Chapter ISOCIO ECONOMIC BACKGROUND OF THE

DESCENDENTS OF THE NAWABS OF AVADH

INTRODUCTION

The culture and pattern of life which developed during the

magnificent era of Mughals, in the sixteenth century in Delhi during the

reign of Akbar, after its disintegration started to diffuse across the

Avadh (Oudh) as certain leading figures left Delhi and eventually found

a new home in Lucknow, where the independent court of Avadh was

established in 1753. The highly developed culture brought by them was

further refined in Lucknow to the level of sophistication scarcely

paralleled in any other Indo- Islamic society.

Pahle –Aap ‘after you’ was a phrase of welcome in old Lucknow

and especially imbued with the mannerism of Lucknow’s past usually

associated with the Nawabs. Arabic Nawab, plural of Naib: ‘Deputy’,

but used honorifically as a title. Under the Mughal government the title

of Nawab was prefixed to the name of a high official and the Viceroy or

Governor of a Province. At the time of disintegration of the Mughal

Empire, some of the Nawabs became independent rulers, hence the word

came to a common title for a Muslim sovereign in India. The title was

retained by the British Government of India who would confer it upon a

Muslim of a high rank or a dignitary without any office being attached

to it. In 1947, the Republic of India, abolished the creation of new

Nawabs of Avadh had the title prefixed to the names of all the members

of the family including the women. This practice continued among the

Muslim aristocracy in Lucknow, even after the demise of the ruling

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dynasty. It actually survived, however, as long as the feudal system

survived in Uttar Pradesh- that is until the British left India in 1947.

Since then, as expected, the process of evolution has transformed

the physical, social and cultural landscape of the people of Lucknow,

especially the Nawab families, whom ancestors were regarded as the

richest and endowed with mannerism and finesse. The culture of

Lucknow like that of other countries at different times and places

couldn’t retain its status quo. It required a constant re-examination of its

value system for the quest of new goals in order to infuse fresh vitality

in the society, which seems to have ended at the death of Nawab Saadat

Ali Khan. Its depreciatory effect over a period of time disturbed the

apparent tenous internal equilibrium people had acquired between

humans, morals and society. From the external side, a slight push from

the British proved to be a sufficient catalyst for its destruction. People

appeared to have neither the will not the strength to strip away the layers

of style before substance.

Hence the social institutions and the economic status kept on

degrading for the whole society and also of the Nawabs as well. Thus,

the present study on the socio economic profiles of the descendents of

Nawabs, traces the sociological analyses of their economic life. The

study also contributes to the linking of micro levels of analysis of

money management which has helped many Nawab families today to

manage their resources, when the whole world seems to be reeling under

severe economic stress, caused by recession. It traces facts like how the

researched families are able to survive and asking questions, for

instance- do they compromise on the education of their children or do

they make compromises on the health front? To an extent yes – Nawab

families reeling under extreme poverty make compromises on all fronts-

education, health and the quantity of food they eat daily. Each day of

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their life is spent in struggling to earn a living, so that the children at

home don’t sleep hungry and hence the big question remains, what keeps

them afloat? This study along with many other important issues tries to

focus the research on management of money resources while

maintaining their social life intact and healthy. Moreover it also

highlights some very pertinent issues related to the modern way of

living in an urban setting, which includes diaries of finances of the

descendents of Nawabs in Lucknow and tracks penny by penny how

specific households manage their money. The stories of these families

are often surprising and inspiring. Most households do not live hand to

mouth, spending what they earn in a bid to keep afloat. Instead they

employ financial tools many linked to informal social networks and

family ties.

Therefore, the present study attempts the following objectives:

1. To document the socio-economic profiles of the descendents of

Nawabs in Lucknow.

2. To analyze the social structure, economic cooperation and cultural

practices related to economic management.

3. To study the linking of micro levels of analysis of money

management by creating financial portfolios of specific households

among the Nawabs descendents.

4. Analyze the dimensions of social networks and ties among the

members of the neighbourhood where they sometimes even employ

financial tools, many linked to informal networks and family ties to

manage their money

Through the above objectives, an attempt has been made in the

following pages to document the problems the descendents are facing

today on their financial fronts along with their effective ways and social

methods employed by them to manage their monetary resources during

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such hard times where the whole world is reeling under intense stress.

Social networks and social capital are particularly very important in this

regard.

Research Area

Map 1.0. Research Area Ghazi Mandi and Raees Manzil in Lucknow,India

Map 2.0. (Research Areas Raees Manzil and Ghazi Mandi in Old Lucknow)

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Methodology

The most important sources for the findings reported in this

research are the words and actions of the poor themselves. In particular,

I have relied on a yearlong observation with indepth interviewing having

both structured and unstructured interview schedules. A total of sixty

households belonging to the descendents of Nawabs were selected on a

random basis from the list which was provided by the Office of

Husainabad Trust, which still maintains a register which holds the

names and addresses of all the surviving Nawabs of Lucknow. Two

research areas were selected which had a majority of Nawabs ,were

Raees Manzil near Husainabad and Ghazi Mandi(See pic.1,2,3) in old

city area of Lucknow.

The intensity of getting to know the characters in the research

gave an indepth insights into the socio economic mode of life and as

well as their financial behaviour though out the year. Stress was laid to

gain a deeper and more personal understanding of the families of

Nawabs and how they were coping with their present financial

conditions. Money is powerful, particularly when you don’t have a lot of

it, and it was only through this fieldwork and interacting with them it

was felt that we could understand how and why the Nawabs who were

poor, managed their money.

It is a well know fact that very few systematic researchers have

been conducted to gain insights into the socio-economic behaviour of

the poor and here in this case no study has been done to analyse the

financial/economic conditions of Nawabs in light of culture. Qualitative

work by anthropologists such as Shirley Ardener and Clifford Geertz

described intricate saving clubs as long as the 1960’s and gruesome

accounts of the predations of money lenders can be found in the

otherwise dry reports of the British officers in the nineteenth century

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colonial India and elsewhere. Other studies have focussed on the

mechanisms and products of the informal money markets, notably Fritz

Bouman’s Small, Short and Unsecured which deals with informal

finance in the Indian State of Maharashtra.At the other end of the

spectrum are quantitative surveys that ask questions about loans and

savings, but these mostly ignore or underreport about social life,

informal devices and services and offer only a summarised snapshot of

the household’s financial behaviour.

Thus keeping this in mind a complete qualitative analysis was

used to capture the richness and complexity of poor Nawab’s financial

lives while being systematic enough in data collection, just to prevent it

from being dismissed as a set of mere anecdotes. Purposive sampling

was done and only those households were covered which were managing

their finances through informal Beesi networks. Criterion Sampling was

also done to select the Beesi networks that had a majority Nawabs

attached to Zardozi (embroidery), so as to target the most poorest and

most vulnerable occupational group of the city who are living for a

pittance, as they earn less than $2 a day on an average throughout the

year.

At the initial level a household census which included all the

social indicators – education, migration, health and household assets,

consumption of essential commodities was taken up. Emphasis was

given to the financial behaviour of a household- on the money they

borrowed and repaid, saved and invested, the amount of expenses

incurred on health, education, household electricity, rent, religious

festivals, daily food consumption, and the financial instruments used for

money management.

Participant observation along with narrative and in-depth

interviewing, with open ended and fixed response questions were taken

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up. Participants were free to elaborate or take the interview in new but

related directions. Here an attempt was made to unravel the management

of the economic portfolio of the household, along with uncovering their

biographical accounts and allowing them to recount specific events

related to their lives. Women from each household were interviewed to

construct data as to what they did with their money on a weekly basis.

This helped in getting an overview of how much income flowed and

when and where it was spent and how the money was saved. Women are

better indicators of the household expenditures, as they know exactly the

household requirements.

Here in this research a new concept of financial diaries has been

introduced to research into the complex life of the Nawabs who are

mostly poor. The concept of creating a set of diaries that would strike

this balance belongs to David Hulme, professor of development studies

at the University of Manchester, who has written extensively on poverty

and on financial services for poor people.

In the 2000 India study, Orlanda Ruthven sought to understand

financial lives in the context of the livelihood of the households that

used them, and to do so she collected more detailed income and

expenditure data alongside the financial data. In the 2004 South African

diaries, Daryl Collins shifted the emphasis to the quantitative, in order

to subject our data to a broader range of financial analysis, creating a

system that allows an expansion of the sample size to the point where

statistical analysis becomes more feasible. Throughout much of the

fieldwork of the financial diaries, Jonathan Morduch, an economist with

an expertise on microfinance and poverty, advised and commented on

the work.

