After Mumtaz Mahal's untimely death in 1631, the 17-year-old Jahanara was entrusted with the charge of the royal seal and conferred the title of Padshah Begum (First lady) of the Mughal Empire, even though her father had three surviving wives.

She was Shah Jahan's favorite daughter and she wielded major political influence during her father's reign, and has been described as "the most powerful woman in the empire" at the time.

She is well known for a biography of Sheikh Mu’in ad’-Din Chishti, ‘Munis al arwah’ whom she believed to have been the highest of the Sufi saints in India and her spiritual master, despite having lived four centuries before her.

[4] Jahanara's early education was entrusted to Sati al-Nisa Khanam, the sister to Jahangir's poet laureate, Talib Amuli.

The women had access to the late Emperor Akbar's library, full of books on world religions, and Persian, Turkish and Indian literature.

From a carefree girl, she was pushed into government politics, overseeing domestic and international trade, and even mediating courtiers and foreigners to communicate with the emperor, and was involved in the tasks of resolving family disputes.

As French traveller and physician François Bernier writes in his memoirs,Travels in the Mogul Empire,"Shah Jahan reposed unbounded confidence in his favourite child; she watched over his safety, and so cautiously observant, that no dish was permitted to appear upon the royal table which had not been prepared under her superintendence.

"In 1644, when Aurangzeb angered his father, the Badshah, Jahanara interceded on her brother's behalf and convinced Shah Jahan to pardon him and restore his rank.

There, she held her own court where she entertained nobles, ministers, officers, clerics and ambassadors, and discussed government affairs or their requests.

It is recorded that the Dutch embassy, in attempting to get permission for trade, had taken note of the importance of Jahanara’s approval, in swaying her father Shah Jahan.

Shah Jahan ordered that vast sums of alms be given to the poor, prisoners be released, and prayers offered for the recovery of the princess.

[14] During her illness, Shah Jahan was so concerned about the welfare of his favourite daughter, that he made only brief appearances at his daily durbar in the Diwan-i-Am.

[citation needed] After her recovery, Shah Jahan gave Jahanara rare gems and jewellery, and bestowed upon her the revenues of the port of Surat.

She organized almsgiving on important state holidays and religious festivals, supported famine relief and pilgrimages to Mecca.

Jahanara Begum made such progress on the Sufi path that Mullah Shah would have named her his successor in the Qadiriyya, but the rules of the order did not allow this.

In it, she regarded him as having initiated her spiritually four centuries after his death, described her pilgrimage to Ajmer, and spoke of herself as a faqīrah to signify her vocation as a Sufi woman.

[37] In June 1658, Aurangzeb besieged his father Shah Jahan in the Agra Fort, forcing him to surrender unconditionally, by cutting off the water supply.

[38] On Aurangzeb's ascent to the throne, Jahanara joined her father in imprisonment at the Agra Fort, where she devoted herself to his care until his death in 1666.

She never shied from arguing with the Emperor in order to prove her point, especially when it concerned his enforced austerity measures or his practice of religious intolerance.

[3] Jahanara re-entered politics and was influential in various important matters and had certain special privileges which other women did not possess: an independent life with a private palace of her own, the power to issue Hukm or Farman (an imperial order that was only the emperor's right), to attend the council (shura or diwan), to receive audiences in her palace, and to mediate between officers, politicians, and foreign kings and the emperor.

She also argued against Aurangzeb's strict regulation of public life in accordance with his conservative religious beliefs, and his decision in 1679 to restore the poll tax on non-Muslims, which she believed would alienate his Hindu subjects.

[41] Jahanara’s influence in Mughal administration resulted in several rumors and accusations of an incestuous relationship with her father, Shah Jahan.

The inscription on the tomb reads as follows: بغیر سبزہ نہ پو شد کسے مزار مرا کہ قبر پوش غریباں ہمیں گیاہ و بس است Allah is the Living, the Sustaining.

The mortal simplistic Princess Jahanara, Disciple of the Khwaja Moin-ud-Din Chishti, Daughter of Shah Jahan the Conqueror May Allah illuminate his proof.

Jahanara Begum's caravanserai that formed the original Chandni Chowk, from Sir Thomas Theophilus Metcalf's 1843 album.