Escape from Harem Read online

  A self confessed word-a-holic and a traveller, Tanushree is sure to be packing her bags and boots to zip around the world when not brandishing her pen. With two successful novels, few best-selling non-fiction titles and a few hundred travel tales under her belt, she is all set to launch into yet another voyage with words. A bundle of optimism with wandering feet and a kaleidoscope of dreams, she loves nothing better than flirting with clauses and phrases.

  After leading a nomadic life for several decades, thanks to the Indian Army, she has finally grown roots at Pune.

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  © Tanushree Podder, 2013

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication

  may be reproduced or transmitted in any form

  or by any means, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Characters and significant events in this book are not fictitious; but personalities, interactions and thoughts, and words are figments of the author’s imagination.

  First published in 2013

  IndiaInk

  An imprint of

  Roli Books Pvt Ltd

  M-75, Greater Kailash II Market

  New Delhi 110 048

  Phone: ++91 (011) 4068 2000

  Fax: ++91 (011) 2921 7185

  E-mail: [email protected]; Website: rolibooks.com

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  Bengaluru, Chennai, & Mumbai

  Cover design: Saurav Das

  Layout design: Sanjeev Mathpal

  Production: Shaji Sahadevan

  ISBN: 978-81-86939-76-5

  For Ajoy

  My guiding star – my Polaris

  Preface

  The foundation of the great Mughal Empire in India was laid by Babar, a minor prince of Farghana in Afghanistan. Hounded by his rivals in Farghana, he crossed the rugged mountains to reach the rich territory of Hindustan, which was known as the ‘Golden Bird’ in those days. Although Babar was a Turk, he claimed to have descended from Changez Khan on his mother’s and Timur on his father’s side. To him goes the credit of establishing the Mughal dynasty in 1526, the word Mughal being an altered form of the word Mongol. Babar’s son, Humayun, a benevolent but weak ruler spent much of his time fleeing from or chasing his adversaries. His unceremonious death caused by falling from the staircase of his library brought an end to his turbulent rule.

  It was his son Akbar, who proved to be the greatest Mughal ruler. An able administrator and shrewd statesman, he expanded the empire to encompass almost two-third of Hindustan. One of the most successful strategies devised by Akbar for the expansion of his empire was the matrimonial alliances with the proud Rajput kings.

  Akbar ruled for five glorious decades, from 1556 to 1605, during which the Mughal Empire grew to be one of the wealthiest and ably-administered empires in the world. It became synonymous with splendour, power, wealth, and culture. It is said that the revenue earned by the Mughal Empire during Akbar’s reign amounted to more than seven times the revenue earned by the British through their colonies around the world. It was the era of architectural splendour when opulent structures like the Agra Fort and Lahore Fort were built. It was also the age of sublime music, miniature art forms, and spiritual liberalism.

  Jahangir, the next Mughal ruler, inherited a rich empire that needed no great efforts to sustain. He went down in history as one who allowed his wife Nurjahan to hold the reins of the empire while he drowned himself in wine and opium. However, like other Mughal rulers before him, Jahangir too was a connoisseur of art and left a perfect account of his reign in the form of a diary, the Jahangirnama. His curious mind recorded every new thing – a bird, a flower or a fruit – that he came across. Whether it was his impressions about art, science, anatomy or nature, he left detailed accounts of his observations in his diary. The artefacts of this period are testimony to the splendour of the royal court of Jahangir.

  However, Jahangir puzzled his contemporaries. He could be sadistic and vengeful one moment, gentle and generous the next. Instances of cruel torture and brutal punishments abound during his rule. Some of the European travellers who visited his court recorded his decadent and bloodthirsty pursuits quite vividly. His personality was a complex package of contradictions. Wine, women, and opium formed an important part of his life.

  His successor Shahjahan’s name is synonymous with beautiful structures. Deeply interested in architecture, Shahjahan will forever be remembered for the grandeur and beauty of the buildings commissioned during his reign, especially the Taj Mahal in Agra and Red Fort at Delhi. His love for his wife Mumtaz Mahal is etched eternally within the fabulously crafted walls of her mausoleum, the Taj Mahal.