The basic concept behind the financial diaries is that finance is

the relationship between time and money, and to understand it fully,

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time and money must be observed together. The best description of how

we have managed to do this is to call this method a "diary", a term that

appropriately conveys the sense that we are tracking intimate details of

financial management over time. However, the financial diaries are not

diaries in the literal sense, because not only were many of the district’s

illiterate, but the detail of information that collected was far beyond

what households would have the patience or time to keep track of

himself.

The gathering of such intimate information meant that we had to

be clear about whom in the household would be interviewed.

Establishing the most appropriate "unit of research" is a common

problem in social research. I decided to follow a well-trodden

convention and treat the household as our unit. While many one-off

surveys would only interview the household head, I wanted to talk to

each of its adult members as often as possible if not at each and every

visit. Because of the likelihood of situations that not all members of the

households were aware of, or of members concealing information from

each other, I had to be very sensitive. This was part of the considerable

effort made to establish a friendly relationship with everyone in the

household and to allow a comfortable environment that would encourage

respondents to be open.

I was ever mindful that this was a very sensitive relationship –

with householders revealing their most intimate financial details to us,

we did not take our role as "confessor" lightly. This meant playing down

the role of the interviews as "work" for which respondents would be

paid, and presenting them as conversations that would help both parties

understand how people were managing their money. I took care not to

overwhelm those respondents who left they needed to offer us traditional

hospitality in the form of tea and biscuits, for example, by taking along

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our own fruit, biscuits and money for tea from the local stall. I listened

empathetically to respondents who were distraught with events in their

lives. But I tried to maintain my role as observer. I took care not to offer

advice or judgement, and I tried not to interfere or burden the

households. Interviews often took place while the interviewees got on

with their everyday work, cooking lunch or feeding the cow, and were

often interrupted by other visitors.

I also tried to explore the emotions that accompanied the

transactions, to elicit comments on the different devices used and to

estimate the degree to which the householders saw financial activity as

an important or as a trivial part of their lives. I recorded, verbatim,

especially striking comments. The result was a simultaneous mixed

method – a means of capturing both quantitative and qualitative data in

the moment, across time.

The limitations of the diary method are the mirror image of its

strengths: above all, as we have said, the number of households I worked

with was too small to represent whole population. There is also a doubt

as to whether participating in the diaries changed the behaviour of some

respondents. In some cases it may have done so. I was tipped off by the

thanks I received from some respondents during the final interview;

when respondents told me that "I had helped them so much." Wonderful,

I said with a sigh. It was difficult to determine if these thanks came from

the companionship I provided during the year, or if respondents saw a

real benefit to recounting their financial transactions to me. It may have

been that, as with weight watchers, being constantly asked about

financial transactions guided my households into behaving differently

than they would have otherwise. However, without a different type of

study design, it is difficult to tease out exactly how much of an influence

I might have had.

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The sharp focus of the financial diaries on the users of financial

services and devices also means that I have less to say directly about the

providers of those services. The diaries do not help us to engage in some

of the fierce debates that are raging in the world of the finances of the

poor – debates about sustainability and the role of subsidies. But we can

bring a fresh perspective to another debate that ought to be at the top of

the list for financial providers, an understanding of the socio-economics

of the poor who so many constraints in their day to day lives.

Map 3.0. Awadh in 1857

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Chapter IIHISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF LUCKNOW AND

NAWABS OF AVADH

There was a time when Lucknow was led to believe that its rulers

were the emperors or the world, second to none. The glitter and the

glory were not to last long: the story of the Shia Nawabs of Awadh

(1722-1857) would end in disaster-but the period fascinates. It has left

lingering memories in the minds of men, especially in Lucknow itself. It

still has a lot to tell us, when we consider the formidable clash of

cultures which characterizes the history of the province in pre-British

times, the kinds of adjustment and compromise which were arrived at

under the colonial rule, and the spirit of mutual tolerance and

understanding which was never denied to Lakhnavis, even though

outsiders would prefer to mock their deblitating, decadent culture rather

than admire the deep-rooted and unfailing courtesy.

Is it surprising that in 1947 Lucknow was one of the towns where

communal harmony survived the traumas of Partition? Yet the local

Muslim elites had played such a role in the emergence of Luckow that it

was impossible for their people to escape the consequences. Refugees

from the Punjab took the place of those who departed. It was the end of

an era. A new way of life, more aggressive, more dynamic also, took

over. Step by step the old cherished symbols and values were eroded,

and the triumphant Congres system, because of its own internal

constraints and divisions, was not especially prepared to help. It would

take another forty-five years of bitter caste and communal struggles for

the wheel to turn full circle. In 1775, the Shia rulers had left Faizabad-

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Ayodhya to settle on the Gomti. In 1991, rulers were back in Ayodhya:

they now carried trishuls and saffron flags.

Putting together a set of articles on a theme is difficult and if the

theme is an Indian town, it is doubly difficult. Indian towns have been

around for centuries. Their architectural histories and morphologies,

however, are often badly fractured, and many of the records and

structures have disappeared. Their social history is often studied only

tangentially, in terms of the histories of castes or communities, or of

wider processes. Towns as prisms do reflect regional and national

changes, but many of them also have social or morphological features

which are uniquely specific. Indians have clear notions of the sense of

place, of the charm/ repulsiveness, warmth/coldness, snobbery/open

ness, of a particular town, but not many have written these down.

Foreign travellers, in the pre-photography days, did describe places

vividly, but often in stereotyped images, making it easier for us to study

the history of perceptions about a town, than the town itself.

Lucknow has enjoyed more attention than most South Asian

towns, except for Calcutta, the 1990 tercentenary of which inspired

many books and articles. A striking example of a post-medieval town,

with a considerable capital of architecture, dance, music and creative

writing, enhanced by a tantalising flavour of a gracious lifestyle,

Lucknow excites the imagination. The metaphor that writers employ for

Lucknow is invariably that of an elusive chiaroscuro. The town-glows

bright when the sun of Delhi and Agra is setting; it is in turn outshone

by Calcutta; after the revolt of 1857-58, the lamp flickers and sputters;

in 1920, the candle burns bright when Lucknow is made the capital of

the United Provinces, but with the advent of Independence and Partition

in 1947 it is dimmed.

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This town on the river Gomti has been in existence since the

sixteenth century at least. Lucknow was a 'natural' urban site,

equidistant between Gonda in the south and Ayodhya in the north, and,

on a wider concentric circle, between the important centres of

Gorakhpur, Varanasi and Allahabad. It was as vital a link in the

eastward expansion of the Mughal Empire as Hyderabad was in the

southward thrust. Under Akbar Lucknow was chosen as the capital of

the suba of Awadh. A century later Emperor Aurangzeb gave it the

status of a university town by establishing a seminary in the escheated

estate of a Dutch merchant. This became known as Firangi Mahal, and

played a key role in twentieth-century politics. The two provinces of

Hyderabad and Awadh worked their way towards autonomy from the

Mughals from the middle of the eighteenth century. The narrrative of the

changing relations between the Nawabs of Awadh and the Badshahs at

Delhi, and the very specific features of the Nawabi regime, have been

traced here and elsewhere by Alam (1986: chapter 1) and Barnett

(1980). Encouraged by the increasing feebleness of the Delhi court, the

Nawab, Saadat Khan (1722-39), began to treat Awadh as his family fief.

His nephew and son-in-law Safdarjang (1739-50) was worsted by a rival

at the Mughal court and, somewhat against his will, was cast in the role

of rebel against the Emperor. He was eventually buried not in Awadh

but in the beautiful mausoleum he had designed for himself in the family

estate at Aliganj, equidistant between Mehrauli (the old Delhi), and the

Mughal capital of Shahjahanabad, in a straight line eastward to the tomb

of Emperor Humayun.

The eighteenth century saw a decline in the population of the

Mughal cities of Lahore, Agra and Delhi, and the growth of towns like

Lucknow and Varanasi. It was under the successors of Saadat Khan and

Safdarjang that Faizabad (the twin city to Ayodhya) and Lucknow

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expanded into distinctive baroque capitals, celebrated in sketches and

word pictures. The dynasty that built these towns was hot native to

Awadh. The Shia family of Saadat Khan had migrated from Nishapur,

the home of Omar Khayyam, in north-eastern Iran. They were in the

tradition of many individuals of talent and enterprise who had carved out

niches for themselves at the courts of Delhi and Agra in the Gangetic

plain, and Hyderabad and Bijapur in the Deccan. Lucknow welcomed

many such immigrants during its second and more lasting spell of

life .as the capital of Awadh (1775-1856). Like Agra, Hyderabad and

Seringapatam, Lucknow was cosmopolitan, home to a number of

Europeans, who created here a part-European dilettante, part-Indian

courtier life style (Lafont, chapter 4). Fisher (chapter 2) highlights the

differences of culture and life-style between the rural zamindars of

Awadh and the urban nobility.

