The women of Mughal Harem by Dr. Sugandha Rawat
My Ratings- 4/5 stars
The book has attractive cover that drew my attention towards it. I liked the concept so I picked this up. I will briefly summarise the concept of the book. We all are familiar with Mughal dynasty. The word Harem means “Sacred” or “Forbidden”. Author has started the book with explanation of these words. The first chapter is “The wandering Mughals” in that author has mainly discussed about Harum of Babur and Humayun. The book mainly focuses on conditions or importance or states of women during that area. I liked how author has quoted little facts here are there such as
“Unlike Hindustan, unmarried daughters of the imperial family held a great political clout in Persia.5 As far as Mughals of India are concerned they did love their mothers, sisters, wives and daughters but political power was a man’s preserve.”
“Even the most powerful Mughal woman of all times Nurjahan could only get to become the de facto ruler of her people.”
I liked the part or division about “Condition of Women in India on the Eve of Mughal Invasion” the most. It was quite interesting read. Next chapter is about Akbar. That was quite fascinating as I knew few details. But author has mentioned all incidents and facts in well details. Author ha seven quoted references for that too. I liked that part. It shows that author has done good amount of research and then penned this down. The language of the book is simple and easily understandable. Overall quite interesting and informative for me. Good one.
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