Celebrating Rahim

Celebrating

ABDUR RAHIM KHAN-I-KHANAN Statesman Courtier Soldier poet linguist humanitarian patron

InterGlobe Foundation | Aga Khan Trust For Culture

Celebrating Rahim Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan (1556–1627), referred to in Mughal records as the ‘noble of nobles’, was one of the Nine Gems of Emperor Akbar’s court. Hailed upon his birth as a “pearl from the river of good fortune”, Rahim Khan–i–Khanan distinguished himself as an unmatched soldier, statesman, patron and poet in the courts of three generations of Mughal emperors.

Raised in the pluralistic environment of Akbar’s court, Rahim acquired proficiency in Persian, Arabic and Turki, among many others. His mother tongue was Hindavi, and he developed a refined taste and sensibility for poetry in different languages.

Rahim’s atelier produced beautifully illustrated translations of the Ramayana and Mahabharata into Persian and a set of Ragamala paintings, among other Persian books and he is also credited with the translation of the Baburnama from Chaghatay Turki to Persian. Rahim Khan-i-Khanan is also credited with the construction of beautiful buildings, canals, tanks, pleasure gardens in Agra, Lahore, Delhi, and Burhanpur.

This book, published alongside a cultural festival of the same name that included an exhibition, concerts, plays and lectures, is the first to capture the manifold attributes of Rahim in a single, richly illustrated volume.

The various essays by renowned experts offer biographical perspectives to locate Rahim’s life and his artistic and political approach in the intellectual and imperial framework of the Mughal durbar; shine a light on exceptional literary talents, summarising his work from Persian to Hindi with popular dohās and lesser–known barvais; and also present Rahim in the context of the present. Several charming references, anecdotes and examples of Rahim and his poetry throughout help comprehend the making of Rahim as a legend in the world of Hindi poetry.

The accompanying music CD contains a remarkable selection of Rahim’s verses, also documented with translation in the second part of this volume, set to music with ragas and vernacular symphonies, performed for the first time by select folk and classical artists especially commissioned for the festival.

These audio tracks are also available on the BooksPlus app for mobile devices.

Presenting a biographical, visual and musical narrative, Celebrating Rahim demonstrates the humanitarian and pluralistic legacy of Abdur Rahim Khan–i–Khanan in governance, art and life.

With 93 illustrations and a music CD.

Celebrating

ABDUR RAHIM KHAN-I-KHANAN

Celebrating

ABDUR RAHIM KHAN-I-KHANAN Editor & Designer Shakeel Hossain Co-editor & Research Manager Deeti Ray Contributors: Allison Busch Chander Shekhar Eva Orthmann Harish Trivedi Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui Mehr Afshan Farooqi Ratish Nanda Richard Cohen Rupert Snell Sunil Sharma T. C. A. Raghavan Wheeler M. Thackston

InterGlobe Foundation

Statesman Courtier Soldier poet linguist humanitarian patron

Aga Khan Trust For Culture in association with

Mapin Publishing

The book has been produced by Aga Khan Trust for Culture with support from InterGlobe Foundation in conjunction with the conservation of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-iKhanan Tomb in New Delhi, a component of Nizamuddin Urban Renewal Initiative. www.nizamuddinrenewal.org

First published in India in 2017 by Aga Khan Trust for Culture with co-funding from InterGlobe Foundation in association with Mapin Publishing Pvt. Ltd 706 Kaivanna, Panchvati, Ellisbridge, Ahmedabad 380006 INDIA T: +91 79 4022 8228 • F: +91 79 4022 8201 E: mapin@mapinpub.com • www.mapinpub.com International Distribution North America Antique Collectors’ Club T: +1 800 252 5231 • F: +1 413 529 0862 E: sales@antiquecc.com • www.accdistribution.com/us Rest of the World Prestel Publishing Ltd. 14-17 Wells Street London W1T 3PD T: +44 (0)20 7323 5004 • F: +44 (0)20 7323 0271 E: sales@prestel-uk.co.uk To listen to the audios from the ‘Verses in Music’ section (pp. 212–223), download the free app from Android Play Store or iOS App Store.

Open the app and point your mobile device at the photograph in the above pages and the audio will begin to play automatically. By swiping, you will be able to read the complete Hindi lyrics and individual couplets of the songs as well as their English translation. powered by ignitesol.com

Text © Aga Khan Trust for Culture Illustrations © as listed All rights reserved by Aga Khan Trust for Culture under international copyright conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

ISBN: 978-93-85360-27-5 We are grateful to several museums, archives, libraries and institutes, as mentioned below, from whose collections reproductions of manuscripts, paintings, and photographs have been displayed in the exhibitions and used in the book. They have been duly credited along with the images throughout the exhibitions and the book: • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Aga Khan Documentation Centre at MIT Bodleian Library, Oxford British Library, London British Museum, London Chester Beatty Library, Dublin Free Library of Philadelphia, Philadelphia Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Mehrangarh Museum Trust, Jodhpur Museum of Fine Arts, Boston National Museum, New Delhi Royal Collection Trust, London Victoria and Albert Museum, London

For Mapin Publishing: Copyediting: Ateendriya Gupta / Mapin Editorial Editorial coordination: Neha Manke / Mapin Editorial Production coordination: Gopal Limbad / Mapin Design Studio Printed by Parksons Graphics, Mumbai

contents Preface Foreword Acknowledgements

7 8 10

Introduction Shakeel Hossain

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The Revival of Rahim in Modern India T. C. A. Raghavan

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Rahim in his World and in Ours Harish Trivedi

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‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan: A Biographical Note Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui

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“The Donor is Somebody Else” ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan as Patron and Benefactor Eva Orthmann

72

Nihavandi on Rahim as Interpreter, Translator, and Poet Sunil Sharma

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From the Pen of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan Chander Shekhar

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His Persian Translation of Bāburnāma Wheeler M. Thackston

124

‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan and his Worlds of Poetry Mehr Afshan Farooqi and Richard Cohen

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Briefly Put: Rahim’s Barvai Couplets Rupert Snell

152

Life and Love in the Couplets of Rahim Allison Busch

174

Rahim, Building his Wife’s Mausoleum Ratish Nanda

196

Appendix Verses in Music Timeline Glossary Extended Bibliography and Further Reading Contributors and Participants Credits

210 212 224 238 245 254 258

preface This book, produced in conjunction with the conservation of the tomb of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-iKhanan, is compiled as a preliminary reader to provide a sketch of the many facets of Rahim, as he is commonly known. It is meant for general reading and, thus, aims more to inform than to analyse.

Unfortunately, I cannot point to any other reader of Rahim in English that covers the complete spectrum of Rahim’s identity for casual reading. There are some academic works on him by scholars, most of whom have contributed to this volume, but they are specific to an aspect of him or his poetry. So, in a way, this is the first book on Rahim to present him in all lights, and by experts in the field.

Rahim has come to us—by us, I mean the common English-speaking Indians—as Rahim ke dohe, the few dohās of Rahim that are included in the English-medium middle schools’ Hindi syllabus. Some of us know Rahim Khani-Khanan too, as Prime Minister of Mughal Emperor Akbar, but often do not know them as the same person.

There is a large opus of Hindi works, both scholarly and popular, on Rahim. And there are Rahim enthusiasts among the Hindi-speaking generation who cherish every nuance of his poetry and recite them with pride when instigated by a moment or by someone. We approached the structure of this book from that perspective. It is not an attempt to re-present Rahim but to present Rahim comprehensively for the first time to the general English-speaking Indians and others who want to explore Rahim or his literature.

In the book, the transliterations of non-English words are kept to the non-strict format in which only the vowels “a”, “e”, and “i” have diacritics marks to assist in the proper pronunciation of the words. Proper nouns and names, in general, are used without any diacritics. The usage of the term Khan-i-Khanan has been retained as a standard throughout the book, in line with the usage throughout the Nizamuddin Urban Renewal project and by other public bodies in India. Its correct usage, as pointed out by Wheeler M. Thackston, is Khankhanan. In the Persian and Arabic, a distinction has been made between ayn with the use of ‘ and hamza with the use of ’ where needed. An attempt has been made to standardize the use of non-English words and names, but the range of languages under consideration here have made it difficult in many situations.

At the end of the book, there is a glossary of all the non-English words. The meanings are mostly contextual, kept as close to the use of the words in the essays. Additionally, certain Braj Bhasha terms are followed by more detailed romanization, within brackets, as speficied by the authors. This should guide the reader as close as possible to the actual pronunciation of the Braj Bhasha words. The authors have referred to varying editions of the same primary and secondary texts but the extended bibliography accompanying the publication refers to the latest editions.

Shakeel Hossain New Delhi, March 2017.

(Page 2) Portrait of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan. Opaque watercolour, ink and gold on paper; 15 x 8.3 cm (5 7/8 x 3 1/4 in); Artist: Hashim. Mughal school, Reign of Jahangir, c. 1627. Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.: Purchase: Charles Lang Freer Endowment, F1939.50a.

