Every year, around World Population Day, one hears the most terrifying statistics of what we have done to our unborn daughters and their mothers for the selection of sons at the cost of their sisters.

One building in India has no fear of being neglected or forgotten, and that is the tomb of Salim Chisti in Fatehpur Sikri in Uttar Pradesh. For many, this tomb of a world-famous saint is intimately connected with the wish of a parent for the birth of a son.

Akbar, the third Mughal emperor, had no heirs at the age of 27, since many had died in infancy. Akbar visited the saint many times, walking the path to his abode barefoot, with piety and grace. It was the Sufi saint, Shaikh Salim Chisti, who predicted that the emperor would have not one, but three sons.

The following year, in 1569, the future emperor, Jahangir, was born in the village of Sikri, 38 kilometres east of Agra. He was named Salim in deference to the saint to whom Akbar believed he owed this gift of an heir.

When Salim was just one year old, Akbar started the design for the fortified city of Fatehpur Sikri that was more splendid than any before it. The plan, as we read it today, is an example of the triumph of geometry in the service of the arts. The entire plan of the buildings and the layout make it a mathematical joy.

Saintly elegance

These are the very own words of Jahangir, who describes Fatehpur Sikri in his memoirs: “My revered father regarded the village of Sikri, my birthplace, as fortunate for himself, made it his capital, and in the course of 14 years the hills, deserts, which abounded in beasts of prey, were converted into a magnificent city, comprising numerous gardens, elegant edifices and pavilions of great beauty. After the conquest of Gujarat, the village was named Fatehpur Sikri, the City of Victory.”

Akbar also situated Fatehpur Sikri near the Chisti site as a mark of respect and a desire to be “near” the saint, as was customary in his family and as Humayun had done when he built his tomb near the Dargah of Nizamuddin in Delhi.

The revered saint died in 1572 and was buried in the jewel-like tomb in the large open courtyard of the Jami mosque at Fatehpur Sikri. This most elegant structure stands on the north side of one of India’s most beautifully designed mosques, perfect and graceful in its details. We are told that Akbar himself respectfully swept the floor of the painted prayer hall of the mosque.

The tomb, now dressed in white marble, has the most exquisite marble white jalli screens of fine lattice-work that make this building a gem in its own right and a masterpiece of architecture perfect in every pro- portion.

Magic of faith

The marble jalli screens are of unmatched quality anywhere in the world. The screens are linked together by a series of ornate marble arches with branching serpentine brackets. The jalli screens create a corridor full of light and air between the outside space of the mosque and the inner tomb chamber. The jallis filter light as it enters the corridor, creating ever-changing patterns on the floor and diffusing the light and the view of the mosque outside.

The tomb of Salim Chisti is still a venerated place of pilgrimage, especially for childless couples who come and tie a thread on the lattice windows of the tomb chamber as a reminder of an unfulfilled desire; untying it when their wish is granted, believing that, like Akbar’s wish, theirs too will be granted.

The artistic beauty of Fatehpur Sikri is matched only by the magic of the historical story of Akbar and, as a consequence, of the faith of people from all parts of India, even today. For those of us in the field of conservation of monuments, there are many strange and wonderful reasons why people assign significance and meaning to a historic site.