Mistress of the Throne (The Mughal intrigues)

by Ruchir, Gupta

  Nur Jahan continued to fiddle with her tea, avoiding eye contact with me.

  “How did you become like this?” I probed.

  She froze and moved only her eyes towards me. Realising I’d just struck a nerve, I prodded her more. “You couldn’t always have been like this…”

  Before marrying my grandfather, Nur Jahan had been in an abusive marriage with a Persian soldier, Sher Afghan, and those many years had made my grand aunt a tough individual who always plotted and schemed for her own interests, and whose cold ambition knew no limits.

  She waved dismissively at the air. “As I said, fair Princess, you cannot understand any of this!” She walked away from my chair.

  “I can’t understand any of this?” I replied bitingly. “You’re poisoning my happy home and trying to destroy your own niece’s family. What more is there to understand?”

  “Is my home not destroyed?” she shrieked. Is my daughter not a widow who refuses to remarry because she’s so traumatised by what your father did to her husband? My grandchild is raised in this house like a prisoner, afforded none of the luxuries you and your siblings enjoy!”

  I fought to remain calm. “Will punishing Aurangzeb for my father’s mistake fix everything?” I pressed.

  Nur Jahan took a deep breath to regain her composure, and then went on: “You can’t understand. You’ve never been poor.”

  “What does wealth have to do with this?” I retorted. “My father gave you a handsome pension to live on; you have plenty of money.”

  “Women in this society have to fend for themselves, she replied, “… always…”

  “How can you say that?” I shot back. “My mother has more riches than any woman in the history of India. Women are getting more rights every day under my father.”

  “Not the same as men.”

  “Almost!” I countered.

  Nur Jahan just stared at me as if laying me bare to the bone with her eyes. She must have felt my unease. “You are very beautiful, Jahanara,” she said, “a true Persian.”

  Embarrassed, I looked away and replied in a low voice, “I’m only half Persian.”

  “Oh, no, my dear! You’re fully Persian! Those long slender fingers, that olive skin, those sensual eyes, and that silky black hair could never belong to a Hindustani. You’re a Persian. Maybe your naiveté and peaceful demeanour is Hindustani – we Persians love war – but physically you’re a Persian beauty.”

  I sensed she was trying to toy with me now. I composed myself and hurled back, “What does my appearance have to do with the plight of women in India?”

  Nur Jahan just smiled, as if amused by my outburst. “Tell me, Jahanara. You’re how old now? 16, 17?”

  “Fifteen.”

  She chuckled. “We Persian women develop fast, don’t we? My body was also fully developed by this age. My breasts were more developed than my Hindustani maid’s, and she was 20!”

  She began to run her finger along the edges of my face, and I looked away, feeling myself blush at her compliments. She purred, “Have you ever been in love, Jahanara?”

  Stunned, I stared at her. “I love my parents. I love my family.”

  “That’s not the love I’m talking about.”

  My shyness and her comment’s directness made me even more uncomfortable. I looked away, and she said, “Have you ever loved a man who wasn’t related to you?”

  “I don’t think that’s any of your concern, Empress Nur Jahan.”

  “Oh, but you see it is. My dear, no matter how beautiful you are, how sensual your face and how well developed your body, it will never be touched by any man. That’s the sad truth of the Mughal Empire.”

  My eyebrows wrenched in confusion and anger as I felt Nur Jahan take control of the conversation and steer it into uncharted territory. “What are you talking about? My Aba will find a prince for me!”

  “Is that what he told you?” she laughed condescendingly. “He lied. No Mughal daughter of the Emperor is allowed to marry. None of your aunts married, and none of their aunts married. You and your sisters have been damned to a celibate existence, while your brothers will enjoy harems of 300 women each.”

  I started to feel suffocated. I’d come here to talk about Aurangzeb, and somehow we were now talking about me? My head throbbed with a strange mixture of emotions: embarrassment, disgust and rage. I spat back: “More of your lies!”

  She chuckled again and moved her hands sensuously over my lips and neck. “I wish they were. No matter how good you are, my dear, no man will touch you. Sensual intimacy will never be yours. Get wise before it’s too late, and find an heir to the throne to groom in your image. If you wish to survive, that’s the only way.”