(Facing page) Emperor Akbar receives the young ‘Abdur Rahim at his court. This illustration depicts Emperor Akbar receiving ‘Abdur Rahim, the four-year-old son of Bairam Khan, at court, soon after his father’s assassination. The child is helped onto the platform by a noble, who has been identified tentatively as Atgah Khan. In the foreground, a man leads a cheetah. Opaque watercolour and gold on paper; 31.7 x 18.5 cm; Mughal, c. 1586–89. Outline and painting by Anant. Victoria and Albert Museum, London, SSEA. IS.2:7-1896 ©Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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foreword interglobe foundation India is home to inspiringly rich historical heritage and cultural tradition. Our history, spanning through the contours of this country, is invariably striking in all its diversity and forms. The efflorescence of these age-old civilizations, exquisite architecture, literature and art, euphonious music and poetry are adeptly corroborated in the monuments adorned with intricate sculptures and designs, bringing our history to life every time it is revisited.

The subaltern history, reflecting life stories of the common man; the architects and the builders of stunning Indian monuments; the painters and the writers who were as much a part of the historical process as the history itself, seem to have quietly escaped our attention. As the famous historian D.D. Kosambi once rightly stated, “History is not stored in archives alone; it’s lying at people’s doorstep.” It is this emphasis and endeavour by Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) to unveil and preserve history by moving closer to people, through a craft-based conservation approach, that resonates with InterGlobe Foundation’s (IGF) commitment to protect and conserve India’s heritage and culture for generations to come.

What could have been a better opportunity than to be able to channelize our efforts to join hands in reviving the art and artistry of a person of such magnified stature like ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan (fondly known as Rahim) and the tomb itself? The tomb is believed to be a precursor and inspiration to the masterpiece belonging to Shah Jahan’s era, the Taj Mahal. Rahim, one of the navratnas in the court of Mughal Emperor Akbar, was a distinguished persona, exuding unmatched excellence in diverse fields. In addition to being a strong administrator and a methodical military commander, he was also a great scholar and a poet. His works referred to as Rahim ke Dohe (Rahim’s dohās) are popular even today. The monument was originally built for Rahim’s wife, and later, Rahim was buried there too. Being the first ever Mughal tomb built for a woman, this is one of the very significant mausoleums of the Mughal era.

At IGF, our aim is to revive the artistic forms and cultural expressions coupled with physical restoration of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s tomb. Compilation of Rahim’s literary works and disseminating this collected knowledge through publications, films, music recordings and exhibition are an important component of this intervention. We believe this will help scholars to interpret the tomb’s influence on the construction of the Taj Mahal as well as its rightful inclusion within the extended Humayun’s Tomb World Heritage Site.

AKTC, through its effort, is remarkably blending conservation with environment and socio-economic development, thereby aiming at improving the quality of life for local communities. We extend heartfelt appreciation to the zealous efforts undertaken by AKTC, which has breathed life into this restoration. With an increased awareness of such a significant segment of history, IGF will continue to contribute towards the preservation of our cultural and historical legacy with utmost dignity and pride. We hope you will enjoy reading the book and discover the multifaceted personality of Rahim.

Rohini Bhatia Director, InterGlobe Foundation

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Master craftsmen restoring incised plasterwork in the lower arcade, where each arch has a unique pattern. ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan tomb, New Delhi.

acknowledgements Rahim ke dohe, widely known even today—four centuries since they were written—are a testimony to Rahim’s genius. Together with several Hindustani cultural icons—Hazrat Amir Khusrau, Shah Jahan’s daughter Jahanara Begum, Mirza Ghalib, among others—Rahim lies buried in close proximity to the 14th-century Sufi saint Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliyā’.

In India, it was considered auspicious to be buried near a saint’s tomb or dargāh and hence, since the 14th century onwards, over a 100 tombs—grand, like Humayun’s Tomb, and small such as the intricate marble screen enclosure of Mughal Emperor Muhammed Shah Rangila—were built in the Nizamuddin area. Though several have disappeared, especially in the late 20th century, since 2007, the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in partnership with the Archaeological Survey of India has been undertaking a major urban conservation effort to conserve the surviving structures.

In 2013, conservation works were completed at the World Heritage Site of Humayun’s Tomb allowing the experienced multi-disciplinary team to undertake the challenging multi-year conservation of the once grand but now ruinous tomb Rahim built for his wife. Conservation works here were only possible with the generous support and partnership of InterGlobe Foundation, marking India’s first ever conservation effort at a national monument undertaken with corporate funds. We hope that our efforts in ensuring Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funds could be utilized for conservation and a successful conservation effort here would serve as a model for many more similar projects to be undertaken.

The significance of the mausoleum lies not only in its architectural and archaeological value but primarily in its association with an eminent cultural personality, which gives it an immense historical significance. Aimed at disseminating Rahim’s literary works, including his dohe, and enhancing our understanding of both Rahim and the culture of the early Mughal era, InterGlobe has, in addition to the conservation effort, also supported an intense research programme of which this book is one outcome. We at AKTC are grateful for the valuable support and partnership provided by InterGlobe Foundation. At InterGlobe, I would especially like to thank Ms Rohini Bhatia for her leadership and personal interest as well as Ms Neelanjana Singh for her sustained involvement and continuous support. Thanks are also due to Shreya Shalini, Ganapati Arvind and Padam Prasad.

I am grateful to my colleagues Shakeel Hossain and Deeti Ray for their efforts over the past year to achieve the project objectives and for bringing together scholars and musicians devoted to performing and disseminating Rahim’s cultural legacy. For the two of them, this has been a labour of love, and I appreciate their deep commitment. Coupled with the conservation effort, Deeti has also led a very successful heritage awareness programme among school children, using both walks and theatre, with the assistance of the Saire-Nizamuddin, a group of heritage volunteers from the Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti.

It has been a privilege for us to present here essays from a diverse group of authors, who shed light on the personality, skill, cultural and military achievement, pluralist character and value of Rahim in today’s age.

The coming together of T. C. A. Raghavan, Harish Trivedi, the late Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui, Eva Orthmann, Sunil Sharma, Chander Shekhar, Wheeler M. Thackston, Mehr Afshan Farooqi, Richard Cohen, Rupert Snell and Allison Busch, has made this publication invaluable and to them we owe our sincere gratitude.

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Celebrating Rahim

This publication also continues our well-established partnership with Mapin Publishing, who have earlier published two major volumes dedicated to another Indian cultural icon, the 14th-century noble and poet, Hazrat Amir Khusrau. At Mapin, I am grateful to Bipin Shah, Neha Manke and Gopal Limbad.

In order to revive Rahim’s cultural legacy, the team has travelled across northern and central India to document Rahim’s verses. For the 2017 Rahim festival, the wide repertoire has been performed by classical performers Pandit Rajan and Sajan Mishra, Pandit Ritesh and Rajnish Mishra, and Swaransh Mishra. In their performances, Devnarayan Sarolia and Rehmat Khan Langa used their grounding in Malwa and Rajasthani folk music. Mohammad Ahmed Warsi, the noted Rampur qawwāl, vocalist/guitarist Harpreet and percussionist Netai Das, dastango Ankit Chadha all symbolized the diversity of Rahim’s legacy. Never before, in the past century, have Rahim’s verses been known to be performed in this manner, and it is hoped many more such festivals will follow.

Aparajita Das has served as research assistant for this publication and the accompanying exhibition for over a year. For the March 2017 festival exhibit, the AKTC design team, led by Archana Saad Akhtar and including Rinkesh Rana and Sagar Suri as well as research assistant Swati Goel, has worked tirelessly. M.P. Mishra enthusiastically participated in the efforts.

Since this effort at cultural revival is coupled with a major conservation effort for the mausoleum, I would like to acknowledge the partnership of the Archaeological Survey of India. We are honoured to serve as partners to the ASI for two decades now. At the ASI, I express my gratefulness to Dr B.R. Mani, former Additional Director General; Dr R.S. Fonia, Joint Director General; Janhwij Sharma, Joint Director General; S.B. Ota, Joint Director General; R.S. Jamwal, Director (Conservation); Dr Daljit Singh, Superintending Archaeologist, Delhi Circle; Shri Basant Swarankar, former Superintending Archaeologist, Delhi Circle; Bhima Ajmera, Deputy SA Engineer, all of whom have provided valuable guidance for the conservation effort at various stages.

At the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, Rajpal Singh, N.C. Thapliyal and Ms Ujwala Menon have had principal responsibility of overseeing the conservation works and have been supported by Archana Saad Akhtar, Guntej Bhushan and Vishal Kakkar. Hundreds of craftsmen led by Shri Attar Singh, Shri Amirak, Shri Babu Lal and Shri Dhani Ram have implemented the presently ongoing conservation works. The team’s effort in overcoming significant challenges and risks is laudable.

It is hoped that both the conservation effort and the associated academic and cultural programmes will enhance the city of Delhi and become a model for our shared tangible heritage to be conserved and presented in context and together with our remarkable pluralistic intangible heritage.