SAADAT KHAN, BURHAN-UL-MULK (1722-1739)

With the accession of Muhammad Shah (the "Frivolous") to the

throne in 1719, Meer Muhammad Ameen of Naishapur (Iran) found an

ample scope for his talents. He came from a distinguished Syed family

which was highly respected in his home-town. The effete and corrupt

rule of the later Safawids of Iran, however, alienated the sympathies of

the nobility and the gentry so much so that they preferred to leave their

homeland and seek their fortune in the neighbouring country of

Hindustan.

Meer Muhammad Naseer (Ameen's father), accompanied by his

eldest son Meer Muhammad Baqar, came to Hindustan during the reign

of Emperor Bahadur Shah-I and after landing in Bengal finally settled at

Patna. Meer Muhammad Ameen, the more promising member of family,

came to Patna in 1708-9 to see his father and his elder brother, but the

former was already dead.

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Meer Muhammad Ameen came to Delhi and, being a brilliant

youngman, found ample scope for his talents in those troubled times. He

became Faujdar of Hinduan and Bayana "situated in the Jaipur and

Bharatpur divisions of Rajasthan and at a distance of fifty to sixty miles

south-west of Agra", in the beginning of November 1719.

After the victory of Emperor Muhammad Shah over the Sayyid

brothers Meer Muhammad Ameen was ennobled by the Emperor with

the title of Saadat Khan Bahadur and later, on 15 th October 1720, he was

appointed Governor of the province of Akbarabad (Agra).

The Empire of Akbar was divided into fourteen provinces and

Awadh (Audh or Oudh) was one of them. The name of capital was

Awadh (Audh), later Faizabad, and it was situated on the river Sarju, a

tributary of Ghagra.

Rajputs of Awadh

When Saadat Khan was appointed the Subedar of Awadh on 9 th

September 1722, he found it to be a "land of semi-independent feudal

barons of varying degrees of strength and political importance". For

centuries past the province had been the seat of martial races specially

of the Rajputs who "are found everywhere, from the Indus to Bihar, but

their original homes were two, Rajputana and the south of Oudh. They

made their first appearance in the eighh and ninth centuries; most of the

greater clans took possession of their future seats between A.D. 800 and

850..............About the same time (tenth century) they spread north and

east from Southern Oudh, and during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries

they made themselves masters of the Centrl Himalayas. Each of the

chiefs had a garhi (strongly built brick or mud fort) ensconced in a

village surrounded by a thick belt of bamboo forest, so thick cannon-

balls could not penetrate it.

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In 1722 Saadat Khan marched to Lucknow, crossed the Gomti at

Gaughat and captured it from the Shaikhzadas, who had defied the might

of the empire since the days of Akbar the Great, and pulled down (or, as,

some say, cut down) the naked sword hanging at the Shaikhan Darwaza

(the main entrance to the fort), to mark their prowess and defiance, and

took possession of their palace, Pachmahla.

Raja of Tiloi vanquished

The capture of the town and district of Lucknow sent a thrill

through the whole province, but the haughty and arrogant Rajput chiefs

would still not accept the overlordship of the newly appointed Subedar.

Saadat Khan, however, was not to be dismayed. He set about, with

characteristic zeal, in bringing peace to the distracted province but the

bolder spirits would not easily submit. Raja Mohan Singh Tiloi was the

most redoubtable and refractory chief and took pride in defying the

Imperial Governor. Saadat Khan decided to crush him and in the battle

that ensued, sometime in the beginning of 1723, Raja Mohan Singh died

on the battlefield, fighting to the last.

Malhar Rao Holkar defeated

Inspite of the sensible but bold advice of Saadat Khan not to

encourage the presumptions of the Marhattas by accepting their

growing demands, Khan-e-Dauran and Jai Singh advised the Emperor

to the contrary and the imbecile Emperor Muhammad Shah was too

frightened to reject it. Afterwards the Marhatta inroads in Northern

India became frequent and the imbecile Court was helpless to avert

danger. "The imperial preparations - as Grant Duff the historian of

the Mahrattas observes - 'commended in bombast and ended in

ridicule. In the meantime Saadat Khan had received the Emperor's

summons to cooperate with the Wazeer and Mir Bakshi against the

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Marhattas, and had started from Faizabad with Safdar Jung and Sher

Jung and a big army.

"The Persian immigrant, Saadat Khan, the Vicerory of Audh,

though as a politician only distinguished by his superior astuteness, was a

far more resolute soldier than the degenerate nobles of Hindustan; His

spirit burned within him to see the central regions of the Empire thus

profaned and thus defended. Moving from Lucknow with a fine force of

infantry, and calling for assistance from the Bangash of Farokhabad, he

moved up the Duab. At Etawa he found a division of the Marhatta army

under Malhar Rao Holkar, whom he attacked and routed with terrible

carnage. Thence proceeding north he drove the advanced Marhatta

columns out of Jalesar (on 23 rd March 1737) and Saidabad, beyond Agra;

and, as the scattered fugitives rallied to the Peshwa near Gwalior, he

pursued them as far as Dholpur on the Chambal, half-way on the high

road between the two cites. He would probably have crossed the river

and completed their ruin had he not been checked, first by letters from

the Khan Dauran, and afterwards by the arrival of that officer. Khan

Dauran was destined to die a soldier's death; but we cannot avoid seeing

that he appears in an unfavouring light throughout the present business.

Unwilling or unable to expel the Southerners himself, he grew jealous of

a better man, and impeded his movements when a blow might have been

struck that would have had important consequences".

Battle of Karnal

"The conduct of the Nizam-ul-Mulk when Nadir Shah actually

invaded Hindustan," writes Basu, "lends support to the suspicion that he

incited him to invade the country". The same Muhammadan historian

who forms our authority on the subject of Nadir Shah's invasion and

Nizam-ul-Mulk's treachery writes:

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"On the first intelligence of Nadir Shah's having entered the

province of Cabul, Khan Dowran and Nizam-ul-Mulk were ordered to

march out to oppose him; but they contented themselves with wasting

their time in the city, after spreading reports of their intention to proceed,

which they thought a piece of very refined policy".

Nadir Shah, after crossing the Indus on 21 st January 1739,

proceeded towards Delhi. The Imperial Court was divided into the two

main factions-the Turani and the Hindustani-headed by Nizam-ul-Mulk

Asaf Jah and Khan-e-Dauran Samsam-ud-Daulah respectively. The

Imperial Court, being honeycombed with intrigues, was so helpless that

even after the fall of Ghazni, on 10th June, 1738, it remained absolutely

inactive due to mutual jealousies. At long last Qamrudden Khan, the

Wazeer and Khan-e-Dauran, the Meer Bakshi arrived at Panipat on 28 th

January 1739 to oppose Nadir Shah.

Saadat Khan Burhan-ul-Mulk, in obedience to the Court summons,

left Fyzabad, in January 1739, "with a well-equipped army of 30,000

horse, a good part of artillery and vast stores of materials of war", and

reached Delhi, "although suffering from a wound in his leg", on 17 th

February and Panipat on the 21 st February 1739. Next day, before

midnight, he reached the Imperial Camp at Karnal.

Next day, on 23rd February 1739, when Saadat Khan was paying

respects to the Emperor, he learnt that the Persians had attacked his

camp-followers, looted his baggage and were carrying away 500 of his

loaded camels. Impatiently he got up and sought permission from the

Emperor to go the rescue of his men. The Emperor and the Nobles tried

to pacify Saadat Khan and advised patience "for his troops were fatigued

on account of one month's continuous journey and the day also was far

spent". But the would not listen. "Issuing out of the Imperial tents with

one thousand horse and a few hundred foot that were in attendance upon

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him, he made a rash advance against the enemy in complete disregard of

artillery or any other preparation". Saadat Khan charged the Persians

vigorously but they "retreated towards their main army, discharging their

arrows and muskets all the way and drawing Saadat Khan to the abuscade

prepared beforehand, about three miles east of Muhammad Shah's camp".

Saadat Khan bravely stood his ground but at last he was captured and,

ultimately, submitted to the Persian monarch. But as Nizam-ul-Mulk and

Saadat Khan could not satisfy the demands of Nadir Shah, for which they

were insulted, Saadat Khan took poison and died on 20 th March 1739;

while Nizam-ul-Mulk, simulating suicide, "drank a cup of water mixed

with sugar, covered himself with a sheet and went to sleep" and thus

escaped the tragic end of his rival Saadat Khan Burhan-ul-Mulk.

