Mistress of the Throne (The Mughal intrigues)

by Ruchir, Gupta

  Love,

  Sati

  I was deeply disturbed to hear how my siblings were reacting to my mother’s demise. I tried to be brave in my loneliness. I began to cope with the harsh reality that my mother’s voice and scent had permanently floated into the vast depths of eternity and now would be known only by God.

  I went to Aba’s chambers and found him as always sitting in front of his copy of the Koran, sobbing as he chanted the prayers. Dressed in white robes from head to toe, he looked as if he’d aged ten years in the last ten days. He’d lost considerable weight, and his beard was now so completely gray, I thought for a moment he must have dyed it this colour to match his robes.

  I sat right next to him, but was unable to distract him from his prayers even for a moment. He seemed mentally in another world. I put my head on his lap as he stared forward, his palms facing upward, praying. Then he suddenly looked down at what was in his lap, and for an instant he must have thought Ami had returned to him: the same silky black hair, olive skin, the same scent, even the same features as Ami were lying in his lap. “Arju?” he muttered.

  I corrected: “No, Aba, it’s me, your princess.”

  As if suddenly waking from sleep, Aba sprang back to reality. “Of course, Jahanara. I don’t know why I got confused.”

  I got up and looked at my father directly, worry etched in my face. “Aba, you were confused because I look just like her. Everyone thinks so. Sometimes I look in the mirror and even I think I’m staring at her. I even show some of the same facial expressions she did… you know… like when she knew you were lying to her, the way she’d put her hand on her waist and begin nodding with her finger? I did that the other day, just so I could trick myself into thinking she was alive again.”

  Aba listened with a helpless look on his face, as if he understood exactly how I felt.

  “But Aba,” I went on, “she’s gone! You can’t just keep mourning like this. You are the king! Your family, including your new daughter, needs you. The kingdom needs you. I need you!” My voice cracked as I told Aba of Sati’s letter and how Aurangzeb had locked himself in the mosque and the other royal children were punishing themselves in equally horrific ways.

  “But I am so lost without her,” he confessed, gazing helplessly at me. “I can’t even get up from a chair, I feel I would fall…”

  “You are a Timurid!” I insisted. “Timurid men have fought greater battles and endured greater hardships than these. What would your father, Emperor Jahangir say? That his kingdom was shattered because the King’s wife died? The House of Timur cannot be shattered by just the death of a queen!” As untrue as I knew this statement to be, I also knew that I needed to appeal to his manhood and familial legacy to jolt him out of this despair. Aba nodded and silently, if reluctantly, began to pull himself together. First he allowed the barber to trim his beard and even dye it black. This was my idea. I didn’t want the public to feel that their emperor was an old man. I had his royal robes cleaned and ironed, but he refused to wear them, insisting instead on wearing his white robe, which looked more like a loincloth than a royal garment. So I had him sequestered in the rear palanquin when we set for Agra, so no one might view their emperor in such a dilapidated state.

  The royal caravan left Burhampur with the same number of people as had arrived with it from Agra almost a year before, except for Ami, whose presence was replaced with infant Gauhara Begum. I stayed in the same palanquin as the King, convinced that he was unable to travel alone.

  I made sure the royal caravan took the same route it had taken on its journey to the Deccan. This was intentional – I had to see if the royal relief efforts had borne fruit in the famine-stricken regions. Of course, this might also afford me an opportunity to steal another glance at Gabriel, though this I never admitted even to myself at the time.

  As the procession approached the former famine-stricken regions, I saw in complete surprise that the villages I’d seen less than a year ago were now drastically transformed. As if I were travelling in some other region that had been unaffected by famine, these villages now had homes, people were working and children playing; it seemed the economy had completely revived here, in this former pit of death.

  Peeking from behind the royal curtain of the palanquin, I remarked to one of my attendants, “This can’t be the same place!”

  “Your Majesty, this is indeed that same village.”

  “Is the young firangi doctor still here, or has he left?”

