1206, Laksmanasena was driven out of Bengal by the Turkish
conqueror, Bakhtyar Khalji, who shifted state patronage to Islam.
• After the Khalji conquest, there was a general drift of patronage for
Islam to eastern regions of Bengal, where the Senas had not uprooted
Buddhists; while Vaishnava Hindus received support from merchants,
landowners and local rulers in the western regions of Bengal.
Brahmin influence in Bengali society was enhanced from Sena times
onward by a distinctly Bengali system of hypergamy in which high
caste women married Kulin Brahmin men who fathered children with
multiple wives; this produced a multi-caste elite that included
merchants, landowners, and administrators who flourished under
medieval regimes.
• From Khalji times onward, Muslim converts and migrants populated
new agricultural settlements in eastern Bengal, where Vaishnavism in
particular, and Hindu temples, arts, poetry and music in general, also
flourished under the patronage of Hindu landlords, merchants, and
administrative elites. Like multiple sovereignties in medieval
domains, multi-religious cultures developed where patronage
sustained diverse religious institutions.
• The Himalayan kingdom of Nepal was a Buddhist stronghold ruled by
Hindu kings. Kingdoms around Katmandu became a mixing ground
for Hindus from the south and Buddhists from the north, and like
dynasties in Bengal, they made multi-cultural patronage a long-
standing religious tradition.
Western India
• In the western plains—in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Malwa, and
Bundelkhand—medieval Hindu dynasties of Kalachuris, Chaulukyas,
Paramaras, and Chandellas also patronised Jains, who were prominent
among merchants.
• Hindu and Jain cultural features blended into one another. Jain temple
worship and Hindu-Jain marriage became common. In Gujarat
particularly, it became difficult to say where Jainism ends and
Hinduism begins.