page_title: Akbar II
section_title: Reign
hierarchical_section_title: Akbar II / Reign
caption_attribution_description: English: The Tombs of Shah Alam and Akbar II," a gelatin silver photo, c.1890's
context_page_description: Akbar II, also known as Akbar Shah II, was the penultimate Mughal emperor of India. He reigned from 1806 to 1837. He was the second son of Shah Alam II and the father of Bahadur Shah II.
  Akbar had little de facto power due to the increasing British influence in India through the East India Company. He sent Ram Mohan Roy as an ambassador to Britain and gave him the title of Raja. During his regime, in 1835, the East India Company discontinued calling itself subject of the Mughal Emperor and issuing coins in his name. The Persian lines in the company's coins to this effect were deleted.
  Akbar II is credited with starting the Hindu-Muslim unity festival Phool Walon Ki Sair. His grave lies next to the dargah of 13th century Sufi saint Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki at Mehrauli.
context_section_description: Emperor Akbar II presided over an empire titularly large but in effect limited to the Red Fort in Delhi alone. The cultural life of Delhi as a whole flourished during his reign. However, his attitude towards East India Company officials, especially Lord Hastings, to whom he refused to grant an audience on terms other than those of subject and sovereign, although honourable to him, increasingly frustrated the British, who regarded him as merely their pensioner. The British therefore reduced his titular authority to 'King of Delhi' in 1835 and the East India Company ceased to act as the mere lieutenants of the Mughal Empire as they did from 1803 to 1835. Simultaneously they replaced Persian text with English text on the company's coins, which no longer carried the emperor's name.
  The British encouraged the Nawab of Oudh and the Nizam of Hyderabad to take royal titles in order to further diminish the Emperor's status and influence. Out of deference, the Nizam did not, but the Nawab of Awadh did so.
  He is also known to have bestowed the title Nawab upon the Nawab of Tonk and Nawab of Jaora.
  Akbar II appointed the Bengali reformer Ram Mohan Roy, to appeal against his treatment by the East India Company, conferring on him the title of Raja. Ram Mohan Roy then visited England, as the Mughal envoy to the Court of St. James. Ram Mohan Roy submitted a well-argued memorial on behalf of the Mughal ruler, but to no avail.
  His grave lies next to the dargah of the 13th century, Sufi saint, Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki at Mehrauli, Delhi in a marble enclosure, along with that of Bahadur Shah I, (Shah Alam I) and Shah Alam II.
caption: The tombs of Akbar II and his father Shah Alam II in Zafar Mehal, Mehrauli, Delhi
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