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54 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
northern boundary of India at the time when Hsuan Tsang came on his pilgrimage. But as Prof. Toynbee points out:
“We must be on our guard against ‘historical sentiment’, that is against arguments taken from conditions which once existed or were supposed to exist, but which are no longer real at the present moment They are most easily illustrated by extreme examples. Italian newspapers have described the annexation of Tripoli as recovering the soil of the Fatherland because it was once a province of the Roman Empire; and the entire region of Macedonia is claimed by Greek Chauvinists on the one hand, because it contains the site of Pella, the cradle of Alexandar the Great in the fourth century B.C. and by Bulgarians on the other, because Ochrida, in the opposite corner, was the capital of the Bulgarian Tzardom in the tenth century A. D., though the drift of time has buried the tradition of the latter almost as deep as the achievements of the ‘ Emathian Conqueror’ on which the modern Greek nationalists insist so strongly.”
The same logic applies here. Here also arguments are taken from conditions which once existed but which are no longer real and which omit to take into consideration later facts which history has to record during practically one thousand years—after the return of Hsuan Tsang.
It is true that when Hsuan Tsang came, not only the Punjab but what is now Afghanistan was part of India and further, the people of the Punjab and Afghanistan were either Vedic or Buddhist by religion. But what has happened since Hsuan Tsang left India ?
The most important thing that has happened is the invasion of India by the Muslim hordes from the north-west. The first Muslim invasion of India was by the Arabs who were led by Mahommad Bin Qasim. It took place in 711 A. D. and resulted in the conquest of Sind. This first Muslim invasion did not result in a permanent occupation of the country because the Caliphate of Baghdad, by whose order and command the invasion had taken place, was obliged by the middle of the 9th century A. D. to withdraw* its direct control from this distant province of Sind. Soon after this withdrawal, there began a series of terrible invasions by Muhammad of Ghazni in 1001 A. D. Muhammad died in 1030 A. D., but within the short span of 30 years, he
- Sind was reoccupied by Mahommed Ghori.