ABSTRACT
The Mughal Collapse India was le* in chaos at the death of Aurangzeb in 1707. His military campaigns in the south and his continued persecution of Hindus and Sikhs had exhausted the treasury and brought most of the country to rebellion. His successors on the throne at Delhi were far weaker men. His three sons fought each other in the usual battles of the Mughal succession. A* er two and a half years of civil war, the victor was then virtually besieged by a Sikh uprising that swept the Punjab and by guerrilla warfare to the west and south. His death in 1712 brought on another struggle for the throne among his sons. & ey were outmaneuvered by a cousin, who captured the Sikh leader and slowly tortured him to death; but then he was poisoned by his own courtiers in 1719.
