Person · Wakil-i-mutlaq, 1707

Asad Khan

Held the office of Wakil-i-mutlaq under shah-alam-i-bahadur, per vol. I, p. 37.

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Wakil-i-mutlaq

Asad Khan was raised above the ordinary run of Mughal ministers under Aurangzib. Irvine's register describes the office created for him: "Asad Khan was offered the position of Wakil-i-mutlaq, that is, Vice Emperor, an office superior to that of Wazir, which had been held in the reign of Shah Jahan by Asaf Khan that Emperor's father-in-law. The office of Wazir had been already promised at Lahor to Munim Khan" (vol. I, p. 37). The arrangement kept him formally senior to the working prime minister while leaving day-to-day administration to Munim Khan.

The ministry under Bahadur Shah

The same division of offices persisted into the following reign. The page sets out the ministry as it stood: "As already stated the high office of Wakil-i-mutlaq was held by Asad Khan, Alamgir's Wazir; Munim Khan Khan Khanan was Wazir or Prime Minister; Zulfiqar Khan Nusrat Jang, son of Asad Khan, first Bakhshi" (vol. I, p. 40). Father and son thus held two of the great offices of state at once, Asad Khan's own long survival keeping him at the head of the ministry into extreme old age. The pages opened for this pass do not carry an account of his death.

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