Watch this 2 minute video to know the glorious history of the Amer Fort situated on the hills of Jaipur which is full of royal charm

Amer Fort, one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites, has been in the news for the past few days. French President Emmanuel Macron is also arriving here on a visit on Thursday. Another interesting information related to this historic fort of Jaipur is also being discussed. Actually, Raja Bharmal here was the first Hindu ruler who married his daughter to a Mughal ruler.

Before independence, there were 19 princely states and 3 states in Rajasthan, which were combined to form Rajputana (Rajasthan). Different princes used to have different kings. Among them was Raja Bharmal of Amer princely state. Raja Bharmal was the first Hindu ruler who married his daughter to a Mughal ruler. Before this, no Hindu king had established a matrimonial relationship with a Muslim ruler. To save his kingdom, Bharmal accepted the subordination of the Mughal ruler Akbar and married his daughter to Akbar. Bharmal became the king of Amer by removing his nephews.

Raja Bharmal or Biharimal became the ruler of Amer in 1547. Earlier, the king here used to be Ratan Singh, who was Bharmal's nephew. Bharmal made a plan to remove his nephew from the throne. Bharmal told his other nephew i.e. Ratan Singh's brother Askaran that Ratan Singh has a luxurious nature. He should remove him and become the ruler.' Askaran obeyed uncle Bharmal and killed his brother Ratan Singh and himself became the king of Amer. After some time, Bharmal removed Askaran from the throne as a murderer and himself became the king of Amer.

Raja Bharmal, who got the throne by getting one of his nephews killed and implicating the other as the murderer, had to face many challenges to save the kingdom. Dethroned Askaran sought help from Sher Shah Suri's son Salim Shah and Salim Shah sent his advisor Haji Pathan with an army to attack Amer. To save his kingdom, Raja Bharmal convinced Haji Pathan by giving him a lot of money and also convinced Askaran to take a large part of the Narwar (Madhya Pradesh) region. Thus the war of Amer was averted and Bharmal's kingdom was saved.

Since many years ago Amer state used to belong to King Prithvi Singh. Prithvi Singh's grandson Shuja also wanted to regain the throne of Amer. Shuja approached Mirza Sarfaruddin, the governor of Mewat, who was the governor appointed by Akbar. Shuja asked for help from Sarfaruddin, Mirza Sarfaruddin agreed to help and started moving towards Amer. To avoid this war, King Bharmal of Amer gave a lot of money to Sarfaruddin and pledged his three men with Sarfaruddin. When Sarfaruddin agreed, Bharmal pledged his son Jagannath, Raj Singh, son of Askaran and Khagal, son of Thakur Jagmal of Jobner.

In 1556, Salim Shah's advisor Haji Khan prepared for war to seize the throne of Narnaul's ruler Majnu Khan. When Haji Khan's army started moving towards Narnaul, Amer's Raja Bharmal intervened. Since Bharmal had convinced Haji Khan by giving him immense wealth during the attack on Amer, they developed good relations with each other. After the treaty between Haji Khan and Majnu Khan, Bharmal's relations with Majnu Khan became even better. Amer's Raja Bharmal's first meeting with Akbar was through Majnu Khan.

As mentioned earlier, Shuja wanted to gain the throne of Amer through Emperor Akbar's governor Safaruddin. If Shuja met Akbar directly through Safaruddin, Bharmal would have to leave the throne as soon as he got Akbar's help. Bharmal wanted to meet Akbar directly to save his kingdom. In such a situation, Bharmal met Emperor Akbar through Majnu Khan even before Shuja. When Emperor Akbar was going to Ajmer Sharif, he stopped at Sanganer for a few days on the way. Then King Bharmal of Amer went to Sanganer on 20 January 1562 and accepted Akbar's subordination.

On accepting Akbar's suzerainty, Raja Bharmal of Amer had to marry his daughter Harkhu Bai to Akbar. While returning from Ajmer Sharif, Bharmal married his daughter Harkhu Bai to Akbar on 6 February 1562 at Sambhar. This was the first occasion when the daughter of a Rajput king was married to a Mughal ruler. After marrying Akbar, Harkhu Bai came to be known as Mariam Uz Zamani. Many historians condemned this decision of Raja Bharmal but some historians and writers also praised Raja Bharmal. Historians like Dr. Tripathi and Gopinath Sharma called this decision of Raja Bharmal a correct and far-sighted step. Akbar and Mariam Uz Zamani's son Salim later became the Mughal emperor by the name of Jahangir.