The 17 th Century was a very different time. A golden age for some, it was a time when the world nosed’ Hindustan’ with bitternes and want. And every day, it seemed like, more and more of the firangis would come to the stupefying and bejewelled court of Jahangir, Padshah of Hindustan, hoping to curry favours and find a toehold. And in those heady days of influence and desire, it seemed beyond belief that these strange pale-faced foreigners could ever hold sway over the richnes that was India.
We all know how it works the British stole us. But numerous seem to have forgotten it was the Portuguese who began that evil activity, beginning of course, with Vasco De Gama.
” The Portuguese were the biggest force before the Dutch, and the English came to India. But they were not in the mainstream of the Mughal Empire ,” says Ira Mukhoty, speaking to The Better India. Mukhoty, the author of’ Daughters of the Sun ,’ a profile of Mughal maids, added that these immigrants were an inconvenience at best to Mughals.
A portrait of Maryam-uz-Zamani. Source: Wikipedia.
Portuguese power came from their ability to dominate the seas around India with their warships. They coerced a sort of’ hafta’ to let trade ships cross the Arabian Sea without occurrence, and thus uttered their abundance through this criminality.
They had curbed Goa by then and ran a few small towns across India. Most of their’ swap’ was sorted at the great port of Surat, in Gujarat.
But in three action-packed years, they would make a severe correct, and so anger a Mughal empress, that Surat would be shut, their schools across the empire locked, and their Jesuits be prohibited from practises their religion. Here is that story.
Harkha Bai: A troop to reckon with: 
‘Birth of a prince’, probably Salim. the woman in the centre, who has just given birth, almost certainly Harkha Bai. Museum of fine arts, Boston. Image Courtesy: Ira Mukhoty.
Harkha Bai, a reigning influence in Jahangir’s court, rose to power after her wedlock with Jalal-ud-din Muhammad Akbar.
A Rajput princess from Amber, she was to change the Mughal empire as the court knew it till that time.
For starters, she was the first empress to not convert to Islam after her sovereign nuptials. Secondly, though the imperial womenfolk during Babur and Humayun’s times had supremacy, force and interests beyond their domestic life, in Akbar’s era they remained shrouded in submissive secrecy.
Abul Fazl, Akbar’s biographer, did not even record their specifies, exclusively their titles. The identify’ Harkha Bai’ hence is largely “ve lost” the pages of record, where she would mainly be called’ Maryam-uz-Zamani'( Mary of The World)- a claim Akbar afforded her after she gave birth to their son, Salim.
After Akbar died, Salim, who crowned himself as Jahangir, would double-dealing the royal stipend of Harkha Bai and cause her a cavalry word of 12000 lovers. This is where Harkha Bai would rightfully come into her own.
Harkha Bai became one of only 4 senior officials from Jahangir’s court, and the only woman in that tetrad.
Nur Jahan hold an image of Jahangir.its from the Cleveland museum of skill. Image Courtesy: Ira Mukhoty.
Along with the cavalry at her dictation, the Rajput-Mughal royal also had the right to issue firmans. Harkha Bai was not dependent on her husband or son’s financial support. She owned owneds, would conduct trade and had the right to a payment for participating in the Harem( which was a mini-government in itself ).
While she was often given knacks in different forms of pearls, ornaments and horses, Harkha Bai had chosen market to be one of her most important revenue sources.
She was not only one of the wealthiest women on earth at that time but likewise had unparalleled influence over the’ Conqueror of The World’.
Mukhoty theorizes that Harkha Bai came from a generally conservative, nobility Rajput upbringing. But formerly she gained ability, she required it efficiently, benefiting farmers, merchants and the general trade of the area.
” She comes from a very talented family of generals and tycoons. The genes would have hardly missed Harkha Bai. Once she got the opportunity, the ability, rational, shrewd gal used it to her full capacity and for the benefit of the empire ,” Mukhoty shares.
The Portuguese, predominating the seas, could have learnt this lesson. But they didn’t. And that signal the very end of their force in Surat.
They burnt a ship, but their swap ran ablaze: 
The Portuguese delineate of India back in the 16 th and 17 th century. Source: Wikipedia.
One of Harkha Bai’s most prized belongings was’ Rahimi ‘, the largest Indian ship in the seas at that time and the ship that carried 600 -7 00 wanderers to Mecca every year.
( A Rajput princess with a Christian-influenced title take hundreds of Muslim devotees to their pilgrim every year. A slice of history lost in time .)
The freshly aggressive Portuguese demanded that every ship that voyages through their marine “territory” must carry their permission. This permission, much to the annoyance of the Mughals in India, was an image of the Christian Virgin Mary.
While Harkha Bai carried a entitlement represent’ Mary ‘, having to put up an image of the Christian figure was an insult to the Mughals. But, to maintain peace, the’ Rahimi’ more, carried the passed away the seas.
This large vessel, with a mast forty-four gardens in stature and carrying 1500 tonnes of goods was, as Manu Pillai’s book’ The Courtesan, the Mahatma and the Italian Brahmin’ indicates,” verye richlye ladened, beeing worth a hundred thowsande pounde .”
In 1613, the Portuguese hijacked this imperial carry and forced it to sail to Goa, together with the 700 parties on board.
The’ Rahimi’ had the pass, but the Portuguese were trying to gain leverage over the other European traders who seems to be frequent the Mughal empire. They figured that they could terrorise the Mughals into devoting them special treatment.
Adding oil to the fire( literally ), the Portuguese also placed the ship on fire.
But, they misjudged the Mughals. Instead than evading for their themes, who were on route for the Holy pilgrimage, to be liberated, the royals fired with fury. And reviled to the grand empress was an insult to the part empire.
Taking quick and stern action, Jahangir blocked all Portuguese trade from Surat- its important trade port.
He” hath similarly made guild for the clutching of all Portingals[ sic] and their goods within his territories ,” notes Pillai, supplementing another account on how Jahangir” sealed up their school openings and hath uttered line-up that their shall no more use the exercise of their religion in these portions .”
The Portuguese were once thought of as invincible by other European colonists. But this incident proved otherwise. They tried to atone for their gaffe, trying every deception in the book to offer peace.
Pillai greenbacks,” Rattled, the Portuguese made amends by offering three lakh rupees as compensation, but on the condition that the Mughals ostracize the English from Agra. Jahangir refused to blink …”
That stare would remain for a very long time, and the Portuguese turned away from Northern India, and the Mughal Empire, curtailing their activities to the Western coast of Southern India. Later demolished by Kannada rulers and the Marathas, they are able to never have any further influence on the titanic matters India would face over the centuries.
They receded to Goa, which they obstinately harboured until India lastly recaptured it in 1961.
With the extinction of Harkha Bai’s beloved send, they scripted their die in India.
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( Edited by Vinayak Hegde)
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