KARACHI: Renowned expert on the art, architecture and material culture of Mughal South Asia, Dr Mehreen Chida-Razvi gave an enlightening presentation on ‘Jahangir and Nur Jahan — Creating an Architectural Legacy of Power’ at the Mohatta Palace Museum on Tuesday evening.

She said Nur Jahan was an avid architecture patron during Jahangir’s reign. It was also recognised that her building projects were undertaken with the intent of creating a lasting legacy. Such intent places her within the long tradition of royals’ building for eternal commemoration, a concept that transcends time and space. She was not alone in this way of thinking: as the wife of the Mughal Emperor Jahangir, her interest in architectural patronage mirrored that of her husband’s. For Jahangir and all Mughal monarchs, buildings were physical stamps on the geographic landscape of ownership, power and prestige, and as such they played a role in the proclamation of imperial Mughal power.

Dr Chida-Razvi said, “The empire that Jahangir inherited from his father, Akbar, spanned the South Asian peninsula. Prince Salim [the name Jahangir was born with] was the eldest son of Akbar. His birth was regarded as something of a miracle for Akbar had been unable to produce an heir to his throne. It was only after having made a pilgrimage to the village of Sikri to the Sheikh of the Chishti Sufi order named Salim that he was told that he’d have three sons. When his Rajput queen conceived she was sent to Sikri to give birth to her child in the presence of the Sheikh. And a prince was born and named Salim after him. Prince Salim ascended to the Mughal throne on Oct 23, 1605 in Agra. [He later changed his name].

“Six years after becoming padshah, Jahangir met a remarkable woman who was to become his last and favourite wife, Mehrunnisa. Jahangir is said to have met her in 1611, and after two months of courtship, they were wed, after which she was given the title Nur Mahal [light of the palace] and then Nur Jahan [light of the world]. From Babar’s foundation of the Mughal Empire in 1526, royal Mughal women wielded immense influence. These were, however, female members of the family — mothers, foster mothers, sisters etc. Wives, too, played a part but it was not until Nur Jahan’s marriage to Jahangir that a Mughal queen could be considered an equal in imperial stature as the padshah. [In the talk] imperial was related to the emperor and in Nur Jahan’s case to the empress.”

Scholar says the Mughal queen’s building projects were undertaken to create a lasting legacy

The scholar said Nur Jahan was granted privileges and powers no previous Mughal queen had, including some that proclaimed her as Jahangir’s co-sovereign. She issued farmaans (royal decrees) in her own name. She was given the right to mint coins and have her ceremonial kettledrums. The coins and the drums until now were the prerogative of kingship, and in granting them to Nur Jahan, Jahangir overtly proclaimed that he was investing her with his imperial authority.

Dr Chida-Razvi said, “Taking all this into account, it is clear that during Jahangir’s reign, Nur Jahan’s role in the court reformulated, de-centring the commonly understood notion of authority as the concentration of power in the person of the emperor. The singularity of her position at the Mughal court is, however, absent in the historical record. Character assassination is carried out in both Mughal and European contemporary histories, memorialised Nur Jahan as a cunning and manipulative woman who rendered Jahangir a puppet king. From the Mughal perspective, this was rooted in the relationship between Shahjahan, Jahangir’s son and heir apparent until 1622, and Nur Jahan. Shahjahan viewed Nur Jahan as the reason he lost his position as heir apparent in the five years before Jahangir’s death and had been effectively banished from the imperial centre. To say that Shahjahan hated her would not be an exaggeration. And when he did succeed Jahangir, Shahjahan went out of his way to vilify Nur Jahan and remove her from the imperial narrative of Jahangir’s reign.”

She said that from Shahjahan’s accession to the throne in 1628 there was immediate erasure from the historical record of Nur Jahan as Jahangir’s co-sovereign. Through the medium of architecture, however, it is possible to reassert her position of authority in Jahangir’s court. “With her architectural commissions, Nur Jahan projected imperial power, both hers and Jahangir’s. In doing so she further legitimised her role as co-sovereign.”

Dr Chida-Razvi said Mughal royals understood the power of visual art and the lasting implications of artistic and architectural patronage. Building was inherently a political act.

In the latter half of her presentation, she told the audience that the discussion would focus on two architectural commissions of Jahangir [Shahi Qila of Lahore and the tomb he built for his father] and two of Nur Jahan [the tomb she built for Jahangir in Lahore and Sarai Nur Mahal in Jalandhar]. It was nicely done to illustrate how intelligently Nur Jahan through architecture projected her political power.

The talk was part of the distinguished lecture series commemorating 25 years of the museum.

Published in Dawn, February 28th, 2024