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  He stops for breath. Men look at him, confused. He ignores their expression.

  ‘Life is a struggle and all of us die. Death as a mujahideen promises unattainable things, like escape from the interrogation by the angels in the grave, the chance to bypass the purgatory uncertainty, to avoid the agonizing wait to be pure before entering paradise. A mujahideen is entitled to the highest ranks in His court.’

  Aurangzeb speaks slowly with dramatic voice modulations as if each word is an ocean pearl, to be seen, felt, pined for and sought with hunger.

  Many in the crowd nod vigorously, not knowing what lies ahead.

  ‘What is the meaning of a kafir, the Arabic word which is active participle to the root K-F-R, the word that means to cover, to deny, to hide?’ he asks. ‘Is it a person who rejects Islamic faith and hides from the truth like an ostrich burying its head in the sand? Or is it also a person who is born a Muslim but wanders into the unholy turfs of infidelity, under the pretext of seeking truth? The truth exists in the holy Quran. Revealed by Him to his chosen Prophet; our beloved Paigambar, Peace Be Upon Him. To seek truth elsewhere is to dishonour our Prophet.’

  He pauses to take a few deep breaths and to let his words sink in the minds of his men.

  ‘A person who rejects Islam may either be blind or ignorant, stupid or mad. But a Muslim who shows interest in the faiths of the infidels is a shaytan, evil to the core.’

  He pauses again to see the expressions on the faces of his warriors, who look utterly puzzled.

  ‘Whoever helps a good cause becomes a partner therein and whoever helps an evil cause shares in its burden.’

  Silence fills the empty space above the gathering. He knows that this silence can be far more potent than the dust clouds hovering over the north-western skyline.

  ‘Jihad!’ he finally screams. ‘This is the only way to deal with these evil men. We hereby declare jihad against the infidel Dara Shikoh, the first prince, for disregarding Islam.’ Aurangzeb makes the word jihad sound like an explosive that has been just fired. ‘A man who encourages kufr or kafirdom and hides from the truth cannot be our ruler,’ he repeats over and over again till his throat goes sore and starts itching. ‘If your men fight for my cause they will become mujahideen, and if they die, they will become shaheed,’ he says with elan as if he was doing a favour by offering the men a chance to become holy warriors, the chance they would never get, and they must never let go. ‘Jihad is essential to save our empire from a heretic dog who aspires to be our next emperor. How can he—who regards the holy Quran and the scriptures of the infidels as two sides of one coin!’

  He strikes still deeper till the sharpness of his words slice the logic of some of his officers. In sheer disbelief, men of war listen to what their master has to say. Somewhere at the back of the crowd, he hears sullen mutterings of disapproval. This infuriates him but he waits, standing still, without removing his gaze from them. This is one moment to lose or win a thousand hearts, to lose or win the world. Eyes filled with cynicism, doubt, confusion, anger and rage look at him. Whether for him or against him, for Dara bhai or against Dara bhai, he is not yet sure.

  ‘Anta turidwa-howa, yuriidwallaahyafthreeal ma yuriid,’ Aurangzeb says as loudly as possible in chaste Arabic. ‘You want what you want, he wants what he wants, but Allah does what He wants.’

  Like molten lava that erupts from a dormant volcano, his few hundred men raise their hands and chant, ‘Deen! Deen! Deen! Deen!’ Within moments, almost all the men raise their hands and echo the battle cry. The collective sound reverberates through his military camp, rattles above the babul twigs blanketing the terrain, shakes the canopies of arjuna trees and hovers over the north-western dust clouds. Its chilling resonance silences the voices of dissent. Hearts that had pounded with cynicism and doubt explode with the hysteria of pride that they collectively feel for their fidelity and brotherhood.

  Mohammed Sultan glares at his father with eyes shining with astonishment and hurt. He has never disliked his Sunni father with so much passion. His father is surely not a man to be trusted. He is a man who wants to use religion as a weapon and he, Mohammad Sultan, may also be a potential victim of his father’s fanaticism.

  Murad Baksh too glares at his brother as jealousy eats into his heart. Aurangzeb has used his idea to instigate their warriors. He cannot accept the fact that his brother receives all the love and admiration of the military officers. It is he who deserves that adulation.

