she had been with her husband as he was fighting a campaign in the deccan plateau. her body was kept at burhanpur in a walled pleasure garden known as zainabad. a popular story says that on her deathbed, her last wish to the emperor was for a symbol or a monument to their love. she also asked her husband not to marry anyone else. the emperor promised immediately. her body was buried in the taj mahal in agra. it is also belived that mumtaz mahal died, aged 40, while giving birth to gauhara begum in burhanpur, the cause of death being postpartum hemorrhage, which caused considerable blood-loss after a painful labour of thirty hours. contemporary historians note that princess jahanara, aged 17, was so distressed by her mother's pain that she started distributing gems to the poor, hoping for divine intervention and shah jahan, himself, was noted as being "paralysed by grief" and weeping fits.