Nawabs of Bhopal

The Begums

Bhopal was founded by Dost Mohammad Khan, an Afghan soldier in Mughal service, in the wreckage of Aurangzeb's empire. Its distinction came later: from 1819 to 1926 the state was ruled by four Begums in succession — Qudsia, Sikandar, Shah Jahan and Sultan Jahan — a continuous female sovereignty of over a century, unmatched anywhere in India.

Sikandar Begum rode, drilled her own troops and made the pilgrimage to Mecca, leaving an account of it that is among the earliest Hajj travelogues by an Indian woman. Shah Jahan Begum built extensively, including the Taj-ul-Masajid, one of the largest mosques in India. Sultan Jahan Begum founded schools and a college, wrote on education and on women's health, and was the first chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University.

Sanchi and after

The Buddhist stūpas at Sanchi lie in Bhopal territory, and the Begums funded their conservation — Shah Jahan Begum and Sultan Jahan Begum paid for the work John Marshall directed, and for the museum and the guidebook. That the great Buddhist monument of central India was rescued at the expense of a Muslim ruling house is a fact worth stating plainly.

Bhopal's accession to India in 1949 was reluctant and delayed; the last nawab had hoped for independence. In 1984 the city suffered the Union Carbide gas disaster, the worst industrial accident in history.