Book Review: ‘Badshah, Bandar, Bazaar’ by Jagjeet Lally

Book Title: Badshah, Bandar, Bazaar
Author: Jagjeet Lally
Publisher: Penguin Business
Number of Pages: 232
ISBN: 978-0143466284
Date Published: Oct. 20, 2025
Price: INR 287

Book Review

Jagjeet Lally’s “Badshah, Bandar, Bazaar” offers a fresh and engaging perspective on the Mughal Empire, placing the bazaar at the heart of historical transformation rather than focusing solely on emperors and dynasties. Lally skillfully demonstrates that Mughal power was not just maintained by force, but by contracts, coins, and everyday economic activity, making the book especially relevant as India reassesses its economic past. By foregrounding merchants, artisans, bankers, and middlemen, the narrative brings forth a dynamic vision of Mughal society in which ordinary people contribute as much to the empire’s vitality and eventual decline as royalty.

The book refuses to leave commerce as an abstraction and instead immerses the reader in vivid vignettes: coin testers at work, banias advancing credit, bustling trade caravans, and judicial disputes in the bazaar. Lally’s exploration of the Mughal legal system, especially under Aurangzeb, reveals how the state’s legitimacy depended on facilitating prosperity and predictability for its subjects. Through compelling storytelling, readers see how Mughal princes, nobles, and commoners alike depended on robust rural and urban production cycles and expansive networks of trade, resulting in a period known as “Pax Mughalica”—a time of notable stability and prosperity.

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Ultimately, “Badshah, Bandar, Bazaar” is written for a lay audience unafraid of complexity, offering new insight into how Mughal India operated from the ground up. With evocative detail and historical nuance, Lally argues that Mughal decline was shaped by ongoing negotiations with local and regional powers, mirroring the logic of its rise. The book’s greatest strength lies in its ability to turn conventional wisdom on its head, inviting readers to look past familiar imperial narratives and discover the histories of those who lived and thrived within the world the Mughals made.

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