Cite
MLA
“First Ekdala war.” Hindu History, 2026, https://www.hinduhistory.in/battles/first-siege-of-ekdala-1353/. Accessed .
APA
Hindu History. (2026). First Ekdala war. Retrieved , from https://www.hinduhistory.in/battles/first-siege-of-ekdala-1353/
Firuz Shah besieged Ilyas Shah in Ekdala but withdrew without taking it; Bengal stayed independent.
01The siege
Shams Siraj Afif, Firuz Shah’s chronicler, tells the campaign. Ilyas Shah had united the three provinces of Bengal and, in 1349, raided the Kathmandu valley, where Nepali chronicles remember the burning of temples, including Swayambhu and Pashupati. When Firuz marched east in 1353, Ilyas withdrew to Ekdala, a fort protected by rivers and marsh. A battle outside the walls went in Delhi’s favour, but the fort held and the rains were coming.
02Bengal goes its own way
Afif says Firuz, moved by the cries of the women of Ekdala and unwilling to fight through the monsoon, lifted the siege and went home. Ilyas Shah sent gifts and the two made peace. The Ilyas Shahi dynasty ruled Bengal, with one interruption, for over a century. Firuz would try once more, against Ilyas’s son Sikandar Shah, in 1359. Ilyas’s capital at Pandua later received the great Adina mosque, built by Sikandar.
It confirmed Bengal’s independence from Delhi.