Whatever be the merits or demerits of the two rival nobleman -

Saadat Khan Burhan-ul-Mulk and Nizam-ul-Mulk- "And here it is to be

remarked that the Nizam and he were two able and prudent

contemporaries, who-though rivals - discovered a modus vivendi that

subsisted for nearly twenty years, and was, in fact, only terminated by

Saadat's death. The consequence of such unusual self-restraint on the

part of rival politicians was that both founded dynasties that rose on the

ruins of the empire".

Able Administrator

"Once he had regarded himself as the sole master of Awadh", says

Srivastava, "Saadat Khan identified himself with it and spent most of his

time within its limits. He suppressed lawlessness and established a

stable government in the province. He could not, of course, "root out"

all the big landlords, but he succeeded in keeping them thoroughly in

check and reconcilling them to his rule by his wise and tolerant policy.

The smaller zemindars and the peasantry welcomed his rule, as it

afforded them protection from spoliation by powerful chiefs, and from

[ 19 ]

Chapter -II

plunder and anarchy attendant on the frequent changes of governors.

And well did Saadat Khan repay the people. We have no details to form

a correct idea of his internal policy; but from the general statements of

the Persian authorities, it seems pretty certain that his policy was to

cherish the peasantry and to protect it from oppression and tyranny.

"Saadat Khan was something than a mere successful soldier. He

had some notion of civil government. Contemporary historians bear

testimony to the fact that Awadh was much better governed under him

than under any governor since the last quarter of the 17 th century, and

the people were contented and prosperous. Without rack-renting the

peasantry he greatly increased the revenue and put his finances in

order..................Saadat Khan left behind him nine crores of Rupees in

hard cash."

ABDUL MANSUR KHAN, SAFDAR JUNG (1739-54)

Mirza Muhammad Muqeem, better known in history as Safdar

Jang, was the son of Burhan-ul-Mulk's eldest sister. He came from

Naishapur at the invitation of his maternal uncle (Burhan-ul-Mulk) in

1723 when he was only fifteen years old and was married to Sadr-un-

Nisa, alias Nawab Begum, the eldest daughter of his uncle. The loving

father-in-law made him his Deputy-Governor (1724-1739) and the

Emperor bestowed on him the title of Abul Mansur Khan. Later, on the

death of his uncle in 1739, he was confirmed as Subedar of Awadh, with

all its Sarkars and Jageers held by his uncle, Burhan-ul-Mulk, by the

Emperor Muhammad Shah who also bestowed on him the title of Safdar

Jang.

Safdar Jang had received military training under his uncle Saadat

Khan, Burhan-ul-Mulk and proved to be an adept pupil and a successful

military tactician:

[ 20 ]

Chapter -II

"In March 1737, he outwitted Malhar Rao Holkar and his troops

near the town of Jalesar by drawing them slowly to near Saadat Khan's

main force whose one cavalry charge scattered the Marhattas about and

drove them out of the field".

Brilliant Career

"In June 1737, he (Safdar Jang) quelled an insurrection in

southern Awadh by defeating a combination of several Rajput chiefs led

by their leader Nawal Singh, Raja of Tiloi...........and the stronghold

(Amethi fort) was captured by the deputy-governor's men........

"Early in 1738, Abulmansur Khan undertook an expedition to

Jaunpur to deprive Rustam Ali Khan of the four districts of Jaunpur,

Mirzapur, Ghazipur and Banaras. Though no fighting was done, he was

able to achieve his object by diplomacy, backed by force, and Rustam

Ali Khan had to seek refuge by flight".

On Burhan-ul-Mulk's death, Awadh rose in revold against the new

Subedar. Safdar Jang acted promptly. He defeated the rebellious

landlords of Amethid Bandagi (near Lucknow), Rajput rulers of

Hasanpur, Tiloi and Garh Amethi (District Sultanpur) and Pathans of

Jagdishpur (Near Tiloi).

In 1741, Safdar, Jang moved against Nabinagar and Katesar

(District Sitapur), whose ruler, Raja Nawal Singh Gaur, had "meditated

open independence and refused to pay the government revenue". He was

surrounded in his forts, defeated and reduced to such straits that he fled

from "the fort during the night of 19 th March, 1741." Later the submitted

and "his territory was restored to him.

[ 21 ]

Chapter -II

Summoned to Court

After the departure of Nadir Shah, the Emperor Muhammad Shah

had become suspicious of the Turani party, headed by Nizam-ul-Mulk

and Qamar-ud-deen Khan (the Wazeer) and "Towards the end of August

1743, Muhammad Shah, desirous of strengthening the Irani faction,

summoned Amir Khan and Safdur Jung from their respective provinces

of Allahabad and Awadh to Court".

In obedience to the Imperial summons Safdar Jung, taking with

him Hidayat Ali Khan and his son, Ghulam Husain Khan (author of

Siyar-ul-Matakhereen), marched for Delhi in the third week of October

1743. When he sighted the Imperial fort by the third week of November,

he performed the salutation ceremony from the bank of the Jumna.

Ghulam Husain Khan, who had been an eye-witness to the whole show,

has given the following interesting description:

"Having arrived at the bank of Yamuna on a date which passes out

of my memory at this time, Safdar Jang thought it advisable to make his

appearance with some pomp and magnificence. Leaving his heavy

baggage in his Camp, he marched on in military array opposite to the

Imperial fort at Delhi. He had with him over ten thousand horses, all

well-mounted and well- armed, the Hindustanis upon horses of value of

their own country, while the Mughals dressed in scarlet uniforms were

upon Persian horses, adorned with silver trapping. Besides, these were

some elephants caparisoned with clothes worked in threads of silver and

gold and having amaries covered over with silver and gold platings. Of

the elephants three bore the Nawabs's standards. Luckily it had rained

during the previous night and the morning proved fair and pleasant.

When Safdar Jang reached opposite to the Octagonal Tower (Musamman

Burf) of the Hall Private Audience, which, being richly gilt, was shining

like the sun, the alighted from his elephant, bowed low according to

[ 22 ]

Chapter -II

custom and stood a while in a respectful posture. After having received

some roses sent by the Emperor (in answer to his bow) through an

eunuch of his Court, he mounted again and returned to his camp, leaving

the Emperor, who was sitting inside the Tower, much pleased with the

show and the warlike appearance of his troops.

Safdar Jang Promoted

The Emperor being pleased with Safdar Jang appointed him, on

21st March 1744, Mir Atish (Superintendent of the Imperial Artillery),

"one of whose duties was the protection of the persons of the Emperor

and his family" and as such "took up his residence in the Imperial fort

and organised the artillery on proper lines".

"Safdar Jang now rose fast in the Imperial favour. In addition to

this former posts, he was appointed Governor of Kashmir on 4 th October,

1744."

Shuja-ud-Daulah's Marriage (1745)

The Emperor himself negotiated the marriage of Safdar Jang's

son, (Jalal-ud-deen Haider) with Bahu Begum, the sister of Isqhaq Khan

Najm-ud-daulah (son of Ishaq Khan Motaman-ud-daulah). It took place

at the end of 1745. The importance of the marriage was all the more

increased when the Emperor declared that Bahu Begum was his

daughter. The lavish scale on which the marriage was arranged can be

imagined from the fact "that forty-six lakhs of rupees were spent in the

marriage, while in Dara's marriage, the most costly among those of the

Mughal princes, only thirty-one lakhs of rupees were spent."

Safdar Jang was now the most important Ameer in the empire and.

"leader of the Irani party'1. "The Wazir Qamruddin Khan being

immersed in degrading pleasure and the Nizam awaiting his fast

approaching end in the Deccan, Safdar Jang now leapt to the front in the

[ 23 ]

Chapter -II

Mughal peerage, and in the midst of youthful mediocrities he began to

be considered as the only powerful, experienced and sober minded noble

at the Imperial court. He acquired an important place in Muhammad

Shah's estimation and delicate state business, like the diplomatic

relations with the Marathas, began to be transacted through him".

Enters Abdali

In the beginning of 1748 the province of Punjab was the scene of

a fratricidal was between the sons of Zakaria Khan (Yahiya Khan and

Shah Nawaz Khan) which was raging since 1745. On Zakaria Khan's

death his eldest son, Yahiya Khan, the son-in-law of the Wazeer Qamar-

ud-deen Khan, "was appointed Deputy-Governor of Lahore and Multan

in September 1745. Shah Nawaz Khan defeated his elder brother Yahiya

Khan and put him in prison. On 25 th December 1747, Yahiya Khan

escaped from the prison and fled to his father-in-law, the Wazeer. Shah

Nawaz Khan, on his part, implored the assistance of Ahmad Shah

Abdali, a former officer of Nadir Shah who, on the latter's murder on

19th June 1747, had enthroned himself as King at Qandahar "in July or

August 1747."

