—BANARSI PRASAD SAKSENA, History of Shahjahan of Dilhi
The Deccan
Sunday, January 28, 1635
9 Sha’baan A.H. 1044
Some thirty years before, the kingdom of Orchha, if it could even be called by such a cohesive name, had been a tract of scrub, desert, and heat-stunted forests. A Rajput chieftain, Bir Singh Bundela, ruled here—his lands were flung out as far as his eye could see, his men gave him allegiance on the sword, his bed was a sun-warmed rock, his sleep was shattered nightly by the howls of jackals. Bundela was one of numerous warring chieftains in Mughal India who held on to their little pockets of lawlessness by marauding hapless passersby, feasted on their belongings, knew little of the man who, so distant in Agra, called himself their Emperor. One day, a furtive message came to him from Prince Salim, Emperor Akbar’s son. For the sum of five thousand rupees, Salim needed the head of a courtier, Abul Fazl. The Bundela chief did not question why Salim wanted Fazl’s life, only set out on his murderous mission. Five thousand rupees was a vast—immensely vast—reward, and so Bir Singh sought out and chased Fazl and cornered him, wounded and resting under the shade of a tree. He did not demur as he chopped off Fazl’s head, wrapped it in straw, and sent it to Prince Salim. He then took his money and disappeared to wait out the end of Akbar’s reign, for by now he knew Fazl to have been a valued courtier and friend, and he knew that, if he were sighted anywhere in the Empire, the Emperor would just as quickly slice off his head.
A few years later, Salim became Emperor Jahangir, and at the coronation Bir Singh came out of hiding to be granted the lands of Orchha as his kingdom and the title of Raja. These were good times for the Bundela king—he was finally a king of something, land and brick and mortar; his coffers increased daily with raids into neighboring fiefdoms, and his Emperor was benevolent enough to ignore his infractions. By the time Bir Singh died, he was a rich and content man, who had passed on some of his belligerence and self-entitlement to his son Jhujhar Singh.
The crown changed hands in 1627, and the new Emperor, Shah Jahan, not quite as understanding as his father had been, demanded a meeting to discuss all this unaccounted-for acquisition of wealth. Jhujhar, who was in Agra for the coronation festivities, fled to his estates in Orchha. The imperial army followed, vanquished him, and compelled him to join the army in the Deccan wars. By 1635, Jhujhar had returned again to Orchha, leaving a son as surety in the Deccan. But fighting was in his blood, so he began forays into other kingdoms again, much as his father had done—and hunted down Raja Prem Narayan, captured his fort at Chauragadh, forced the Raja to send his wives and the women of his zenana to a funeral pyre and to die himself on the battlefield.
Emperor Shah Jahan roared at Jhujhar from Kashmir—surrender the Chauragadh fort to the imperial generals, or pay retribution for the spoils and present yourself at court immediately. Jhujhar ignored his Emperor and sent word to his son to escape from the imperial army in the Deccan and find his way home so that they could fight out this battle together from their stronghold at Orchha.
This, then, was Shah Jahan’s response to the errant Bundela king. He sent three generals at the head of a twenty-thousand-strong army to Orchha, with Aurangzeb to command the men, accompanied by the Emperor’s brother-in-law Shaista Khan to advise and counsel the sixteen-year-old prince.
• • •
The fort and the palaces at Orchha fell on the fourth day after Aurangzeb arrived in the area, fervent, his nose scenting battle. On that morning, soldiers set off mines on the fort’s ramparts, blew a massive hole in the ten-foot-thick walls, and stormed their way inside. The imperial army spread quickly through the palaces, crashing through studded doors, dragging out the servants and soldiers and beheading them on the spot, spilling the stored grains and shattering water vessels.
With the stench of gunpowder still washing his nostrils, Prince Aurangzeb clanked his way in, tripping on the heavy armor and mail he wore, barely able to see through the eye guard of his helmet. A tight complement of guards hedged him in as he swept through the courtyards, his sword drawn and dragging his wrist down with its unused weight. Someone smashed a terra-cotta pot, and a shard cut into his upper arm. Even before he began to bleed, a couple of soldiers came bearing bandages, which they slapped on to stanch the trickle of blood.
