Of faith and fratricide
SUNDAY, 22 MAY 2016
KASHMIR MONITOR
MUNEEZA
SHAMSIE
140
VIEWS
In
recent years, the rise of religious extremism and related violence has led to
an increasing literary interest in the historical rivalry between Dara Shikoh
the Mughal heir and his younger brother, Aurangzeb. In these writings, the
former represents an intolerant religious extremism and the latter a more
inclusive, tolerant and multicultural aspect of faith. Now the Indian writer
and historian Murad Ali Baig has added to this body of work with his debut
novel Ocean Of Cobras which encompasses the sibling rivalry between Shah
Jahan’s four sons, but focuses in particular on Dara Shikoh and Aurangzeb and
the respective partisanship of their sisters Jahanara and Roshanara.
Baig
constructs his plot in the form of a lost manuscript, discovered after 1857, by
British officers in the Red Fort, Delhi and translated by British scholars from
the original Persian into English: the document proves to be written by the
fictitious Mubarak Ali, a eunuch at Shah Jahan’s court. The great strength of
his narrative lies in the descriptions of different aspects of 17th century
India including the precariousness of court life while serving a
fratricidal/patricidal dynasty.
Mubarak
Ali, the son of a Persian nobleman and an aristocratic French lady, becomes the
victim of family misfortune following his father’s support for Khusrau’s
unsuccessful rebellion against Jahangir, his father. Mubarak Ali is
subsequently imprisoned and castrated by a vicious enemy. He is then bought in
the slave market, to serve in the imperial harem. There his background,
breeding and personal courage stand him in good stead. He is not only
befriended by Shah Jahan’s eldest, the beautiful Princess Jahanara, but is
later placed in charge of young Prince Murad and is educated alongside.
The
book uses Mubarak Ali’s role as eunuch to great advantage to portray life among
both the men and women at the Mughal court. He rides and hunts with Shah
Jahan’s sons. He conjures up a vivid description of the royal shikar and of
life in the Mughal camp, “a huge tented city”. As Shah Jahan travels to
different districts to receive due tribute from their vassals or intimate
rebels, the novel also captures the panoply of power which accompanies the
imperial caravan — elephants, camels, cavalry and artillery, women (including the
pregnant Mumtaz Mahal) carried in palanquins or riding veiled, on horses.
Mubarak Ali goes on describes the death of Mumtaz Mahal in childbirth, Shah
Jahan’s grief and the monument — the Taj Mahal — that he builds for her.
Mubarak Ali’s sojourn with his shikari friend, deep in the forests among the
Bhil tribe, teaches him how live and survive in a world close to nature which
stands him in good stead during the exile he shares with Dara Shikoh and his
diminishing entourage.
Mubarak
Ali’s eyewitness account of the sibling rivalries between Aurangzeb and Dara
Shikoh begins when Mubarak Ali is nine and first joins the royal household. He
observes Shah Jahan’s harsh treatment of 11-year-old Aurangzeb, while the
Mughal heir Dara Shikoh enjoys the undisguised love showered on him by Shah
Jahan: he can do no wrong in his father’s eyes. Mubarak Ali writes of
Aurangzeb’s courage, his undoubted competence as a military commander — and his
successful campaign in Orchha at 15, followed by his appointment as viceroy of the
Deccan.
He
reveals that the teenaged Aurangzeb was strongly influenced by a Sunni scholar
in the Deccan, during his campaign there. He contrasts the puritanical and
orthodox Aurangzeb with the intellectual and literary Dara Shikoh, who
translated The Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita into Persian, espoused a
mystical, inclusive Islam and was strongly influenced by the Sufis and Mian
Mir.
In
fact, as the friction between the two brothers grows, the novel continues to
describe their rivalry and their power-struggle in the somewhat simplistic
terms:
Dara
wanted to bring all the people into the loving bosom of a merciful and
benevolent Allah but Aurangzeb believed that the Mughals had a moral right to
convert all the people of Hindustan into Muslims.
The
problem with such a black-and-white reading of Mughal history and indeed Baig’s
repeated statement that under the Mughals, India was a Muslim country, is that
Baig looks at a pre-modern society through modern concepts of nationalism and
statehood. Such interpretations are doubtless common currency in India and
Pakistan today, but they do ignore the fact that from the 15th to 19th
centuries, the religious wars that raged in Europe (Catholic versus Protestant)
defined the nations of modern Europe, whereas in pre-colonial India, although
religious conflicts did exist, battles were largely fought for power or
territory with Hindu and Muslim rulers, joining forces against a common foe.
Aurangzeb’s military allies were frequently Rajputs. As Aurangzeb’s power grew,
both Hindu and Muslim princes/warriors joined him, and betrayed his
incarcerated father and his defeated brothers.
As a
historical novel, Ocean of Cobras does not take advantage of fiction as a
creative medium to explore the emotional complexities of Shah Jahan and his
fratricidal sons, which did not simply revolve around issues of faith, and
whose actions would define the fate of their dynasty — and facilitate a
denouement that they could not have imagined: British hegemony. Instead, Dara’s
spiritual inclinations and his quest for transcendence, which encompassed many
faiths and scriptures, are reduced by the author to a self-conscious
post-independence polemic on religious unity. The novel is also peppered with
sweeping and sometimes, inaccurate statements on Mughal/Indian history,
including a reference to Aurangzeb’s literary daughter Zebunissa, as his
granddaughter.
Nevertheless,
this is a very readable book and its insights into Mughal life include
particularly interesting details of military battles witnessed by Mubarak Ali.
His narrative includes a detailed account of the Battle of Samugarh during
which Shah Jahan’s armies led by Dara Shikoh were defeated by Aurangzeb. As a
part of Dara Shikoh’s entourage, Mubarak Ali tells of their journey across the
subcontinent from Agra to Lahore, where Dara Shikoh regroups his forces and
travels through Multan, Thatta and Ahmedabad and encounters Aurangzeb’s armies
at the Battle of Deorai. There Dara Shikoh is defeated once more. Mubarak Ali’s
account leads up to the brief, shocking and tragic trial of Dara Shikoh for
apostasy, instituted by Aurangzeb and his orthodox clerics, culminating in Dara
Shikoh’s execution (soon followed by that of his mentor Sarmad) which is all
the more chilling for its combination of fratricide, realpolitik and faith.
Ocean
of Cobras: The Epic Battle for the Soul of India between Dara Shikoh and
Aurangzeb
(HISTORY)
By
Murad Ali Baig
Tara
Press, India
ISBN
978-8183861281
344pp.
Kashmir Monitor
25/05/2016