Ahmad Shah invaded India and crossed the Ravi on the 10 th

January 1748. Lahore was taken, and the Afghan invader "plundered the

outskirts and subrubs of the city, particularly Mohallah Mughalpura, but

spared the city for a ransom of thirty lakhs."

On the 18 th January (1748) an army was dispatched against the

invader under Qamaruddin Khan, the Wazeer, Safdar Jang, ^ Mir Atish and

other nobles. After the fall of Lahore Prince Ahmad Shah *** sent» on **

February, as the nominal leader of the army. He reached Panip at on 20<h

February 1748. Having arranged the army in fighting order the procee ded

towards Sarhind ^d. putting a part of his treasure and heavy baggage there, he

[ 24 ]

Chapter -II

advanced towards the north. Ahmad Shah Abdali, in the meantime,

captured Sarhind on 12 th March.

Having heard the disastrous news of the loss of Sarhind, the

Prince retraced his steps to Manupur on 13 th March, and &°m me next ^ ^ ^°

armies came close to each other and daily skirmishes commenced

between the two advance-guards. On 21 st March, the day of battle, the

Wazeer Qamruddin Khan was struck with a cannon-ball, while reciting

Pravers (Wazayqf) in his tent, and dried. After commencement of the war

Ish^a" sia& of Jaipur, who was in charge of the left wing, fled from the

field wi* Ws 20'000 Rajputs. Mir Mannu fought with great valour but he

lost some of *e chief officers and was wounded himself while "the Abdali

pressed on and jt appeared that a great disaster was going to befall the

Mughal army."

Safdar Jang defeats Abdali (1748)

The only ray of hope in the otherwise glootftf P'cture came from

the right wing of the Mughal army. It was under Safdar Jang whose

"men rushed at the enemy, fired their long guns, slew most of the

Afghans and captured the hillock with all the enemy camels and guns.

The remnant of the enemy fled and were charged by Safdar Jang's

Qlizibashes who captured all their swivels and camels." In the

meantime, the Afghans attacked the Imperial van and centre and reduced

them to a sorry plight. Safdar Jang acted quickly and "Throwing himself,

his troops and artillery between Mir Mannu and the Afghan force, he

brought the latter to a stand. Already fatigued, the enemy found

themselves suddenly assaulted by a body of fresh Irani troops who

poured murderous fire on them............. Baffled in his attempts to rally

them, Ahmad Shah Abdali prudently left the field after his army was

broken and his men had fled to their encampment...............in the

morning of the 26 th (March, 1748) the Indian army mounted for battle,

[ 25 ]

Chapter -II

when, to their surprise and joy, they found that the enemy had fled

previous night, leaving a part of his artillery and heavy baggage in the

garden outside Sarhind".

Safdar Jang appointed Wazeer (1748)

The Emperor Muhammad Shah died on 25 th April 1748, and was

succeeded by his son Ahmad Shah who appointed Safdar Jang as Wazeer

of the Empire on 29 th June 1748, and conferred on him the titles of

Jamat-ul-Mulk, Abul-Mansur Khan Bahadur Safdar Jang, Sipah-salar,

besides loading him with rich gifts etc. But the new post was not a bed

of roses and "The Empire which had once embraced practically the

whole of the continent of India had dwindled into insignificance and

most of the provinces had shaken off its yoke.........The Mughal territory

being thus confined from Agra to Attock, the term "empire had become

a misnomer."

Ruheles collude with Abdali

The fratricidal skirmishes, plots and counter-plots, between the

Irani and Turani nobles in the Durbar sapped the strength of the nobility

and encouraged fissiparous tendencies throughout the Empire. But the

most fatal malaise of the time was lack of patriotic feeling among the

various sections of the country so much so that "In treacherous alliance

with him (Ahmad Shah Abdali) were the Ruhelas of Ruhelkhand whose

object was the establishment of Afghan supremacy in Hindustan."

At first Safdar Jang conceived ambitious schemes of restoring the

old frontiers of the empire and converting in into a homogenous, well-

knit kingdom of the Timurids by uprooting "the colonies of the Jats and

of the Bangash and Ruhela Afghans" from whom he anticipated trouble

in the near future. He even "urged the new Emperor not to enter the

capital, but follow up his recent success against Abdali, march beyond

[ 26 ]

Chapter -II

the Indus, and recover Afghanistan. But instigated by Javed Khan,

Ahmad Shah preferred the life of slotful ease to one of perilous

enterprise."

Abdali's Second Invasion (1749-1750)

Smarting under the disgrace of the previous defeat at the hands of

Safdar Jang in 1748, Ahmad Shah Abdali found the conditions at Delhi

propitious to wipe off his former ignominy. He crossed the Indus by the

end of 1749 and, by successive marches, reached near Lahore. Mir

Mannu (Muin-ul-Mulk) bought off the Shah by promising Rs. 14,000

annually as the surplus revenue of the four districts viz., Sialkot,

Aurangabad, Gujrat and Pasrur. Ahmad Shah Abdali went back to his

barren country and left the Delhi nobleman to continue or start afresh

the game of self-annihilation to the bitter end.

Abdali's Third Invasion (1752)

While Safdar Jang was away from Delhi Ahmad Shah Abdali

attacked for the third time, inl752, to realise the promised but

unremitted revenues of four districts. Mir Mannu tried to oppose Abdali

but failed. At last he "surrendered himself to the King of Afghans; and

the latter, pleased with Muin's dignified conduct and frank talk,

appointed him Governor of Lahore and Multan on his own behalf and

issued orders to his men not to plunder or molest any body."

Punjab ceded to Abdali

In the meantime Ahmad Shah Abdali sent his envoy, Qalandar

Beg, to Emperor Ahmad Shah of Delhi for the cession of the Punjab.

"The Emperor granted audience to the envoy in the Diwan-i-Khas on the

13th April 1752, and dismissed him by putting his seal to the Treaty thus

losing the most important frontier province of the Mughal Empire."

Safdar Jang's death (1754)

[ 27 ]

Chapter -II

Worn out and exhausted by the never-ending Court intrigues

which received encouragement from the vacillating Emperor, Safdar

Jang died at Paparghat on the Gomti on 5* October 1754 (17 th Zil Hijjah,

1167 H).

His personality and character

"Like his predecessor, Saadat Khan, and all his descendants on the

masnad of Awadh," writes Dr. Srivastava, "Nawab Wazir Abul Mansur

Khan Safdar Jang possessed a handsome and imposing appearance -

broad forehead, long nose, bright eyes, white complexion and a thick

beard. To his natural gifts of intelligence and ready wit he combined a

cultured disposition, charming manners and a refined taste..........Highly

educated as he was, he wrote Persian with flexibility and ease.........

Himself a lover of literature, he patronised scholars, procured titles for

them and granted them suitable allowances and rewards.......

Dr. Srivastava further writes: "We are in possession of numerous

letters written by Safdar Jang to his Naibs and amils ordering them to

return the Jagirs or restore subsistence allowances to pious Sayyids and

other ancient families of Awadh who had been unjustly deprived of them

by local officers."

Looking to the laxity of morals in his age and to the seraglios of

contemporary nobles teeming with women, Safdar Jang was head and

shoulders above the dissolute Muslim noblemen of the day. "Safdar

Jang's private life was marked," says Dr. Srivastava, "by a high standard

of morality , extremely rare in the class to which he belonged and in the

age in which he lived. He married only one wife to whom he was

ardently attached, and he had no mistress, courtesan or concubine. 'His

natural modesty and sense of good conduct........did not make him desire

the company of any woman except that of that illustrious and chaste lady

[ 28 ]

Chapter -II

(Sadrun-nisa)', writes Ghulam Ali of Lucknow. He was also a loving

father, a kind relation and a faithful friend..........To his Maratha allies

he remained ever faithful, and although they were sometimes guilty of

double dealing, he held firm firmly to their alliance till they openly

made a bid for subas of Awadh and Allahabad and threw in their lot

with his implacable enemy, Ghazi-ud-din Khan Imad-ul-Mulk."

"His greatest achievement was a lasting peace "writes Dr.

Srivastava "that he gave to Awadh and Allahabad.........In an age when

all parts of India were bowing low before the relentless might of

Maharashtra, Awadh and Allahabad were the only provinces which were

still unvisited by their plundering hordes."