Ratish Nanda Aga Khan Trust for Culture, India

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Selected medallions from Rahim’s Tomb

introduction Shakeel Hossain

‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan (1556–1627) was the son of Bairam Khan-i-Khanan, the regent of Mughal Emperor Akbar from 1556 to 1560. Upon his birth, Maulana Fariduddin Dehlavi, the learned associate of Bairam Khan, composed the line (of chronogram) yielding the year of his birth: “The pearl from the river of good fortune has come forth.”1 The Mughal annals record this “pearl” to have grown up to be the greatest of the all greats, the noble of nobles, Khan-i-Khanan, of the courts of the Mughal Empire (1526–1857). However, the multifaceted shines of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s genius and compassion faded within the changing times in the mosaic of Indian history. It was also the changing times of early 20th century “Indian” nationalism, which re-produced Rahim to modern India through his Hindi literature. The Indic languages and imageries of the poetry of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan drew curious interests from writers and scholars with the discovery of his Hindi verses and, later, with the finding of volumes (together, the three volumes run into 3,000 pages) of his biography in Persian by ‘Abdul Baqi Nihavandi, Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī.2 Who was this larger-than-life Khan-i-Khanan of Emperor Akbar (r 1556–1605) and Emperor Jahangir (r 1605–1628)? Later, a mentor of Prince Khurram (Emperor Shah Jahan, son and successor of Jahangir), for whom he went to battle with the imperial Mughal army.

Who was he, the unmatched soldier and statesman, who wrote poems in Persian, Sanskrit and in dialects of Hindavi, with metaphors ranging from Giridhar to Ganga, evoking basics of morals and human values in precise and concise mātrās (metres) of dohās and barvais? His barvais supposedly inspired Tulsidas to write his Barvai Rāmāyana.3 He became so legendary for his generosity and patronage in his own time that great poets composed uncounted verses in Sanskrit, Hindavi and Persian in praise of him. As a lover of books,

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his library, unfortunately lost to the ravages of time, has been recorded in history as one of the grandest in the Mughal Empire.4 This book, Celebrating Rahim, catalogues the festival of exhibition, concerts, plays and lectures, and sets out to capture all of the above to present ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s manifold attributes and genius.

The festival is curated to touch upon the many aspects of Rahim, as he his commonly known, so we can get a glimpse of this larger-than-life Khan-i-Khanan and learn to appreciate the syncretic milieu of early Mughal Empire. One can argue whether it was intentionally syncretic or not, but there can be no doubt from the readings of Rahim’s poems and his use of metaphors that one had the knowledge and appreciation of the other—a vital ingredient of plurality.

Further readings into the court culture of the early Mughal Empire5 give evidence of the meetings of the minds and arts between the Muslims and the Hindus under the secular patronage of Akbar. Here, the classical Sanskrit scriptures and epics of the Indic traditions were discussed and translated into Persian.

The translations were beautifully compiled with exquisite miniature paintings. One of the most intricately illustrated manuscripts commissioned by Akbar was Valmiki’s Rāmāyana. It was copied with permission in the kārkhāna (atelier) of Mirza Khan ‘Abdur Rahim.6 Today, it is in the collection of the Freer Gallery, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C. The festival also sets out to celebrate the secular canvas of Rahim’s verses and patronage. As mentioned earlier, the “re-birth” of Rahim was part of the Hindu nationalistic revivalism after the end of the Mughal Empire. The British rule (1857–1947) brought the diverse communities of India on equal grounds. It gave the Hindu intellectuals and populace a platform to propagate their traditions and expressions. The language culture that grew out of the interactions of the Persianate world, with its roots in Central Asia and Iran, and age-old Indic traditions began to be replaced by Sanskritized Hindi and local dialects. Writers and publishers soon began to produce books in Hindi rather than Urdu, which was the popular language of literature towards the end of the Mughal era. In that process, compilations and revivals of poetry in Sanskrit and Hindavi found new grounds and instigated new research in the field. In one such research, the Hindavi and Sanskrit verses of Rahim were produced. The first essay here, by T.C.A. Raghavan, walks us through the late19th and early-20th century rise of Hindi literature. It traces the history of Hindi literature in modern India, in which lies the discovery of Rahim’s poems.

Raghavan’s essay, “The Revival of Rahim in Modern India”, placed in the beginning of the book Celebrating Rahim, is essential, for it locates Rahim in the context of the present, which is the core intention of festival’s curatorial concept. It connects the contemporary direction of Hindi literature with Rahim, the poet of dohās heavily loaded with Hindu idioms, as he is popularly remembered today. For it can be argued that without (Previous page) Muhammad Amin Diwan, a trusted aide, escorting the widow of Bairam Khan and her infant son ‘Abdur Rahim to Ahmedabad in 1561, following the assassination of Bairam Khan. This image is said to be from the first illustrated copy of the Akbarnāma. It drew upon the expertise of some of the best royal painters of the time, many of whom receive special mention by Abu’l Fazl in his ‘Āīn-i-Akbarī. Opaque watercolour and gold on paper; 32.1 cm x 19 cm; Artist: Mukund. c. 1586–89 (made). Victoria and Albert Museum, London, IS. 2:5-1896. ©Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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the nationalistic urge to revive Hindi literature, beginning at the end of the Muslim rule and in the face of the prevailing Persian and Urdu literature, the study of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan may not have generated the momentum and popularity that one can see from the many studies and books (mainly in Hindi) on him.

As the second essay, by the author Harish Trivedi, clearly exemplifies, there is another argument for the growing popularity of the verses of Rahim—“the sheer simplicity and felicity of the verses, and the sweetand-sour pragmatic wisdom which they express”—that they stay with the readers as precious pearls of worldly experience. Harish Trivedi calls him “one of the most widely popular poets in all Hindi literature”.

There are comparisons, in his essay, with other great poets of his times and later poets, substantiated with quotes and parallel references. There are several charming references, anecdotes and examples of Rahim and his poetry in Trivedi’s work, such that one can comprehend the making of Rahim as a legend in the world of Hindi poetry. However, Rahim was not a poet like the bhakt (religious devotees) poets—Surdas, Tulsidas, Kabir—with whom he is equally compared. Rahim was a soldier most of his early life and spent years in battlefields and military campaigns with Emperor Akbar, later to become governor (sūbadār) of Gujarat to follow with Sindh and the Deccan.7 In all, he was “as prodigious with the pen as with the sword”, to quote from Trivedi’s contribution in this book.

The other poet cited by Trivedi in this book is Kabir, who was brought up by a Muslim family but, like Rahim, primarily wrote poems with Hindu idioms, with references to Muslim beliefs and rituals. He spoke of rising above their worldly practices, speaking of morals in the realm of nirgūna, one without human/worldly attributes. But unlike him, Rahim does not make many evocations of the two religions in the same breath, nor does he render exclusively Islamic symbolisms. Though Allison Busch, later in this book, makes convincing analyses of Rahim’s verses being sufiānā, in the mystical dimensions of Islam, they are interpretations and not direct renditions of Sufi canons.

At heart, he was likely a bhakt, drawing more from the Hindu religious narratives and customs of veneration, as is apparent in his poetry, rather than the abstract mystical concepts of the Sufis in India. By the time of Emperor Akbar, definite orders (silsilās) of Sufis were well established in India. We know of the popular story of Akbar’s devotion to Shaikh Salim Chishti of Sikri; in the devotion of Chishti, Akbar built his new capital city of Fatehpur Sikri. Akbar was a patron of the shrine of the Sufi Shaikh Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliyā’ (d 1325) of Delhi too. It is to be noted that, in the barkat (blessing) of this Sufi saint, ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan built the mausoleum for his wife; it is here that he himself is buried. Yet, rarely does he include Sufi evocations in his poetry. There are, however, poems of his in Persian, also poems with a mix of Persian and Hindavi lines, similar to the poems of the 13th–14th-century Delhi poet Amir Khusrau. Trivedi draws comparisons between the two in his essay. Amir Khusrau is also legendary for his Hindavi poems, which continue to be sung by the qawwāls across South Asia. On the other hand, his Persian poems, of which he has many dīvāns (compilations of poems), are rarely sung and remembered today. Though they lived more than two centuries apart, the comparison between the two is intriguing and revealing in several layers, especially in reference to their Hindavi repertoire. Another discussion on this will be elaborated later.

For now, it is to be noted that the other reason for the continuing popularity of his verses written in 16th– 17th-century Mughal India even in the modern times is that he wrote mainly in the sweet and rhythmic

Shakeel Hossain

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dialects of vernacular Hindi language—Braj Bhasha and Avadhi. But why did he write in Braj and Avadhi, especially laden with Hindu idioms and religious references, when he was a high-ranking Muslim noble in Persianate Mughal courts? Though his mother was Indian-born, Raj Gusain, daughter of the Chief of Mewat, and his mother tongue can be said to be Hindavi, ‘Abdur Rahim was a Turk who conventionally spoke Turki and Persian. By the time of Akbar, very few could speak Chaghatay Turki, the mother tongue of the Mughals, but ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan could speak and read well enough to translate Babur’s autobiography, Vaqī‘at-i-Bāburī into Persian. These translations were not very well done, however, as is demonstrated by Wheeler M. Thackston in his essay in this book. Thackston points out that his translation to Persian sticks so close to the original syntax of Chaghatay Turki that meanings are distorted and the Persian outcome is, sometimes, incomprehensible without the knowledge of Chaghatay Turki. Fortunately for Rahim, Akbar may have known the language of his grandfather, Babur.

‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan was gifted with languages; he was a polyglot like his father, Bairam Khan.