  The Mughals brought with them a whole new culture and way of life. The beautiful g
ardens landscaped with great care were a gift of the first Mughal ruler, Babar. Persian architecture synthesized with the Hindu style to form a perfect balance of beauty. Poetry, literature and paintings; the Mughals left an indelible mark of their rule in Hindustan.

  The Mughal rulers were not just lovers of art and architecture; they loved beautiful women, too. Most of them maintained large harems, within which resided hundreds of women brought from different places. With each conquest, came more women. There were wives, concubines, their attendants, nautch girls, and eunuchs who loved, lived, quarrelled and shared the joys and sorrows of their lives within the cloistered environment of the harem.

  Most Mughal emperors had many wives and many more concubines. For instance Jahangir had no less than twenty wedded wives and hundreds of concubines. During Akbar’s rule the harem contained no less than five thousand women and by the time Aurangzeb ascended the throne, the number increased manifold, as the numerical strength of the servants alone amounted to about two thousand.

  The Mughal princesses were not allowed to marry and had to spend their entire lives within the confines of the harem. Unlike the popular notion that the Mughal women spent a life of ennui and worthless existence behind veils, many of them had a powerful influence in many spheres of the empire. Nurjahan, Mumtaz Mahal and Jahanara were strong women who brought about significant changes in the social and political scenario. During their times, the harems buzzed with new ideas and creative activity.

  Harem is an Arabic word meaning prohibited or a sacred enclosure. It was the secluded part of the royal household where all the female relatives of the emperor lived along with entertainers, maidservants, attendants, and concubines. During the Mughal rule, the harem had developed into a highly complex but organized domestic institution. Francois Bernier, a European traveller who stayed at the Mughal capital during the reign of Shahjahan, provides a vivid description of harem administration in his travel account, Travels in the Mogal Empire (1656–68).

  The harem observed a strict hierarchy in which seniority was accorded the highest importance. Although the Padshah Begum, or the Chief Queen, was the most significant figure in the harem, the status of the dowager queens was accepted as more important. The residences, amenities, monies were allotted according to the pecking order. The grandeur of their palaces and lifestyle varied according to their influence upon the emperor.

  The mahals or palaces of the Mughal queens were grand and luxurious with splendid apartments in keeping with their rank and income. Every chamber had its reservoir of running water and the apartments were surrounded by beautiful gardens, delightful alleys, shady retreats, streams, fountains and pavilions. There were lofty divans and terraces on which the women could sleep comfortably on sultry nights.

  According to Abul Fazl, the noted historian in Akbar’s court, the harems were run in an efficient and highly structured manner. With hundreds of women living in them, these harems or zenanas needed deft management. The female employees of the harem were divided into three categories – the highest ranking women called Mahaldars, then the middle ranking ones known as Paristaran-é-hudur, and lastly the lower rung employees that consisted of female slaves who had entered the harem as gifts or had been bought by the emperor.

  Mahaldars controlled the harem. This lofty rank was granted only to highly educated and responsible women who also spied for the emperor. There are umpteen stories about the ego clashes between mahaldars and princesses since these women wielded extraordinary power in the harem. The princesses also resented the watchful eyes of the mahaldars. Efficient and reliable women were appointed as daroghas and belonged to the middle-ranking strata. They maintained discipline and order and were assigned different sections to look after. These ladies were given liberal salaries and benefits.

  The harem was very closely guarded with a three-tier arrangement of guards. The innermost circle of guards consisted of the most trustworthy women guards, generally Uzbek women, who were skilled in wielding of scimitars and swords. Eunuchs formed the next tier of security and finally came the Rajput guards.

  Entry to the harem was strictly regulated. The doors of the harem were closed at sunset and torches were left burning through the night. Each guard was obliged to send their report to the nazir of all that happened in the harem. The written reports of all the events that occurred in the harem were sent to the emperor. Nothing that happened in the harem remained secret from the chief queen and the emperor, at least not for long.

  Whenever the wives of the nobles desired to visit the harem, they had to send message to the servants of the harem, who forwarded the request to the officers of the palace. After serious evaluation, only those who were eligible were permitted to enter the harem. Nazir was a term used for the eunuchs who guarded the harem. Each princess had a nazir in whom she reposed great confidence and faith. Whenever the emperor moved within the palace, he was followed by a retinue of kaneezes (women servants). Sometimes, a beautiful kaneez caught the emperor’s eye and attained the exalted status of a concubine.

