'The tomb of Auranzebe (He desired in his will that not more than 8 rupees...

The simple grave of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, ruled 1658-1707, comprises a stone slab on a wooden platform. As a devout Sunni Muslim, Aurangzeb followed the Prophet Muhammad's doctrine that a grave should be unadorned and open to the sky. The tomb lies within the courtyard of the shrine of the Sufi saint Shaikh Burham-u'd-din Gharib (died 1331). This disciple of Nizam ud-Din Auliya of Delhi was buried at Khuldabad near Aurangabad, the Mughal capital in the Deccan, and a long-standing centre of Sufi practice and thought. A cotton sheet, as shown in the drawing here, usually covers the grave of the emperor. Lord Curzon and the Nizam of Hyderabad had a marble railing erected around the grave in 1911.