Indian History is full of rich stories of great rulers, their triumphs, marvelous governance, world class architecture, grandeur of wars, deceit and constant scheming of how to be the next ruler.
Our school text books have diligently covered the entire spectrum, spanning from Vedic period, Gupta Dynasty to Mughal and then East India Rule; however, those have been just the peripheral stuff. Each chapter of History has multiple shades under it and only someone who is interested to know the details can marvel at the details of those events and the charisma of those larger than life figures.
I had the good chance of reading about one such person and period recently. The multitude of emotions I have felt ever since I kept the book down have made me uneasy.
The Twentieth Wife is a book written by Indu Sundaresan which chronicles the life of Nur-Jahan- the twentieth and last wife of Emperor Jahangir (popularly known as Salim).
Jahangir was the fourth emperor of Mughal dynasty after Babur, Humayun and Akbar. For all that he did in terms of building his kingdom, in popular storytelling, he is most famous for his love story with Anarkali (Salim-Anarkali). He was in fact quite a man of love – he was smitten by Nur-Jahan and against the wishes and advices of his Ministers, he continued to give in to her desires of becoming an equal.
Now to Nur-Jahan- the protagonist of this novel and the first woman in History who managed to stir me. I wonder why till now I had not known about her- or was not taught about how one woman managed to literally rule the country in those days.
Before I take you inside her accomplishments, lets first understand the context of why these achievements are no mean feat.
She didn’t come from a King’s family; her father was a Minister at Akbar’s court. Education for girls was limited. Their participation in administrative governance was limited to bearing sons for the king, so that the kingdom remained in the family. They would dress up well, provide necessary entertainment to the men and participate in local gossip.
In such a world, Nur-Jahan was a woman of substance. She was intelligent, well-educated and had a mind of her own. Her love story with Jahangir started at an early age when a young Salim falls in love with her beauty. However, Akbar doesn’t approve of this marriage (Marriages in those times were done to acquire more kingdom, gain friendships and strengths of other rulers so that wars could be won easily- hence son’s marriage to a Minister’s daughter didn’t appeal to Akbar). She gets married to a soldier, who is later killed. Akbar has also died by then and Jahangir is now the King.
The King hasn’t forgotten his love interest and starts seeing Nur-Jahan again (officially available- since her husband has died)
The King has many wives and Nur-Jahan doesn’t want to be just one of the many concubines and hence refuses to meet him anymore. Salim (love-struck) doesn’t have a choice and offers to marry her. They get married and in the Kingdom, she is given the rights of the highest wife (which was earlier with Jagat Gossini- another love marriage of Salim)
Nur Jahan in the course of next few years become the de-facto ruler.
- She was signing authority of royal orders
- Gold & Silver Coins bore her name (Only the king’s name was used)
- She did daily Jharokha-Darshans (which was only done by Emperors)
- In daily matters of court, she used to signal Jahangir in which way to budge
- She did hunting, played polo and other games (chess/ludo)
- She could come to imperial balcony, which was reserved for only men
- She started directing which Minister would be sent to which area (sending some of key aides of Jahangir to not so strategic places)
- She led an army to save Jahangir from a coup
With all these achievements, what she couldn’t do was bear a son for the King. And hence she spent a lot of time grooming Shah-Jahan (Jahangir’s son- most deserving successor) so that when he becomes the King, she continues to enjoy her reign.
However, things take an ugly turn after Jahangir’s death. Shah-Jahan who part of the growing clan that didn’t like Nur Jahan’s rise- grew to hate her immensely. After the unfortunate events, she is sent to exile.
Now the part that disturbs me so much about Nur Jahan’s story:
- It was Nur Jahan who got Arjumand Banu Begum (famously known as Mumtaz Mahal) married to Shah Jahan. Arjumand was the daughter of Nur Jahan’s real brother
- So many years later, the larger world would know/remember a Mumtaz Mahal more than Nur Jahan. What did Mumtaz Mahal do? In 19 years of marriage, had 14 kids (8 sons and 6 daughters).
- Taj Mahal, one of the wonders of the worlds, was commissioned by Shah Jahan in loving memory of Arjumand
- Itimad-ud-Daulah was the tomb made by Nur Jahan after her father’s death. Just look at the resemblance this has with Taj Mahal- the world-famous monument. Nur Jahan had shared this unique design idea with her brother (Shah Jahan’s father in law) after their father’s death. Her Brother was instrumental in getting the powers snatched from her and to give it to his son-in-law. The same brother whom Nur Jahan had gotten great titles and power under Jahangir.
Efforts would be taken in years after Jahangir’s death to remove all stories of Nur Jahan’s prowess and intelligence so that no woman could ever dare to dream big.
I wonder why was I deprived of this powerful woman’s story all these years. I wonder if me or my great grandmothers had a different perspective to life if we were brought up normalizing the equality of men and women.
I wonder how many more pieces like this are buried under the carpets so that it doesn’t lead to inequalities being removed.
Just imagine, if Shah Jahan was in favour of Nur Jahan and she had grown to continue being the ruler even in his time, how different this world history would have been for women.
Alas, very rarely does a book (well, two in this case- Feast of Roses is a sequel) manage to evoke emotions of both pain and happiness like this. Am grateful I got to read about this in my lifetime, when I still have time to get inspired and spread more such powerful stories to the world.
If you have liked reading this, do spread it in your network, you never know when reading something like this can give a fresh start to someone.
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Very interesting piece of information. I wonder why it was never taught to us in our history classes. We learnt only the Valor of Mughal emperors and very scanty information about their wives. After all history is all about ‘his story’ and seldom ‘her story.’ The sad truth!!