In addition to the admission in the Badhshanama and Tavernier’s noting that the Taj mansion was purposely chosen by Shah Jahan for Mumtaz’s burial there is another piece of important coraborative evidence and that is a letter written by Prince Aurangzeb himself & his own father emperor Shah Jahan.

If Mumtaz is taken to have died around 1631 as is commonly believed the period of 22 years gives us 1653 A. D. as the year in which the Taj Mahal stood completed spick and span massive and firm in all its grandeur and majesty. But we have on record a letter from Aurgazed of a year earlier i.e. of 1652 A.D. scotching that claim. That letter is recorded in at least three Persian (contemporary) chronicles titled Adaab-e-Alamgir (pg. 82 of the manuscript with the Nation Archives, New Delhi) Muraqqa-e-Akbarbadi, and Yaad Gaarnama. In that Aurangzeb reports to Emperor Shah Jahan that while proceeding from Delhi enroute to assume charge as governor in 1652 A.D. Aurangzeb happens to visit his mother Mumtaz’s burial place in Agra.

Aurangzed states in his letter “I reached (Akbarbad i.e. Agra) on Thursday, the 3rd of Moharam Mukram on arrival I called on Badshahzada Jahanbani (i.e. the elder prince Dara) in the garden of Jahanara. In that splendorous house surrounded by springtime verdure I enjoyed their company.

Next day it, being a Friday I went to pay my homage to the sacred grave which had been laid in your majesty’s presence. Those (i.e. cenotaph, grave etc.) are in good shape strong and solid but the dome over the grave leaks at two or-three places during the rainy season on the northern side. Similarly several royal rooms on the second storey, and the four smaller cupolas and the four northern portions and the secret rooms and the tops of the seven storey ceilings and the jamposh of the bigger dome have all absorbed water, through seepage and drip water during the current monsoon season at several places. All these I have got temporarily repaired But I wonder what will happen to the various domes, the mosque, the community hall etc. during subsequent rainy seasons.

They all need more elaborate repairs, I feel that the second storey roof needs to be opened up and redone with mortar, brick and stone. Repairs to the smaller and bigger domes would save these palatial buildings from decadence. It is hoped that your majesty will look into the matter and order necessary action.

The Mehtab garden is innundated and looks desolate. Its scenic beauty will reappear only when the floods recede. That the rear portion of the building complex remains safe is a mystery. The stream keeping away from the rear wall has prevented damage.

Thus from Aurangazeb’s noting it is apparent that in 1652 A.D. itself the Taj Mahal building complex had become so ancient that it needed elaborate repairs. What was carried out in 1652 A.D. was not the completion of a new building but the repairs of an old building complex. Had the Taj Mahal been a building completed in 1653 it would not have fallen to the lot of a chance, lone visitor like Aurangzeb to notice the defects and order repairs in 1652. The defect should have been noticed by the thousands of workmen and hundreds of court supervisors who were supposed to be building the Taj Mahal.

Another very significant point which emerges from Aurangzeb’s letter is that had the Taj really been completed in 1653 A.D. the principal workmen would have been fired for having wasted millions of rupees on a building complex which leaked and cracked even a year before its (ficticious) completion. Aurangzed could have thundered anathema against those workers, in his letter to Emperor Shah Jahan. Instead he coolly mentions the fact of carrying out some urgent repairs. The obvious reason is that the building was very old and the labourers carrying out the repairs could not be blamed for leakages in the building.

None of the histories seem to have taken notice of this letter. [The Persian text of the letter was published in Muraqqa-i-Akbarabad in 1931 (on page 43)] which proves that during Shah Jahan’s reign itself the Taj complex was so old as to need immediate repairs.