‘Abdur Rahim was blessed with all of the wonderful traits of his father, who was also bestowed with the title of Khan-i-Khanan, given to him by Emperor Humayun. Bairam Khan was an intellectual, a poet and a cultured man with great military and administrative skills. From the beginning of his service, he was a faithful companion of Emperor Humayun and because of his loyalty and bravery, he came to be the regent of Akbar.8 The family of Bairam Khan came into the service of Babur sometime after A.D. 1505, and Bairam Khan, at the age of 16, was associated with Prince Humayun. Later, the alliances grew between the families with several intermarriages. The third essay in the book, by Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui, gives a detailed account of Bairam Khan and the life of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan and their associations with the family of the Mughals.

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Siddiqui’s account is very important to the overall intention of this book, for it helps us place Rahim, his family and his ancestry in the context of Mughal history, even before Babur’s conquest of India. The direct association over four generations—Babur to Shah Jahan—and previous associations with the Timurid princes locates ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan in the inner circle of the Mughal royal family. However, it was not just that. Their loyalty and bravery, along with their well-groomed etiquettes and highly educated background, made them perfect companions and tutors of the Mughal princes. As mentioned earlier, Bairam became the regent of Akbar when he ascended the throne at the age of 13. Siddiqui, in this book, with references from primary Persian sources, gives us intriguing details of early Mughal history with Bairam Khan-i-Khanan and ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan in the midst of it.

He was one of the Nine Gems of Emperor Akbar. Raised in the pluralistic environment of Emperor Akbar’s court, ‘Abdur Rahim acquired proficiency in Persian, Arabic and Turki. Impressed by his learning, sophisticated manners, and humanism, Akbar conferred upon him the title Mirza Khan and appointed him the teacher of the crown prince Salim. Akbar also married his foster sister and daughter of Shamsuddin Muhammad Atka9 to ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan.

Rahim developed a refined taste and sensibility for poetry in different languages. He eventually turned out to be a versatile poet, prolific writer, consummate scholar and an able administrator. He was also interested in mathematics, astronomy and scholasticism. Of the works by him, only Bāburnāma is extant. Equally important was his role as a patron. His library was a rich store of learning, open to scholars. Some precious books that once belonged to his collection are now found in prestigious collections across the world. Khan-i-Khanan is also credited with the construction of beautiful buildings, canals, tanks and pleasure gardens in Agra, Lahore, Delhi and Burhanpur.

Sixteen-year-old ‘Abdur Rahim accompanied Emperor Akbar on the Gujarat campaign in 1572. The painting depicts the Emperor parading into the impressive Surat fort after his victory. Opaque watercolour and gold on paper; 31.9 x 19.1 cm (painted surface), 33 cm x 20.2 cm (painted surface and borders); Farrukh Beg (maker); Mughal, c. 1586–89 (made). Victoria and Albert Museum, London, IS.2:117-1896. ©Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

(Facing page) Unlike bhakti poets Kabir and Ravidasji, Rahim’s poetry adapted devotional imagery within courtly settings. On the other hand, verses by the former were rooted in popular Bhakti traditions in the 15th–16th centuries, and are widely sung to this day.

Mughal, Jahangir period; Paper; 18 x 25 cm; c. A.D. 1620–30. National Museum, New Delhi. Accession Number: 79.444.

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The most important monument constructed by him is the tomb he built for his wife. The tomb, together with Humayun’s Tomb, served as a source of inspiration for the architecture of the Taj Mahal at Agra.

Eva Orthmann’s contribution in this book goes on to explain the patronage system that existed in the subimperial courts of early Mughals typical “of a high-ranking Mughal office holder (mansabdār)” like ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, but, she continues to emphasize that “…he was nevertheless singular because of both the extent of his patronage and generosity”. Like Siddiqui, Orthmann draws from Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī to expound on the patronage process at his court and to call out the numerous great scholars and poets that ‘Abdur Rahim employed. Besides being very fond of books and the arts of book, he was patron to many artists of miniature painting and scribes. His court and kārkhānas were so desired—as he handsomely paid the scholars, poets and artists—that some left the imperial court to benefit from his patronage. ‘Abdul Baqi Nihavandi, the author of Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī, left the administration of Shah Abbas (r 1588–1692) of Persia to seek the patronage of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan on the suggestion of Mughisuddin Asadabadi.10 The next essay by Sunil Sharma translates an extract from the third volume of Nihavandi’s biography of Rahim, Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī. ‘Abdul Baqi Nihavandi’s voluminous work has not only been an important contribution to the study of Rahim’s life and patronage, but it has also been a source book for the understanding of Rahim’s court and the “biographies of 191 persons” who worked at his court, as cited by Orthmann. As Sharma states: “From the early Mughal period, the only equivalent of such an extended glowing tribute to a powerful personage is Abu’l Fazl’s (d 1602) equally massive biography-history of the Emperor Akbar, Akbarnāma.”

The translation by Sharma in this book provides a glimpse into Rahim’s court. He points out that the biography concentrates mainly on the Persian personalities associated with Rahim’s court and Rahim’s Persian poems, as to be expected of Nihavandi who had just come from Iran. However, it is important to note here that he affirms Khan-i-Khanan’s natural gift with various languages “that he used in his daily communications with different communities of people, official correspondence to other courts, and in composing his own poetry”.

Rahim, being a poet and a lover of books, employed many scholars and poets with whom he personally interacted. Several worked in his grand library. As Orthmann points out, Rahim personally oversaw the collection and the preservation of his books. The essay by Chander Shekhar, “From the Pen of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan”, tells us about his personal involvement with the books from his collection.

Shekhar’s essay catalogues and analyses a few of his notes on the flyleaf of the manuscripts. The importance and value of the books in his library is reinstated by the endorsements of imperial owners such as Jahangir and Shah Jahan.

His love for books also came from his love for poetry. Mehr Farooqi and Richard Cohen in their essay titled “Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan and his Worlds of Poetry” compile an overview of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-iKhanan’s literature in Persian and Hindavi, which, according to them, seem as if they are by two different personalities. Like all the authors in this collection, they too question the lack of his Hindavi poems in Nihavandi’s voluminous biography—the most essential resource record—of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, which was commissioned by Khan-i-Khanan himself. When, especially, it even includes Persian works of

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poets only remotely connected with his court. The bigger question they raise is why Khan-i-Khanan himself did not have his Hindavi works included. Was it considered lesser than the Persian works in the cultured courts of the Mughal and, thus, not worthwhile?

Here again we see a similar situation with Amir Khusrau’s Hindavi verses. Khusrau himself mentions in the autobiographical preface of his dīvān that he wrote as many verses in Hindavi and Persian, but never compiled a dīvān of his Hindavi verses. He was very careful and particular about documenting all his works. So much so that he recorded the number of words in his manuscripts to ensure there was no room for the careless scribes to make errors. The question again is this: did he consider his Hindavi works not worthy literature in the glory of the Persianate cultures of the Sultanate courts of 13th–14th century? It is understood that Persian, and the patronage of anything originating from the Persianate world of Medieval Islam, was cherished more than the vernacular and the indigenous.

Amir Khusrau, who was born of an Indian mother with Hindavi as one of his mother tongues, wrote extensively, glorifying the facets of India over that of Khurasan and other grand centres of the Islamic world to counter the Sultans’ perceptions, and thus their patronages, of the foreign Persianate over the IndoPersianate. An attempt, perhaps, to reinstate himself in the world of Persianate literature. The other reason, which is apparent in Khusrau’s case, Rahim did not include his Hindavi verses coloured with Hindu divinities and imageries was to avoid the obvious confrontations with the Islamic vigilante who were on an extra watch due to the shift in the religious sentiments of Akbar.

These may have been the reasons for not finding any traces of Rahim’s Hindavi verses in Mughal records.

However, fortunately, the rich flavours of the Indic traditions, language, music, and the other creative and religious expressions continued to co-exist, not only among the populace, as commonly mentioned in the khānaqāhs of the Sufis, but in the courts of the nobles and emperors, of both Sultanate and Mughal eras of the Muslim rule. In the 700 years or so of the Muslim rule, the Indic traditions flourished independently and with the freshness of syncretism between the two cultures. The polity and the culture of Mughal Emperor Akbar’s court and his nobles, here referring specially to ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, became the crucible of that interaction. The recent work of Audrey Truschke expounds on the exchange between the Sanskrit works of the pandits with that of the ‘ālims of the Persian and Arabic.11 Here, in the process of translating the scriptures and epics, discussions were happening not just in the worlds of literature and arts but in the world of religions. Akbar initiated his own sect, Dīn-i-Ilāhī, where he intended to put the best of India’s beliefs and practices together. Major scriptures of the Hindus were translated into Persian, accompanied by exquisite miniature paintings. As mentioned earlier, ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan was given the privilege to make a copy of the imperial manuscript of Persian Rāmāyana commissioned by Akbar. John Seyller, a scholar of Mughal paintings, beautifully documents the manuscript expanding on Khan-i-Khanan’s grand patronage of visual arts.

