Bahadur Shah Zafar

Bahadur Shah Zafar, the last Mughal emperor, was also a poet, calligrapher and patron of Delhi’s literary culture. Born in the Red Fort, he studied Arabic and Persian and had a deep interest in poetry, music, calligraphy and Sufism. He adopted Zafar as his pen name and received poetic guidance first from Zauq and then from Ghalib.

His political realm was limited, but his court remained an important gathering place for poets in the final period of Mughal Delhi. After the war of 1857, the British put him on trial and exiled him to Rangoon. The deaths of family members, the destruction of his city and cultural world, and the sorrow of exile became inseparable from his historical memory.

Zafar’s ghazals are known for simplicity, sadness and a sense of transience. Deprivation, separation, longing for home and spiritual acceptance are prominent themes, giving voice to the decline of an entire age. He died in Rangoon in 1862, far from Delhi.