The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c20.15

v4.c20.15

And now the garrison lost heart; the future looked absolutely dark to them, and their ranks had been thinned to 2000 men, while no help was to be expected from outside. Their two leading nobles arranged the terms of surrender, which Aurangzīb readily granted. On 22 September, 1686, Sikandar, the last of the ‘Ādil Shāhs, left the capital of his ancestors and waited on Aurangzīb in his camp at Rasūlpur. He was very kindly received and enrolled among the Mūghul peers with the lesser title of *Khān* (instead of *Shāh*), and an annual pension of 100,000 rupees was settled upon him. All the Bījāpurī officers were taken over into Mūghul service. On the 29th, Aurangzīb entered the fallen city through the southern or Mangali gate (henceforth to be called the “Gate of Victory”, *Fath Darwāza*). In the ‘Ādil Shāhī palace and the “Relic Shrine” (*Āsār-i-sharīf*) he erased all pictures drawn in violation of the Qurānic law and all Shiah inscriptions. The kingdom was ordered to be styled *Dār-uz-Zafar*. Complete desolation settled upon the city of Bījāpur after the fall of its independent dynasty; from a proud capital it became merely the headquarters city of one of the numerous provinces of the Mūghul empire; its nobility decayed and disappeared, and the multitude of artisans and labourers, poets and scholars, lost their bread. Two years after its conquest, a terrible bubonic plague swept away more than half its population, and even the abundant water supply in the city wells suddenly grew scanty. The city and its once populous suburbs were deserted and fell into ruin.