Picture an evening in the last days of October. The chinars of Srinagar have turned crimson and gold, there is a faint chill in the air, and the Vitasta, the river the world knows as the Jhelum, moves slowly through the city. Then, one by one, clay lamps begin to glow along both banks, on the arches of the bridges and on the rooftops. Their reflections tremble in the water, as though the river itself had put on light. Through this glow a decorated royal barge glides forward, carrying the Emperor of Hindustan, Jalaluddin Muhammad Akbar.
This scene belongs to Akbar’s visit to Kashmir in 1592, usually counted as his second journey to the Valley. It is more than a story of royal spectacle. It is a way into a larger question: how power, culture and faith met, and shaped one another, on Kashmir’s soil.
The Political Backdrop: A Conquered but Uneasy Valley
Mughal rule in Kashmir began in 1586, when the Chak dynasty, first under Yusuf Khan and then Yaqub Khan, lost its hold on the Valley. A sultanate tradition that had lasted for centuries had come to an end, and with it the political and cultural autonomy Kashmiris regarded as part of their identity. Revolts were put down and a new administration was set up. But marching into a conquered land and winning the hearts of its people are two different things.
Akbar understood the difference. He first visited Kashmir in 1589 and returned in 1592. The accounts of Abu’l-Fazl’s Akbarnama and of later historians suggest that these journeys were not only seasonal retreats or an admiration of nature. They included administrative inspection, revenue arrangements and efforts to build ties with the local elite. It is against this background that the night of Kartik amavasya in 1592 should be read.
Diwali in Srinagar
In the Indian calendar, the new-moon night of the month of Kartik is the night of Diwali. For the Mughal court it was not an unfamiliar festival. According to court chroniclers, Akbar took an interest in Hindu festivals and had them observed at court with respect. The Ain-i-Akbari records the practice of raising an akash diya, a sky lamp, in the month of Kartik on a tall pole at the royal encampment. This symbolic use of light was part of royal splendour.
In Srinagar, this tradition appeared in a new form on the riverbank. A city whose life is built along both sides of a river, with its ghats, bridges and waterways woven into everyday routine, could find no more natural stage for a festival of lights than the river itself. Traditional accounts describe lamps lit along the banks, on the bridges and on boats, local residents illuminating their homes and windows, and the emperor watching the scene from a boat. These accounts also mention courtiers, musicians and local notables in attendance.
One point needs to be stated plainly for readers. The finer details of this particular night, and above all the poetic line about reflections in the water resembling stars that had come to float on the river, are repeated often in popular writing. Before attributing them to Abu’l-Fazl in a serious historical piece, the passage should be checked against the original text in Beveridge’s English translation of the Akbarnama (Volume III, regnal year 37). What the source directly confirms should be written with the evidence. What rests on tradition or inference should be described as such. That is the discipline of both journalism and history.
Light: More Than Illumination for Akbar
The story remains incomplete without understanding Akbar’s own relationship with light. In the Ain-i-Akbari, Abu’l-Fazl places the idea of divine light, farr-i-izadi, at the centre of kingship. For Akbar, sovereignty was a radiance flowing from God and reaching the people through the ruler. The reverence for the sun and fire at court, the celebration of Nawruz and the lamp-lit nights were all expressions of this idea.
Seen this way, Diwali was not merely one community’s festival for Akbar. It also resonated with his own political philosophy. This is the point at which sulh-i-kul, peace with all, moves beyond politics into cultural practice. Historian Sri Ram Sharma, in The Religious Policy of the Mughal Emperors, documents in detail the court’s attitude to Hindu festivals during Akbar’s reign, while Irfan Habib’s edited volume Akbar and His India offers analysis of the political and social layers of this policy.
The most interesting aspect of this story is that the illumination of 1592 was not new to Kashmir. The Nilamata Purana, the ancient text usually placed between roughly the sixth and eighth centuries, is the most important source for Kashmir’s festivals and customs. It describes the observance of Sukhasuptika on the new-moon night of Kartik, which is commonly linked to today’s Diwali, and it records the practice of lighting lamps, decorating homes and praying for prosperity. The edition and translation by Dr. Ved Kumari Ghai gives both the original Sanskrit and its rendering, and should be the first stop for any researcher.
