Why will Tiger Slayer resonate with today’s readers? What is it that you wish to tell especially young readers about Nur Jahan’s legacy?
Designed for young adults, Tiger Slayer (Penguin India) is a remix of my previous biography, Empress, The Astonishing Reign of Nur Jahan, in which I launched Nur Jahan, for the first time, as a Mughal co-sovereign. A remarkable history of a figure, who grew to be powerful over time. Nur Jahan was not from the royal family and did not inherit the right to rule.

A widowed mother, she married the fourth Mughal Emperor at 31, his 20th and last wife — who went on to become a co-sovereign with him. The one woman we can count among the Great Mughal (male) rulers of India. Nur designed marvellous buildings and gardens, championed social justice, especially in the name of the poor and women, hunted killer tigers to protect her subjects, even went to war to rescue her husband from captivity.