There is that heart-reading and mysterious episode at the end of Babur’s life. Humayun is fatally ill and is on what appeared to be his death bed, and all medicines and doctors have failed. Babur is aware that he has just won India, but he will not have an heir to pass it on to create a dynasty. The Mughal Empire is over before it has even begun. He consults everyone and tries everything. He is advised—a life for a life: if he gives up his most precious possession, his son’s life may be spared. The fabulous Koh-i-Noor is offered, but Babur knows it has to be his own life, and he offers it without hesitation. The family women are torn and traumatised—which one will they pray for: Father or son? Here is how the episode is depicted in the epic:
Refusing offering Koh-i-Noor
Babur resolved upon
Supplicating his own life
In return for his son’s
Invoking help of a saint
Firdous Makani Babur
Thrice he circumambulated
Humayun’s bed
If a life be exchanged
O God for another
Implored Babur
Mine for my son do offer
A soaring fever
During prayer grew
Upon Babur
Wave upon wave
He cried out aloud
Bardashtan! Bardashtan!
Unladen have I the burden!
Mine is now the misfortune!
The poem concludes with Bibi Mubarika quoting these powerful lines:
I brought him back
From Hind to Kabul
To lay him down
In his resting place final
Thus did I ultimately
Requite the love he gave me
In ever lasting
Timeless memory.
Shortly before he died, Emperor Babur wrote a personal letter to his son and successor, Humayun. It is a guide to governance and has the stamp of the integrity of the dying testament:
“Dear son,” he wrote with the tenderness of a father sensing he may not have long to live.
Babur mesmerises a range of people, from E.M. Forster to the great historian, Stanley Lane-Poole
“Oh, my son. The realm of Hindustan is full of diverse creeds. Praise be to God, the Righteous, the Glorious, the Highest, that He hath granted unto thee the empire of it. It is but proper that you, with a heart cleansed of all religious bigotry, should dispense justice according to the tenets of each community. And in particular refrain from the sacrifice of a cow, for that way lies the conquest of the hearts of the people of Hindustan; and the subjects of the realm will, through royal favour, be devoted to thee. And the temples and abodes of worship of every community under imperial sway should not be damaged. Dispense justice so that the sovereign may be happy with the subjects and likewise the subjects with their sovereign. The progress of Islam is better by the sword of kindness, not by the sword of oppression.
Ignore the disputations of Shias and Sunnis, for therein is the weakness of Islam. And bring together the subjects with different beliefs in the manner of the four elements, so that the body politic may be immune from the various ailments. And on us is but the duty to advise.” (from Written in History: Letters That Changed the World by Simon Sebag Montefiore, 2019).
The letter radiates the warmth of Babur’s personality and his hugely enlightened worldview. It is well to recall that during the same period, Catholics and Protestants were slaughtering each other in the thousands across Europe. Yet here was Babur the conqueror, who, after defeating his main Muslim and then Hindu rivals, set about winning them through diplomacy: Houses of worship were to be protected and care must be taken of the cow because it was sacred to the majority populations. It is precisely this aspect of his character that has endeared him to those who have contemplated his life. Getting to know him through his detailed autobiography writers have hailed him as the “Prince of Biographers.”
Babur is an almost irresistible figure in world history and has many admirers. He is the classic poet-warrior in the wuxia tradition. Babur mesmerises a range of people, from E.M. Forster to the great historian Stanley Lane-Poole. It is well to recall that both Forster and Poole were British at the time the British ruled India, their admiration is thus authentic. The latter described the emperor’s autobiography Babur Nama in these words:
“His autobiography is one of those priceless records which are for all times, and is to fit to rank with the Confessions of St. Augustine and Rousseau and the memoirs of Gibbons and Newton. In Asia it stands almost alone.” (page 12).
Stanley Lane-Poole emphasises the “utter frankness” and “honesty” of Babur’s autobiography:
“The utter frankness of self-revelation, the unconscious portraiture of all his virtues and follies, his obvious truthfulness and a fine sense of honour, give the Memoirs an authority which is equal to their charm. If ever there were a case when the testimony of a single historical document, unsupported by other evidence, should be accepted as sufficient proof, it is the case with Babur’s memoirs. No reader of this prince of autobiographers can doubt his honesty or his competence as witness and chronicler.” (page 12).
Today, Babur is considered a national hero in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Many of his poems are celebrated as folk songs. His Babur Nama, which he wrote in Turkic, was translated into Persian during the reign of his grandson, Emperor Akbar. Aitchison College, the elite school of Pakistan, has a Babur House named in his honour. In October 2005, Pakistan developed the Babur Cruise Missile, also named in his honour.
I, too, was a great admirer of Babur. To express my abiding admiration, one of my earliest poems written in Peshawar was called “Spring Thoughts in Farghana.” It tried to capture the irrepressible spirit and ambition of a young, twelve-year-old Babur when he had just lost his tiny kingdom to grasping uncles.
Sahibzada Riaz Noor has done a great favour to not only Pakistani literature, but the very understanding of South Asian history and culture.
Today, Babur is too frequently projected as a monster in contemporary Indian popular culture and literature. Indeed, he is depicted as Ravana, thus, neatly linking his villainy with the classic Hindu sacred literature, the Ramayana. Every kind of calumny is heaped on Babur. There is a political reason for this. Babur and other Muslim rulers are cast as “rapists, murderers and looters.” Resultantly, Muslims of India are noisily and aggressively cast as the children of Babur (Babur ki aulaad). Their association with Pakistan is underlined. Thus, by attacking Babur, the Muslims of India and Pakistan are also targeted.
Babur is accused of breaking Ram’s temple at Ayodhya and building a mosque on the site. This is said to justify the demolition of the mosque, which stood there for half a millennium. Indian scholars, judges and historians have challenged the narrative of the Babari Masjid or Babur’s mosque. There is no hint of any incident of this kind in Babur’s very detailed and very frank autobiography. Besides, anyone who wishes to find the truth as to the Emperor’s views only has to read the letter I have quoted to understand his notably tolerant nature. A father who advises his son not to harm Hindu temples and to take special care of the Hindu community to the point of protecting cows would be unlikely to demolish a prominent temple. Besides, Riaz’s epic poem confirms that Bibi Mubarika, a lady of discernment and courage, would not have so loved Babur if he was the monster depicted in the wild literature clogging the internet. To suggest that Babur was a bigot is to project current prejudices onto the past. The fact is that Babur first faced a Pathan Muslim king who ruled in Delhi at the battle of Panipat. Later his son Humayun was toppled by another Pathan Muslim leader, Sher Shah Suri.
Indian historians have a splendid record of scholarship. The current commentators are in danger of overwhelming and, thus, polluting that reputation with their caricature of history. History needs to be presented in a more balanced and fairer manner than what we are seeing today. In the end, we only distort our capacity to learn and benefit from the lessons of history. Perhaps, the contemporary commentators could start by reading Bibi Mubarika and Babur.
(Concluded)
The writer is Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at School of International Service, American University, Washington, DC, and author of The Flying Man: The Philosophers of the Golden Age of Islam