To summarize, ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan wrote verses in Turki, Persian, Hindavi and Sanskrit. Nihavandi does not include Rahim’s Hindavi poems, but he refers to them in his biography. Sharma explains that he mainly wrote about his “countrymen” and their biographies and poetry. Farooqi and Cohen further infer

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that he began working on the biography soon after coming from Iran and that he did not know Hindavi and was unaware of the significance of Rahim’s Hindavi poems. Yet, it was Rahim’s Hindavi poems that gave him his legend.

None of Rahim’s Hindavi poems in original survive from his time, though several later tazkiras mentioning that he composed in Hindavi.12 This brings us back to the beginning of this book: the revival of Rahim through his Hindavi poems. It needs to be noted here that, as Raghavan alludes to in his conclusion, while there was this ardent drive in earlier 1900s to re-produce Rahim’s Hindavi verses highlighting their Indic idioms as opposed to Persian metaphors in order to link him to the soil of the nation rather than that of the conquerors, there was a similar push to expose his Persian works to “enigmatically… [pass] over Rahim’s Hindi poetry, or to… [contest] the provenance of his [Hindu] devotional verses”. However, with the flow of time and the directives of modern India, Khan-i-Khanan’s Persian verses did not “stick to the soil” and remained in the libraries and books of the scholars. Farooqi and Cohen show in their essay that there were studies that projected Rahim’s Persian works as comparable to the masters of Persian poetry. They also note that Shibli Nomani wrote in Sher’ul Ajam “…if he [Khan-i-Khanan] had taken to write [Persian] poetry as a profession he would be no less than Urfi or Naziri”.

Thus, the first part of the book ends with two essays on Rahim’s Hindavi poems in the metres of barvai and dohā to present the substance of them through translations with annotations of a few selected verses.

The sources of the authors are different due to the fact that none of Rahim’s Hindavi works survive in their original forms. Most of the ones we know came about in prints in the 1920s. Raghavan’s essay in the beginning of the book presents a clear chronology of Rahim’s Hindavi poems. He records that over a short span of time, there was a steep rise in the Hindavi verses that were published. In Khānkhānanāma by Munshi Deviprasad, there are only 40 dohās of Rahim with the mention that there are about a hundred more. Later, Brajratna Das, in his Rahiman Vilās, reproduced 289 dohās. After these, there have been an abundance of publications in Hindi, which build on them. Most of the Hindi verses in this book have been taken from the later publications. Different authors have different books as their sources and, thus, there are variations in the verses. Attempts have been made to call out the sources of the verses where used.

Rupert Snell introduces Rahim’s barvai verses explaining its structure and use. In doing so, he makes the comparison with the other barvai poet of Rahim’s time, Tulsidas, who wrote the Barvai Rāmāyana. Snell tags the style as “intimate miniature verses in a rare and tiny metre”. His analyses “rest on their aesthetic function rather than their hereditary history or subsequent influence”. He introduces Rahim’s two barvai poems, Barvai Nāyikā Bhed and Barvai. The former is the tradition of codifying typical physical manifestations of the heroine’s emotions and acts in given situations and roles—a lover, a wife, a mistress. The latter is laden with Krishna bhakti references. He ends the essay with the translations of selections from both compositions.

(Facing page) Illustrated folio from the Persian translation of Valmiki’s Rāmāyana commissioned by ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan.

The image depicts Ram, Lakshman and Vishvamitr rest at the hermitage of Kama at the confluence of the Sarayu and the Ganges. The translation followed that of an imperial copy. Ink, opaque watercolour, and gold on paper, in modern bindings; 27.5 x 15.2 cm; Artist: Ghulam ‘Ali. Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.: Gift of Charles Lang Freer, F1907.271.1-172 vol-I: folio 34 recto.

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The next chapter by Allison Busch, in the given structure, presents a set of Rahim’s compositions—dohās and barvais with annotations and translations. Busch beautifully provides insights into the reading of the verses of Rahim from his Nagarshobhā and Nāyikā Bhed to get a deeper understanding of them. Although, as she mentions, the appreciation comes with the pre-knowledge of the literary tradition, with Busch’s help one can get to enjoy the nuances of Rahim’s metaphors and imageries. Busch unpacks the brief yet richly loaded verses and guides the reader to the emotional and physical states of various heroines. Explaining the usage of languages, metaphors and imagery, the essay provides an accessible entry-point into the pleasing world of medieval Hindi poetic traditions.

The 11 essays in the first part of the book essentially expose the core intention of the festival, the multifaceted legacy of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan elaborating the many characters of Rahim as called out in the sub-headings of the book’s title: Statesman, Courtier, Soldier, Poet, Linguist, Humanitarian, Patron. His compassion, his patronage and his poems, as put by Farooqi and Cohen, find their expressions “within the hybrid cultural environment of his time, an environment which facilitated interaction between [religions, cultures, languages, arts, intellectuals] poets and circulation of their [traditions and] texts, regardless of their religious identity or association”. As mentioned above, and emphasized by Eva Orthmann in her essay, these attributes were underpinned and made possible by the career of Khan-i-Khanan as a prominent statesman.

In the chapter by Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui, the history of Rahim’s life beginning with Bairam Khan, his father, is presented with references from Persian primary sources ranging from Akbar’s court historians to chronicles commissioned by Shah Jahan and Mughal political biographies. His work refers to important sources such as the Akbarnāma, Tuzuk-i-Jahāngīrī, Shāh Jahānnāma, Ma’āsir-ul-Umarā, Zakhīrat-ul-Khwanīn and Ma’āsiri-Rahīmī. The essay throws light on the side that largely gets ignored under the weight of Rahim’s literary contributions: Rahim as an able courtier and a key Mughal general.

The chapters on history and patronage paint the pluralistic canvas of Akbar’s darbār within which the talent and mentality of Rahim flourished. It highlights the factors that enabled Rahim to commission and produce Sanskrit and Hindi masterpieces in a Persianate court and further outlines the canvas of their revival and popularity. They flesh out the process through which the Mughal court developed a multifaceted intellectual and imperial framework, rooted in political pragmatism as well as courtly aesthetics, and then locate Rahim within it.

Siddiqui along with Orthmann gives a glimpse into ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s generosity and patronage, which went beyond the conventional norms of the Mughal imperial and sub-imperial courts. His generosity spurred many legendary anecdotes and his patronage left many wonderful remnants; unfortunately, some in ruins and lost to the ravages of time. Shekhar presents Rahim as a patron of arts, and some of the manuscripts from his library that can be found in museums across the world. The essay refers to him as connoisseur and collector of important literary and artistic masterpieces. Sharma’s translation of an extract from Nihavandi’s biography of Rahim gives us an opportunity to get a first-hand view of the functioning of his court and those who were employed by him.

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The chapters on his poetry summarize the literary works of Rahim from Persian to Hindi. They comment on the subjects and kinds of his literature as they continue into present times. This section of the book includes some of his popular dohās along with some scarcely known barvais to present a cross-section of the subjects of his Hindavi compositions. The verses are presented with transliterations, translations and annotations with references to subjects, symbolisms and metaphors.

The first essay of the part two of the book by Ratish Nanda provides historical and architectural narratives to several buildings built by ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan. It focuses on the tomb of his wife that he built and where he was buried. He died an old man, as Khan-i-Khanan, in the beginning of the reign of Emperor Shah Jahan. The architecture of Khan-i-Khanan’s tomb, as it is commonly known, is a fine example of Mughal architecture and is seen as a precursor to the Taj Mahal at Agra. It is the conservation of this building that led to Celebrating Rahim—the book and the festival.

On the one hand, Celebrating Rahim presents ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan as a statesman, courtier and soldier. On the other hand, it illustrates his contribution as a poet and a patron. The festival, in all, demonstrates his humanitarian and pluralistic approach to art, life and governance, integral elements of the Mughal Era. No doubt, in the span between ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan of Akbar’s and Jahangir’s eras and the Rahim of the 1920s—300 years and more—there have been creations and re-creations of him and his attributions, and his contributions. The Mughal annals presented him more as a soldier and governor than as a patron and a poet. It is mainly in the Persian and Sanskrit writings of those employed by him that his patronage and generosity received mention. It is stated that there are more qasīdas dedicated to him than Akbar, and his biography in volume equals that of Akbar’s. ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan begins to be unravelled with a drive again in modern India after centuries of there being minimal records of him.

In case of Amir Khusrau, his verses and anecdotes remained alive and continued to be sung with all the variations included throughout within the lineage of Qawwāl Bachche, who claim him as their master. In case of Khan-i-Khanan, his verses remained in the pages and never got sung or recited. Thus, they remained mostly unknown. The insights and beauty of his Hindavi poems guaranteed their popularity, but only within the realms of books and conversational quotes. When compared to the poetry of Kabir, Surdas and Tulsidas, in whose genre and style Rahim sets his poems, there are no traditions of his dohās being part of any recitation or singing traditions. Neither do they lend themselves naturally to the rhythm of music since, it seems, they were not written to be recited. They needed modification and adaption to be included among recitable verses.

The second part catalogues the performances, with translations and audio links, performed during the festival. The concerts—classical and folk—give life to his popular verses, with rāgas and vernacular compositions exemplifying the depths of his poetry and his understanding of life; the musical narrative tells the story of his life and his humanity; and the dance performance demonstrates his treatise on nāyikā (heroine) and shringār (love). The events were composed and choreographed for the first time for the festival. The selected artists were especially commissioned to develop musical compositions, plays and dance performances based on Rahim’s poetry and his biography.

