Previous Year Question
Given below are two statements, one is labelled as Assertion (A) and the other as Reason (R).
Assertion (A): Babur wrote Tuzk-e-Babri in Chagatai Turki.
Reason (R): Turki was the official language of the Mughal Court.
Select the correct answer from the code given below:
Both (A) and (R) are true, but (R) is not the correct explanation of (A).
(A) is false, but (R) is true.
(A) is true, but (R) is false.
Both (A) and (R) are true and (R) is the correct explanation of (A).
Correct Answer: C
Detailed Solution
Babur's autobiography, Tuzk-e-Babri or Baburnama, was originally written in Chagatai Turki. It was Babur's mother tongue and was a literary form of the Turkic language prevalent in the Timurid cultural tradition of Central Asia.
Babur recorded his life, his struggles in Central Asia, acquisition of Kabul, campaigns in India and his observations concerning contemporary society and nature in this language. Therefore, the assertion identifying Chagatai Turki as the original language of the Baburnama is correct.
However, Turki was not the official language of the Mughal Court. With the development of Mughal rule in India, Persian became the principal language of the court, administration, official correspondence and historical writing.
Babur's autobiography written in Chagatai Turki was translated into Persian by Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan during Akbar's reign in 1589–90 CE. This also clearly demonstrates the distinction between Chagatai Turki and the predominantly Persian language of the Mughal court.
Thus, Babur used Chagatai Turki because it was his own language and the language of his Central Asian literary tradition, not because Turki was the official language of the Mughal Court.