Aurangzeb(1618-1707), one of the most powerful rulers of India, throughout its history, belonged to the Mughal family which ruled India for more than 300 years. Infamous in history for his anti-Hindu policies here is a drama Zawal-e-Azim (the fall of the great Mughal Empire) which explores the circumstances under which Aurangzeb became what he was. Written and directed by Torit mitra, this 2 hr 20 min. drama is a humanistic perspective of the history.

How family values can shape one’s personality? How the circumstances can lead one towards becoming a rebel and a powerful ruler? How there is no substitute for innate talent? Mr. Mitra has tried to re-explore Aurangzeb, who dared to go against the family tradition of being pro-Hindu in the Hindu majority country India and still succeeded.

Some questions remain unanswered but that does not mean that there are no answers.
The colossal Mughals Empire of the pre-British age fell more due to its inability to adapt the internal administration in the changed circumstances than due to external aggression. There were so many reasons behind its inability to do so but the one that misses the historian’s focus if not attention is the familial circumstances. Tarit’s drama highlights this angle.

Aurangzeb was the son of Sahjahan another great Mughal ruler, who built the world famous Taj Mahal of Agra. Sahjahan always feared his own son Aurangzeb due to his hardliner approach and he always tried to keep him aside. While Dara Shikoh, Aurangzeb’s elder brother and the declared heir to the throne was imparted special trainings, he was sent to fight wars when he was just 15 in the remote south of India far away from Agra, the seat of power. While Dara was taught about all the religions, Aurangzeb was taught only Quran. Whenever he wanted to return from south to meet his family, he was denied due to some or the other reason. What Aurangzeb felt bad about was the impartiality his own father did to him.

Aurangzeb won a large tract of the southern India, never won earlier by any Mughal Empire. So while he had the feeling of being brave, Aurangzeb had a deep resentment against his father who didn’t treat him equally and against Dara who ‘showed’ his scholarship more often than not. “With such sense of injustice and inferiority Aurangzeb decided to do everything as said in Quran. So he ruined temples and imposed Jaziya, a tax to be paid by non-Muslims”, says Torit Mishra and adds, “He also donated to build temples.”

Sahjahan, already old due to his age felt helpless between the secularism of Dara and the fundamentalism of Aurangzeb. The human witnesses to this family tragedy are the three sisters of Aurangzeb and Dara; Jahanara, Roshanara and Gauhara, tied down with the Mughal tradition of daughters not being married. Aurangzeb had whatever sympathy, in the family, only with Jahanara, who was the eldest of all of them and had nurtured them all like their mother. An extraordinarily intelligent woman, Jahanara had observed with her tearless eyes some of the most immoral and inhumane atrocities, at times silently and at times through her poetic acumen, which stands out as a statement of womanhood:

“Let my grave be covered with bed of grass,
Let the grass be the adorning grace of me, the ever irrepressible”

21st century should be thankful to this director for his depiction of how lack of emotions, values and fair play can lead to mistrust and conspiracies. The drama is a reminder that the story of the Mughals in India was not only of conquest but also of love, hate and other manly passions.