  3

  Dara Shikoh does not want to think about the defeat of Jaswant Singh Rathod. And yet a hesitant Dara has decided to wait for three long days, despite his military advisers pleading otherwise. He does not want to launch the first offensive but will instead wait for his younger brothers to march in. He has turned a deaf ear to his advisers warning him of the dangers and the pitfalls of the delay.

  Dara wipes his face with a small towel. It is insanely hot. In the sweltering sun, blazing sands and the blistering wind around them, his men and animals sweat profusely under their heavy metal armour. It is their third day of waiting for ‘start’ orders so they can march on. The marshalling of ranks is long over, battle formation has been done with and his army can be set in motion with one order. His gaze rolls over his army, the enormous elephants wrapped in steel plates strengthened with barbwires. Weapons like swords and spears are tied to their trunks. Their steel-coated howdahs soar above the sea of horsemen and footmen, perhaps fifty, perhaps seventy thousand in numbers commanded by the Muslim khans and the Rajput rajas. The air is filled with dust particles and rattles with the whinnying of restless horses and trumpeting of impatient elephants. Somewhere in the front, drummers standing behind the cannon make a racket. The cannon carts linked to each other by massive iron chains have formed a barrier.

  A steel howdah has been specially designed for him. Its metal plates are thick like bricks, to protect him from arrows. It is secured with metal bars that reach up to its roof making the howdah look like a cage. Footmen with javelins march from behind while countless swordsmen guard the beast’s legs. Heavy iron chains with dangling steel balls are tied to its trunk. The tusker is trained to swirl them to kill men who come near it and use axes to chop off their legs.

  However, the first prince is disconcerted. He now realizes that he has indeed made a mistake by waiting, thereby putting his army in a contingency mode for three successive days. His uncertainty has allowed his brothers’ armies to move further eastwards and reach the banks of the Yamuna. He has given them the leave to rest and recover from the long journey across the dry plains—Ujjain to Gwalior and then towards Agra. The blunder has been committed, and he is aware that his men, horses and elephants are tired and drained under the veneer of banners fluttering in the air like rivers of silk. He looks down. Mir Jumla stands before his elephant, clad in chain mail and armour. He looks ahead and another reality starts to sink in slowly. ‘Do not worry, Your Imperial Highness, we are prepared.’ Mir Jumla first bows and straightens up, his voice rising above the din of the battlefield. Dara Shikoh raises himself, resting his body on his knees and looks through the bars. Mir Jumla’s dark eyes are looking up at him but they just twinkle, giving nothing away.

  ‘Our plans are in place. The artillery, in a half-a-kos-long line of cannon carts surrounded by cannoneers and artillerymen, stands right in the front, stuffed, ready to fire,’ shouts Mir Jumla.

  Dara Shikoh is not comfortable with Mir Jumla and other military officials. They are strangers to him; he does not know them as he has hardly fought any battles. Dara is dogged by a nervous feeling that they are not under his control. He has been gathering mansabdars from far and nearby provinces. Their contingents have been hastily equipped with armour and weapons with the arsenal from Agra Fort and pampered with huge funds from the imperial treasury. He is unable to deal with them decisively and does not know if they truly stand by him or not.

  A strange fear nibbles at his innards. The ill will between his personal army and his father’s highly p
aid ahadi soldiers is obvious. Ahadi in Arabic means ‘standalone’ and these soldiers do not report to any mansabdars, they are reserved for the emperor and a pampered lot. They are not used to taking orders, have not fought any battles in the recent times and are good only for parade.

  The mutual jealousy between the Hindu and the Muslim military officials suddenly bothers him. Aurangzeb’s victory and Jaswant’s defeat have created a new equation in the mind of the people. With one single blow, Aurangzeb has brought him down from the position of the crown prince to a prince. But what hurts the most is Dara’s suspicion that some even think of him to be lower in position than Aurangzeb. He is no longer sure how to be the general of this war, or of any war for that matter. Suddenly, terror strikes him. The southern horizon is darkened with dust. It seems that his brothers have reached.

  He looks down. Mir Jumla is staring back at him, waiting for orders.

  ‘Fire when you see them!’ Dara shouts. He cannot decide if his orders will come sooner or later.

  Mir Jumla does not comment, but only turns back and disappears.

