Descendents of two great warriors of Central Asia-Taimur and Chingiz Khan, The Mughals have become a legend in history of the world. Their rule in India heralded a new era of far-reaching socio-political changes making for an enlightenment of a sort that calls for an evergrowing scholarship to grasp its many-faceted significance. The monograph in hand is not just a mere addition to the numerous works on the Mughals and their activities in various fields. Being the result of a deep and critical scholarly study of the various Political and Religious aspects of the doings of the Mughals it comes up as a unique approach to the subject. Here is an attempt to study Mughal history from a new angle.

The Mughal Empire dominated India politically, culturally, socially, economically and environmentally, from its foundation by Babur, a Central Asian adventurer, in 1526 to the final trial and exile of the last emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar at the hands of the British in 1858. Throughout the empire's three centuries of rise, preeminence and decline, it remained a dynamic and complex entity within and against which diverse peoples and interests conflicted. The empire's significance continues to be controversial among scholars and politicians with fresh and exciting new insights, theories and interpretations being put forward in recent years. This book engages students and general readers with a clear, lively and informed narrative of the core political events, the struggles and interactions of key individuals, groups and cultures, and of the contending historiographical arguments surrounding the Mughal Empire.

The Mughal Period Was The Most Glorious Epoch In The History Of India. There Was Peace And Prosperity And An All-Round Development. It Is Rather Surprising That No Systematic Attempt Has Yet Been Made At Surveying Its Origi¬Nal Sources. The Present Study Is The First Attempt At Surveying The Original Authorities For The Mughal Period From 1526 To 1740. It Describes Published Works And Manuscripts In Persian, Sanskrit, Hindi, Gurmukhi, Marathi And In European Languages.The Present Book Is Primarily Inten¬Ded For The Serious Students Of What Is Popularly Known As Mughal History Whether He Be An Under-Graduate Aspir¬Ing To A University Degree Or A Candi¬Date For The Competitive Examinations For The Higher Administrative Services. He Will Find His Purpose Admirably Fulfilled. Even The General Reader Will Not Find It Wholly Unprofitable. There Is Much To Arouse His Interest And Awaken His Sympathy.

This Volume Of The Author S 5-Vol Series History Of Mughal Architecture Studies Such Aspects Of The Architecture Of Jehangir S Age (1605-27 A.D.) As Public Works (Roads-And-Sarais), Gardens And Garden-Pavilions, Palatial Mansions And Shikargahs, Picture Wall Of Lahore Fort And Tombs, Each In A Separate Chapter. It Covers 43 Monuments, Extending From Kabul To Allahabad, And Kashmir To Burhanpur, And The Scope Of This Volume Is Much Wider Than The Earlier Ones.That Public Works As Roads, Kos-Minars, Bridges, Sarais, Wells, Baolis And Porters Walls Were Built And Maintained At Government Expense Testifies That The; Mughal State Was Fully Alive To The Welfare Of Its Subjects. Four Masonry Bridges Have Been Specifically Studied. Jehangir Was Greatly Interested In Gardens, And Garden-Craft Received A Distinct Form Under His Patronage. Palaces Were Built Amidst Gardens, Mostly On The Riverbank, With Characteristic Idioms Of The Age. A Unique Building Complex, Which Developed Under Him, Was Shikargah (Hunting Lodge) And Four Representative Examples Have Been Studied. The Glazed-Tiled Picture Wall Of The Lahore Fort Is Unique In Respect Of Its Scale, Scheme And Subjects. Originally, It Covered An Immense Mural Area 500 Yards In Length And 16 Yards In Height, By An Ingenious System Of Panelling Which, Besides Stylized Florals, Arabesques And Geometricals, Depicted Beautiful Figurative Compositions. Architect, Potter, Painter And Glazed-Tiler Collaborated On This Grand Project Which Has No Parallel In The World.Domeless Tomb With A Barahdari With Chaukhandi Roof Or A Plain Chabutarah Was Also A Unique Growth Of This Age And The Most Notable Tombs Of This Class, As Those Of Akbar, I Timad-Ud-Daulah And Jehangir, Have Been Studied In Detail. Development Of Such Distinctive Architectural Features As Dado , Gateway And Minar Also Belongs To This Period, During Which Unprecedented Emphasis Was Given On Ornamentation, Which Is Why This Art-Epoch Is Noted For Colour And Design . This Study Has Been Made In The Context Of, And With Reference To, The Cultural Milieu Which Produced It And This Is Not Only A History Of Jehangir S Architecture But Also A History Of Jehangir S Age And History Of Jehangir S India. It Is A History Of Those Tender Feelings, Sublime Thoughts And Subtle Ideas Which Go To Make A Civilization, Not Of Those Political Intrigues And Feuds, And Military Conflicts Which Destroy It.

In the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2011, discussions on ties between Islamic religious education institutions, namely madrassahs, and transnational terrorist groups have featured prominently in the Western media. In the frenzied coverage of events, however, vital questions have been overlooked: What do we know about the madrassahs? Should Western policymakers be alarmed by the recent increase in the number of these institutions in Muslim countries? Is there any connection between them and the "global jihad"? Ali Riaz responds to these questions through an in-depth examination of the madraassahs in Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India. In Faithful Education, he examines these institutions and their roles in relation to current international politics.

This volume delves into the literary lives of four Muslim women in pre-modern India. Three of them, Gulbadan Begam (1523-1603), the youngest daughter of Emperor Babur, Jahanara (1614-1681), the eldest daughter of Emperor Shah Jahan, and Zeb-un-Nissa (1638-1702), the eldest daughter of Emperor Aurangzeb, belonged to royalty. Thus, they were inhabitants of the Mughal 'zenana', an enigmatic liminal space of qualified autonomy and complex equations of gender politics. Amidst such constructs, Gulbadan Begam’s 'Humayun-Nama' (biography of her half-brother Humayun, reflecting on the lives of Babur’s wives and daughters), Jahanara’s hagiographies glorifying Mughal monarchy, and Zeb-un-Nissa’s free-spirited poetry that landed her in Aurangzeb’s prison, are discursive literary outputs from a position of gendered subalternity. While the subjective selves of these women never much surfaced under extant rigid conventions, their indomitable understanding of ‘home-world’ antinomies determinedly emerge from their works. This monograph explores the political imagination of these Mughal women that was constructed through statist interactions of their royal fathers and brothers, and how such knowledge percolated through the relatively cloistered communal life of the 'zenana'. The fourth woman, Habba Khatoon (1554-1609), famously known as ‘the Nightingale of Kashmir’, offers an interesting counterpoint to her royal peers. As a common woman who married into royalty (her husband Yusuf Shah Chak was the ruler of Kashmir in 1579-1586), her happiness was short-lived with her husband being treacherously exiled by Emperor Akbar. Khatoon’s verse, which voices the pangs of separation, was that of an ascetic who allegedly roamed the valley, and is famed to have introduced the ‘lol’ (lyric) into Kashmiri poetry. Across genres and social positions of all these writers, this volume intends to cast hitherto unfocused light on the emergent literary sensibilities shown by Muslim women in pre-modern India.