Emergence of Afghan Power
- The Durrani Empire, also known as the Afghan Empire, was founded and built by Ahmad Shah Durrani. At its maximum extent, it ruled over what are today Afghanistan and Pakistan, along with parts of northeastern Iran, eastern Turkmenistan, and northwestern India.
- The year 1747 marks the definitive emergence of an independent Afghan political entity, free of both Persian and Mughal control.
- In October 1747, a grand council (loya jirga) held near Kandahar selected Ahmad Shah Durrani as the new leader of the Afghans — an event that founded the Durrani dynasty.
- Abdali (Ahmad Shah Durrani) invaded the Mughal Empire a total of seven times between 1748 and 1767.
- He first crossed the Khyber Pass in December 1747 with some 40,000 troops for his initial invasion of India, occupying Peshawar without any opposition.
- He crossed the Indus River for the first time in 1748 — the year following his ascension — with his forces sacking and absorbing Lahore.
- The following year (1749), the Mughal ruler was induced to formally cede Sindh and the whole of Punjab, including the vital trans-Indus territories, to Ahmad Shah, in order to spare his capital an assault by Durrani forces.
- Having secured substantial eastern territories without a fight, Durrani and his forces turned westward to take Herat, then ruled by Shah Rukh, a grandson of Nadir Shah.
- The city fell to the Afghans in 1750, after nearly a year of siege and bloody conflict; Afghan forces then pushed further into present-day Iran, capturing Nishapur and Mashhad in 1751.
- In his fourth invasion, Ahmad Shah consolidated Afghan control over the Kashmir and Punjab regions, with Lahore now placed directly under Afghan governance.
- In 1751–52, the Ahmadiya Treaty was signed between the Marathas and the Mughals, with Balaji Bajirao serving as Peshwa of the Maratha Empire.
- Through this treaty, the Marathas effectively controlled large parts of India from their capital at Pune, while genuine Mughal authority was reduced to little beyond Delhi itself (the Mughals remaining merely nominal heads of the city).
- The Marathas were, by this point, actively pushing to extend their sphere of control further towards northwestern India.
- Ahmad Shah Durrani sacked Delhi in 1757, but permitted the Mughal dynasty to retain nominal control of the city, on the condition that the ruler formally acknowledge his suzerainty over Punjab, Sindh, and Kashmir.
- He then withdrew with the plunder he had sought, leaving his second son, Timur Shah, to safeguard Afghan interests in India while he himself returned to Afghanistan.
- To counter this growing Afghan presence, Peshwa Balaji Bajirao despatched Raghunath Rao, who succeeded in ousting Timur Shah and his court from India, bringing the northwest of the subcontinent — up to Peshawar — under Maratha control.
- Consequently, upon his return to Kandahar in 1757, Durrani resolved to march back into India to confront the Marathas directly and reclaim the northwestern part of the subcontinent.
- This confrontation culminated in the Third Battle of Panipat, fought in 1761.
- Ahmad Shah’s victory at Panipat marked the true high point of both his own power and that of the Afghans more broadly — yet even before his death, the empire had already begun to unravel.
- In 1762, Ahmad Shah crossed the passes from Afghanistan for the sixth time, this time to subdue the Sikhs. From this point onward, Afghan control over its Indian territories steadily loosened, and by the time of Durrani’s death, Punjab had been entirely lost to the Sikhs — compounding earlier territorial losses in the north to the Uzbeks, which had already forced him into compromise.
- Ahmad Shah eventually retired to his home in the mountains east of Kandahar, where he died on 14 April 1773.
- He had succeeded, to a remarkable degree, in balancing rival tribal alliances and hostilities, and in channelling tribal energies away from open rebellion — earning him lasting recognition as Ahmad Shah Baba, or “Father of Afghanistan.”
- Ahmad Shah’s successors, however, governed so ineptly amid a period of profound unrest that within just fifty years of his death, the Durrani Empire itself had effectively ceased to exist, with Afghanistan plunged into civil war — much of the territory Ahmad Shah had conquered passing into other hands over the course of this half-century.
Afghan Kingdoms in India
- Alongside the Durrani Empire itself, a couple of small Afghan kingdoms were also established within north India, as Mughal authority continued to weaken.
- The rise of these states was, in large part, a direct fallout of sustained Afghan migration into India from the 17th century onward.
- A particularly large wave of Afghan immigration into India occurred in the mid-18th century, driven by growing political instability and economic dislocation within Afghanistan itself.
- Kingdom of Rohilkhand: The breakdown of authority across north India that followed Nadir Shah’s invasion created an opening for another Afghan leader, Ali Muhammad Khan, to establish a modest kingdom of Rohilkhand, situated at the foothills of the Himalayas.
- This new kingdom, however, acquired very little real influence, suffering heavily at the hands of neighbouring powers such as the Marathas, the Jats, Awadh, and, eventually, the English.
- Kingdom of Farrukhabad: A separate independent Afghan kingdom, to the east of Delhi around the town of Farrukhabad, was established by Ahmad Khan Bangash.
- Both the Rohillas and the Bangash Afghans provided support to Ahmad Shah Abdali during the Third Battle of Panipat — yet their own regional power declined rapidly once Abdali withdrew from the Indian political stage, leaving Najib-ud-Daula in effective charge of affairs at Delhi.
