He is credited with constructing many beautiful monuments throughout the landscape of North India. Shah Jahan is also the founder of Shahjahanabad in Delhi. During his final days, he was held captive by his son Aurangzeb, who went on to succeed him to the throne. As per the prediction of the fortune teller, Shah Jahan was born on 5thJanuary , to Emperor Jahangir and his second wife, Jagat Gosaini a Rajput princess. After naming him Khurram the joyous one , his grandfather, Emperor Akbar took him away from his mother and handed him over to his Empress Ruqaiya Sultan Begum.

Khurram, who was just six days old, started growing up under the care of Akbar and Ruqaiya Sultan Begum. Quite naturally, young Khurram was fond of Akbar and his foster mother more than his biological parents. Ruqaiya Sultan Begum raised him with love and care and made that her top priority. In fact, Jahangir once famously said that he Khurram was showered with more love by Ruqaiya Sultan Begum than he or his wife ever could have. He received a traditional princely education that involved training in martial arts and cultural arts which included music and poetry.

While Akbar would instill in him the different techniques of warfare and leadership, his foster mother would narrate him the importance of moral values.


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In , post the demise of Akbar, a year-old Khurram returned to his biological parents. After he was told to wait until for his wedding with Mumtaz, Khurram went ahead with his first wedding with Kandahari Begum, a princess from Persia. He had his first child, a daughter, with her. He then married another princess before marrying Mumtaz Mahal in After having fathered two children from his first two marriages, he fathered fourteen children with his favorite wife Mumtaz. The accession to the throne in the Mughal Empire was determined through military successes and display of power by potential successors.

The Mughal had stayed away from the traditional primogeniture method of choosing the rightful heir and that made Khurram a potential successor to Jahangir, even though he was the third child of the emperor. In , Khurram got an opportunity to display his military prowess, something he was so desperately waiting for. The moment he was waiting to seize came in the form of Maharana Amar Singh II, who was asked to surrender his Rajput state to the Mughal.

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Khurram led an army of more than , men and defeated the forces of the Rajput king. This brave act of his, paved the way for moresuch opportunities. Three years later in , he was asked to conquer the Deccan Plateau in order to expand the empire. After his success in doing so, his father Jahangir bestowed upon him the title Shah Jahan, which literally meant King of the World in Persian. This made him the blue-eyed boy of the empire and his dream of succeeding his father strode a step closer to reality.

Though Shah Jahan had proved his abilities and prowess more than once, the fight for the throne was harder than he thought it would be. Jahangir married Nur Jahan and she along with her brother Asaf Khan, became important members in the court. She then continued to convince the emperor that Shahzada Shahryar was better than Shah Jahan and that he should be the one to succeed him.

This led a rebellious Shah Jahan to build his own army with the help of a Mughal general named Mahabat Khan.

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He then led his army against his own father and Nur Jahan but was defeated comprehensively in the year Three years later, he was forgiven by the emperor but Shah Jahan continued to find ways which would lead him to the throne. In , upon the demise of Jahangir, Shah Jahan crowned himself emperor as the entire military was under his control.

As soon as he became the emperor, Shah Jahan eliminated all his foes just to make sure the throne had no further contenders. He killed many in the year including his brother Shahzada Shahryar; his cousins, Tahmuras and Hoshang; his nephews, Garshasp and Dawar, and sons of prince Daniyal and prince Khusrau.

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Anyone he thought would be a threat to his throne was put to rest permanently. His step-mother Nur Jahan was spared but was imprisoned under tight security. Throughout his reign, Shah Jahan constantly strived towards expanding his empire. The name Taj Mahal is a derivation of her name. He grew up as a serious-minded and devout youth, wedded to the Muslim orthodoxy of the day and free from the royal Mughal traits of sensuality and drunkenness.


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Shah Jahan

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