Mihir Bhoja or, Bhoja 1, was the king of the ninth century of the Gurjara Pratihara dynasty. He was a warrior, conqueror and great emperor.
October 18 is celebrated as the birth anniversary of the great king Mihir Bhoja across North India. The celebration was noteworthy in towns of Pratiharas like Gwalior, Mandore, Nagod and other places.
The celebrations were for the Rajputana community like Akhil Bhartiya Kshatriya Mahasabha, Kshatriya Yuvak Sangh, and Gujjar.
The last two decades have witnessed distortion of Rajput history where political parties led by RSS–BJP have reduced historical figures like Mihirbhoj Pratihar to garner Gujjar votes community.
As explained in my previous article, this distortion has wrongly led Gujjars of NCR to claim they are descendants of the Gurjar-Pratihars.
History
The Pratiharas community’s rule was considered a memorable chapter of our history. Bhoja’s empire expanded to the river Narmada in the south upto Bengal in the east.
The Barah Copper Inscription introduces Bhoja I or Mihirbhoj Pratihar as – Param Bhagavatī Bhakto Maharāja Śrī Bhojadeva. Sulaiman, who was the Arab chronicler, expresses the army of the Mihirhoj.
Although he was unfriendly to the Arabs, still he accepted that the king of the Arab was an appreciable warrior. Amidst the princess of India. Among the princes of India, there is no greater foe of the Islamic faith than he. He has got riches, and his camels and horses are numerous.”
Mihirbhoj Pratihar built the Sagar Tal at Gwalior, and the inscription opens with adoration of Vishnu then highlights the origin of the Pratihar clan.
It mentions legendary kings like Ikshvaku and highlights that “In the same race was born Lakshmana, the brother of Rama. Saumitra (Lakshmana) was a devoted brother and served as a Pratihara (doorkeeper).
His other wife was Kalavati Chauhan, the sister of Guvaka I Chauhan (863-890 CE) of the Sambhar Chauhan dynasty (RB Singh, History of Chauhans, p. 96-97, 116).
Kannauj, the capital of Pratihars, was later conquered by Raja Gopal Rathore (Rashtrakut), Emperor Chandradev Gaharwar. (R.C. Majumdar, The Struggle for Empire, Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan, pp. 50-51).
In 1911, the district Gazetteer of Farrukhabad (Kannauj was part of Farrukhabad) recorded a Parihar/Pratihāra Rajput population of 1,575 who owned 4235 acres (E R Neave; Farrukhabad: District Gazetteers of The United Provinces of Agra and Oudh; p. 72).
The Imperial Pratihar dynasty also left many cadet branches near Kannauj, especially in the Chambal and Bundelkhand regions. Some of them were the Gwalior Pratihar, Hamirpur Pratihar dynasties.
The Census of India, 1921, Volume-XX, Gwalior, Part-II, p.78 showed 1,754 Parihars in the Gwalior district. Similarly, Volume XXII of the District Gazetteers of the United Provinces & Oudh, 1909, p. 71, counted 2,640 Parihar Rajputs in Hamirpur district.
The Central India State Census series, Vol XXII, Nagode State, p. 13 counted 2451 Parihars in Satna District.
Apart from the plethora of inscriptional evidence and British era Gazetteers/Census records, noted anthropologist Prof FC Spaulding submitted a research paper to the Ohio State University in 1994.
That other communities are also celebrating the birth anniversary of Emperor Mihirbhoj Pratihar is welcome, as he is truly a national treasure and an important historical figure.
Yet, this should not come at the expense of his lineage being distorted for political gains.
The appropriation of the ninth-century Rajput emperor just before the UP assembly elections is another example of vote bank politics to appease backward castes at the expense of Rajput history.
