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Such was the erosion of demography and prosperity that after the capture of Brahmanabad, "all people, the merchants, artisans and agriculturists were divided separately into their respective classes, and ten thousand men, high and low, were counted. Muhammad Qasim then ordered twelve dirhams weight of silver to be assigned to each man , because all their property had been plundered."15 The Brahmans, "the attendants of the temples were likewise in distress. For fear of the army, the alms and bread were not regularly given to them, and therefore they were reduced to poverty."16 From the destruction of Debal to the end of the campaign temples had been broken with the zeal of an iconoclast and their purohits and other dependents had no employment, no income. "It was ordained that the Brahman should, like beggars, take a copper basin in their hands, go to the doors of the houses, and take whatever grain or other thing that might be offered to them, so that they might not remain unprovided for. (en) |