“Don’t,” Prince Aurangzeb muttered, sweating in embarrassment. “I’m fine.”
“Your Highness,” a soldier said kindly, “you must be safe; Mirza Shaista Khan has entrusted your well-being to us.”
“I’m at war, you dolt,” Aurangzeb shouted, pushing his hand away. He wiped his forehead unthinkingly, and the armor scratched against his fine skin, drawing blood again. At war, he thought, was that what this was? He waved off the soldiers and sat down on a stone bench in the center of the courtyard.
Aurangzeb lifted his head, weary already, when the men brought out a woman and began to tear off her clothes.
“Stop!” he yelled. “Raja Jhujhar has left the palaces; there is no need to search here anymore.”
At the sound of his voice, the soldiers halted, and one of them yanked the woman by the hair and led her out of the yard, her screams melting into the dust.
“Bring her back!” Aurangzeb roared. But no one paid heed to him. He turned in rage to Khan Duran, one of the generals his father had sent along with him, and said, “Why do they not listen to me?”
“As his Highness wishes,” Khan Duran said. He had barely raised his voice, and yet, amid all the shouting and the noise, the men seemed to have heard him. The girl was brought in; someone had thrown a thin cotton sheet over her shoulders. She stood in front of Aurangzeb, shivering, her face mutinous.
“Where is the Raja?” Aurangzeb asked her.
She stared at him, uncomprehending, and then shook her head.
“Your Highness,” Khan Duran said, “she is nothing. If they have left her here, she must be little more than a servant. It will not do to question her. I have news that Raja Jhujhar and his son have fled to their palace in Datiya. We will follow them there.”
“Tonight?” Aurangzeb asked, already counting the hours until departure.
“No,” Khan Duran said, his hands spread out, his shoulders rising in an exquisitely dismissive gesture. “There is no need for haste—wherever the Raja goes now, we will find him. With Orchha ours, and Datiya soon to be ours, the Raja is as good as dead. The rebellion is over, your Highness. We have won.”
Aurangzeb nodded bitterly. Over, and so soon. What had they really done? Nothing. What sort of a command had this been? He had arrived at Orchha a little less than a week ago, but his uncle had cautioned him against storming the fort until Khan Duran had come in with his own army. So Aurangzeb had spent the next three days in waiting, his army encamped outside the fort, winnowed out over the plains in a massive show of force, their tents baking in the heat, the flags on the posts wilting. A smear of ocher in the eastern horizon had heralded Khan Duran, and then the three generals had closeted themselves in a tent in conference—which Aurangzeb had insisted upon attending. There had been less talk of war and more revelry, as though victory was already theirs. Wine had flowed, women had danced, and the soldiers had sung bawdy songs around campfires until they all straggled to bed in the brief moment of cool before the break of dawn. The next morning, almost desultorily, the generals had sent sorties toward the fort to assess the battlements and scout locations for mines. One hole in the wall and they were in. An hour later it was obvious that they had been guarding an empty fort.
The prince returned to his tent and allowed his slaves to divest him of the armor. The pieces fell to the floor and lay there glittering, their shine barely dulled in all the fighting. A smudge of black—dirt, Aurangzeb thought with disgust, not the blood of an enemy—streaked one of his cheeks, and when he wiped it off, it disappeared. His horse still pranced around outside, neighing at the inactivity. He had ridden him harder in play at chaugan than here in battle. Why had his father sent him here
? The generals treated him like a child; one of them had actually applauded when he suggested setting a mine under cover of night—they had long decided it to be the course of action, of course, but this Aurangzeb realized only when the army set it off within ten minutes of his suggestion. His father had fought against the Rana of Mewar and vanquished him when he was not much older than Aurangzeb, and no one would have dared to suggest that it had been one of his generals who had led that assault. But it was only too obvious that he was a puppet here, merely a token commander. The three generals, older men, long in the service of the Empire and well acquainted with one another, had trounced the Raja of Orchha without any effort at all. Now they would not even allow him to go after the fleeing Jhujhar. He would be caught, they said, in good time, for he had nowhere to go other than south to the Deccani kingdoms, where he was sure to be killed first and questioned later about his defection.
