THE PIGEONS

As a child Salim played with Mehr-un-nisa, who later came to be known as Nur Jahan.

As a child, Mehr-un-nisa was a naughty girl. She used to tease Salim a lot.

Akbar was very fond of her and if she did anything naughty, she would hide behind Akbar.

One day Salim asked her to hold two of his precious pigeons while he went for some work.

When he came back, he saw that she had only one pigeon in her hand.

Salim exclaimed, "Just one pigeon! Where is the other pigeon?"

Mehr-nu-nisa replied, "It flew away."

Salim angrily said, "What! it flew away! You knew that it was my favourite pigeon. Why didn't you take care of it?

How did it fly away?"

Mehr-nu-nisa innocently said, "Like this," and she let th other pigeon fly away too.

When Salim got angry on losing his favorite pigeons, Mehr ran and hid behind Emperor Akbar.

Mehr -un-nisa

Salim loved Mehr-un-nisa a lot. He wanted to marry her.

Emperor Akbar was also fond of her, but he thought that Salim's marriage to Mehr would be against all forms of propriety as she was a refugee's daughter.

So Akbar ensured that Mehr was married elsewhere while Salim was away from the court on a conquest.

Akbar came to Mehr and said, "I have dreams for Salim. He has to be the Emperor. So it is better that you leave him and marry elsewhere.

Mehr respected Akbar so she promised him that she wouldn't marry Salim.

Mehr-un-nisa, at the age of seventeen, was married to Sher Afghan, who was a governor under the Mughals. He too was a Persian immigrant.

Mehr-un-nisa has a daughter from him called Ladli Begum.

After Akbar's death when Salim was crowned as th emperor, Sher Afghan thought that he and his wife should go and pay their respect to the new emperor. On their way, Sher Afghan was killed but Mehr was safe.