  “Your Majesty, I’ve been informed that he’s still working here.”

  “Tell him we would like to see him and set up the royal camp on the outskirts of the village. We will camp here tonight.”

  The imperial camp was soon set in the grandiose manner typical of the Mughal times. As if palaces themselves, its golden embroidered tents were raised in lavish contrast to the mud and brick shacks that existed a few yards away in the village.

  I arranged an audience with Gabriel from behind a thin screen that allowed us to see only halos of each other, without ever revealing who was truly on the other side. I thanked him for his service and offered him 100 mohurs as a reward for his good work. But he shared some displeasure at not having an audience with the King.

  I explained: “As you know, the Queen, my mother, is no more.”

  Gabriel bowed his head to acknowledge his sadness at this news, which, I would later learn, he’d known for some time, though he hadn’t yet had the chance to express his condolences.

  “The Emperor would be barely alive without me.” I confided. “His body exists, but his mind and heart are gone. He can’t even dress himself or shave. He has lost weight and is barely recognisable. If my mother were alive, we would surely have come here and given you the full court audience you deserve. But I cannot grant such a favour, nor would my father be capable at this time of meeting with you.”

  For reasons I couldn’t fathom, in those moments together Gabriel made me feel more like a desirable woman than just a member of the royalty. He addressed me repeatedly as ‘fair maiden,’ a term I liked. At the end of the audience he asked to shake my hand in thanks for the gift of the 100 mohurs.

  I replied, “But that would be impossible! Mughal women are not allowed to be seen even by our people.”

  “Well,” he said cordially, “I’m not one of your people, and surely you’ve shown your hand to people, just not your face.”

  Hesistantly, I extended my hand from the side of the curtain; the firangi doctor took it and gently kissed it, then hurried from the tent

  My hand remained outside the curtain, posed just as if he was still holding it, and I felt a sudden veil of shyness descend upon me.

  The royal caravan eventually made its way into Agra, and the entire city gathered to see it without the Empress. The drumbeats seemed more sombre than usual, a sign that our arrival was steeped in sorrow. I leaned my head out of the canopy to see the people who were now to be my responsibility.

  The citizenry moved closer to the edges of the procession as our caravan grew nearer, like relatives holding an all-night vigil at the bedside of a dying patient. I watched their faces, horrified. Some of the women, overwhelmed, began sobbing uncontrollably. Many of the men, peasants who probably never directly saw Ami, stood with their farming tools, tears dribbling down their faces. No matter where I looked, I saw people crying, looks of profound helplessness having possessed them. Eyes blood-shot, layers of tears caked on both cheeks, there wasn’t a dry eye in that sea of people that flooded the streets…

  During the months that followed, Agra was like a ghost town. No celebrations took place, no exchange of presents for Hindu or Muslim festivals, no music or dancing of any sort. Everyone merely went about their business and in their spare time stared outside their windows waiting – waiting to live, waiting to die, waiting for answers that would never come.

  I had convinced Aurangzeb to leave the Pearl Mosque, into which he and Raushanara had locked themselves for several months after heari
ng of our mother’s death. Now in his chambers he’d become more orthodox than ever, believing that he was responsible for his mother’s death by having committed sins such as observing Hindu festivals and tacitly condoning idol worship. The mullahs used this time of vulnerability to mould him in their image. Raushanara was his partner, following him wherever he went and inciting him to proclaim himself the heir apparent.

  Dara moved oppositely. Devastated by Ami’s untimely death, he began learning more about other religions, all in hopes of understanding a higher meaning of life and death. He also began publicly labelling the mullahs ‘enemies of a diversely cultural India,’ chanting that the only way he could keep the empire strong after Aba’s reign would be to appeal to both Hindus and Muslims.

  Aba became more lucid as time went on, but he also began blaming unorthodox religious practices for Ami’s death. Like Aurangzeb, the mullahs succeeded in filling an answer vacuum for both father and son. God was punishing them for their un-Islamic ways, they claimed.