He sighed and sat down in the warm bath that the eunuchs brought in for him. Keeping his hands carefully out of the water, Aurangzeb began two letters—one to his father, telling him of their victory, and another to Jahanara—and wrote a paragraph in each in turn.
All is well by the grace of Allah, he began in both, but the letter to his father had this salutation: Your imperial Majesty, your third son begs your attention, and to his sister, he said, My dearest Jahan, I pray that this finds you well, as I am indeed, to be able to write to a sister so beloved.
When he had written that first line, he laid down his quill on the little teak table beside his bath and put his head in his hands, remembering their last meeting, a few months ago, before he had departed Agra for this . . . war.
He had taken leave of Dara and Nadira, but only because he had had to, standing at the door of their apartments to say good-bye. Dara had nodded and waved a languid hand at him, and Nadira, the cousin they had grown up with, as much their sister then as she was now, had said, “Go with Allah, Aurangzeb. May He grant you success in your mission.”
“A very important mission,” Dara had said, lifting his head from the divan’s cushions, laughter bubbling out of him.
“What do you mean?” Aurangzeb had asked, flushing, erect with his soldier’s bearing at the door. How could Dara bear to lounge in such a slothful manner? Was this the behavior of kings?
“I hear Mirza Shaista Khan is being sent along to be your nursemaid.”
“Our uncle,” Aurangzeb had said stiffly, “wishes to be in the south with me. I am a commander of ten thousand horses, Dara; I do not need anyone to look after me.”
“Go without him then,” Dara had said slyly. “Why not suggest this to Bapa and see what he says?”
“I have to leave now,” Aurangzeb had replied, and marched away.
When he had gone into Jahanara’s apartments, he had stepped in farther, all the way up to her as she leaned forward against the small writing desk set on the rugs, her head laid on her arms. She had not realized he was there until he sat down and touched her on the shoulder. And then, she had started and laughed. “I did not expect you.”
“I sent word that I would be coming.”
“I had forgotten.” She had turned away again, her gaze moving beyond the windows to the brightness outside. Overhead, a punkah had flapped forward and back on its wooden pole, creaking every now and then. It had a rope tied to one end of the pole, which was then strung out along the ceiling to the verandah through a hole in the wall. On his way here, Aurangzeb had passed the punkah girl, tugging at the rope tirelessly so that cool air would eddy around the princess’s apartments. He had sat awkwardly by his sister’s side, on his knees, wishing that she would look at him and talk to him. He had barely seen her in Srinagar; each time he had visited her rooms it was only to be told that she had gone to the gardens at Shalimar or Nishat, or that she was with their Bapa or in a shikara on the lake. Almost as if she were a man and could leave the zenana when she pleased, without questions.
“I depart tomorrow,” he had said.
“Bapa has given you a great honor, Aurangzeb,” she had said. “Even Shuja did not have such a high rank when he was sent to the Deccan.”
“I deserve it,” he had said. “I am a royal prince.”
She had sat up, frowning. “We are all royal, none different than another.”
He had looked at her anxiously, noting the shadows beneath her eyes, the whiteness around her mouth. “You are tired.”
“I have been listless ever since we returned from Srinagar. Perhaps it is the heat here, even so late in the year. In the valley, there would be a chill in the air during the nights and the early mornings, the trees would begin to shed their leaves, painting carpets of red and gold at their feet . . .” She had rubbed her neck and lifted the heavy hair from her nape. “Why did we have to come back, Aurangzeb?”
“The Empire is here, Jahan. This is where we rule, where we are kings. Srinagar is a pleasant interlude, but life is not all pleasure,” he had said, and she had glanced at him thoughtfully. He had hesitated. “Will you miss me?”
She had been silent for so long that he had begun to doubt she would ever speak, then she had said gently, “I will always miss you, Aurangzeb. But I wish sometimes that you were not so insistent on having your way.”
Happiness had filled him at those first words, such as he had never heard from her, and then he had glowered. “I am not that one.”
“No, not Dara,” Jahanara had said. “He will only get, in the end, what he deserves as the heir to the Empire.” A pause. “You must go now; I have to lie down for a while.”