A second stage of this continuity belongs to the sultanate period. Sultan Zain-ul-Abidin, remembered in Kashmiri memory as Badshah, is known for religious tolerance, patronage of the arts and respect for scholars. Shrivara’s Jaina Rajatarangini offers a glimpse of the cultural life of his time, and Mohibbul Hasan’s Kashmir under the Sultans gives a solid foundation for understanding the social fabric of the sultanate. In this tradition, local customs and the bonds of authority were never completely severed.
It would therefore be more accurate to say that Akbar did not “begin” a festival of lamps in Kashmir. He gave royal patronage to an existing tradition and tied it to the splendour of his own court. Between the ancient text, the sultanate and the Mughal court, the thread that stays visible is the celebration of light beside the river.
The Local View: Voices from the Baharistan-i-Shahi
Mughal court history is often written from the conqueror’s point of view. For that reason, local Persian chronicles such as the Baharistan-i-Shahi are important for the Kashmiri perspective. K. N. Pandit’s English translation (Baharistan-i-Shahi: A Chronicle of Mediaeval Kashmir) offers a chance to see the fall of the Chak dynasty and the Mughal entry through local eyes. P. N. K. Bamzai’s A History of Kashmir gives a broad account of the administrative and cultural life of the Mughal period.
Read together, these sources paint a more layered picture. On one side lie the memory of defeat and the pain of a transfer of power. On the other lie the practical attempts to come to terms with the new order. For Kashmiri society, a festival of lamps may well have been a mixture of both feelings. It could stir a sense of belonging while also reminding people that the centre of power had moved elsewhere.
Culture as a Tool of Politics
Was Akbar’s Diwali an act of pure faith, or a calculated piece of politics? Historians generally see a blend of the two. The foundation of the Mughal empire rested on a non-Muslim majority population, and stability depended on that population’s participation. The emperor’s presence at festivals sent a public message that the new power would respect local custom.
In Kashmir the message mattered even more. This was a region where military campaigns had only recently been fought, where the Kashmiri Pandit community had long held an administrative and intellectual role, and where Sufi and Rishi traditions had already prepared the ground for coexistence. In such a place, a festival of lamps could become an effective instrument of cultural diplomacy. Calling it politics does not diminish its importance. Hardly any large public event in history has been entirely free of politics, and the feelings of ordinary people who took part can still be genuine.
What It Means Today
Today, when history is so often read and taught through the lens of conflict, the night of 1592 invites a different way of thinking. What happened on the banks of the Vitasta was not the story of one religion’s victory or another’s defeat. It was a story of shared space, shared festivals and a shared sky. The idea of Kashmiriyat, in which Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist traditions appear interwoven, gains much of its meaning from episodes like this.
At the same time, we must guard against romanticising the past. This shared heritage was never a permanent or untroubled condition. It had tensions, inequalities and shifts in power. An honest writer’s job is neither to gild the past nor to reduce it to a battlefield. It is to be faithful to the sources, to say as much as is known, and to call what is uncertain uncertain.
Conclusion
The night of October or November 1592 may be recorded in history as a small event, but its symbolic weight is large. It holds the memory of an ancient Kashmiri tradition, the imprint of the tolerance of the sultanate era, and the cultural understanding of Mughal politics. The Vitasta, which has been the artery of this Valley for centuries, was the witness to the light that night.
Perhaps that is why the story still holds our interest. It reminds us that Kashmir’s identity was formed not by a single stream but by the meeting of many, just like the river beside which those lamps were lit.
References (Key Sources)
- Abu’l-Fazl, Akbarnama, Vol. III (trans. H. Beveridge)
- Abu’l-Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari (trans. H. Blochmann, H. S. Jarrett)
- Nilamata Purana (ed. and trans. Ved Kumari Ghai)
- Baharistan-i-Shahi (trans. K. N. Pandit, 1991)
- P. N. K. Bamzai, A History of Kashmir
- Mohibbul Hasan, Kashmir under the Sultans
- Irfan Habib (ed.), Akbar and His India
- Sri Ram Sharma, The Religious Policy of the Mughal Emperors
The writer is an Independent researcher. ankitpatelkonch508@gmail.com>
