Aurangzeb
Aurangzeb
Jahan's son Aurangzeb was to be the last great Mughal Emperor.
Itimad-ud-Daulah's tomb in Agra is considered a landmark in Mughal architecture ©
History's verdict on Aurangzeb largely depends on who's writing it; Muslim or Hindu.
Aurangzeb ruled for nearly 50 years. He came to the throne after imprisoning his father and having his older brother killed.
He was a strong leader, whose conquests expand the Mughal Empire to its greatest size.
Aurangzeb was a very observant and religious Muslim who ended the policy of religious tolerance followed by earlier emperors.
He no longer allowed the Hindu community to live under their own laws and customs, but imposed Sharia law (Islamic law) over the whole empire.
Thousands of Hindu temples and shrines were torn down and a punitive tax on Hindu subjects was re-imposed.
In the last decades of the seventeenth century Aurangzeb invaded the Hindu kingdoms in central and southern India, conquering much territory and taking many slaves.
Under Aurangzeb, the Mughal empire reached the peak of its military power, but the rule was unstable. This was partly because of the hostility that Aurangazeb's intolerance and taxation inspired in the population, but also because the empire had simply become to big to be successfully governed.
The Muslim Governer of Hydrabad in southern India rebelled and established a separate Shi'a state, he also reintroduced religious toleration.
The Hindu kingdoms also fought back often supported by the French and the British, who used them to tighten their grip on the sub-continent.
The establishment of a Hindu Marathi Empire in southern India cut off the Mughal state to the south. The great Mughal city of Calcutta came under the control of the east India company in 1696 and in the decades that followed Europeans and European – backed by Hindu princes conquered most of the Mughal territory.
Aurangzeb's extremism caused Mughal territory and creativity to dry up and the Empire went into decline. The Mughal Emperors that followed Aurangzeb effectively became British or French puppets. The last Mughal Emperor was deposed by the British in 1858.