Aurangzeb had risen to his feet and stood looking down at his sister’s bowed head. He had wished for something more coming here, some token of her affection, a little gift perhaps from her to him—a handkerchief, a sandalwood box in which she kept her jewelry, a ring from her finger—something for him to remember and hold close to his heart when he was on the battlefield. There were times when he could not explain even to himself why he had so much love for her, why he admired her so much. When he was Emperor . . . she would always have a place in his zenana, one more exalted than his wives or his concubines. If Jahan was supreme here, in Bapa’s harem, she would be more powerful in his. He had shifted his weight on his feet, wanting to tell her this and knowing how ridiculous it would sound. He was a young prince on the way to his first command, his father had lost none of his potency and was hardly likely to step aside for him, and besides, there was Dara. There was always Dara, whom Jahanara loved as unreasonably as he, Aurangzeb, esteemed her.
“Bapa asked Mirza Najabat Khan to stay back in Srinagar and lead the campaign there,” he had said, unable to stop himself even as the words came from his mouth.
When Jahanara had stood up—almost like an old woman, putting her hands on the floor to raise herself—a flush had stained her face and neck. Her eyebrows had been drawn together over eyes that were very, very angry. “What are you saying, Aurangzeb?”
He had felt himself vacillate, half-fearful of her reaction. She must know that there was only one reason he had brought up Najabat Khan’s name in her presence. There had been talk, all summer long, souring the crisp air of the mountains and rendering his stay so unpleasant that he had been forced to speak. How could he make her understand this? “It is good for Mirza Najabat Khan to be away from court, Jahan,” he had said quietly. “We all, and I mean all of us, the men and women of our family, have to present ourselves pure and unblemished to the people of the Empire. How will they look upon us to lead if we are ourselves tarnished? Take care, Jahan.”
“Go!” She had swept to the windows and would not turn to look at him again. Silently, he had kissed his hand and sent the kiss flying toward her rigid back. “Aurangzeb”—her voice had been acid—“you take too much upon yourself. It’s not for you to tell me what I must do and what I must not. Come back when you’ve had some experience of the world yourself, and talk with me then.”
He had not replied because he had felt that there was no response he cou
ld make that would satisfy her. She would realize one day that he had been right; Aurangzeb was content to wait until then, knowing that he had done his duty in attempting to protect Jahanara, who was misguided in her actions and needed his succor. One day, she would even accept it.
The water of his bath cooled as Aurangzeb sat in thought in his tent at Orchha. He could hear the soldiers shouting and singing outside, their voices broken into stupidity by alcohol and opium, its sweet, sickly smell permeating even the canvas walls of his tent. It was still an hour to sunset, and they were already drunk, he thought, nauseated. If he had been the true commander here, he would have put a stop to all of these unseemly festivities, ordered a halt for prayer five times a day, had the camp swept free of the women of ill repute and the nautch girls.
He dried his hands on a towel and picked up his quill again, blocking out the sounds of carousing with an ease that came only from practice. When Aurangzeb wanted, he could concentrate in a matter of minutes on something to the exclusion of all else. He wrote, steadily, almost identical letters to his father and his sister.
Here in Orchha, the erstwhile Raja Jhujhar and his father, Raja Bir Singh, have chosen their seat with the eye of an architect and a landscaper, without, I understand, having the benefit of either of these. How could these people from the plains have the kind of insight we have into such matters? But the countryside is fine in parts, and the palaces stand in a place of eminence. The river Betwa flows through this dry, baked, brown dirt, creating broad bands of opulent forests and farmlands along its banks, as though it carries the green within its clear blue heart. During the day, partridges, wild fowl, and bustards scurry across our path—they are plentiful, and I have already shot a fair number. The trees hide other animals—the nilgau, deer, tigers, and leopards. Wild elephants trumpet all night long, especially when a female is due to give birth, which the soldiers tell me should be anytime now, and we are all fearful of entering the forest for the next few days. The Betwa’s waters are sweet and cool to a parched throat, the palaces are of a fashion I have not seen anywhere else in Hindustan, with their flat roofs, their chattris in our style, some domes here and there, all standing in a ring in the river. The Betwa is unusual in this, it splits into two at a point and curves east and west, meeting to form one stream again farther south, and the Rajas have built their palaces in the center of this loop of the river, so that from the rooftops one sees the calm of azure water all around, creating an island.
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