Colored Portrait of Begum Samru

Begum Samru is the story of the dancing girl who ditched the Burqa and other norms of propriety to head a very successful mercenary Army of 4000 troops and ruled for 55 glorious years. One can appreciate this fact more as it was during this time that the Mughal Empire was crumbling and everyone wanted to take advantage of this vacancy. In fact, such was her streak of success that people thought that she practiced witchcraft. She must have cut quite the figure at four and a half feet, wearing a turban and mounted on a horse as she led her troop into the battlefield.