  I wrenched Nur Jahan’s hand from my face and shouted, “Is that what you’re trying to do with Aurangzeb? Groom him for your own ends?”

  “Why should I groom him? My days in this world are numbered. By the time he or any of your brothers becomes king, I’ll be but a memory. I have other reasons to groom him…”

  “Like what?”

  “Oh, you’ll see. No one has ever wronged me and lived happily. Even if it’s from beyond the grave, I’ll get even with your father,” Nur Jahan replied ominously.

  “How? By turning Aurangzeb into a zealot?”

  “Precisely.”

  “That’s a strange way to get revenge.”

  “Your own life will tell you why it’s not strange.”

  Consumed with rage, I turned to storm out of Nur Jahan’s residence, but before I’d gone some distance I whirled around and spat, “If your life is dedicated to destroying Aurangzeb, then my life will be dedicated to preserving him!”

  Nur Jahan’s chest heaved and her eyes reddened with rage at my challenge.

  I continued: “You and I are made of the same Persian blood, eh? I swear to you, I’ll see my father’s image in whoever becomes king, and I’ll help him rule Mughal India to the best of my abilities. I’ll never cross my king!”

  Nur Jahan pursed her lips as if about to reply, but I never gave her the chance: “You tried it your way, Nur Jahan; I’ll do it mine!”

  5

  PIT OF DEATH

  4th January, 1631

  Are you getting more comfortable with these elephant rides?” Ami smiled.

  I didn’t think anyone would ever be comfortable riding on top of these massive beasts, but I was getting more used to it. “Yes, Ami!” I would lie just to make her happy.

  Nearly two years had passed since Manu’s poisoning, and Ami was pregnant yet again. Having miscarried many times before, it seemed this time she was determined to give birth to a living child. This was now her fourteenth pregnancy, her previous 13 having resulted in the birth of four sons, two daughters and seven miscarriages.

  As fate would have it, there was yet another war to be fought, this time in the Deccan, and as always, Ami insisted on being by Aba’s side during the war, even in pregnancy.

  We set out for the Deccan with the entire kingdom at our disposal. Not everyone came though; Dara, Shuja, Aurangzeb, and Raushanara remained in Agra while I, along with young Murad, accompanied our parents. I was riding with Ami in her palanquin due to her health.

  She moaned, “Try being pregnant on these rides! Every bump feels like a contraction.” Ami was beyond modesty at this point. She would continue lamenting her condition to me. Not knowing how to respond, I would simply smile.

  I could tell we’d left Agra because the scent of sweetmeats and kebabs was fading, gradually being replaced by that of woods and forests. The bumpiness of our ride made me realise the heavily vegetated mud paths of the wilderness had replaced the paved streets of Agra. Day and night we travelled, stopping more frequently than usual so Ami would have sufficient rest. At times, Ami protested to Aba that he was making her feel like a burden by slowing down his troops en route to war, but Aba would not relent. He continued to pamper Ami, as if she were still in Agra.

  The journey was long. Travelling with the Emperor was
very different than travelling with anyone else. Even during the march to war, Aba paused to hold court every day at noon, dusk and dawn to anyone who wished to pay homage and present gifts. The local nobles – the ranas, amirs, divans, maharajahs – gladly paid us homage as the Emperor passed through lands they claimed to rule, knowing full well they were ultimately subservient to us.

  Several days into our journey, I began to sense yet another change in smell. Was it the Deccan? The Deccan had a vague but familiar scent that is very difficult for me to even describe. The Deccan was really nothing more than an endless mass of jungle with interspersed pockets of isolated villages run by petty princes. Oddly, it was comforting to me. This is where I’d grown up, and though life was much more fulfilling now, I often thought of the Deccan with nostalgic joy, for this land was where I had spent many happy moments with my parents.

  “Not there yet,” Ami would correct me. “But we’re getting close.” We’d actually taken a detour through the state of Gujarat and were several days from the Deccan.

