Himalayan Bootcamp Diaries

Part 1:

The year was 1631 and the queen was dead.

Emperor Shah Jahan was devastated and promptly retired to his private rooms in distress.  Now and again one would hear a heart-wrenching, anguished cry coming from his chambers.

Shah Jahan had lost his constant companion, confidante, and advisor, a loving partner who was so close to him that she had even acc ompanied him during his military operations. She had rejoiced with him in his achievements, and she alone had known how to console him after a great loss on the battlefield. But now, his beloved Mumtaz Mahal, his queen and inseparable soul mate, had flown to the next life.

With the exception of the emperor’s intermittent cries of sorrow, a quiet stillness permeated throughout the palace halls and grounds. Cou rt attendants, guards, princesses and politicians talked in whispers for fear of disturbing him.

After a number of days, the emperor finally came out of his rooms where, it was said, his appearance stunned all the members of his court and his people. Was this, could this be the same man who just a few days ago had fought and won a raging battle against a neighboring enemy? His beautiful thick locks of black hair had turned a silvery white, sorrow had diminished his proud stature, and where once a light shone in his eyes, they now held only a look of mournful emptiness.

With an air of gravity, Shah Jahan declared that the entire kingdom would go into mourning, which would last for a year’s time.  For that year, the sounds of laughter and music ceased, the people abstained from wearing brightly colored clothes, and overall solemnity descended on the Mughal Empire.

The emperor himself immediately discarded his beautifully embroidered and colorful royal garments and clothed himself in white robes as a symbol of his grief and his public display of mourning whi ch was to last for many years.

Not a day would go by where Shah Jahan would not feel the loneliness and loss of Mumtaz Mahal’s presence in his life. His world had turned dark with unhappiness and grief. This was not just loneliness for a wife who had gone away for a few days; she would never return from this last journey! She was gone forever from his presence and never again would he be able to visit her apartments and hear her laughter, touch her beautiful skin, or enjoy that special love that existed with her alone.

For six months after her death, the queen’s body lay in a tomb in Burhanpur. Thereafter, her body was brought to the city of Agra, then the capital of Shah Jahan’s empire and his permanent home from where he ruled his kingdom.  At the emperor’s orders, his builders constructed a crypt in the gardens near the palace, to hold Mumtaz Mahal’s body temporarily.

Finally, in the year 1632, the emperor was ready to start on the project that would be his obsession for the next twenty-two years of his life. He brought in architects, builders and planners from all over his empire and beyond.  The finest of jewels, the most luxurious marble… he would spare no expense.  Shah Jahan was ready to build a tomb that befitted his love for his adored Mumtaz, a burial place that would preserve her memory and their love story forever.

But let us step back and look at how this amazing love story came about. According to historians it started twenty-four years ago in 1607 at a royal bazaar in Agra…    (to be continued)

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