Why 17th-century emperor Aurangzeb’s grave is India’s latest flashpoint

Datta Shirke, a resident of New Delhi, India, has been avoiding leaving his house for the past two days because he worries about his family’s safety. In Hindu-Muslim sectarian clashes, vehicles parked in the street where he lives have been torched.

Aslam, who requested to be identified only by his first name, is just a mile (1. 5 km) away and is terrified as well. He says he is afraid of being detained by the police, who claim to be holding innocent Muslims in custody, so he avoids returning home where he lives with his wife and mother. I haven’t done anything, I promise. But when police arrive, he claimed, “our eyes are looking for our blood.”

In western Maharashtra, where violence broke out on Monday over the future of the tomb of the long-dead Mughal ruler Aurangzeb, they both reside.

More than 50 people have been detained in police raids ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s planned March 30 visit to Nagpur, mainly Muslims. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the political arm of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party and its Hindu majoritarian allies, has its headquarters in the city.

Why did a city that was otherwise known for its oranges in India erupt in religious hostility? Aurangzeb, who was he? And why does India still be divided by his legacy?

What caused Nagpur to erupt in a battle?

A BJP parliamentarian from Maharashtra called for the Mughal emperor’s grave to be excavated last week.

Nearly 100 Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) volunteers protested in Nagpur on Monday, demanding the destruction of Aurangzeb’s grave. They claimed he had attacked Hindu temples and abused Hindus during his time in power.

Amit Bajpai, a spokesperson for the VHP and one of the protest’s organisers, said, “That grave is a black spot in our homeland.” In front of the police, “We gathered near a square and burned the Aurangzeb effigy covered in green.”

He continued, “It is our democratic right to demand what we feel right.”

Asif Qureshi, a lawyer and former head of the neighborhood’s Maharashtra Bar Council, said that other onlookers, including Muslim shopkeepers, pleaded with the police to stop the demonstration, especially during Ramadan.

Muslims were reportedly upset that the green cloth used to cover the effigy had Quranic verses written on it. Following a counterprotest that evening, groups of Muslims demanded that the police file a case against the VHP members after breaking their fast and offering Maghrib prayers.

“Unfortunately, things started to get out of hand and angry people started fighting,” Qureshi said for Al Jazeera.

A curfew has been in place since then, with police barricades covering the area of the city where the violence had occurred. Additionally, there was a police crackdown. Qureshi claimed that the police should detain Muslims who participated in the clashes but instead “have arrested innocent people who were just out to pray.”

After the clashes, VHP member Bajpai expressed his anger. We will now retaliate even more harshly. Why do they believe that rioting can scare us, according to Muslims? We demand Aurangzeb’s removal.

Meanwhile, Devendra Fadnavis, the chief minister of Maharashtra, suggested that Aurangzeb’s most recent Bollywood film, which depicts him as a villain, might have contributed to stoking Hindu sentiments. The fictionalized conflicts between the Marathas, who ruled large portions of modern-day Maharashtra, and the Mughal ruler in Chaava, the movie. According to Fadnavis, the movie highlighted “the public outcry against Aurangzeb.” Fadnavis also belongs to the BJP under Prime Minister Modi.

Aurangzeb, who was he?

Aurangzeb, one of the most powerful rulers to have ruled the Indian subcontinent, is not buried there. It is located 280 kilometers (450 kilometers) from Nagpur, in a city that, until 2023, had been given the name Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar.

Hindu majoritarian organizations, who have long regarded Aurangzeb as the most bloody villain in modern India, resisted changing the name. However, according to historians, his legacy was more complicated than Aurangzeb’s depictions, which currently predominate India.

After imprisoning his father and having his older brother killed, Aurangzeb inherited a powerful empire. However, the power-hungry emperor was exceptional at forming alliances and unmatched on the battlefield during his time, according to Audrey Truschke, historian and author of Aurangzeb: The Man and the Myth.

According to Truschke, his policies were heavily influenced by Akbar, his great-grandpae a Mughal emperor.

As a prince, Aurangzeb traveled all over the empire, read, and established connections with all groups, including Marathas and Rajputs, before later appointing them to important positions in his cabinet, according to her.

However, Aurangzeb also imposed stringent Islamic laws and a tax that Hindu citizens were required to pay in exchange for protection. Truschke remarked that Aurangzeb was a complex king with many facets.

Truschke claimed that the Mughal emperor repeatedly demonstrated during his rule that he was driven by power rather than by religion while the Hindu far right frequently portrays Aurangzeb as a religious zealot. He chose power whenever piety and power clashed, she said. “Every single time,”

Why is Aurangzeb in India such a divisive issue?

Many historians have argued that prior to that time, kings were primarily not democratic. Truschke remarked in many ways that Aurangzeb was not particularly different from Indian kings in the pre-modern era.

She claimed that British colonialists had attacked him. She continued, “the BJP and the RSS are essentially repeating colonial-era propaganda.”

That anti-Aurangzeb sentiment is becoming more and more violent.

Four people were detained in 2024 for carrying Aurangzeb poster-raise in a procession. A 14-year-old Muslim boy was jailed in June 2023 as a result of an Instagram post about the ruler. The Modi government removed a table describing the accomplishments of emperors like Aurangzeb and his ancestors in order to change middle- and high-school history textbooks for students in 2022.

Aurangzeb is more than just history to many Modi supporters. He is credited with promoting the destruction of numerous temples, but he is also credited with giving other Hindu shrines grants and land.

Hindu nationalists have filed a lawsuit against the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh’s northern state, in the name of Modi. According to them, the mosque was constructed on the site of Aurangzeb’s order-destroyed grand 16th-century Hindu shrine, the Vishwanath temple.

Prime Minister Modi spoke at a meeting in Varanasi in 2022 about “Aurangzeb’s atrocities, his terror,” adding that “he attempted to change civilisation by the sword.” He made an effort to fanatically destroy culture. Modi has since repeated his name several times.

The chief minister of Maharashtra, Fadnavis, said the day after the clashes in Nagpur that it was unfortunate that the government had to take responsibility for Aurangzeb’s grave despite his history of persecution.

The Archaeological Survey of India has a 1958 law that protects Aurangzeb’s tomb from unapproved alteration or demolition.

Residents and neighborhood activists are concerned that Nagpur’s tensions will increase.

Shirke said, “We have no faith in one another. I have no faith in my neighbor’s ability to harm my family if they don’t take advantage of it. Muslims fear raids because they fear that the state’s authorities will handle the situation impartially, according to Qureshi.

Source: Aljazeera