A poet, a historian, torch bearer of truth, Kalhan is known to be India’s first historian who has documented the times and lives of the Kings on the land, especially Kashmir. His writings - Rajtarangini - documented in Sanskrit is credited to be of great value for understanding the history of Kashmir. Rajtarangaini, meaning “the river of kings” describes the chronology of Kashmir right from the geological age to his times.

Rajtarangaini, meaning “the river of kings” describes the chronology of Kashmir from the geological age to Kalhan’s times.

Life of Kalhan: Speaking about his early life, Kalhan was born in the 12th century and was a son of Campka, the “dwarpati” of King Harsha of the Lahore Dynasty who ruled from 1089 to 1101 A.D. Thanks to Jona Raja’s colophons, we know that Kalhana was the court poet during Jayasimha’s reign, who ascended to the throne of Kashmir after the death of Sussala in 1127 A.D.

Rajtarangini has numerous references from Mahabharata, which means that Kalhan’s literary training was powerful too as there are references to poets and scholars. His poems also reflect his in-depth understanding of Jyotish Sasha or Astrology.

Kalhana's Writing & its Significance: Kalhan had access to the prevailing political system hence was able to understand the activities taking place. Another proof that his writings were unbiased can be concluded by the fact that despite Kalhan being served under many kings he did not receive any patronage from the rulers and hence no rhetorical praises.

The reason why his writings are so significant are because he had described the tales with references to the prevailing conditions. This quality in Kalhan’s scriptures made it more reliable and can be considered unbiased. What makes his writings more special is his observance and analysis of events, that is flawlessly stitched into ornate style of writing. As described earlier, his writings spoke the truth and Kalhan strongly believed that one should always learn from his mistakes.

Why Kalhan? When history is narrated, sources and references are extremely important and this is what exactly Kalhan did. He used information about temples, records as reason based sources made the writings more trustworthy despite his unsurity about dates. Nevertheless, his poems were not error-free, Kalhan’s writings featured a lot of regionalism where he had even mentioned Maurya kings as the rulers of Kashmir.

Kalhan’s writings featured a lot of regionalism where he had even mentioned Maurya kings as the rulers of Kashmir

What modern historians say about Kalhan

Kalhan is to be truly credited for his writings as none before him had worked more consciously on the subject that he did. A few names, those of Parvarsena II, Lalitaditya, Jayapida, Avantivarman, Queen Didda, Sussala and Jayasimha, etc. stand out among a host of petty kings, most of whom, as Kalhana says, resemble the bubbles produced in the water by a downpour of rain. They did little to merit the remembrance by posterity.

Prof. Somnath Wakhlu, an eminent writer, historian and critic describes the first three books of Rajtarangini, as “a coat of many colours, yet for all its composite character it is not a thing of patch-work quality, but a harmonious assortment of myths, tales and true history.”

He further explains that Kalhana desired to set down the truth as far as he could know. For the earlier part of his chronicle he assiduously collected and studied the works of previous writers and borrowed from the oral tradition and mythology but in the contemporary records (from the fourth book onwards) he wrote of things he had seen or heard in many instances, because of his early high position, he had been in personal contact with the warriors, statesmen and ministers.

Dr. Sunil Chander Ray the author of the book “Early History And Culture Of Kashmir” believed that "in spite of historical materials in the early portions of his work, Kalhana's splendour of imagination, depth and range of thought and above all the power of centralizing many talents to a single purpose had given his Rajtarangini a literary immortality"