  Suddenly, the air was filled with the most putrid stench of waste I’d ever known. “What is that smell?” I choked. I began coughing and moved my shawl over my nose to attempt a partial escape from the stench. “It smells like death.”

  Ami looked equally disgusted and worried. We moved the curtain of the canopy with our hand and looked out for answers. “Allah have mercy!” cried Ami.

  The shock in her voice was nothing compared to my own feelings. I utterly lost my voice. Perhaps Ami had seen such a disturbing scene in the past, allowing her to be in simple dismay, but for me this was a sight unlike any other that had ever met my eyes. My breath quickened.

  “Where are we, my child?” Ami asked rhetorically, probably aware I had no answer.

  To our dismay, dead bodies of all ages and types were lining the streets. The road was littered with them: men, women, children, goats, cattle, dogs, horses. Those not yet cremated or buried had been partially consumed by jackals and vultures. This desolate village looked completely devoid of any inhabitants. The air was dry and suffocating, making it impossible to even breathe. “Allah have mercy!” repeated Ami. I stared at my mother as she again invoked God. Yet one devastating scene gave rise to another even more horrific one. I held my breath at the stench of the beggars now filling the air. I didn’t want to risk inhaling their affliction.

  “Two dam!!!” yelled a man. so skinny I could see every bone is his body. He held a baby in his hands out to us.

  “What’s a dam?” I asked Ami, trying to sound unmoved. She told me a dam was made of copper, and was the lowest form of currency; I had never seen nor heard of it before. As royalty, the lowest denomination I dealt with was the rupee, made of silver; but more commonly, I just used the mohurs, made of solid gold.

  “Allah have mercy!” Ami continued as she gazed at the man. “They’re selling their children for money!” With no food for entire villages, the inhabitants had resorted to deserting their own children. As Ami and I stared at the devastation, we saw a group of men fighting each other for rights to a pile of dung to see if there was a piece of undigested grain they could eat.“This is the real India, Jahanara,” said Ami. “This is what you must fight for. The true sin and offence against Allah is poverty.”

  “Wait! Wait! Please, we need your help!” A pale-skinned man at a distance pleaded with our caravan to come to a halt. Our soldiers immediately surrounded the poor man for the offence of stopping the King. Ami and I, seated in the palanquin behind Aba’s, heard bits and pieces of the conversation. Ami asked one of our eunuchs if the man was old or young, to which the eunuch replied, “He is young, handsome, and slender.”

  As the caravan resumed its journey, I snuck my head from behind the gold-embroidered curtain on my elephant to look upon the village again. As I did so, my gaze settled on a man wearing a white shirt tucked into dark pants with sweat pouring down his face. Tall, with blond hair and green eyes, he was truly the most handsome man I had ever seen, though I couldn’t understand why I felt the need to stare at him. As the elephant rode by, I continued staring at him though he wasn’t looking at me. Finally, he moved his head up and towards me and our eyes met. He smiled at me, sending me into a quiet fit of embarrassed joy, and I ducked back into the palanquin. When I gathered the courage to peek my blushing olive face out of the palanquin again, the man was gone, and I was filled with a sudden sadness because I knew I would never see his handsome face again.

  That night we camped in the outskirts of the famine-stricken town. The stench had left the air, and the royal cooks had begun to prepare roast chickens, curried lamb and mixed vegetables for our dinner.

  As always, Aba insisted on having dinner with us. Ami asked, “What was the commotion with that firangi?” as she sipped her soup sporadically, as if with a depressed appetite.

  “His name is Gabriel Boughton,” Aba replied. “He’s a physician with the East India Company.” The East India Company was a corporation of British merchants who lobbied the Mughal emperor for trading rights in India.

  “What’s he doing here in this desolate land?” inquired Ami, taking the words out of my mouth.

  Aba said, “Well, though he’s a doctor by trade, it seems his official profession now is a commercial traveller for the East India Company.” Aba took another bite of his chicken, seeming little interested in saying anything more about this man who, I was embarrassed to admit, had piqued my growing interest. “He seems to have travelled from Surat to Gujarat on his way to Agra, but seeing the devastation from the famine caused him to remain here.”