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Project Note: Conservation of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s tomb and his legacy, supported by InterGlobe Foundation, is one of the key objectives of the Nizamuddin Urban Renewal Initiative implemented by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC). The Nizamuddin Urban Renewal Initiative is a unique urban renewal programme where conservation objectives are coupled with environmental development, socio-economic development and cultural revival. It is a not-for-profit public-private partnership model aimed at tangible and intangible heritage conservation with subsequent improvement of quality of life for the local communities.

1. Chhotubhai Ranchhodji Naik, ‘Abdur Rahīm Khan-i-Khānān and his Literary Circle (Ahmedabad: Gujarat University, 1966), 29, fn1.

2. Annemarie Schimmel, “A Dervish in the Guise of a Prince: Khan-i-Khanan Abdur Rahim as a Patron,” in The Powers of Art: Patronage in Indian Culture, ed. Barbara Stoler Miller (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1992), 203.

3. The completion of half a couplet of Tulsidas by Rahim and their close friendship is a widely popular lore; the Manas Mandir at Varanasi has the couplet inscribed on its walls adding another layer to this belief.

4. A thorough study of the library holdings and book-production in the sub-imperial atelier of ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan has been made by John Seyller, Workshop and Patron: The Freer Rāmāyaṇa and Other Illustrated Manuscripts of ‘Abd al-Rahim (Zurich: Artibus Asiae Publishers, 1999), 50–63.

5. Audrey Truschke, Culture of Encounters: Sanskrit at the Mughal Court (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016).

6. Seyller, Workshop and Patron, 81–249.

7. Gujarat (1583); Sindh (1592); Deccan (1593).

8. Abu’l Fazl, Akbarnāma, Vol. I tr. H. Beveridge (Delhi: Low Price Publications, 2002), 657–58.

9. Shah Nawaz Khan Shamsamuddaula, Ma’āthir-ul-Umarā, Vol. II (Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1952), 156–60.

10. Naik, op. cit., 375–78.

11. Truschke, 104–05.

12. The political biographies from the 17th and 18th century: Zakhīrat-ul-Khwānīn by Shaikh Farid Bhakkari, Ma’āthir-ul-Umarā by Shah Nawaz Khan, and poetic biographies like Kalimāt-us-Shu‘arā mention Khan-i-Khanan briefly.

(Facing page) Traditional craftsmanship forms an integral part of the conservation process. The image shows the transfer process of the pattern on the wall for incised plasterwork, ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s tomb, New Delhi.

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THE REVIVAL OF RAHIM IN MODERN INDIA T. C. A. Raghavan

‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan (1556–1627), the only son of Akbar’s regent, Bairam Khan, is a prominent figure in Mughal political, military and intellectual history during the reigns of Akbar and Jahangir. Rahim’s political achievements include the re-establishment of Mughal control over Gujarat after a major rebellion (1584), the conquest of Sindh (1592), campaigns in Berar and Ahmednagar in the 1590s and a long tenure as Governor of the Deccan in the 1590s and in the first two decades of the 17th century. Like many prominent families at the heart of the imperial system, his family, too, faced annihilation on account of internecine conflicts within the royal family and the consequent civil wars. Rahim’s last days were spent as a prisoner of the very court he had served with distinction, and he was also to see the physical destruction of his family at the hands of feuding princes.

Rahim was at the centre of the court’s patronage of Persian literature. His translation of Emperor Babur’s memoirs from Turkish into Persian in 1589 is a milestone in Mughal literary history. Many Persian poets gravitated to Rahim, and his personal library was a centre of patronage for calligraphers, book binders and painters. However, he also stands out in areas outside the traditional parameters of intellectual and political achievement of the Mughal nobility in India and has come down to us as a Hindi poet of distinction. Major works attributed to him range from mixed Sanskrit and Persian verses on astrology, as in Khet Kautukam; eight verses in a traditional bhakti idiom on devotion and attraction to Krishna of the gopīs of Vrindavan, as in Madanāshtaka;1 sensuous and erotic verses in Nagarshobhā,2 Shringār Sorthā;3 and those in a nāyaknāyikā bhed format, as in the Barvai Nāyikā Bhed.4 The latter is an important work because it is the first to use in Hindi the Sanskrit genre of nāyak-nāyikā bhed and also the first to use the barvai5 couplet. Rahim is,

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T. C. A. Raghavan

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however, best known today for his collection of dohās,6 pithy reflections on daily morality and ethics, which remain a staple in school textbooks of Hindi for their simplicity of language and the down-to-earth quality of the advice conveyed.7 Despite the extensive documentation of Rahim’s life and career in contemporary Persian sources, there is scant detail in them of his Hindi poetry. His literary corpus, as we know it today is largely the result of a wide-ranging research into his life and writings in the late 19th and early 20th century by scholars and protagonists of the Hindi movement. By the mid-20th century, Rahim was regarded as both a secular exemplar as well as a philosopher general of Mughal India. Popularly regarded as one of Akbar’s navaratnas, he is the Mughal noble representing Akbar’s India and the consummate product of the Emperor’s bold experiment to forge a new communal and religious consensus in India.

This paper examines how Rahim, the historical figure and the poet, was engaged by Hindi litterateurs and historians. In the 19th century, as we shall see below, there were enigmatic failures to encounter Rahim’s poetry when most expected. From the early 20th century, however, we encounter a steady expansion of knowledge about him as a determined effort to reconstruct his literary personality as a social and national icon was undertaken.

The Historical Rahim Of all the significant milestones in preserving Rahim’s history, the Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī of Maulana ‘Abdul Baqi Nihavandi (1570–1637) occupies the foremost place.8 It is a contemporary source on Rahim and on the Persian poets and scholars he patronized. Thereafter, Rahim features in a biographical dictionary called Zakhīrat-ul-Khawānīn, which enlists Mughal nobles, written some 25 years after his death. Some of its descriptions were based on eyewitness accounts, and from these, we get a flavour of Khan-i-Khanan’s personality. The Zakhīrat itself was a source for another biographical dictionary of Mughal nobles, Ma’āsirul-Umarā, dating to the 1740s. Numerous other Persian histories of the period beginning with Akbarnāma

by Abu’l Fazl (1551–1602) and Muntakhab-ut-Tawārīkh by ‘Abdul Qadir Badauni (c.1540–1615) also contain rich biographical details on Rahim. All these Persian sources mention his patronage of literature and that he composed poetry in Arabic, Persian and Hindi, although no examples are cited of his verses in Hindi.9 An early reference to Rahim’s Hindi verse is in Kāvya Nirnaya (The Verdict on Poetry), a Braj Bhasha work composed in 1746 by Bhikharidas. This work has some introductory verses classifying prominent poets and it “…distinguishes four (overlapping) categories of poets: those such as Tulsidas and Surdas, distinguished for religious merit; those rewarded by patronage—Kesavdas, Bhusan, and Balbir; those seeking fame—Raskhan and Rahim; and the scholastic poets, Tos, Rasraj, Raslin and himself”.10

(Previous page) Bairam Khan, father of ‘Abdur Rahim and regent of Emperor Akbar, watching the latter learning how to shoot (1555). ‘Abdur Rahim also went on to tutor Emperor Akbar’s son, prince Salim. The illustration is contained within the first volume of Akbarnāma which describes Emperor Akbar’s Timurid ancestry and the history of his grandfather Babur (1483–1530) and father Humayun (1508–56). The margins of the opening have been decorated and illustrated in Jahangir’s reign. Opaque watercolour; 18.7 × 33.5 cm; 1603–04. British Library, Akbarnāma Vol.I, Or. 12988, f. 158a.©The British Library Board (Or. 12988, f. 158a).

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Bhikharidas’s description, although brief, does shed light on contemporary evaluations of Rahim. “Seeking fame” is certainly a categorization with some value. Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī is one of the few panegyrics inspired by and devoted to a Mughal noble rather than a monarch. The work was obviously composed at Rahim’s own instruction and evidently designed with an eye to both his contemporary and posthumous reputation.

Similar purposes were also achieved by the large volume of verses composed in his praise by Persian, Sanskrit and Hindi poets. In this context, striking also is the massive tomb he built for his wife in Nizamuddin, New Delhi. It is usually referred to as Khan-i-Khanan’s tomb, but he was buried in it only later. Amongst the numerous structures that constitute Mughal heritage in India, this is one of the very few built in memory of a wife, perhaps rarer still if we ignore queens and princesses. In Burhanpur, a provincial capital in Mughal India, numerous structures attributable to Rahim still dot the landscape—public baths, an underground water supply system, mosques and the tomb of his son, Shah Nawaz Khan.

A 19th-Century Enigma Rahim’s Hindi poetry was noticed in Kāvya Nirnaya, a century and a quarter after his death. Yet, this cannot be taken to imply that these verses were in any sense popular or even known outside a small fraternity of scholars. Certainly, we have little evidence of a widespread familiarity with Rahim’s verses in the early 19th century. For example, Thomas Broughton, a British Army officer, who spent many years in India, compiled a collection of poems and songs popular amongst the soldiers in his command. Selections from the Popular Poetry of the Hindus was published first in 1814.11 It includes a large sample of verses from numerous poets.

