Later Mughals v1.c9.s18.41

v1.c9.s18.41

At length on the 29th Jamadi II. 1128 (19th June 1716) Banda and his remaining followers were led out to execution. The rich Khatris of the city, who were secretly favourable to his tenets, had offered large sums for his release. But all these offers were rejected. The execution was entrusted to Ibrahim-ud-din Khan, Mir Atash, or general of artillery, and Sarbarah Khan, the kotwal. The Guru, dressed as on the day of his entry, was again placed on an elephant and taken through the streets of the old city to the shrine of Khwaja Qutb-ud-din Bakhtiyar Kaki,* and there paraded round the tomb of the Emperor Shah Alam, Bahadur Shah. After he had been made to dismount and was seated on the ground, his young son was put into his arms and he was told to take the child's life. He refused. Then the executioner killed the child with a long knife, dragged out its liver, and thrust it into the Guru's mouth. His own turn came next. First of all his right eye was removed by the point of a butcher's knife, next his left foot was cut off, then his two hands were severed from his body, and finally he was decapitated. His companions were also executed at the same time. His wife was made a Muhammadan and given over to Dakhini Begam, the Emperor's maternal aunt.†