MUHAMMAD BIN TUGHLAQHIS CHARACTER SKETCH

CONTENTo A WONDERFUL KING.o THE SCHOLARSHIP.o INTELLEGENT AND WISE.o PRAISE FOR HIS SCHOLARSHIP.o A GREAT VISIONARY.o HIS SENSE OF JUSTICE:HIS IMPARTIALITY.o NOT A TYRANT.o SHATTERING OF HIS IDEALS.o HATRED AND REVOLT OF THE PEOPLE.o A CRAFTY INTRIGUER.o HIS IMPULSIVE NATURE.o HIS FUSTRATION.o CONCLUSION.

A WONDERFUL KING

• Central character of the play.• Most wonderful king, who ruled India for a

short span of twenty years.• Girish Karnad has shown him to be a man

of opposites, the ideal and the real, the divine aspiration and the deft intrigue.

• One of the critic said that karnad projected the curious contradictions in the complex personality of the Sultan.

A

• Tughlaq is well versed in Greek, Persian and Arabic literature.

• He has read the Greeks. • He was very much influenced by the

excellence and the power of uplifting in the poetry of the Sheikh sadi of persia.

• He is also an expert in the game of chess.• His learning of Quran(koran) is better than

that of any of any Sheikh or sayyid.

PRAISE FOR HIS SCHOLARSHIP

”YOU ARE A LEARNED MAN. YOUR MAJESTY, YOU ARE KNOWN THE WORLD OVER FOR YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF PHILOSOPHY.”

------BARANI Even his critics and opponents recognize his

scholarship. Sheikh imam-ud-din who had raised the standard of revolt against the Sultan and stirred the people of Kanpur to rebel, admits that Sultan is a ‘SCHOLAR OF EMINENCE’.

A GREAT VISIONARY

• Tughlaq’s scholarship makes him a visionary.

• He longs to climb up to the tallest tree in the world.

• Like Nehru, who was also a visionary, he has hopes of building a new future for INDIA and is ready to explain what the people don’t understand.

“explain tomorrow to those who haven’t even opened their eyes to the light of today. ”

HIS IDEALISM

• Tughlaq has his own ideas which he wants to translate into action.

• He is idealistic to his step-mother and stands for justice, equality, honesty and courage.

• He wishes every act in his kingdom to be a prayer, every prayer to be a further step in knowledge and every step to lead the people nearer to God.

• He wants every man to have prayers five times a day and to read the koran and act upon it.

HIS SENCE OF JUSTICE- HIS IMPATIALITY

• He longs for justice to work in his kingdom without any considerations of might or weakness, religion or creed.

• His ideas of justice and equality are ahead of his times.

• He wants his people to be treated equally.• He wishes to share their joys and to laugh

and cry and pray with them. He works hard for the people.

?? TYRANT ??

• Tughlaq is a democrat & not a tyrannt.

• He allows people to criticize him openly and not to be afraid of him.

SHATERRING OF HIS IDEALS

• All his idealism is shattered.• Justice and equality is denied by his state

officers to the people.• Thieving ,looting and killing are rampant in

the state.• People eat burnt strips of skin of all kinds of

animals.• They are facing drought and famine stalking• There are riots for foods.

HATRED & REVOLT OF THE PEOPLE

• Tughlaq wanted to be a king, worthy to wear the royal robes, to be loved by the people of his state,to gain their confidence to began trust but he got hatred, contempt and revolt.

• His step-mother suspects him and even barani doubts him.

• Many rulers up against him• The state is in a mess.

A CRAFTY INTIGUER

• Tughlaq is also a crafty politician.

• He commits murder one murder after the other.

• He orders his step-mother to be dragged to death.

• To do away the opposition, he lays a trap for sheikh Immamudin for becoming his envoy for peace and gets him murdered.

HIS IMPULSIVE NATURE

• Tughlaq is impulsive in nature.

• He always thinks that he is right and all his actions are right too.

• Nobody can foretell his moods and actions and his own fate.

HIS FRUSTRATION

• Tughlaq ideals were frustrated within the short span of twenty years.

• He made him as a laughing element.

CONCLUSION

The play ends as he sleeps on his throne,

tired and exhausted, then wakes and looks

around dazed, frightened as if he cannot

comprehend where he is.