We have samples from Surdas, Keshav, Bihari, Giridhar, Kaviray and Mandan, apart from verses of lesser known poets. However, there is no Rahim. On the other hand, other poets absent in the anthology include Tulsidas and Kabir. Broughton’s collection, therefore, is not fully representative, but this lack of reference is nevertheless significant, given Rahim’s absence elsewhere. Another influential collection was William Price’s Hindee and Hindoostanee Selections (1827). The poets included are Kabir, Tulsidas, Gang, Kesavdas, Mira Bai, Parmananddas and Haridas Swami.12 The themes of the selections are such that some inclusion of Rahim’s verses would have been expected, but once again, we do not encounter him.

We could look also at two early examples of Hindi as it emerged in the 19th century and at the beginning of its great divide with Urdu. Lalooji Lal (1747–1824) was described in later years as having “…practically newly invented modern Sanskritized Hindi by excising ‘alien’ words from the mixed Urdu language of Akbar’s camp followers…” as also having a pioneering role in the crafting and identifying of Hindi as the “language of the Hindus”. His collection of Hindi poetry, Sabhā Vilās (1817), has a dohā of Rahim.13 This suggests that at least some of his verses were still in circulation in the early 19th century, scattered across different manuscript collections or oral traditions, which Lalooji Lal would have had access to. Yet, the presence of this single verse in Sabhā Vilās does not suggest any great familiarity with Rahim or his work. The fact that Sabhā Vilās included a whole section entitled barvai would lead us to expect a larger representation from Rahim, since this was unquestionably a verse form that he is well known for writing in. Yet, none of the barvais in the Sabhā Vilās can be ascribed to Rahim.

From Lalooji Lal, let us move to 19th-century Raja Shiva Prasad, another seminal figure in the history of the emergence of modern Hindi literature.14 Amongst Raja Shiva Prasad’s influential works is an anthology

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who, following Saroj, says, “It is difficult to distinguish between the works of this poet and those of his illustrious namesake.”18 The Misra Bandhu We encounter Rahim in greater detail in another important anthology of poetry, Misra Bandhu Vinod (1913). Vinod was composed by Ganesh Bihari, Shyam Bihari and Sukhdev Bihari, three brothers known collectively as the Misra Bandhu and distinguished for writing everything they did together.19 Vinod has a detailed entry for Rahim and summarizes the extant knowledge of him in the early 20th century. It also has an unambiguous assertion that “despite being a Muslim he was a complete devotee of Krishna and Ram”. However, in its knowledge of Rahim’s works, we find that the Misra Bandhu Vinod is neither very comprehensive nor accurate. Nagarshobhā and the barvais, apart from those in the Barvai Nāyikā Bhed, are prominent omissions in works attributed to Rahim. The Rāsapanchādhāyī is wrongly attributed to Rahim, as it was actually the work of the Krishna-bhakt poet Nanddas in the 1580s.

Clearly, over the 19th century, the complete Rahim was yet to emerge. But some knowledge about him was spreading and had advanced incrementally over the century. In the early decades of the 20th century, three seminal contributions would fill in greater historical and literary detail. This part-historical, part-literary endeavour was prompted by and took place amidst a wider nationalist and linguistic ferment in north India, in the late 19th and early decades of the 20th century.

The Rise of Rahiman The Nagari Pracharini Sabha, or the Society for the Propagation of the Nagari Script, was the crucible of this ferment. The establishment of the Sabha in 1893 in Varanasi constitutes a milestone in the promotion of Hindi and its literature as a whole and not just the movement to establish the primacy of the Devanagari script, which was the society’s declared aim. The Sabha drew to it a body of committed and gifted scholars and public personalities. It led the movement for the official recognition of Hindi and its use in government and legal proceedings. Simultaneously, it conducted searches for old Hindi manuscripts and published numerous books on history and literature, including compilations of the great Braj Bhasha and Avadhi poets of medieval India. The principal objective was to establish the antiquity of Hindi and, by subsuming within it older Braj Bhasha and Avadhi literary traditions, demonstrate the richness of its literature and the seamless continuity of its traditions from ancient times. The demand for the recognition of Hindi as the principal official and literary language had, however, integral to it the parallel implication of the displacement of Urdu. The divide between the two grew over the second half of the 19th century and progressively crystallized in the 20th century, as literary competitiveness was increasingly influenced by growing communal tensions.

The three protagonists I detail now, in the resurrection of the literary Rahim, were all intimately associated with the Nagari Pracharini Sabha. Henceforth, the elevation of Rahim due to their efforts becomes indistinguishable from the larger Hindi movement, and indeed from the great divide between Hindi and Urdu.

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Celebrating Rahim

Munshi Deviprasad Munshi Deviprasad came from a family of Kāyasthas (a Hindu scribal caste), a long-time resident of Delhi. In the service of the Mughal court, their knowledge of Persian, accountancy and calligraphy defined their status. The decline of the Mughals witnessed the dispersal of the family to smaller princely states. Deviprasad was to join the service of Tonk State but had to leave, apparently on account of his advocacy of Hindu causes.

The efforts of his family led to him receiving an offer for a post in Jodhpur in 1879, where he remained until his death in 1923.20 The Jodhpur government employment did not wholly define Munshi’s activities or range of interests. Social reform, the advancement of the status of women and an abiding interest in historical research and antiquities broadly formed one side of his preoccupations. The pursuit of Hindi and its propagation formed the other. In the commingling of history and literature, we can see the full range of Munshi’s endeavours. He wrote some 50 books and almost a hundred essays in Hindi. His most important historical works include Shāh Jahānnāma, Aurangzebnāma, and the lives of Sher Shah and Akbar. Munshi Deviprasad was equally a prodigious writer in Urdu, with some 27 publications in it. These include several histories, writings on education and social reformist texts. His earlier works were principally in Urdu, before he moved to using both the Urdu and Devanagari scripts and, finally, only the latter. In some sense, then, the move from the “Muslim” princely state of Tonk to the “Hindu” Jodhpur was more than geographical. The advancement of Hindi and Devanagari, both locally and nationally through the Nagari Pracharini Sabha, was to become an inseparable part of the Munshi’s personality in Jodhpur.

Interest in history with a commitment to the establishment of Devanagari Hindi as the national language of India is common between Deviprasad and many other historians of the time, notably, Gauri Shankar Ojha, Visvambar Nath Reu and Kasi Prasad Jaiswal. The establishment of Hindi in the Devanagari script was, in the eyes of its protagonists, equally an act of historical research and discovery as one of political and public advocacy. The search for old manuscripts, establishing the identity and biographical details of poets, tracing

‘Abdur Rahim’s interest in literature, his patronage of poets and translation activities was influenced by the vibrant culture at the Mughal court. An illustration from the imperial Razmnāma depicts the Mughal Emperor’s translation bureau where Hindu and Muslim scholars collaborated to translate Mahābhārata from Sanskrit to Persian. Opaque watercolour, ink and gold on paper; 30 x 17 cm; Artist: Dhanu; 1598–99. Free Library of Philadelphia, Rare Book Department, mcom00181, Call Number: Lewis M18; Philadelphia, PA. (Previous pages) Akbar, Todar Mal, Tansen, Abu’l Fazl, Faizi and ‘Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan in a court scene (16th century A.D.).

Panel No. 45, Outer Gallery of Parliament House, New Delhi; Artist: M. K. Sharma, Jaipur; Artist Supervisor: O. P. Sharma, New Delhi; Image courtesy: HarperCollins Publishers (India).

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that he did not do for any other language… Rahim did not see Hindi as being lesser than Arabic, Persian, Turkish…”. There is then a logical extension to “From the name of incarnations, the glory of Mahadeva and Ganga…etc., it becomes clear that ‘Abdur Rahim’s sentiments towards Hindus were not one of dislike. There was great respect for the Hindu religion and he was a follower of Vaishnavism and a devotee of Krishna…”.26 Language devotion thus fused with religious identity, in much the same way as we saw with Brajratna Das. The Decade of Rahim and Later Brajratna Das’s Rahiman Vilās and Mayashankar Yajnik’s Rahim Ratnāvali are only the most prominent and comprehensive of the many works that have led to the 1920s being described as the “decade of Rahim”.

Through the 1920s, we have an explosion of titles on Rahim. Rahīm (Allahabad, 1921) by Ramnaresh Tripathi, Rahiman Chandrikā (Benaras, 1924) by Ramanath Lal “Suman”, Rahiman Shatak (Mathura, 1924) by Navanita Chaturvedi, Rahīm Kavitāvali (Lucknow, 1926) by Surendranath Tiwari, Rahiman Shatak (Benaras, 1926)

by Lala Bhagvandin, Rahiman Shatak (Allahabad, 1927) by Siva Sankara Misra, Rahiman Vinod (Allahabad, 1928) by Pandit Ayodhya Prasad Sharma, Rahiman Lālitya (Calcutta, 1928) by Anantsharan Ojha “Lalit”, Rahiman Sudhā (Patna, Allahabad, 1928) by Anup Lal Mandal, and so on. This plethora of titles had many impulses, apart from the general nationalist mood sweeping the country—the expansion of Devanagari publishing houses, the commercial demands of a growing market for books to be used as texts in schools and colleges and the requirements of academic curricula for which Rahim’s dohās, with their moral aphorisms in Hindi, were eminently suited. Not surprisingly, many of these publications concentrate almost entirely on Rahim’s dohās.

