My good friend, the exceptionally talented writer and historian William Dalrymple, is someone I have known since the late 1980s, when he and his charming wife Olivia, a fine painter herself, lived in a small barsati in Golf Links in New Delhi. William was then slim with a full head of hair, and researching his book on Delhi, City of Djinns. It was our common passion for the history and culture of the old city that brought us together. Olivia specialized in painting watercolours of the old monuments of Delhi, and I am privileged to have one of her beautiful portraits of Humayun’s tomb.

My good friend, the exceptionally talented writer and historian William Dalrymple, is someone I have known since the late 1980s, when he and his charming wife Olivia, a fine painter herself, lived in a small barsati in Golf Links in New Delhi. William was then slim with a full head of hair, and researching his book on Delhi, City of Djinns. It was our common passion for the history and culture of the old city that brought us together. Olivia specialized in painting watercolours of the old monuments of Delhi, and I am privileged to have one of her beautiful portraits of Humayun’s tomb.

William has since written many best-selling books, but the one that I personally identify the most with is The Last Mughal, his brilliant biography of Bahadur Shah Zafar, the last Mughal emperor. I am fascinated with the life of this man, whom fate had ordained to be the last ruler of the Mughal dynasty.

Although history was against Bahadur Shah, he was perhaps the best example of the Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb. This syncretic Indo-Islamic culture was one of the significant consequences of Islamic rule in India. During his rule (1837-57), the Mughal empire had shrunk to the outskirts of Delhi; the British were the de facto power; the king was a titular head paid a sum of some eleven and a half lakhs rupees a year; and the once beautiful palace, the Red Fort, also called the Qila-i-Mualla, the Fort of Exalted Dignity, built by Emperor Shah Jahan when the Mughal empire was at its zenith, was in visible ruin.

But in spite of this, Zafar—normally portrayed by historians as weak and non-descript—was an exceptionally talented man. In the Delhi of his times, he was the presiding cultural icon. He was the touchstone of correct etiquette, a fine marksman and horseman, and an accomplished poet, adopting the takhallus (pen-name)‘Zafar’ as his nom de plume. He was a scholar who authored a learned commentary on the great poet Saadi’s Gulistan.

Fond of music, he composed khayals and thumris under the penname ‘Shauq Rang’. He was an accomplished calligraphist and a patron of painting. It was largely court interest which kept the Delhi school of painting alive, nurturing artists such as Raja Jivan Ram and Hussain Nazar. Notwithstanding his empty coffers, he somehow found the means to express the Mughal love for gardens, laying out one in Shahdara and one below the palace wall. He played chess, enjoyed kite-flying, and liked bird fights. His own bulbul—Bulbul-e-hazar dastan—was greatly admired by the public. Bahadur Shah liked good food—mangoes, in particular, became much in vogue because of the royal weakness for them—and beautiful women. He was poor but dignified, politically impotent but still the Jahanpanah—Emperor.

Zafar was famous for the Urdu mushairahs or poetic soirees he held at the Red Fort palace. Ibrahim Zauq was the officially designated royal ustad or tutor, a fact resented by Mirza Ghalib, who was generally considered the city's Poet Laureate. One day, the story goes, as Zauq was walking to the palace, Ghalib loudly remarked: Bana hai shah ka musahib, phire hai itrata ('But a courtier of the king, see how he struts about). The taunt was blunt, and as expected, Zauq complained to Zafar. Soon enough, Ghalib was summoned to the palace.

A convincing explanation would have to be given as it was an attack on the king’s ustad, and denial would be futile. Such was the genius of Ghalib, that on the way to the palace, he composed his famous poem, Har ek baat pe kehte ho tum ke tu kya hai, which while subtly chiding the king on his partisanship, completely changed the context of his insult to Zauq:

To all I say, you rejoin:

Pray, what is this?

You tell me, for conversing,

What style is this?

When the body was burnt

The heart too must have;

You rake the ashes now,

What search is this?

My envy is but this,

That he has your ear;

Fear of the enemy’s mischief

What else—except for this?

I have no strength for speech

And even if I did

With what hope would I say:

My desire is this

But a courtier of the king

See how he struts about

Ghalib’s prestige in the city

What else—if not for this?

(Translation is mine)

In the changed context there was nothing that His Highness could take umbrage at; but he, Zauq, and the entire city knew the truth.

After the defeat in the great 1857 Revolt against the British, in which Zafar led both Hindus and Muslims, he was imprisoned by the British in his own palace, and after a summary trial banished to Rangoon for life, thus ending the Mughal Empire. He died there, in an alien land, in 1862. I have had the opportunity to pay my homage at his grave. One of his couplets will forever continue to haunt us:

Kitna hai badnaseeb Zafar daphn ke liye

Do gaz zameen bhi na mili ku-e-yaar mein

How wretched is your fate, Zafar

That for your burial

You could not even get two yards of land

In the land of your beloved

Pavan K Varma is an author, diplomat, and former Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha). Just Like That is a weekly column where Varma shares nuggets from the world of history, culture, literature, and personal reminiscences with HT Premium readers. The views expressed are personal