  Dara Shikoh narrows his eyes and stares ahead. The entire southern horizon has come alive with footmen, horsemen and elephants. Banners flutter wildly in the air. It is unbelievable that his younger brothers have gathered such a large force. He feels the ground shudder beneath him. Between his and his brothers’ armies, the plain explodes as a thick cloud of smoke rises like a dark curtain. He looks on, aghast. Mir Jumla seems to empty the stock of their explosives even though the enemy has not walked into the firing range. The explosives hit the barren land between the armies. A curtain of smoke rises, blocking his view. He waits as his elephant raises its trunk in fear and trumpets as his mahout struggles to control his fidgety animal with his ankush. Acrid smoke that rides on the wind makes him breathless even as the enemy starts emerging from the wall of soot.

  The enemy comes in waves and he is numb with shock as explosives, arrows and javelins start raining over his men. Some arrows hit the metal plates of his elephant. One gets stuck into the barbed wires and he can see its shaft shudder on impact.

  He looks down: one of his bodyguards has fallen, impaled by a javelin.

  The war has begun. Dara looks to his left and shouts, ‘Attack!’

  His left wing is commanded by Rustum Khan. Thousands of horsemen pull out swords from their scabbards and charge at European artillerymen protecting Aurangzeb’s right wing.

  Dara looks to his right but does not say anything. His right wing is a sea of Rajput squadrons and is commanded by Chatrasal Hada.

  Aurangzeb is not worried, but Dara, not being used to battles, makes the mistake of using the same old tactic. Worse still, his army is a motley group of hastily put together squadrons. Dara may be backed by numbers but his army is not at all a cohesive body. To face such a disorderly enemy, Aurangzeb has divided his artillery into two units, and put his heavy cavalry, commanded by Mohammad Sultan, in the middle. The enemy is likely to attack impulsively, and will be intercepted by two-pronged artillery attack, while Sultan can advance towards the core of the enemy’s battle formation.

  Aurangzeb has placed Murad Baksh and his army behind the left artillery unit, while he is behind Mohammad Sultan’s squadrons and is surrounded by a mass of horsemen. He watches from his howdah as both the units of his artillery start firing at once, killing Dara’s horsemen in large numbers. Mohammad Sultan’s cavalry advances towards the core of Dara’s army. Another mass of cavalry, commanded by Murad, press forward towards Dara’s right wing. Suddenly, a sea of saffron-clad Rajput horsemen under Chatrasal Hada move towards Murad’s elephant, the archers shooting wildly. The projectiles miss Murad but get stuck to his howdah and the tusker’s armour. Soon his war beast looks like a giant porcupine. His mahout is hit, and falls down on the hot sands of the battlefield, dead.

  Dara watches too and realizes that Murad’s reckless march has blocked Aurangzeb’s artillery. Chatrasal Hada and his Rajput horsemen from Gaur, Sisodia and Rathod clans have charged forward, wielding their swords, literally flinging themselves on Murad’s contingent. He feels excited for the first time but his excitement is short-lived. When he looks to his left, Rustum Khan is nowhere to be seen, as if he and his elephant have disappeared in thin air. Dara notices Aurangzeb’s horsemen wearing green turbans breaking into his domain, their swords cutting his men down as if they are goats. Aurangzeb’s artillerymen are busy firing. Dara notices for the first time that his brother’s artillery has a line of archers trained to use their composite bows to fire grenade-like rockets. Flames rise from the midst of the dense body of his cavalry. Around him, his men are shot down quickly by arrows and javelins.

  ‘To the left!’ he shouts at his mahout. He has to investigate Rustum’s disappearance. The mahout hesitates. His general is not supposed to leave his position.

  ‘To the left!’ Dara screams again.

  As they move towards the left, his elephant lumbers forward through the sea of his army and he can no longer see his right wing, or what his Muslim commander is up to. He searches for Mir Jumla who has vanished. To his right, he sees a long line of cannons on wheels. His artillerymen have abandoned their guns. His elephant keeps moving towards his left and Aurangzeb’s right wing. Dara watches with dread. The battleground is already littered with bodies, broken blades, shields and hilts. Enemy horsemen have broken his artillery barrier. To his right, the earth is strewn with corpses, rolling heads and scattered limbs. Horses stand lost and confused near their dead masters. Injured men cry for help. Aurangzeb’s frenzied riders move ruthlessly over those on the brink of death. The deafening noise of clashing swords, leaping hooves and the beastly cries of hysteric warriors pound his eardrums.

