History

The history of Aurangabad can be traced back to 1610, when the former Abyssinian slave and then prime minister of the Muslim kingdom of Ahmednagar, Malik Ambar established a city on the site of an old village called Khirki. His son Fateh Khan named the city he ruled over, Fatehpur in 1626.

Afterwards, when the control of the Deccan kingdoms passed into the hands of the Mughals, the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb renamed the city Aurangabad when he made it the foundation of his campaigns into the Deccan. Aurangzeb, the last great Mughal Emperor took over this city in 1653 and renamed it Aurangabad. Because of its strategic location in peninsular India, Aurangzeb made it his capital from where he tried to repress the rising power of the Marathas. After his death in 1707, the city was taken over by the Nizam of Hyderabad who retained control till it was merged with Maharashtra in 1956.

Modern Aurangabad retains an Islamic character and still maintains an old world charm. The city has put on a more contemporary face as a major industrial centre for pharmaceuticals, automobiles, textiles and electronics and as the access to the cave temples of Ajanta & Ellora.