'Lucknow Culture'

"The lasting peace and uniform justice, which kept the strong and

the unruly in check and created a feeling of security of life and property,

gave as impetus, for the development of liberal arts and profitable

industries, and made Awadh evolve a distinct type of civilization, known

throughout India as the 'Lucknow Culture'. When all other provinces

were sinking into a state of degeneration and anarchy, Awadh

progressed to rival Delhi in wealth, magnificence and culture in the time

of Safdar Jang's son and Grandsons.

"Though not a successful Wazir, Safdar Jang filled the office with

dignity and firmness, and proved more consistent and hardworking than

this predecessor, the slothful Qamar-ud-din Knan. And he was

undoubtedly more loyal and successful than any of his numerous

successors from Intizam-ud-Daulah downward, who disgraced the

exalted office of Wazir from the later days of Ahmad Shah's reign to the

time of Bahadur Shah II, the last prince of the house of Babur who sat

on the throne of Delhi."

[ 29 ]

Chapter -II

SHUJA-UD-DAULAH (1754-1775)

On Safdar Jang's death his only son, M* za Mal-ud-deen Haider,

better known to history as Shuja-ud-Daulah, succeeded to the

Governorship of the two important provinces of Awadh and Allah abad

when he was only twenty-two years old-an age of irresponsible

immaturity'

The tortuous politics of the Delhi Court had thrown up the

'notorious' Ghazi-ud-deen Khan Imad-ul-Mulk, the adopts son of Safdar

Jang and the turban-exchanged brother of Shuja-ud-daulab, as the

implacable enemy of his patron Safdar Jang and his son. He was even

trying to wrest the two provinces of Awadh and Allahabad from the

hands of Safdar Jang but his highly ambitious moves alarmed even his

own supporters. The intriguing Wazeer, Intizam-ud-Daulah, and the

vacillating Emperor Ahmad Shah counter-acted his moves secretly.

Balwant Singh of Banaras

While Safdar Jang was busy with Delhi Politics Balwant Sing' the

ambitious Raja Banaras, had been extending & Possessions to the

surrounding areas. After the patched up peace with the Emperor, Safdar

Jang reached Banaras on 17 th February 1754 to chastise the recalcitrant

Raja. But before he could fulfil his task Safdar Jang "received urgent

messages from the Emperor and Intizam-ul-Daulah summoning him to

western Awadh to join them in an expedition against their common and

much-hated foes, the Marathas and Imad-ul-mulk," Safdar Jang

complied with the Royal summons, and Balwant Singh was free to

indulge in his pranks.

Shuja as Subahdar

[ 30 ]

Chapter -II

Safdar Jang died on 5 th October 1754, and Emperor Alamgir-II

"wrote with his own hand a special note to Shuja-ud-daulah, condoling

with him on his father's demise and appointing him Subahdar of

Awadh..........and Allahabad, too, like Awadh, passed quietly into Shuja-

ud-daulah's hands as inheritance from his deceased father."

Shuja-ud-daulah on assuming the Subahdari found a number of

ticklish problems facing his nascent administration. The first serious

challenge to his statesmanship was religious fanaticism which flared up

in the important pilgrim-city of Banaras. "Determined to revive the long

forgotten days of Aurangzeb," says Dr. Srivastava, "the Qazi (Judge of

Muslim Canon Law) and muhtasib (Censor of Morals) of the town

Banaras, rallied a party of fanatical Muslims and demolished the sacred

temple of Visheshwar Mahadeva, situated near the Alamgiri mosque, on

22nd September 1755." Naturally there was an outburst of religious

frenzy, which might have ended in disaster for the new Governor; but

saner counsels prevailed, and Peshwa Balaji Rao's Guru, who had gone

on hunger-strike, broke his fast and normally returned.

Shuja-ud-daulah moves against Balwant

Shuja-ud-daulah, by the end of 1756, marched towards Banaras to

restore communal harmony among Hindus and Muslims and to punish

Balwant Singh for his traitorous moves to capture the fort of Chunar,

situated on the Ganges, 20 miles due east of Mirzapur. While Shuja-ud-

daulah was thus engaged in eastern Awadh, "news from Delhi confirmed

the alarming reportes that Ahmad Shah Abdali accompanied by a

formidable force had swooped down upon the Punjap and had

triumphantly entered the capital of India. So great was the panic at Delhi

that its residents began flee to places of safety and the Wazir issued

frantic appeals to Shuja-ud-daulah and other notables to come speedily

to his assistance." A peace was patched up with Balwant Singh, and

[ 31 ]

Chapter -II

Shuja-ud-daulah began his return march to Faizabad in February-March,

1757.

Shuja becomes Prime Minister

On 15 th February 1762 (21st Rajab, 1175 H.) "Shah Alam was glad

to invest him (Shuja-ud-daulah) formally with the role of the Prime

Minister post, although he had been nominated Wazeer as far back as

24th December 1759 by Shah Alam when he had become the Emperor

after the murder of his father Alamgir-II.

British traders warned

The foolish and criminally selfish moves of Imad-ul-Mulk, devoid

of all sense of patriotism, had torn to shreds the already crumbling

fabric of the Timurid Empire. As Wazeer of the Empire, instead of

supporting and sustaining the hands of the Emperor, he reduce him to a

cypher even in the management of his own household. Unnoticed by the

egocentric, squabbling Indian noblemen the Britishers, under the mask

of a trading Company, became the most potent political power in the

subcontinent.

In March 1764 when Shuja-ud-daulah, in support of Meer Qasim,

reached the confines of Banaras with the Emperor, Vansittart threatened

war against him. Cut to the quick, Shuja-ud-daulah, besides his warning

to the President and Council sent the following letter to Carnac:

"Agreeably to His Majesty's care for the welfare of the people I

now write to you, consider how the Kings of Indostan have given your

Company settlements and factories, exempted them from duties, and

conferred greater favours upon them than other Europeans or the

merchants of their own dominions. Since then, notwithstanding all those

favour, you have been guilty of ingratitude to the Court, since you have

turned from your former paths and on the contrary have been continually

[ 32 ]

Chapter -II

marching your troops into the King's country and since you have

presumed to remove the officers of the Imperial Court and to turn out

and establish Nabobs, what kind of behaviour is that? In case you have

your King's or your Company's orders for these proceedings, be pleased

to inform me of it that I may shew a suitable resentment, but if it is

through your own inclinations that you have plundered villages

belonging to Allahabad and that you entertain your evil designs

notwithstanding the approach of the Royal standards, it is proper you

should desist from such proceedings and represent your desires to me. In

case of your obedience our favours shall be conferred upon you,

otherwise the guilty and disobedient shall be utterly destroyed".

Treacherous Moves

After this bold challenges of Shuja-ud-daulah, perhaps first of its

kind given by any Indian Prince to the English, war became inevitable

between the two powers. The English, as usual, started raising traitors in

the Awadh camp and Balwant Singh Banaras was the first to earn the un-

enviable distinction of being a traitor to his own master, Shuja-ud-

daulah. Balwant Singh was promised, naturally, by the British,

protection and independence of his liege-lord then and for all times to

come.

Although Shuja-ud-daulah had espoused the cause of Mir Qasim

with the consent of the Emperor, still none of them was sincere to the

Nawab Wazeer. It is strange to find that "the Emperor was at cross

purposes with his Wazir and was secretly corresponding with the

English who were anxious to foment differences between the two and

had written to Carnac to encourage the King's party in its opposition to

Shuja-ud-daulah. In spite of the fact that Mir Qasim's well being

depended upon the success of the expedition the Ex-Nawab did not

cheerfully cooperate with the Chief Commander (Shuja-ud-daulah) and

[ 33 ]

Chapter -II

take an active part in the campaign, to the great annoyance of Shuja-ud-

daulah. Such an army with such leaders was hardly likely to succeed

against British talent, discipline and military science".

Nawab's Officers tempted

Shuja-ud-daulah's rivals and enemies were approached to form

a confederacy against him. Major Carnac, and later, Hector Munro

made all sorts of promises to the Nawab's troops and military

officers for rise in pay, big chunks of the Nawab's territory and, if

the Nawab was arrested and handed over to the British, even the

Governorship of one of the two provinces of Shuja-ud-daulah was

promised to Muhammad Baqir Khan, one of the leading Generals of

the Nawab-Wazeer. The Mughal officers of Shuja-ud-daulah's army

had already colluded with the British, but, as their terms had not

been accepted, they remained in the Nawab's army except Asad

Khan, an important leader, who with his followers went over and

joined Munro before the Battle of Baksar took place.