  He was not born to do this. He was born to study theology, discover the real meaning of religions and write books!

  ‘Our advance guard has vanished,’ someone shouts. Dara gazes at his right and a cold shiver runs down his spine: he is in the firing range of the enemy’s cannon—one that he had never seen before.

  ‘Turn back!’ he yells at his mahout, who too has noted the large and small cannon mounted on pivot over the wheels, surrounded by frantic white men. They swirl the guns in his direction. It takes his mahout a while to turn back the cumbersome beast and start moving across the front line towards their core. The cannons start firing violently. Aurangzeb’s archers too have gone insane. He looks up and notices long, burning shafts flying above him. He looks down to see some of his guards turning into bright torches, their high-pitched cries rising above the din of the battle. Iron projectiles hit the targets, carrying off heads and limbs of his remaining guards. He is still safe in his howdah, its thick steel plates resisting the crossfire, but he fails to notice a mysterious horseman appearing to his left. He holds a stretched composite bow to its fullest. The arrows are shot in succession, aiming for the eyeholes of his fully armoured beast. He feels his elephant rock violently under him. Perplexed, he watches as his mahout tumbles down. The elephant raises its trunk to screech in agony, and then stands on its hind legs. He holds on to the steel bars of his howdah. Then the animal suddenly slumps as life is snuffed out of its enormous body. The howdah tumbles down and crashes. Dara finds himself flung on the floor as dust starts rising around him. His fall is awkward, he falls face down. His metal body armour hits his jaw, breaking some of his teeth. His mouth fills up with blood. Someone drags him from behind, lifts him by the armpits and hurls him on a horse.

  ‘The first prince is dead, our beloved Dara Shikoh is dead!’ a horseman gallops past the fighting men, shouting.

  Dara Shikoh’s army starts to scramble; there is a stampede crushing men, animals, artillery carts. Panic leads to mayhem and the pandemonium leads to the crumbling of Dara Shikoh’s battle formation. Kalil Ullah Khan from Samarkand, one of Dara’s mansabdars, watches the fall of Dara Shikoh from a distance. He is least bothered as he was forced to defend Dara whom he hates. The same prince has had him beaten with a shoe for a trivial ma
tter. The Samarkand warrior nurses ambition to work for Aurangzeb as he gazes at Dara ride towards Agra, running away from the battlefield. Dara has noticed Kalil Ullah Khan staring at him with glee, but he is helpless. He spits to show anger and spews out a few of his broken teeth. He kicks his horse to a full gallop in the direction of Agra. His world of books, music, poetry and theological studies seems to evaporate in the heat and dust of his battlefield he has left behind where another drama of brotherly love unfolds. Aurangzeb has rushed to check on the injured Murad. ‘Brother, my brother,’ he cries while watching the best medic tend to Murad’s superficial wounds. ‘What will I do if anything happens to you!’ he laments and keeps Murad’s injured hand on his knee. He touches it tenderly and says, ‘The war was fought for you, my brother and the future emperor. You must take care as you are precious to me, much more than anything in the world.’

  4

  It is rather early for the monsoon but rain clouds float over Agra. It seems like the sky’s attempt to wash away the blood of the thousands lying on the battlefield. Eleven days and eleven nights have passed since Agra fell into Aurangzeb’s hands. Dara Shikoh, the holder of lofty titles such as Shah Bulund Iqbal, the king of lofty fortunes, Padshahzaada-i-Buzurg Artaba, the senior son of the emperor, and Jalal-ul-Kadir, the superior and the most capable, has run away like a frightened rabbit, first to Agra Fort and then to Dilli. A smile appears on Aurangzeb’s face. The emperor has shut the gates of Agra Fort and Aurangzeb has cut off the water supply that the fort enjoys from the Yamuna. The news that many of the fort inhabitants have died of thirst has been making the rounds. He diverts his gaze from the sky to the path before him and walks briskly through his camp at Nur Manzil, a far-off suburb south of Agra, while Shaista Khan runs behind him muttering a request.