  I found myself nestled between my orthodox relatives and the overly ascetic Dara. Though I thought about Gabriel all day and hoped that somehow I could tell him how I felt, I realised the future of the family was in my hands. As much as I could, I tried reasoning with everyone, but grieving was different for everyone. Some were angry, others resigned; everyone coped with grief over Ami’s death in their own – albeit self-destructive – ways…

  Then, like a cool summer breeze in the middle of a hot arid day, a letter came to me from the Deccan… from Gabriel:

  Dear Princess,

  As per your request, I am updating you regarding the progress here in the once famine-stricken regions of the south. The summer rains were good to us, the harvest is sufficient. New homes have been built, and the economy of the village is solid. My good friend, Mirza Diwan Baksh, who is the governor of the region, is an honest man well able to take care of matters from here on. I ask your permission to continue my journey now. I will be travelling to Hugli, in the eastern border of His Majesty’s Empire. The Portuguese have a flourishing business there, and I hope to learn more about it from them.

  As your friend, I assure you this is not farewell, and I will write to you once I arrive in Hugli. Till then, please accept this rose as a token of my friendship with you. When we met, you gave me 100 mohurs, but at the time I had nothing to give you in return. I hope I am not being too forthright, but we Englishmen have a tough time being passive, as you may have already noticed. Give the Emperor my respects.

  Warm wishes,

  Gabe

  I wasn’t sure what to make of this letter. I smelled the rose repeatedly, though it had withered considerably in the journey from the Deccan to Agra; but I wasn’t sure if this was an admission of some attraction he also shared with me or simply a chivalrous gift given by an awkward-feeling firangi unsure of proper etiquette towards eastern royalty. I read and re-read the letter, looking for signs or hints of how he felt.

  I thought: did he abbreviate his name Gabe, instead of Gabriel, to indicate that he feels comfortable enough with me to talk to me like an ordinary person?

  After spending hours holding and caressing the letter as if it were my lover, I began to wonder where Hugli was and if it might be possible to visit there. I learned that Hugli was a trading port of the Portuguese in Bengal, Eastern India. Vessels of India, China, and Manila were repaired in great numbers in this port city. Persians, Armenians, and Mughals all came here to fetch their goods. In addition, the Portuguese carried on a very profitable salt trade here. If the British East India Company was to be successful, it would have to begin operations in Bengal.

  Unfortunately, relations between our empire and Hugli were never very stable. Originally, the arrangement was that the supreme power would lie with the Mughals, but they were content with leaving the governing up to the Portuguese, as long as the empire received revenues. The spiritual government of Hugli was vested in the Brethren of St Augustine, an enemy of the Islamic mullahs of Agra.

  So Hugli was an unlikely place for me to ever visit. Though my title of Begum Sahiba placed me above the confines of protocol my siblings had to adhere to, thereby allowing me to travel just about anywhere, why would I tell Aba I wished to go there? Why would a Muslim Princess visit a Jesuit colony that had been at odds with the Mughals ever since my father ascended the throne?

  As always, I would visit my forbidden destinations only in my thoughts and dreams. I would imagine walking around this Europe-like city, free from the bondage that my heritage and title trapped me in. I would imagine an alternate reality, and in that imagination, I would find the strength to deal with my current state. Dreams, I learned a long time ago, are always good – they help you deal with reality.

  8

  DEFEAT

  5th March, 1632

  It’s gone! I thought. Everything is gone! There is nothing more left to mourn or fear the loss of, for nothing remains. Everything is gone. Hugli has been burned to the ground, and all its people have perished under the wrath of Mughal intolerance.

  Today, as the court assembled in the Diwan-i-am, the Mughal General paid his respects to Aba and informed him that he had been successful in rooting out the infidels from our kingdom. Apparently the mullahs had incited Aba a few weeks ago to obliterate the colony, as punishment for its tacit support of my uncles during the war of succession. Now, in Aba’s quest to win the favour of Allah, he listened to the ill advice of these fanatical mullahs who were abusing their role to raze Hindu temples and destroy Christian churches.

