Later Mughals v1.c9.s5: Sec. 5.—Procession into Dihli.
Later Mughals v1.c9.s5
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Sec. 5.—Procession into Dihli.
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Next morning, the 17th Muharram (12th February, 1713), Farrukh-siyar left Khizrabad and marching in state into Dihli took possession of the palace and its citadel. The artillery of all sorts went in front. Behind the guns came the new Emperor mounted on an elephant, and at his back sat Ibadullah Khan (Mir Jumla) waving a peacock fan over his master's head. Largesse was scattered among the crowd as he went by. The head of Jahandar Shah was carried on the point of a long bamboo held by an executioner seated on an elephant; his body was laid across the back of another elephant. The corpse of Zulfiqar Khan, with head and feet bare, was tied by the feet to the tail of a third elephant. These followed about one hundred yards behind the elephant on which the Emperor rode. The procession was met by Sayyid Abdullah Khan (now Qutb-ul-mulk) near the city wall, at the inside of the Dihli Gate. The crowd in the streets was immense, a greater had rarely been seen. Some of the spectators were unable to restrain their grief, their eyes filled with tears, lumps formed in their throats, and they muttered to each other, under their breath, "Glory be to God! Yesterday lords over thousands, to-day fallen into this calamity."*
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∗ B. M. No. 1690, fol. 162a says Taqarrub Khan (alias Nusrat Khan), Yahya Beg, was the messenger.
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The bodies of the unfortunate Jahandar Shah and of his Wazir were thrown down on the sandy waste before the Dihli Gate of the palace. Asad Khan's family, taking with them nothing but the clothes they had on, were removed in palkis from their house to one known as the peshkhana of Khan Jahan where they were kept under surveillance; and Taqarrub Khan, the new Khan-saman or Lord Steward, brought in two elephants loaded with the jewels and jewelled vessels from Asad Khan's house, and also sixty-two of his horses. The fallen vice-gerent himself had been forced to appear in the triumph procession into Dihli, seated in a palki and accompanied by a few men on foot, all that was left of his former grandeur. At the Akbarabadi mosque he was halted, and there he sat in his *palki* unheeded for four or five hours, until Farrukh-siyar ordered his removal with his women to the office rooms of the diwan above referred to. Some temporary screens were put up, and there he and his family sought shelter. Food was sent to them at night by Husain Ali Khan.*
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∗ Mirza Mhd. 168, Ijad 123, Khush-hal Chand 395b. The Dihli Gate is on the south side of the city, it is the one nearest the Jamuna. Mirza Muhammad and his brother witnessed the entry into Dihli from the roof of the Akbarabadi mosque, which is in the Faiz Bazar, the street running north and south from the Dihli Gate of the city to the Dihli Gate of the fort. (Asar-us-sanadid, 70; Carr Stephen, 246, 248). Khush-hal Chand, also, was one of the onlookers and "into the skirt of this humble one, too, fell a silver rose, weighing seven mashas."
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It was not till the 19th (14th February, 1713), that Arslan Khan received orders to bury the bodies of the murdered Jahandar Shah and Zulfiqar Khan. The Prince was laid in the vault of the Emperor Humayun's tomb, at the side of other members of the family. Zulfiqar Khan's remains were interred close to the shrine of Shaikh Ata-ullah, which is situated at the gateway of the same tomb. Zulfiqar Khan was a little over fifty-nine (lunar) years of age at the time of his death ; he left no sons. No memorial was erected over him for several years. At length some of his eunuchs, who had been transferred to Sayyid Husain Ali Khan, mentioned this fact to their new master. The Sayyid ordered a tomb to be built, and on a tablet were inscribed the following lines, composed by Asad Khan :—
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"A hidden voice, lamenting with blood suffused eyes, said, 'Ibrahim made of Ismail a sacrifice' " (1125 H.)†
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† The father's original name was Ibrahim and the son's Ismail, Ijad 127b, Warid 147a, Khush-hal Chand 395a.
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In connection with these lines, Warid tells a story in praise of Asad Khan's strength of mind and vigour of intellect, even at the extreme age that he had then reached, which, if true, would seem rather to prove his want of common feeling. At the moment that his son's death was announced to him, he hung his head for a little while, and then said to the bystanders, "My thoughts repeatedly recur to the words 'Ibrahim made of Ismail a sacrifice.' " As the numerical value of the letters in these words accords with the year of Zulfiqar's death, the coincidence, if the words came spontaneously into his mind, was very wonderful. If not, this excogitating of a numerical puzzle was a curious use of the first moments following the news of an eldest son's violent death. As there was no member of the family left to support its name and fame, and Asad Khan now disappears from our history, it will be sufficient to note that he survived until the 25th Jamadi II. 1128 H. (15th June, 1716), when he passed away at the great age of eighty-eight lunar years.*
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∗ Kamwar 131, Ijad 124b, Khafi Khan 734, B. M. No. 1690, 162b.
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Zulfiqar Khan had obtained great renown as a soldier in the Dakhin, and there can be no question that he was a man of great experience in matters of State. But during the period that we are treating, commencing with the battle between Azam Shah and Bahadur Shah in 1707, his generalship was prudently displayed more in furthering his own interests than in winning battles for the master that he might be serving at the moment. Danishmand Khan (Ali) has a passage, taunting him with his conduct in the battle of Jajau, and accusing him of acting on the maxim that discretion is the better part of valour. An anecdotist [*Chamanistan*, 22] states that Zulfiqar Khan offered the poet and historian a large sum if he would erase this passage from his work, but to Ali's credit be it said, the words still stand in the copies which have come down to us.†
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The greatest blot on the life of Asad Khan and Zulfiqar Khan is, however, the base ingratitude displayed towards Jahandar Shah. Even native historians do not defend this act
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[^ *]: Warid 146b, *Tarikh-i-Muhammadi* year 1128 H., Kamwar Khan 165. *M. U.* ii. 319, says 94 years; also Khafi Khan, ii. 771, where the year is 1129 H. Kamraj makes the age 98 years. An allowance of Rs. 50,000 a year had been given to him by Farrukh-siyar, B. M. Or. 1690, fol., 164a. [^ †]: *Bahadur-Shah-nama*, B. M. Or. 24, fol. 37b. "The first to show his back was Muhammad Ismail, entitled Zulfiqar Khan. To Azam Shah's face he made great protestations, but instead of sacrificing his life, he made off at the earliest moment. Receiving from an arrow a skin wound near the mouth, he cast away his honour through excessive love of life. If he is abhorrent (*malun*) to the people, his excuse is notorious (*malum*). He had risen to fame and place in the Dakhin; from his youth up, his training in valour had been in running after the traces of the Mahrattas, a tribe of cats, whose occupation is robbing and running away. He had never seen a battle between kings; had never met in battlefield with tigers from the forest of valour. In brief, to stand firm in such violent contests you must be a hero."
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of treachery. Jahandar Shah had many claims upon them for favours conferred; and he had placed his life in their hands. If Asad Khan had thought fit to excuse himself from joining any further in the Prince's fortunes, he should have left it open for the fugitive to seek some other refuge. But he should not have seized him or delivered him over to his mortal enemy to be killed with indignity. Apart from this harsh and fruitless act, Asad Khan was superior in character to the other nobles of his time. He did little oppression, was long-suffering, full of dignity and of a handsome presence. He was of a correct disposition, which means, we are told, the showing of benevolence and sympathy to the lowly, and of ostentation and hauteur to your equals. His rise was rapid and unchecked, or as it is put, "he threw without intermission double-six from the dice-box of desire." [M. U. ii. 317—318.]