Daughters of the Sun – Book Preview

Were an artist to choose me for his model, how could he draw the form of a sigh?

Zeb-un-Nisa, Daughters of the Sun by Ira Mukhoty

Revelations

Up until three days before I started reading this book, I was not even aware of its existence. Upon being exposed to its legitimacy, my initial resistence towards it was attributed to having already explored the Mughal history in detail previously. This includes seven page turners in the Empire of the Mughal series by Alex Rutherford. I had a pre conceived notion of what to expect from this one.

Introduction

The introductory note by the author describes how the word ‘Mughal’ has been unfairly attached to these flamboyant and glorious lineage of rulers as an extension of their distant enemies, the Mongols. This was more than enough to dispel my doubts and establish early on that I was going to have a very unique experience with this book.

The Experience

And boy what an experience that was! The themes in this book navigate around certain misconceptions surrounding the Mughals. Almost all of them have been propagated by the colonial narrative of the East India Trading company.

Ira Mukothy’s distinguished piece of work deals with one of the primary inaccuracies in the retelling of Mughal history. The zenana which housed the women of the royal household was relegated to the status of simply being a quote unquote, immoral harem where the emperor’s housed their favourite concubines and engaged in a series of nefarious activities to blow off steam.

Layer by layer, the author reveals the existence of an extensive world inside the zenana. It is a thriving industry which is spearheaded by some of the most literate, educated and intelligent women of their time. Their mental prowess and ingenuity is evenly matched with their strength of character. They were the critical backbone of the Mughal empire, protecting the interests of the emperor with a calculated decisiveness.

Take Noor Jahan as a prime example of this quality.

Others matriarachs like Khanzada Begum, Gulbadan Begam, Harkai Bai, Zeb-un-Nisa and Jahanara Begum wrote great works of art, built entire cities, traded with merchants, had their own shipping companies and brought the empire and all its subjects under one glorious umbrella.

These amazing women were the subject of great admiration as well as envy from foreign expats who were not used to having their women having such control over ‘The Affairs of Men’.

Englishmen and Portugese who were vying for a piece of the Indian market looked down on Mughal women, the prosperity they brought to India and the ever flowing coffers of gold and precious jewels that the thriving Indian economy generated.

Ira Mukhoty brings these misconceptions and jealous distortions by the future colonisers to the forefront. Every page is brimming with the briliance, industry and artistry which was to be systematically crushed and looted in the near future. The language is crisp and wavy in equal measure. A hint of the author’s affinity for showing off the extent of her vocabulary is visible in spurts. Her brief description of the eventual decimation of this glorious heritage by the East India Company brings a heavy pang to the reader’s soul.

The book certainly diminishes the allure of the Western culture and the colonial powers that be. It makes us look inward to our own rich heritage, garnering a new and revelatory appreciation for the same. This revelation is understandably curious, given our present day reputation as a backward snake charming third world country.

Verdict

As far as eye opening odessies are concerned, this one can claim a sizable share of its cake. Don’t miss it.

This Girl of Mine Part 2

A flurry of exchanges set aside any other experiences and emotional investments with a resounding finality.

This girl of mine, my star and my conscience, made me whole, made me confront, made me insecure, made me excited, a dash of thrills at a time.

Gazing into those eyes, that cute button nose, those luscious black hairs of someone with whom, physical interaction was as alien as my weakness. Yet it was there, that feeling of familiarity, of love, devotion, respect and family.

Falling in love is as mysterious a concept as it may ever be and yet, the knowingness of it, this girl of mine and my affection for her is indicative of its unpredictable power.

And that power grew beyond comprehension, in all its romantic and affectionate exuberance.

To be continued…

This Girl of Mine Part 1

There she is. This pariah. This outlier, smiling at the edge of my consciousness, reeling me in.

She does it so steadily, this woman of mine, this girl like no other. As I am navigating the criss crossed emotional by lanes of my life, she comes along. On the outset, she is a person like many others like her, scattered by the noise around her.

The noise which I had struggled all my life to be rid of with mental walls of steel. But she joins me on my journey, supposedly to look beyond a noisy world and experience the lazy laidback comfort of my routinely existence. But I had been deceived by fate.

She prodded the walls surrounding my guarded visage, measuring it for weaknesses, unravelling the mystery behind my invisible smiles, the secrets I carry in my eyes, the quiet observant tendencies of my psyche and the warm alien fuzziness of my demeanour.

Beyond the lame hilarity and the suggestive cat and mouse verbalism of our initial exchanges, I found something unexpected, something scary but something true, something carnal but something pure, something passionate but something clear.

To be continued….

The Dark Forest – A Peek at Love

So it was how the two of them ended up near the edge of the forest. The dark forest. This was the highlight of their trip. They both had a fascination with darkness and paranoia.

Truly, as the guy once said, they were meant to be with each other.

Now they stood, looking at the dense outgrowth of trees taking it in. No one dared to venture into this area. But retreat was not an option. The two of them had trekked for three hours to reach this point. Anxiety and trepidation had no place here.

Even so, at this point, the girl was a little nervous. Whatever would happen when they entered the forest would threaten to rip their connection apart.

The guy looked at his girl, biting her finger. He called out to her, broke her trance as she turned towards him. He smiled at her and said, ‘Darling, you didn’t think it was all going to be sunshine and roses, did you?’ He raised his hand and held her cheek with it, calming her instantly.

He said ‘ Do you trust me baby?’, even though he knew what the answer was.

She obliged him with an answer even though her eyes did not require her mouth to do so. She said,’ I trust you baby. More than anything in this world.’ He held her hand firmly as her led her forward.

Together they stepped into the darkness of the woods which would most certainly destroy them individually but together it was no match for their love and strength, resilience and commitment. As they entered the woods, the trees seemed to close in on them as if to block their way out.

But they were not afraid anymore.

First Time Blogger – An Introductory Blog

Blogging is a phenomenon which in spite of being adopted by different categories of people including those individuals who provide useful and relevant insights on various subjects and issues as well as those who simply intend to exploit it as means to venting out their frustrations on an online forum, thus publishing useless and ultimately trivial pieces of trash, relatively caught on with me only during the last few months.

Although my primary passion has always revolved around the world of computer and information technologies, writing is an innate talent which has slowly yet steadily been festering within me right from my high school days. Not that this should be a clear indication of the fact that I am a proficient writer, in fact quite far from it.

However it is my desire and hope to improve and hone my writing skills by blogging as frequently as my priorities allow me to while simultaneously contributing something useful and relevant to add to this already abundant wealth of information produced by legitimate bloggers.
As a clarification, I hope to avoid the compulsion to upload personal online diaries which in my opinion have no business being the stuff of public knowledge. By hoping, I am simply not quick to discount the fact that this idea may grow upon me, but for now, I shall strive to restrict myself only to periodic bouts of informational blogging.

Keeping this in mind, I will embark upon my blogging journey with my first blog right after this introductory blog. With luck, it will be a more extensive piece of writing than this one and deeply rooted to my personal views on blogging.
New and exciting blogs are coming soon, stay tuned and happy reading.
-Siddharth Gupte