The founder of the Mughal Dynasty of South Asia, Zaheer od-Din Babar

Compiled By: Syed Ali Shahbaz
On February 23, 1483 AD, the founder of the Mughal Dynasty of South Asia, Zaheer od-Din Babar, was born in the Central Asian town of Andijan, in the Ferghana Valley in what is now Uzbekistan. He was the eldest son of Omar Sheikh, ruler of Ferghana, the son of Abu Sa’eed (and grandson of Miran Shah, the son of the Turko-Mongol Conqueror, Amir Timur).From his mother’s side Babar was the grandson of Yunus Khan, the ruler of Moghulistan and a direct descendent of the fearsome Genghis Khan.
Like the rest of the Timurids, Babar had embraced Persian language and culture, although his mother tongue was Chaghatai Turkic. In his obsession to take control of Samarqand he lost Ferghana as well, and after years of wondering with his band of Turkic and Tajik troops, who twice lost the battles to the Uzbek leader, Mohammad Shaibani Khan, he accepted Shah Ismail I, the founder of the Safavid Dynasty of Iran as suzerain (after having spurned the demands of the Ottoman sultan, Selim I to yield to his authority).
This alliance enabled him to chalk out an independent kingdom in Kabul. Later with Iranian military help he conquered the northern parts of the Subcontinent by defeating the Afghan king, Ibrahim Lodhi of Delhi at the Battle of Panipat in 1526 and then routing the huge Rajput-Afghan joint army of Rana Sanga in 1527 to establish the Mughal Empire. Babar died in 1530 at the age of 47 in Kabul where his tomb is situated in a garden outside the city. He was accomplished poet in both Persian and his Turkic, and had devotion for the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).