Battle of Baksar (1764)

Before the fateful battle was fought on 23 rd October, 1764 at

Baksar, the successful diplomacy of the British had already made the

result a foregone conclusion. Besides Balwant Singh even Rajah

Beni Bahadur, the Naib-Subah, had "eagerly listened to the English

overtures and decided to back up their cause" with the result that in

the midst of the fight and Baksar, Beni Bahadur "suddenly changed

his mind, and turned his face from the field, followed by his men,

including Ghalib Khan and his son". Balwant Singh, on his part,

instead of guarding the post entrusted to him, by Shuja-ud-daulah,

and fighting against the British, had invited the Company's soldiers

to enter the Nawab's camp through his Morcha (post). Naturally the

[ 34 ]

Chapter -II

battle was lost and shuja-ud-daulah . left the field. Later the British

handed over all the letters to the Nawab that were written by his

officers to the Company's commanders, which proved how

completely Shuja-ud-daulah's army was honeycombed with

treachery. The defeat at Baksar decided the fate of Northern India

once and for all because there was none left to oppose the march of

the British to their destined goal. After the battle, "The Viceroy

(Shuja-ud-daulah) withdrew his forces in good order; though it was

not till some time after that, accepting the situation, he allied himself

permanently with the conquerors. The Emperor, f° r n's P^ yielded

much more promptly; coming the very next day into the British camp

and concluding a treaty whereby the conquerors for the first time

attained a legal position in the country".

It is astounding to note the while the Wazeer of the Empire

(Shuja-ud-daulah) was fighting to maintain the dignity of his

suzerain, the Emperor himself had thrown himself, with such

indecent haste, at the mercy of his enemies. What must have been the

feelings of Shuja-ud-daulah can better be imagined than described!

Historians' tribute to Shuja

"We must also admit", says Malleson, "that never before had

they (the English) encountered an enemy in all respects so

formidable. Shuja-du-daulah, Nuwab Vazir of Awadh, was the most

killed native leader of soldiers in India. Contemporary writers

declare that if he had lived in the palmy days of the Mughulus, his

force of character, his astuteness, and, above all, his qualities as a

general, would have placed him in the front rank...................He

cannot be held responsible for the mistakes of Shuja Kuli Khan and

of Benni Bahadur -mistakes, the first of which ensured his defeat,

[ 35 ]

Chapter -II

and the second made of the defeat a rout. Again, his men, especially

his cavalry, fought most bravely".

British moves against Shuja

The English were, as usual, lavish with their promises. The British

"Commander-in-Chief waited upon Shah Alam, assured him of the

loyalty of the English and gave him hopes of his being put in possession

of the Wazir's territory"; and at the same time Major Munro wrote to

Rajah Beni Bahadur, who was carrying on negotiations on behalf of

Shuja-ud-daulah, "Separate yourself from him (Shuja-du-daulah) and in

consideration of your friendship for the English, we shall establish you

in the Subadarry in his room, according to the ancient custom. The

Wazeer's dominions were promised by the deceitful British to Shah

Alam and Beni Bahadur at one and the same time!

In order to weaken Shuja-du-daulah still further, the British raised

a host of enemies by making lavish promises at his expenses against the

Awadh Ruler. Balwant Singh, the traitorous Zamindar of Banaras, was

won over when "The Council approved of the terms of the agreement,

but directed the Major (Munro) to procure from the Emperor a Sanad of

the Zamindari of Balwant in the name of the Company, so as to have

power and authority over the Rajah". But it was not enough, as Shuja-

du-daulah would not surrender Meer Qasim to the British. "Munro made

the Emperor write to the Wazir's two great enemies, Mirza Najaf Khan

and Ahmad Khan Bangash of Farrukhabad, investing the one with the

management of the Subah of Awadh, and the other with that of the

Allahabad province. All the important chiefs in the two provinces were

directed by the Emperor to afford no shelter to the rebel Wazir, but to

drive him out without delay".

Shuja's last efforts

[ 36 ]

Chapter -II

Although deserted by almost everybody (The Emperor, Balwant

Singh and deserters from his own army had joined the British against

him), Shuja-du-daulah did not lose heat and challenged the British once

more. But he was defeated. Even then he did not lose heart. 'The Nawab

nevertheless made one more effort for delivering a second battle,' writes

Madec,..........'but after the first effort terror seized our army and the

Nawab retreated in disorder on seeing himself abandoned by his

men.........' It fact he was betrayed by his faithless. Mughals who wanted

to deliver him up to the English. Two of the prominent Mughal deserters

were Abdur Rahim Khan and Muhammad Ali Khan who had some time

before been sent by the Wazir to negotiable peace with the English

Commander at Banaras. These two Mughal commanders offered to place

themselves with 6000 troops at the disposal of Major Fletcher very soon

after the battle of 18 th January".

Shuja attempts an Anti-British Coalition

Shuja-du-daulah "endeavoured to form a coalition of several

important chiefs to drive out the English, whom he represented as

cherishing designs on the Empire. Leaving Lucknow on 31 sl January, as

we have seen", says Dr. Srivastava, "he took the road to Bareilly where

Hafiz Rahmat Khan received him with apparent cordiality. But the

Wazir's proposal for an offensive alliance against the foreign intruders

met with an evasive reply from this hoary Afghan politician, who would

not risk a war with the victorious and mighty English". Najib-ud-daulah

"excused himself on the plea that he was too much occupied with the

Jat War. Worse still," Shuja-du-daulah, returning to Bareilly, found the

Ruhelas unfriendly and even plotting to attack the fugitive Wazir's small

and dwindling retinue and plunder his treasure, or to capture and hand

him over to the English. The Ruhelas as a whole looked upon Shuja-du-

daulah as then-hereditary foe".

[ 37 ]

Chapter -II

Ruhelas refused to join

Advised by "Saadullah Khan, who was on friendly terms with the

Wazir", Shuja-ud-daulah proceeded to Farrukhabad to "seek the

assistance of Ahmad Khan Bangash," but the latter "would not joint the

proposed confederacy on the ground of ill health and lameness".

Abandoned by his fellow-religionists Shuja-du-daulah had to fall back

for help on the Hindu Marhattas.

Marhattas join Shuja

Sadly disappointed, Shuja-ud-daulah who had already written to

the Marhattas for help, agreed to their terms. "Malhar Rao........... with

30,000 troops set out from Malwa, and a little later Shuja-ud-daulah also

began his march with Imad-ul-mulk, but without any of the Ruhela

chieftains who evaded joining him on one pretext or another, and both

proceeded in the direction of Kora Jahanabad with as much expedition

as possible."

Shuja disillusioned

Shuja-ud-daulah had put great faith in the Marhatta army but

"Holkar's men, though numerically superior, could not stand the close

and steady fire from the British guns, and a few rounds speedily threw

ranks into confusion. Without waiting to reply, the Marhattas drew off

and retreated in disorder towards Kalpi. A general panic among his

troops.......... exasperated Malhar Rao................Shuja-ud-daulah's men

fared no better"............Shuja-ud-daulah was "confounded at the Maratha

defeat and flight. The action at Kora on 3 rd May 1765, and the

subsequent one at Kalpi, were not battles, not even well-matched

skirmishes; they were mere routs".

It seems that Shuja-ud-daulah was sadly disillusioned at the

reception he had received in Rohilkhand. Sweet words were not spared,

[ 38 ]

Chapter -II

no doubt,.but it was crystal-clear to him that the Ruhelas would not join

him in any action against the British. And his attempt to put up a

combined opposition against the Britishers, whom he represented "as

cherishing designs on the Empire", did not move the Ruhelas. He had

already made a suggestion to satisfy the Ruhelas. "The Wazir seems to

have also proposed that Ahmad Shah Abdali of Kabul might be invited

to head the confederacy (as he had done against the Marhattas in 1761),

and the intermediary between the Wazir and Najib was the well-known

Durrani agent, named Yaqub Khan, who had met Shuja-ud-daulah on

13th March. But nothing tangible came out of this mission, as Najib

excused himself on the plea he was too much occupied with the Jat war."

Najib-ud-daulah's refusal must have been "the most unkindest cut

of all" and "having met with an indifferent reception from Ahmad Khan

Bangash. Hafiz Rahmat Khan and other Ruhelas, who were not in the

least willing to make a common cause with him, Shuja-ud-daulah's

hopes were now shattered and his spirits were completely broken. He

turned his attention once more to obtaining terms, and this time by

throwing himself absolutely at the mercy of the English."

Ruhelas' "deceitful promises"

"After the battle of Buxar", writes, Mill, "the Vazir had sent his

women and treasures to Bareilly, the strong fort of a Rohilla Chief;

and............. endeavoured to obtain assistance from Ghazi-ud-Khan,

from the Rohilla Chiefs, and a body of Mahattas, who were at that time

under Malhar Rao in the vicinity of Gualior (Gwalior). The Marhattas,

and Ghazi-ud-din, Khan, with a handful of followers, the meserable

remains of his former power, had, in reality joined him. But the Rohillas

had amused him with only deceitful promises; and he had been

abandoned even by Sumroo: who, with a body of about 300 Europeans

[ 39 ]

Chapter -II

of various nations, and a few thousand Sepoys, was negotiating for

service with the Jats".