  Escape from Harem is the story of Zeenat, a poor, teenaged girl brought to Jahangir for a night’s pleasure. The single night turns into a nightmare as she finds herself trapped in the quagmire of imperial zenana.

  One

  January 1610, Agra

  The gnarled hands of winter gripped the capital in their freezing talons. It was one of the coldest years, people said. The water in the Yamuna seemed to have frozen and icy winds swept through the deserted streets of the city lashing the walls along it. No one stirred out of their homes. A deathly silence covered the city’s innards. In their hovels people huddled before crackling flames, coaxed out of reluctant logs, warming their numb fingers to keep themselves from freezing to death. Wind whistled mercilessly through the forests tearing through the trees denuded of their leaves.

  The sun had set over the banks of the glorious Yamuna, speeding people on their way home. Doors were shut, the streets deserted. The thick silence was punctured occasionally by the piteous howl of a mongrel.

  All traces of life were wiped off the narrow streets of the bazaar just outside the Agra Fort. At one corner of the narrow lane at the end of the wholesale grain mandi, flanked by shops, stood a cluster of tiny, mud-baked houses. Servants working in the shops occupied most of these. Open drains ran on both sides of the street that flanked these houses, filling the air with a foul odour.

  In a small two-room brick house Humra Begum and her fifteen-year-old daughter, Zeenat, huddled next to their chulha, warming their hands over its dying embers. They had just finished their frugal meal of roti, and a heavily spiced, watery lamb meat-and-potato curry. ‘For poor people like us, the only spice in our lives is the spice that goes into the belly,’ Humra jested whenever her daughter protested the sharpness of the spices in her cooking.

  For days, Humra had been saving some money for the occasion. She had bought a small pot of ghee to flavour the roti and splurged on the raisins and dry fruits that went into the halwa they were relishing as dessert. The elaborate meal was a rare luxury. But then it was a special day. It was Zeenat’s birthday. Today her daughter had turned fifteen.

  Humra sighed as she looked at her daughter, who was licking her ghee-smeared fingers with contentment. The girl’s black curls hung loosely about her radiant face, her tiny shell-like ears embellished with a pair of cheap ear-studs. The rosebud mouth bore traces of the meal. Sensing her mother’s eyes on her, Zeenat’s dark eyes danced with joy, ‘Ammi, this is the best meal ever,’ she declared.

  Sweeping back the curls from her daughter’s face, Humra kissed her on the forehead.

  The girl deserves much more than I can give her, she thought and her eyes misted over with emotion. All she had been able to gift Zeenat on the special day was a pair of silver anklets that had been her wedding gift. She had taken it to the jeweller and got it polished and packed in a new velvet case. For the girl, it was priceless.

  She tied the anklets and ran around the house, plea
sed with the musical tinkle of the umpteen bells that adorned the slender chain of silver. The cheap printed muslin skirt ballooned as she twirled, revealing her slender legs.

  Humra Begum’s husband had been a foot soldier in the imperial army. The man had fought many wars for the emperor. A dedicated soldier, he barely found time to spend with the family; a couple of weeks each year when they were not engaged in battle. The happy memories were hoarded carefully, to see them through the long periods of separation. Ghulam Baksh died fighting at the Kabul frontier when Zeenat was just five years old.

  Like many widows who depended on the munificence of the monarch for their survival, Humra found herself at his mercy. ‘I don’t want charity, I want a job,’ she declared proudly when her husband’s commander offered to put up her case before the emperor. ‘The emperor can give you a pension,’ he had said.

  ‘I do not want a pension. I am young and able. I will work.’

  When this was brought to the emperor’s notice, he was surprised that the widow wanted to work; most of the widows settled for a pension.

  ‘Well, if she wants to work, give her work,’ he ordered.

  And so Humra found herself employed as a servant in the harem, under the charge of the dowager queen, Ruquaiah Begum.

  Her wages were meagre and the only house she could afford was located in one of the poorer localities of the city. Rows of shops surrounded the house, including a few that sold country liquor. Throughout the day, inebriated men loitered around in the streets, making it difficult for the women to move out.