In recent months, a Mughal emperor who passed away more than 300 years ago has become a popular topic of discussion in India.
From 1658 until 1707, Aurangzeb, who is frequently referred to as the “last effective Mughal emperor,” controlled India. However, historians have never been very fond of him.
To begin with, he ascended to the kingdom by putting his father in prison and assassinating his older brother.
He also performed poorly in comparison to other Mughal emperors, including his father Shah Jahan, the great romantic who constructed the Taj Mahal, his grandfather Jahangir, the benevolent secular emperor, and his great-grandfather Akbar.
However, Aurangzeb, the sixth emperor and a devout Muslim was frequently criticized as an expansionist brutal tyrant who imposed strict Sharia rules and brought back the discriminatory jizya levy that Hindu citizens had to pay in exchange for security.
Additionally, he was said to despise music and other fine arts and to have instigated the destruction of several temples.
All of that occurred over a thousand years ago, yet the modern hatred directed toward him is unheard of.
It began when tensions over the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi, a sacred city, started to flare up. The mosque was constructed on the site of the Vishwanath temple, a magnificent Hindu temple built in the 16th century that was destroyed on Aurangzeb’s orders in 1669. Now, his name is popular on social media.
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Even though Aurangzeb chopped the heads of numerous people, he was unable to shatter Mr. Modi’s faith.
A Canadian-American journalist who was perplexed by his remarks on Twitter asked: “Why is the Indian Prime Minister giving a long speech bashing a Mughal emperor who died 300+ years ago?”
Historian Audrey Truschke responded to a series of tweets by stating that Hindu nationalists thought “Muslims oppressed Hindus for hundreds of years thus they deserve to be oppressed today, as payback for the past.”
She asserted that the usage of Aurangzeb’s name served as “a dog whistle to communicate that it is permissible to harbor animosity and employ violence against contemporary Muslims.”
Since this Twitter conversation, Aurangzeb has faced a lot more criticism.
The mayor of the city of Agra called him a “butcher” and demanded that any reminders of him be eliminated from public areas. The Mughal emperor was referred to as “an invader” who sought to exterminate Hindus on Twitter, and one person urged that all Mughal monuments and structures be built over Hindu sites.
His tomb in the western state of Maharashtra was closed to tourists on Thursday after a local lawmaker called into question “the purpose for its existence” and demanded that it be destroyed.
Author and professor of medieval history at Aligarh Muslim University, historian Nadeem Razavi, claims that bringing up Aurangzeb is “a very easy name” to demonize India’s Muslim minorities, who have recently been subjected to mob violence.
The Mughal emperor, according to Prof. Razavi, did destroy a number of Hindu temples and levy a discriminatory tax on Hindus, but he was a complex character and not entirely bad.
He provided the most gifts for the upkeep of Hindu temples, and because Akbar, his great-grandfather, was two-thirds Hindu, he himself was
His tomb in the western state of Maharashtra was closed to tourists on Thursday after a local lawmaker called into question “the purpose for its existence” and demanded that it be destroyed.
Author and professor of medieval history at Aligarh Muslim University, historian Nadeem Razavi, claims that bringing up Aurangzeb is “a very easy name” to demonize India’s Muslim minorities, who have recently been subjected to mob violence.
The Mughal emperor, according to Prof. Razavi, did destroy a number of Hindu temples and levy a discriminatory tax on Hindus, but he was a complex character and not entirely bad.