Alamgir II

Alamgir
Emperor of Mughal Empire
Reign	1754-1759
Born	1699
Died	1759
Predecessor	Ahmad Shah Bahadur
Successor	Shah Jahan III

Silver rupee minted between 1817 and 1835, in the name of Mughal Emperor Alamgir II.

Alamgir II (عالمگير ۲) (1759 - 1699) also known as Aiz-ud-din was the 16th Mughal emperor of India between 1754 and 1759. He was the son of Jahandar Shah and the tenth of the "later" or "lesser" Moghuls under whose rule the Empire disintegrated, and was finally wound-up by the British who, although technically agents of the last Emperor, sent him into exile following the so-called Mutiny of 1857. Having spent most of his life in prison, Alamgir II was unprepared for rule when the Vizier, Ghazi-ud-Din placed him on the throne after deposing the 15th Emperor. Faced with powerful enemies, he oversaw the beginning of the end of his empire as the British gained control of Bengal (in 1757), the Maratha's were encroaching from the South and the Sikhs were becoming increasingly independent in the Punjab. From 1756, when he invaded and sacked Delhi,Ahmad Shah Durrani of Afghanistan dominated from the North and Alamgir was nothing more than a puppet ruler. In 1759, when Shah Durrani again invaded to try to curb the power of the Maratha's (who had seized the Punjab in 1758), Ghazi-ud-Din, fearing that Alamgir was more of a liability than an asset, killed the man he had made ruler. According to McLynn, Alamgir's assassination in 1759 left the British as masters of the world, "The assassination of Alamgir II in 1759 really marks the end of the Mugha story ... the result was to leave south India wide open to European penetration."

Life

Aziz-ud-Din, the second son of Jahandar Shah, was raised to the throne by Ghazi-ud-Din after he deposed Ahmad Shah Bahadur in 1754, whom he blinded and and later killed (1775). During Ahmad Shah's reign, the Persian ruler, Nader Shah had sacked Delhi (1738-9) and carried off both the Peacock Throne and the Koh-i-Noor diamond, both symbols of Moghul prestige and so much treasure that Persians subsequently enjoyed a three year holiday from taxation. The Vizier, whose own grand-father ruler the State of Hyderababd from 1720 until his death in 1748, was effectively the ruler of the Empire under both Ahmad Shah and Alamgir II. Since he could not claim the throne himself, he tried to control it by ruling through weaker men who had the advantage of belonging to the Moghul dynasty.

Rule

On ascending the throne, he took the title of Alamgir and tried to follow the approach of Aurangzeb Alamgir. At the time of his accession to throne he was an old man of 55 years. He had no experience of administration and warfare as he had spent most of his life in jail. He was a weak ruler, with all powers vested in the hand of his Wazir, Ghazi-ud-Din Imad-ul-Mulk. In 1756, Ahmad Shah Durrani invaded India once again and captured Delhi and plundered Mathura. Marathas became more powerful because of their collaboration with Ghazi-ud-Din, and dominated the whole of northern India. This was the peak of Maratha expansion, which caused great trouble for the Mughal Empire, already weak with no strong ruler.

The relations between Alamgir and his Wazir, Ghazi-ud-Din, by this time had gotten worse. Alamgir was murdered by Nawab Mir Nawab Mir Ghaziudin Khan Bahadur (grandson of Asaf Jah I).

Legacy

He was briefly succeeded by Shah Jahan III, a grandson of Aurangzeb by his second son, Muhammad Kam Baksh) who was deposed the very next year and replaced by Shah Alam II, Alamgir's own son. Defeated by a British army in 1764 which left him homeless and a fugitive, Shal Alam had little choice but to grant the British virtual sovereignty of the province of Bengal with the Treaty of Allahabad of 1765. According to Schimmel, Shah Alam spent the rest of his rule as a "puppet of the leader of the Maratha's, Sindhia, who enjoyed the support of the British" and before his death, he was impoverished in his own palace; "foreign visitors reported that they could hear cries of hunger coming from the quarters of the ... princes."

Map of the Moghul Empire showing greatest extent before its decline following Aurangzeb's 48 year reign (1707).

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Eraly, Abraham. 2004. The Mughal throne: the saga of India's great emperors. London: Phoenix ISBN 9780753817582
• Hansen, Waldemar. 1972. The Peacock Throne; the drama of Mogul India. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston ISBN 9780030002717
• McLynn, Frank. 2004. 1759: the year Britain became master of the world. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press ISBN 9780871138811
• Richards, John F. 1993. The Mughal Empire. The New Cambridge history of India, I, 5. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press ISBN 9780521251198
• Robinson, Francis. 2007. The Mughal emperors and the Islamic dynasties of India, Iran and Central Asia, 1206-1925. New York: Thames & Hudson ISBN 9780500251348

Preceded by: Ahmad Shah Bahadur

Mughal Emperor 1754–1759

Succeeded by: Shah Jahan III

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