Of the many individuals who attempted to become Ilkhan after the death of Abu Sa'id, Togha Temür was the only one who hailed from eastern Iran, and was the last major candidate who was of the house of Genghis Khan.

ʿAli Qushji, noting Togha Temür's relation to Genghis Khan, proposed naming him Ilkhan, and most of the princes of eastern Iran were convinced to accept him as sovereign.

There was dissension within his ranks, however; several local princes resented the power of Shaykh ʿAli over the would-be Ilkhan, and hated the economic policies that he had been in charge of implementing as governor of Khurasan.

As a result, two of his supporters, namely Arghun Shah, who was chief of the Jauni Qurban tribe, and ʿAbd-Allah b. Mulai, who held Kuhistan, withdrew from the campaign at Bistam.

Together they occupied the old Ilkhan capital Soltaniyeh, but in June 1337 Ḥasan Buzurg met and defeated them on the field, forcing Togha Temür and Shaykh ʿAli to evacuate the region.

Togha Temür and Arghun Shah defeated and executed him in the fall of that year, making sure that Khurasan remained free of the Jalayirids.

He sent a letter to Togha Temür, offering him the hand of his own Ilkhan puppet, the princess Sati Beg, in marriage with the prospect of an alliance between the Chobanids and Khurasanis.

The regular Khurasani army had been decimated, leaving Togha Temür dependent on his and his allies' tribal forces, which were insufficient to conquer the west, although he continued to be recognized as ruler in much of Khurasan, Gurgan, and Mazandaran.

The Sarbadars came to power by revolting against one of Togha Temür's subordinates, ʿAlaʾ-ad-Din Muḥammad, as a result of increasingly harsh tax demands.

[13] When they attacked Arghun Shah's Jauni Qurban in 1340, however, Togha Temür was prompted to send his forces against them, but they were defeated in the ensuing conflict, and both ʿAlaʾ-ad-Din and ʿAbd-Allah b. Mulai were killed.

[16] Togha Temür and his supporters fled to the Jajrud valley, to the south of Amol (in Mazandaran), whose ruler, the Bavandid Ḥasan II, was his vassal.

Togha Temür was not helped by the death of his ally Arghun Shah, who died in 1345 or 1346, after which the Jauni Kurban ceased to support him against the Sarbadars.