The Last Days of Mughal Dynasty

 

Bahadur Shah Zafar was born on 24 October 1775 in Delhi. He was the twentieth and last Mughal Emperor of Indian Subcontinent. He was a poet, musician and also a Calligrapher.

He was the second son of Akbar Shah II. He succeeded the throne upon the death of his father on 28 September 1837. He was not the preferred choice of his father as his successor. For many of his reign he was a client of the British and was lacking real authority. The countless Mughal Empire had vanished much of its power and territory by the end of the 1700s. When Zafar succeeded to the throne in 1837, his rule stretched only to Delhi and its surroundings. For his subjects, he always stayed as “The King”.

There is quite disagreement that the Mughal rule finished much before 1857, even before the custody and humiliation of Bahadur Shah Zafar. His exile and the death of last Mughal Emperor, was the actual death of hope.

On 19 September 1857, the king was detained from Humayun’s Tomb along with some of his wives and princes. Mahmood Farooqui’s Besieged Voices from Delhi 1857, is a lot gentler to the ruler, stating that he was a crucial symbol of the revolution despite being a reluctant martyr. There would be no moral without him authority under which a settled management could emerge and troops could be gathered.

The book also states that even with the Mughal Empire at its weakest, it only extended to Delhi and Palam, he was still the ‘Baadshah of India’. Farooqui goes on to speak about the self-awareness of the emperor who knew that he would be the last Mughal ruler to live in the Red Fort and the innovative means of establishing his dominance and getting his way — by threat of asceticism, abdication or vanishing into the palace until his demands were met.

Garrett, writes that the emperor yielded only with the promise that his life would be spared. That he showed cowardice by hiding in Humayun’s Tomb. His sons, Mirza Mughal and Mirza Khizr Sultan were fighting against the British and they were shot dead by William Hodson at Khooni Darwaza. The introduction of his book further states that the only respectable thing Bahadur Shah Zafar did during his trial was nap in between and that although his testimony had the potential of being a final tribute to the astonishing heritage he inherited, it ended up only a “weasel’s lament”.

When he was captured by the British, ever the poet-king (whose pen name ironically means victory) belted out his shayari to a British officer: 

“Hindion mein bu rahegi jab talak imaan ki

Takht e London tak chalegi tegh Hindustan ki.”

Means “As long as Indians have even an ounce of honesty and dignity- the Indian sword will reach the throne of London”

Death of Last Emperor

On November 7 1862, the last Mughal king of Delhi, died in Rangoon, Burma Yangon Myanmar, exiled by the British. He lies buried there today and his tomb has become a popular shrine, to which devotees congregate in large numbers. Zafar had always wished to be buried in his beloved Delhi, having earmarked his gravesite in Mehrauli next to the Shrine of Khwaja Qutbuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki (1173-1235), the original Sufi (Chishti) saint of Delhi. Zafar and his ancestor Akbar Shah II had gotten a summer palace constructed here, including a remarkable small mosque in marble, the Moti Masjid which has since come to be recognized as the Zafar Mahal complex.