Babur, seated left, founded the Mughal dynasty in India in 1526. This Mughal miniature from the late 16th century or early 17th century is at the Guimet Museum, Paris, France. Encarta

Babur (Mongolian, “tiger”), real name Zahiruddin Muhammad (1483-1530), founder of the Mughal dynasty of India and its first emperor (1526-1530). A descendant of Tamerlane on his father's side and of Genghis Khan on his mother's, Babur was 12 years old when he succeeded his father as sovereign of Fergana (now in Uzbekistan). He established himself at Kābul in 1504, having lost Fergana the year before, and from there made repeated attempts to conquer Samarqand, the capital of his Timurid ancestors. That failing, he turned southeast, to India, where the Delhi sultanate was crumbling. In 1526 he led his fifth raid into India and met Sultan Ibrahim Lodi (reigned 1517-1526) in the Battle of Pānīpat. Although Lodi commanded an army of 100,000 men and 100 elephants against Babur's 21,000, superior tactics as well as artillery made Babur victorious. During the next four years he conquered most of northern India and established his capital at Āgra, but he died in 1530 before he could consolidate his rule. He was succeeded by his son, Humayun. Babur was said to be a man of compassion, who would not allow his troops to plunder or to harm innocent people. Highly cultured, he wrote poetry both in Persian and his Turkic mother tongue, and he also left a volume of memoirs that has been widely translated. His name is also spelled Babar and Baber.

Akbar (1542-1605), third Mughal emperor of India (1556-1605), generally considered the true founder of the Mughal Empire. The son of Emperor Humayun, he was born in Umarkot, Sind (now in Pakistan), and succeeded to the throne at the age of 13. He first ruled under a regent, Bairam Khan, who recaptured for the young emperor much of the territory usurped at the death of his father. In 1560, however, Akbar took the government into his own hands. Realizing that Hindu acceptance and cooperation were essential to the successful rule of any Indian empire worthy of that name, he won the allegiance of the Rajputs, the most belligerent Hindus, by a shrewd blend of tolerance, generosity, and force; he himself married two Rajput princesses. Having thus secured the Hindus, he further enlarged his realm by conquest until it extended from Afghanistan to the Bay of Bengal and from the Himalayas to the Godāvari River. Akbar's supreme achievement, however, was the establishment of an efficient administrative system that held the empire together and stimulated trade and economic development. Almost as notable was his promulgation of a new religion, the Dini-Ilahi (Divine Faith), a blend of Islam, Brahmanism, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism. Although this attempt failed, Akbar surrounded himself with learned men of all faiths and, although illiterate himself, made his court a center of arts and letters. (Encarta)

Amritsar Massacre or Jallianwala Bagh Massacre, the shooting of unarmed Indian demonstrators by the British army on April 13, 1919, an incident that contributed to the downfall of the British Indian empire. The events of the Amritsar Massacre arose from the British government’s struggle to maintain control over its Indian colony in the face of a growing movement for Indian independence after World War I (1914-1918). During the war, India contributed extensively to Britain's war effort, and Indian political leaders expected democratic concessions and greater opportunities for self-government after the war ended. However, the British government in India was worried about subversive activities that could destabilize its rule, because it had faced German-supported terrorist disturbances during the course of the war. In response to these concerns, a commission headed by Sir Sydney Rowlatt drafted legislation in 1919 that empowered the British colonial government to search and arrest people without warrant, detain suspects without trial, and try people before courts without jury or right of appeal. These acts, called the Rowlatt Acts, were strongly opposed by the Indian National Congress, the Muslim League, and other Indian nationalist groups. To protest enforcement of the acts, Congress leader Mohandas Gandhi began a series of nationwide strikes. In Amritsar, a holy city of the Sikhs and the second largest city of Punjab province, two general strikes and mass demonstrations were held at an open field in the center of town on March 30 and April 2. In response, the local government arrested and deported two middle-class political organizers on April 10. The arrests led to massive rioting, looting and burning throughout the city, police shootings, and the murder of five British residents. Unable to control the situation, the local government called on the military for help. British Brigadier General Reginald Dyer arrived in Amritsar on April 11 and assumed complete control of the city. As thousands of pilgrims were arriving to celebrate a festival at Amritsar's Golden Temple on April 13, Dyer issued a proclamation prohibiting processions or gatherings. The pilgrims, many of whom had not heard of the proclamation, gathered that evening along with thousands of protesters to listen to speeches at Jallianwala Bagh, a walled garden. Dyer reacted by leading a column of troops to break up the demonstration. On his orders, without warning, the soldiers blocked the only entrance to the garden and fired for ten minutes into the defenseless crowd of some 10,000 men, women, and children, killing at least 379 people and wounding about 1200 (though some sources put the number of deaths much higher). Dyer later testified that he intended to teach a "moral" lesson to the populace through this action. The tragedy polarized opinion throughout India and Britain. Some hailed Dyer as "Savior of the Punjab," while others believed he exemplified the worst kind of imperialist arrogance. Gandhi, horrified by the slaughter, suspended the movement of civil disobedience, but the Indian National Congress held its annual conference in Amritsar later that year to commemorate the martyrs of the freedom struggle. A British parliamentary committee that investigated the shooting was extremely critical of Dyer's action and of the entire Punjab administration. Dyer was forced to resign his military commission in March 1920, a decision later supported after debate in the British House of Commons. In July 1920, however, the House of Lords deplored the decision, and a funding campaign to support the general raised a total of 26,000 pounds from a wide range of citizens in Britain. In India, the shootings and subsequent government responses convinced Gandhi and millions of others that British rule was corrupt and that India must become independent. (Encarta)