- In full:
- Nāṣir al-Dīn Muḥammad Shah
- Original name:
- Roshan Akhtar
- Born:
- August 7, 1702, Ghaznā [now Ghaznī], Afghanistan
- Died:
- April 6, 1748, Delhi [India] (aged 45)
- House / Dynasty:
- Mughal dynasty
- Notable Family Members:
- son Aḥmad Shah
- Role In:
- Battle of Karnal
Muhammad Shah
Muhammad Shah (born August 7, 1702, Ghaznā [now Ghaznī], Afghanistan—died April 6, 1748, Delhi [India]) was an ineffective, pleasure-seeking Mughal emperor of India from 1719 to 1748.
Roshan Akhtar was the grandson of the emperor Bahadur Shah I (ruled 1707–12) and the son of Jahan Shah, Bahadur Shah’s youngest son. Jahan Shah was killed in 1712, early in the succession struggle following Bahadur Shah’s death that ultimately was won by Farrukh-Siyar (ruled 1713–19), Roshan Akhtar’s cousin. In early 1719 Farrukh-Siyar was imprisoned and later killed by the powerful Sayyid brothers ʿAbdullāh and Ḥusayn ʿAlī, and in September, after the quick deaths (from disease) of two others whom the brothers had installed on the throne, they made Roshan Akhtar emperor (as Muhammad Shah).
In 1720 the assassination of Ḥusayn ʿAlī and the defeat of ʿAbdullāh at the battle of Hasanpur (southwest of Delhi) liberated Muhammad Shah from effective Sayyid control. In 1721 he married the daughter of Farrukh-Siyar. After Nizam al-Mulk Asaf Jah, who was the court-appointed vizier, had left court in disgust in 1724, the provinces steadily slipped out of imperial control: Sadat Khan, the nawab of Oudh (now Ayodhya), became practically independent there; the Afghan Rohilla tribesmen made themselves masters of Rohilkhand (southeast of Delhi); Bengal paid only an annual tribute to Delhi; and the leaders of the Marathas, under the peshwa Bajirao I, made themselves lords of the regions of Gujarat, Malwa, and Bundelkhand and, in 1737, raided Delhi. In 1739 Nādir Shāh of Iran took advantage of Mughal neglect of the North-West Frontier areas (now in Pakistan) to rout the Mughals at Karnal and occupy Delhi. In March 1748 Muhammad Shah defeated the Afghan ruler Ahmad Shah Durrani, at Sirhind, thus achieving a success in his final years.
