]
  7. H. M. Elliot and John Dowson (eds.), The History of India as Told by Its Own Historians: The Muhammadan Period, Vol. VII (opens in a new tab), Trübner and Co., London, 1877, pp. 526. [Public domain]
  8. William Kirkpatrick (tr. and ed.), Select Letters of Tippoo Sultan to Various Public Functionaries (opens in a new tab), Black, Parry and Kingsbury, London, 1811, li, liii, lv. [Public domain]
  9. Muhammad Burhanuddin Siddiqui (Moulvi), The Carnatic & Kurnool, their Last Muhammedan Rulers (opens in a new tab), Commercial Press, Madras, 1905, pp. 56–57. [Public domain]

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