Machine summary:
Among ochers, he has also described the land-routes and the sea-routes to India: he has given an account of the different castes into which Indian society was at that time divided.
He is the first authority who mentions the Indian Ocean as Darya-i-Hargand, and later on the Arabs adopted that name to indicate the Indian Ocean: in reality Hargand is that part of the ocean which is nearest to the coast of Southern India.
Our Arab traveller expresses his wonder at it and says : "There are no date-palms in India but all other fruits are found here.
Coming outside the boundaries of China he passed in his travels Turkistan, Kabul, Tibet, and Kashmir and came to Multan, Sind, and the southern coast of India.
Probably he is the first Arab traveller who came to India by the land-route.
He has recorded in Arabic his own experiences and also those of his comrades in a book known as 'Ajd'ib al-Hind, which also relates various -happenings in Southern India and Gujarat.
Starting from his native place Baghdad, he travelled in 'Iraq, Syria, Armenia, Asia Minor, Africa, the Sudan, Zang,' China, Tibet, India and Sarandip (Ceylon).
There is a detailed account of the Indian Ocean which he mentions as "Bahr Fars" or the Persian Sea. He also came to India in 340 A.
H. He travelled over the then Islamic world, came to India too, but did not go further than Sind.
OTHER HISTORIANS AND GEOGRAPHERS THE ABOVE-MENTIONED writers are those who personally came to India.