Was Aurangzeb, the Mughal emperor of India, the most evil human being in history?

No story of the Mughal Dynasty can be completed without talking about the cruelty of Aurangzeb. Mughal rule was established in India by Timurid prince Babur in 1526. Babur defeated Ibrahim Lodi in the first battle of Panipat in 1526. He invaded India when the Lodi dynasty was ruling Delhi and surrounding areas and defeated Ibrahim Lodi to capture Delhi. This was one of the earliest battles where gunpowder firearms and field artillery were used. “Gunpowder,” as it came to be known, is a mixture of saltpeter (potassium nitrate), sulfur, and charcoal. Together, when these materials get mixed they will burn rapidly and explode as a propellant. Chinese monks discovered the technology in the 9th century CE. However, it took a few more centuries to perfect the formula and the proportion. Cutting the long story short. Mughals had a great technical advantage in the battle against the Indian rulers. Aurangzeb took the Mughal Empire to its largest size. And he resorted to all possible cruelty to achieve this.

The Mughals ruled India for roughly about 250 years. Akbar and Aurangzeb together ruled for about 100 years. Both ruled about 49 years each to be specific. So both occupy a large chapter when we look at Indian history by the sheer length of ther tenure. Cruel? Yes, they were like any major medieval-period ruler. Aurangzeb in particular was no exception. Rather he was on the extreme side. That’s why n the beginning of my answer I mentioned that Babur was from the Timurid clan. According to modern scholars, Timur’s campaigns caused the death of an estimated 17 million people, which was roughly 5% of the world’s population at the time. In that sense, his army was a killing machine. In his lifetime, Timur conquered more than anyone else except for Alexander the Great.

Aurangzeb possibly wanted to follow his ancestors' DNA spreading the Mughal Empire. During the large part of Akbar’s rule, the Mughal Empire covered only about 30% of India. Shahjahan It expanded it to about 50%. Aurangzeb took the Mughal Empire to its zenith and controlled about 80% of India. Though this was for a very brief period (less than a decade). His cruelty or killing spree was in consonance with expanding Mughal rule.

However, he is evaluated more in the backdrop of the religion Hindu-Muslim. Go back to the emperor Ashoka period. Alone in the Kalinga war, the casualty figure was around 200000–250000. And this was without any firearms or weapons of mass destruction. The Maurya Empire also reached its zenith during Ashoka’s rule only. You see this killing business has a direct connection with the expansion of empire and consolidation of power. Banvir killed the innocent son of Dhatri Panna and the elder brother of Rana Uday Singh to make sure holding power. Ajat Shatru imprisoned his father for the empire. Ashoka gave up his killing spree and his empire fell immediately after his death. Most Indian kings failed despite being great warriors for not being ruthless killing machines

In the medieval period possibly killing was the only way to sustenance for a kingdom or empire. Governance and administration were largely dependent on killing and public displays of brutality. This continued throughout the 2nd World War. Unfortunately, it's continuing even today. Look at the indiscriminate bombing of Gaza. Muslim rulers never followed any honor codes like Chivalry or Bushido or our very own Rajput honor code.

However, when we evaluate the Mughal rule in India inclusive of that of Aurangzeb, we can not ignore the economic prosperity of India under Mughal rule. Especially when we know that India had almost a quarter share of world GDP under the Mughal rule. Not that the Mughal rule created the robust economic base of India. India was an economic superpower since the 1st century AD and continued to be so till the beginning of the 18th century. Aurangzeb despite all his not so conducive image managed to hold the economic stability and progress for half a century. Aurangzeb was reasonably successful in providing good administration and a conducive atmosphere for the economy to prosper. He didn’t let the economy of the vast nation go down even though he was constantly fighting wars. This could be some silver lining in his reign.

One more thing people need to take note that India stopped bleeding financially after the Mughals came to power. Before the Mughals, all the invaders came to loot India. However, the Mughals settled down here. Not only did looting out of India stop but internal development also started. Whereas earlier every time somebody invaded India a trail of devastation was left behind. Definitely, casualties occurred in the internal wars. Yes, we had casualties before that even when we were constantly fighting wars with external enemies in addition to internal wars.

However, I do not have readymade data to compare whether the pre-Mughal or Mughal period was better in terms of casualties. Though the constant wars fought by Aurangzeb had a disastrous effect on the Mugla empire. In his desire to expand the Mughal empire, Aurangzeb went too far to exhaust his resources and manpower. The result was that the Mughal empire started collapsing after his death.

Matthew White estimates that about 2.5 million of Aurangzeb's army were killed during the Mughal–Maratha Wars (100,000 annually during a quarter-century), while 2 million civilians in war-torn lands died due to drought, plague, and famine. This campaign also had a ruinous effect on Mughal Treasury, and Emperor's absence led to a severe decline in Governance in Northern India. Marathas started expanding northwards shortly after the death of Aurangzeb, defeated the Mughals in Delhi and Bhopal, and extended their empire up to Peshawar by 1758.

After Aurangzeb's death his son, Bahadur Shah I, repealed the religious policies of his father and attempted to reform the administration. However, he could rule only for five years. After he died in 1712, the Mughal dynasty began to sink. I said violence, cruelty inflicting atrocities, and killing had a big role to play in the medieval ruling. Meanwhile, the Indian economy started losing its shine as India shrunk into political instability. Marathas were great warriors but they never had the ingredients to build a great empire.

Any way coming back to your question - Was Aurangzeb the most evil human being in history? I don’t think so. When we evaluate a ruler we have to look at the macro picture taking into consideration all angles. And I definitely don’t find him the most evil human being in history. He was cruel & ruthless - definitely yes. But that alone wouldn’t be enough to be the most evil human being in history. The search for the most evil human being in history would be a long one. And I am possibly not qualified to do that. I know too little.