  Gabriel pleaded with our generals for food and supplies and a small garrison of soldiers to protect him and those with him from robbers. In response to his request, Aba ordered half of all rations travelling with the caravan to be given to Gabriel, to be distributed as he saw fit; imperial tents to be used as safe houses, living quarters, and hospitals; and 200 troops were set to guard his supplies and men. Aba also ordered 5,000 rupees to be distributed every Monday among the deserving poor. As for the governors of the Deccan, who had sat silently and increased their treasuries during this time of destitution, Aba ordered them to be relieved of their duties and sent back to Agra immediately.

  That night, Aba bid Ami and me goodnight with his kingly kiss on our foreheads, oblivious to how his story of Gabriel’s courage and heroism had affected me. As all girls do, I dreamed of romance. Was it just lust or something much deeper I felt for this man? I had read poetry devoted to this thing called ‘love’ and of how numerous people along the ages had withered and died from this strange illness. But to me, love was nothing more than an illusion, a concept meant to be heard, not felt. Still, I decided that with time I would approach Ami about how I was feeling and let her guide me. My inner feelings were too raw and fragile to be shared with anyone else.

  The Burhampur fort was a much smaller building than our fort in Agra. Made of brick, it reflected the undeveloped and simple character of the region it was located in.

  As our caravan finally arrived in the fort of Burhampur, I continued to think about the pale-skinned man with whom I’d shared but one moment of eye contact. I wondered how people in his country lived and what traditions they followed. Unlike most Mughals, Gabriel had no facial hair; his head-hair was blond; he wore tight English trousers; his eyes were hazel green. Yet here he was, thousands of kos from his home, yet he’d stopped the royal caravan to plead for rations for my people, while we, the royalty, were ready to merely drive past the people’s plight. Such gentleness was rare in the Mughal household. Perhaps Dara had it, I thought, but even he now spent more time on religion than in practical community service.

  As we arrived at the imperial fortress in Burhampur, I helped my pregnant mother to the harem quarters, using the opportunity to talk to her about this encounter with the firangi. Though only three months pregnant, her face had turned pale white, and she was losing weight from her face and arms, as if this child was literally draining the life ou
t of her. She was unable to walk without the assistance of another, and even then she moaned with every step.

  The marble staircase in the fortress was poorly maintained, its edges cracked and uneven. One could see the wear and tear on the tiles of the steps, on which thousands of people had stomped through the ages. Ami moaned every time she raised a leg to take a step up.

  I asked her, “How long was it before you knew you loved Aba?” as we limped up the stairs.

  Ami looked at me as if annoyed that I would choose such an inopportune time to ask such a question. “How many times do I have to tell you the story?” she asked me wearily. I stared at her feet as we continued to climb, pointing her where to step and trying to bear her weight as she leaned on me.

  “I know the story,” I replied, “but you never told me how long before you knew.”

  Still moaning and limping, she huffed, smiled at me and said: “Instantly!”

  Indeed, I’d heard the story of my parents’ romance many times. In fact, nearly everyone in the Mughal kingdom knew it. It had become somewhat of a legendary fairytale. While every king and queen would have some stories recited about them praising their beauty and greatness, my parents didn’t need any court chronicler to create a mythical tale about them; their story was popular long before they were crowned – and it was factual!

  My parents had met 23 years earlier, in 1607 at the royal Meena Bazaar, a private marketplace where the women of the aristocracy purchased dyes, oils, waxes and perfumes that were essential for their elaborate daily beauty rituals. Men were strictly forbidden, however, and any man caught in the bazaar would have his hands and feet cut off at the minimum. Certain dates, however, were reserved as ‘contrary dates’ during which men and women were all welcomed in the bazaar regardless of rank. The bazaar on these dates looked less like a traditional marketplace and more like a lusty pleasure garden, with courtship and flirtation flowing in both directions between men and women.

  Some otherwise passive and docile aristocratic women and concubines would even reverse their roles and become noisy shopkeepers, selling goods from behind the store pavilion and flirting with the young male customers, who, momentarily emancipated from the restrictive routine, would show off their courtly wit by asking prices in rhyming Persian verse.