  I tried requesting an audience with Aba, but in the weeks leading up to taking this fanatical course, he’d become very dismissive of everyone else, including me. Getting an audience with him was impossible, and even if I did, what would I say? I didn’t know the art of manipulation and evasiveness others in the empire practised. I’d never learned to ask questions without divulging my own emotions and intentions. What would happen if somehow I revealed that I had feelings for Gabriel? Aba would be horrified, and I’d be a disgrace in the household.

  I grew dejected and withdrawn and stopped attending court sessions. The massacre in Hugli had left me in a drowning despair. I retreated into my palace and remained there for the next several days.

  I lay on my bed as the sun set in the distance. The hot summer air blew my curtains inward, as if the wind itself was angry this night and wanted to make its presence known. I walked up to the balcony and viewed the town beneath, watching the still grief-stricken townspeople go about their business. At a distance where once a beautiful stone temple stood, Hindus had constructed a makeshift shrine on the rubbles of their lord’s home. The shrine would be short-lived, however, for the mullahs were trying to convince the King to use the rubble to make stones for the steps of a mosque, to be constructed on that very site.

  Further along the Jumna, I could see a Jesuit priest rummaging through his belongings, for our soldiers had thrown all his possessions onto the street from the Mughal guesthouse where my Ami had given him permission to stay as long as he wished.

  The Muslim citizenry, unhappy to see their fellow townspeople mistreated, were helping their non-Muslim neighbours with rations and places to stay, but they had to do so discreetly or face the Emperor’s wrath.

  I have never understood why men force others to follow their religion. Is it because they themselves are insecure in their beliefs, and thus feel that if others follow their faith, perhaps they alone won’t be thought of as fools if their beliefs turn out to be false?

  The Jumna river, usually calm this time of year, was rushing along with powerful waves, as if it wanted to leave our jinxed city and irrigate someone else’s fields. Its waves struck the shores and collapsed against the stones, seeming as though it, too, was cursing us as it ran by.

  Before I knew it, my eyes became so filled with tears, all these ill-fated images turned a brownish blurry, in which the houses of worship were destroyed, a whitish blur where the moon reflected on the angry river
, and reddish blur where the burgundy-coloured Mughal military men continued executing their king’s sinful orders. I had lost everything, I felt; my mother, my chance at love, the well being of my people, everything. Even Aba existed for me in name only; the nurturing father I’d always known no longer existed. He might as well have been buried alongside my mother on the Tapti river.

  Utterly demoralised, I went to Aba to inform him of the decision I’d made: to leave Agra and spend my days in prayer at Mecca.

  “That’s great news!” my father exclaimed. “I’ll come with you! Lately, I, too, have been feeling that I haven’t visited the birthplace of the prophet for some time now. Your mother always wanted to take me, but alas, it was written that we wouldn’t go together. Anyway, having you with me will be just as pleasant.”

  Staring at the ground, ashamed to clarify the situation to my father, I said in a low tone, “No, Aba. Not with you. I wish to go by myself.”

  “Yourself?” He thought for a moment and then turned his head and sighed, “If you want to, fine. I’ll arrange for you to go, and after you come back, I’ll go with your sister.”

  I paused. “I won’t be coming back, Aba. I wish to go to Mecca and stay there. I want to devote my life to service of the pilgrims.”

  Aba’s face purpled, and he shouted: “What is this nonsense, Jahanara? You are a royal princess. You can’t just go to Mecca and live like a fakir.”

  “I don’t want to be a princess!” I fumed directly at my father. “I have no pleasure in being a Mughal princess anymore! I want none of this! I hate my life!”

  Aba’s face softened. He leaned close to me and held my hand. “I know the death of your mother has saddened you, but you can’t give up, my child.”