This abundance of books in the 1920s gave certain completeness to characterizations of Rahim as a symbol of Indianness. Rahim as a literary or historical figure is thus overtaken by Rahim as national icon, and this status was derived in considerable measure due to his ethical and devotional verses. An illustration of this is found in a work of Seth Govind Das, a prominent political and literary figure in central India between the 1920s and the 1970s. Govind Das combined an active political career in the Indian National Congress with an equally strong commitment to the cause of Hindi as India’s national language. Amongst his many works of literary criticism, drama, historical fiction and poetry is a play entitled Rahīm. First published in 1955, the play presents an assessment of Rahim’s life as one pulled by contradictory impulses—a desire for political and military power befitting an important courtier, but also the yearning for the life of a recluse who finds fulfilment in religious devotion and literature, in brief emulating the life of Tulsidas. For Govind Das: “Despite being a true Muslim, Rahim was a devotee of Ram and Krishna and the spirit of this devotion suffuses his entire poetry… Although a Muslim, Rahim was a real follower and practitioner of Indian culture (Bhāratiya Sanskriti). Because of this, his heart had tolerance, and for this reason he viewed Hinduism and Islam, Hindus and Muslims equally.”27 In all these works, Rahim’s devotional poetry is viewed as an indisputable evidence of his Indianness. As communalism, separatism and Partition took their toll on the national psyche, the synthesis believed to have (Facing page) Battle scene from Razmnāma or the Persian translation of Mahābhārata commissioned by ‘Abdur Rahim.

Gouache on paper; 34 x 22.6 cm (inside margins); c.1616–17. British Museum, Museum number: 1981.7-3.01. © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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been achieved in Akbar’s court became a roadmap for India’s future, and in this, Rahim became a national icon. For instance, a large mural adorns the walls of India’s Parliament illustrating a scene from Akbar’s court, where Todar Mal, Tansen, Abu’l Fazl, Faizi and Rahim loom large with Akbar in the foreground.28 The story of the 19th–20th century engagement with Rahim would, however, be incomplete if it is limited to the endeavours of litterateurs participating in the movement for the elevation of Devanagari Hindi as the national language of India. There is a divergent and often opposing trajectory in Urdu. Figures of eminence in Urdu literary and historical writings, such as Muhammad Hussain Azad, Shibli Nomani and Syed Sabahuddin ‘Abdur Rahman of the Dar-ul-Musanafeen in Azamgarh, too, engaged with Rahim from the late 19th century onwards, either by enigmatically passing over Rahim’s Hindi poetry or by contesting the provenance of his devotional verse. For reasons of space, it is not possible to trace out here this parallel but largely opposite process.29 However, in both these trajectories, we see the influence of forces far removed from Mughal history and derived from 19th and 20th centuries’ inter-communal relations and literary contestations.

Neither set of protagonists in this divide appears willing to explore the possibility that poetic form or literary convention in themselves need not amount to either devotion or apostasy. Revisiting this contest, the reality remains that the lack of convergence between these epistemic communities has resulted in the rich contours of Rahim’s life suffering from neglect, as the totalizing requirements of each has created an afterlife that has overshadowed his life story and biography.

1. These are eight verses of love (madan) based poetry.

2. Literally “beauties of a city”, this composition describes the characteristics of different city-women.

3. A couplet that has the inverted format of a dohā (the mātrā construction being 11, 13 for each pāda of a line, which is the reverse in the dohā). The Shringār Sorthā is based on shringār or love themes. For a detailed treatment, see Rupert Snell, A Braj Bhāṣā Reader (London: SOAS, 1991), 20–21.

4. The Nāyikā Bhed refers to a rhetorical description of different kinds of heroines. See Rupert Snell, A Braj Bhāṣā Reader, 41.

5. Barvai is a more compact couplet than the dohā containing 12, 7 mātrās in each line. However, this tiny and rhyming couplet is composed to deliver complex messages. ibid., 21, 41.

6. Dohās are couplets with 13, 11 mātrās in each line. Snell, 21.

7. The standard biography of ‘Abdur Rahim’s life, political and literary career is C.R.Naik, ‘Abdur Rahīm Khān-i-Khānān and his Literary Circle (Ahmedabad: Gujarat University, 1966). For a more recent treatment of Rahim as a collector and patron of books and paintings, see John Seyller, Workshop and Patron in Mughal India: The Freer Ramayana and Other Illustrated Manuscripts of ‘Abd al-Rahim (Washington: Artibus Asiae, 1999). For Rahim’s poetical works in Hindi, see, Balkrishan Ankichan, Bhartiya Nīti Kāvya Paramparā aur Rahīm (Delhi: Alankar Prakashan, 1974); Samar Bahadur Singh, Abdur Rahīm Khānkhānān (Jhansi: Sahitya Sadan, 2018, V.S.[A.D. 1961]) For the Nāyak-Nāyikā Bhed tradition, see Rakesh Gupta, Studies in Nayak Nayika Bhed (Aligarh, 1967), 397–98, 257 etc. For barvai, see Rupert Snell, “Barvai metre in Tulsīdās and Rahīm,” in Studies in South Asian Devotional Literature: Research papers 1988-91, ed. Entwistle Alan and Francoise Mallison (New Delhi: Manohar, 1994), 373–405.

8. Mulla ‘Abdul Baqi Nihavandi, Ma’āsir-i-Rahīmī, Vols. I–III (Bibliotheca India Series; Vol. I, 1924; Vol. II, 1925; and Vol. III, 1927).

9. Farid Bhakkari, The Dhakhirat-ul-Khawanin of Shaikh Farid Bhakkari, trans. Ziyauddin A. Desai (New Delhi: Idara-i-Adabiyat, 2003); Shah Nawaz Khan, Ma’āthir-ul-Umarā, trans. H. Beveridge (New Delhi: Low Price Publications, 1999 [reprint]).

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Celebrating Rahim

InterGlobe Foundation sees equality in all and aspires to touch lives by dedicating itself to building partnerships and supporting sustainable programmes that bring together resources, expertise and vision in critical areas such as environmental change, job creation and the preservation of Delhi’s heritage.

InterGlobe Foundation, with a vision to promote India’s heritage and culture, sees a great opportunity in undertaking efforts in promoting India’s tangible and intangible heritage and culture. At InterGlobe Foundation there is a belief that heritage conservation not only seeds a sense of identity in communities inhabiting historic districts but also fulfills our responsibility of passing on India’s rich heritage into the hands of generations to come. With these objectives in mind, InterGlobe Foundation joined hands with Aga Khan Trust for Culture for conservation of Rahim’s tomb and revival of his literary works through publications, exhibitions and films. The conservation initiative at Rahim’s tomb is an endeavour to revive the art and artistry of a person of such magnified stature and to ensure a new lease of life for the grand mausoleum that inspired the Taj Mahal.

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Celebrating Rahim

Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan Edited by Shakeel Hossain Co-editor & Research Manager Deeti Ray 258 pages, 93 illustrations and a music CD 8.66 x 11” (220 x 280 mm), hc ISBN: 978-93-85360-27-5 ₹2950 | $60 | £40 Septemeber 2017 • World rights

Across urban conservation projects worldwide, AKTC aims to leverage the unique transformational power of culture to bring development and improve the quality of life for communities that often have a rich cultural heritage yet live in poverty.

Since 2007, AKTC has been implementing the Nizamuddin Urban Renewal Initiative as a non-profit public–private partnership between Archaeological Survey of India, South Delhi Municipal Corporation, Central Public Works Department and a host of private agencies such as the InterGlobe Foundation. The effort has three broad components: heritage conservation, improving the quality of life and environment development of historic urban landscapes.

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Aga Khan Trust for Culture is the cultural agency of the Aga Khan Development Network. Founded and guided by His Highness the Aga Khan, AKDN focuses on health, education, culture, rural development, institution-building and the promotion of economic development. It is dedicated to improving the living conditions and opportunities for the poor, without regard to their faith, origin or gender. AKDN works in over thirty countries around the world, employing 80,000 people.

In the late 16th century, Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, one of the ‘navratans’ or nine most important courtiers in the court of Emperor Akbar, built a grand mausoleum for his wife—inspired by the architectural style of Humayun’s Tomb and, in turn, inspiring the Taj Mahal. On his death, Rahim—the great poet, warrior, patron—was also buried in this grand structure. Since 2014, Aga Khan Trust for Culture, with the support and partnership of InterGlobe Foundation and the Archaeological Survey of India, has been engaged in the conservation of this tomb.

Coupled with the conservation effort, this book aims to celebrate the associated intangible heritage.

Essays by noted scholars shed light on Rahim’s contributions to literature, arts, architecture, culture and Indian society. This legacy includes not only the famed dohe that Rahim is today most well-remembered for but also much else that over time had been lost to us. The March 2017 ‘Celebrating Rahim’ festival and this book present, for the first time ever, Rahim’s genius, compassion, cultural legacy and continued relevance for today’s times.

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