When the emperor became seriously ill in 1657, Aurangzeb began a two-year-long maneuvering for power. By 1658, he had eliminated his brothers, declared himself emperor and imprisoned his ailing father. He immediately put an end to the patronage of court artists, and revoked many of the policies of religious tolerance that had been in place since Akbar's reign, hoping to impose orthodox Islam on all of India. A hero to the Muslims, he was an oppressor to the Hindus.

Shah Jahan died eight years after Aurangzeb took the throne. Acknowledging the deep love between his parents, Aurangzeb buried his father next to Mumtaz Mahal. "My father entertained a great affection for my mother;" he wrote, "so let his last resting place be close to hers." The emperor's cenotaph, placed to the side of his queen's, is the only apparent imbalance in the entire Taj Mahal complex.

Strained by a diminishing treasury and Aurangzeb's rigid governance, anarchy and dissension reigned, and the empire began to crumble. When Aurangzeb died at the age of eighty-nine in 1707, he was buried in a small tomb by the side of a road.