The Tucy family of Hyderabad, India, direct descendants of the Mughal dynasty, are claiming Taj Mahal as their own.
Her granddaughter, Afreena, combs them for her every evening.
In return, she gets to hear stories about how her forefathers came from Samarkand in Uzbekistan and went on to became emperors who ruled India for 332 years.
They lived in royal grandeur; sat on the legendary Peacock Throne studded with the priceless and legendary Kohinoor diamond; were draped from head to toe in silk and brocade and wore only seven-stringed pearl necklaces; roamed about on bejewelled elephants and had more than 1,000 attendants to serve them ... of whom about 100 were employed only to oil and comb the hair of the royal family members!
Begum Laila Umahani ... "Is it a matter of pride, or is it [my] plight to be a [descendant] of the Mughals? ... I don't know." |
She, along with 14 members of her family, which include her sons, their wives and her grandchildren, lives in a modest greying two-bedroom rented house, numbered 1-63, in Rajendra Nagar village, an obscure locality far away from the city.
The state of the house is a far cry from the lifestyle of the descendants of a family that once boasted a landmark home address: the Lal Quila (Red Fort) in the Indian capital of Delhi.
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Fourteen-year-old Afreena finds it difficult to believe all this, but she loves listening to such fascinating tales about her ancestry.
Once in a while, she, in all her innocence, would enquire: "If our forefathers were so rich and famous, why are we living in anonymity and neediness?"
Begum Umahani would offer a sigh as a reply. Her own sons and their children have posed the same question to her a million times.
And a million times, she has replied the same way: "We are trying to keep pace with the changing times."
Times have changed and Begum Umahani has witnessed its tumultuous upheavals as well as the irreversible fading away of regal glory.
The great granddaughter of the last Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar, from his first wife, Ashraf Mahal, Begum Umahani is the oldest living Mughal today.
| Waiting for the court's verdict ... From left: The Begum's third son, Y. Shajeeuddin Tucy, fourth son Masihuddin Tucy, eldest son Y. Ziauddin Tucy, the Begum, and grandchildren Y Moinuddin Tucy, (in the foreground): Y. Akbaruddin Tucy, Limra Taha Tucy and Y. Zoha Taha Tucy. |
"Bas jee rahein hain. Tab chadhe hue the, abhi ekdam niche aa gaye; Utaar chadaav hi
to zindagi hai," says Begum Umahani in chaste Urdu. (We are existing. Those days we were at the crest; today we have hit rock bottom. Life is all about ups and downs.)
"Is it a matter of pride, or is it [my] plight to be a Mughal? ... I don't know," she says.
"What I know is that life must go on and it is a bitter struggle for existence," she adds, tears welling up in her eyes.
Her pale, fair face carries as many wrinkles as the summers she has spent acquiring them but each wrinkle is like a royal scribble.
As Afreena cajoles her into relating yet another tale of her great royal ancestry, it is evident Begum Umahani has to struggle to dredge up nuggets from her fading memory.
Many tales of the mighty Mughals are wedged in the crevices of her memory – but she finds it hard to retrieve them, quite like how the last few living Mughals of Hyderabad are finding it hard to retrieve their past glory that's all but been pushed into collective public oblivion.
(In fact, not many were aware about their existence before noted Indian documentary filmmaker Arijeet Gupta chronicled their life in a film, The Living Mughals, that was telecast on the national TV channel.)
Following Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar's arrest by the British and his subsequent exile to Rangoon during the Indian sepoy revolt of 1857, his 22 sons and 27 daughters from four wives (Ashraf Mahal, Akhtar Mahal, Zeenat Mahal and Taj Mahal) managed to flee fearing further British tyranny. While some hid themselves in Humayun's Tomb, in Delhi, others fled to different parts of the country.
According to Begum Umahani's eldest son, Ziauddin Tucy, "Only one son of the emperor, Prince Mirza Quaish, the crown prince, survived.
The British killed the rest 48 children of the exiled emperor. Mirza Quaish, Bahadur Shah Zafar's fourth son from Ashraf Mahal, fled to Kathmandu in Nepal evading British security.
As the lone survivor, he lived a fugitive's life. Fearing his identity would be revealed if he overstayed, Mirza Quaish then relocated to Udaipur in Rajasthan, Western India, and later Aurangabad, where he sought refuge with his son, Mirza Abdullah, till he made peace with God."
Begum Umahani picks up the thread from there. "Mirza Abdullah, my grandfather, settled in Hyderabad, where he was given shelter by Lashkar Yar Jung, a noble in the service of the sixth Nizam, Mahboob Ali Pasha, who was then ruler of Hyderabad. Soon after, my father was born, Mirza Gafoor Ali Baig. He was popularly known as Mirza Pyare. He married Habeeba Begum, granddaughter of Tipu Khan Bahadur, a family member of the Nizam. In 1914, I was born," recounts the Begum nostalgically.
"I remember vividly the tales my father would relate about our forefathers ... how they lived a glowing life in royal splendour."
In 1935, Begum Umahani married Prince Yakub Moinuddin Tucy – grandson of Nizam-ul-mulk Tucy of Turkey, who was at the time prime minister of Baghdad. She bore him seven children – four sons and three daughters.
Even as the royal lifestyle, which the Begum grew up hearing about, began to be relegated to history books, the Begum was keen that her children and grandchildren know about their heritage.
Since all she had were memories, she decided to pass them on to her children so that posterity would rest in their royal roots.
Music to the ears
Ziauddin Tucy, a fifth-generation Mughal, now a retired state government employee, fondly recalls