After the two battles of Kora and Kalpi, on the 3 rd and 22nd May

1765, respectively, "The Vizir, impelled on the one side'by the desperate

state of his affairs, on the other by hopes of moderate treatment from the

English, resolved to throw himself entirely upon their generosity, by

placing his person in their hands. On the 19 th of May, General Carnac

received, written partly by the Nabob with his own hand, a letter, in

which he informed that officer that he was on his way to meet him. The

General received him with highest marks of distinction; and all parties

recommended a delicate and liberal treatment. The final settlement of

the terms of pacification was reserved for the presence of Clive. As it

was unanimously agreed, that it would cost the Company more to defend

the country of the Vizir, than it would yield in revenue; that Shuja-ud-

daulah was more capable of defending it than the Emperor, to whom it

had been formerly promised, or than any other chief who could be set

up; and that in the hands of the Vizir it might form a barrier against the

Marhattas and Afghans; it was determined to restore to him to whole of

his dominions, with the exception of Allahabad and Corah, which were

to be reserved to the Emperor".

Trade Permission refused

Shuja-ud-daulah was, naturally, grateful for restoration of his

dominions "and readily agreed to the payment of fifty lacks of rupees

demanded in compensation for the expenses of the war (at the first

Conference held on 2" August, 1765): but, when it was proposed to him

to permit the English to trade, free from duties, and erect factories in his

dominions, he represented so earnestly the abuses which, under the

name of trade, the Company's servants and their agents had perpetrated

in the provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa, and expressed with so

[ 40 ]

Chapter -II

much vehemence his apprehension of disputes, and the impossibility

they would create of long preserving the blessings of peace, that Clive

agreed, in the terms of the treaty, to omit the very names of trade and

factories."

Shuja's generous treatment

Shuja-ud-daulah is blamed for anti-Ruhela feelings, but the critics

conveniently forget the role of the Pathans, after the Battle of Chatauni

in 1750 when they temporarily occupied Lucknow, before they were

routed and expelled by the Sheikhzadas. Students of history also cannot

forget the ill-treatment of Shuja-ud-daulah by the Ruhelas when he went

to Rohilkhand, after the Battle of Baksar in 1764, to organise a coalition

against the British foreigners. The Ruheles, in their animosity towards

the Nawab-Wazeer forgot all canons of hospitality towards a brother

Muslim Prince and plotted "to attack the fugitive Wazir's small and

dwindling retinue and plunder his treasure, or to capture and hand him

over to the English. The Rohilas as a whole looked upon Shuja-ud-

daulah as their hereditary foe". He had gone to them for help but, as Mill

says, "the Rohillas had amused him with only deceitful promises".

Inspite of all these ill-treatments which he experienced at the hands of

the Ruhelas, Shuja-daulah's treatment of his vanquished foes was more

than generous.

Much capital has been made out of the death of Hafiz Rahmat in

the Battle of Miranpur-Katra on 23 rd April, 1774, by Anti-Awadh

writers. M. Najmul Ghani Rampuri has devoted thirty-nine (39) pages to

highlights the most trivial details of the battle ant its effects on the

defeated Ruhelas. At the same time he has not missed any opportunity to

ascribe all sorts of motives to Nawab-Wazeer Shuja-ud-daulah, the

victor of the day. But not a word has been said about Shuja-ud-daulah's

generous behaviour towards the Ruhela Chiefs families or the pensions

[ 41 ]

Chapter -II

that he gave to Mohubbat Khan, son of Hafiz Rahmat Khan, and other

members of the family at Bareilly. Not even a grudging admission has

been made by Najmul Ghani Rampuri and other writers of the patronage

meted out to the Ruhela Sardars by Awadh Rulers up to the Indian

National upsurge in 1857-1859.

The Awadh Rulers' friendly behaviour and generous financial

assistance to the families of their vanquished foes is proved by the

British official record.

Long before this victory over Hafiz Rahmat Khan, Shuja-ud-

daulah had begun to feel the full significance of the British traders'

"sincere friendship and firm union". By the first treaty, executed on 16 th

August 1765, he had to pay 50,00,000 lakhs of rupees (besides other

concessions); by the treaty of 29 th November 1768, his forces were

reduced to 35,000 men only; by "a couple of treaties, both dated the 20 th

of March 1772, Chunar was taken and Allahabad was kept; and thus,

during the lifetime of Shooja-ood-Dowlah, two steps were taken in

advance of the treaty of August, 1765; that is to say, his forces were

restricted, his forts were appropriated", and by the treaty of 7 th

September 1773, he paid 50,00,000 lakhs of rupees in lieu of which,

"shall he possess Corah and Currah, and Allahabad, for ever".

The last treaty (7 th September 1773) "was followed by a

proceedings, on the part of Shooja-ood-Dowlah, by which he provided

against its infringement in his lifetime, that is to say, in the year 1775 he

died, and so escaped the further demands of his pertinacious Allies".

British ingratitude

[ 42 ]

Chapter -II

The death of Shuja-ud-daulah saved him from "the demands of his

pertinacious Allies" no doubt, but everyone of his descendants had to

work as a 'wet-nurse' to the British ever after and at the end the last

representative of the family was repaid with the annexation of the

country itself! The British victory at Baksar "bound the rulers of Awadh

to the conqueror", says Col. Malleson, "by ties of admiration, of

gratitude, of absolute reliance and trust, ties which made them for the

ninety-four years that followed the friends of his friends and the enemies

of his enemies. For that constancy of friendship English repaid them in

1855-56."

Macaulay on Hastings and Company Directors

Shuja-ud-daulah, unfortunately, had to deal with unprincipled

persons like, Hastings and Directors of the East India Company. How

apposite are the remarks of Macaulay.

"The principle which directed Hastings' dealings with his

neighbours", says Macaulay, "is fully expressed by the old motto of one

of the great predatory families of Teviotdale: 'Thou shall want ere I

want'. He seems to have laid it down, as a fundamental proposition

which could not be disputed, that, when he had not as many lacs of

rupees as the public service required, he was to take them from anybody

who had.........The Directors, it is true, never enjoined or appluaded any

crime. Far from it. Whoever examines their letters written at that time,

will find there many just and humane sentiments, many excellent

precepts-in short, an admirable code of political ethics. But every

exhortation is modified or nullified by a demand for money. 'Govern

leniently, and send more money; 'Practise strict justice and moderation

towards neighbouring powers, and send more money-' this is in truth

sum of all the instructions that Hastings ever received from

home.......The Directors dealt with India as the Church, in the good old

[ 43 ]

Chapter -II

times, dealt with a heretic. They delivered the victim over to the

executioners, with a earnest request that all possible tenderness might be

shown".

Shuja's death irreparable loss

Shuja-ud-daulah dominated the contemporary Indian stage like a

colossus and naturally raised a host of enemies among his rivals who

were jealous of his power and position. As for his military skill, inspite

of Champion's vituperations, Col. Malleson says: "we must also admit

that never before had they (the English) encountered an enemy in all

respects so formidable" (quoted earlier).

His untimely death removed "the most skilled native leader of

soldiers in India". According to his countrymen "since his death

prosperity, happiness and brilliance have departed from the world", so

observes Harcharan.

"In spite of the failures and weaknesses of Shuja-ud-daulah his

real claims to greatness cannot be denied", says Dr. Qidwai, "He raised

the prestige of Awadh during his time to an amazing height. He won a

reputation "among country powers that has not been equalled by any

ruler of Awadh. He aroused a dread in his English contemporaries which

is no doubt a tribute to his personal power and a testimony to his

sagacity".

[ 44 ]

Chapter -II

ASAF-UD-DAULAH (1775-1797)

Shuja-ud-daulah died an unhappy man on 29 th January 1774. "His

army was restricted; his fortress were occupied; by every fresh

arrangement he was brought more directly", says Major Bird, "under the

influence and control of the East India Company".

He was succeeded by his son, Mirza Yahya Khan Bahadur, better

known by his title Asaf-ud-daulah. "The accession of a Prince", writes

on Englishman, "was just one of those occasions which the Company

rarely failed to improve; and it was improved on this occasion without

the slightest reluctance".

The treaties of 16 th August 1765 and of 7 th September 1773 with

the late Nawab-Wazeer Shuja-ud-daulah were declared by the Council

"to have ceased with his death", although it was laid down by the latter

Treaty (Articles: I) that "This Agreement shall be observed by all the

English Chiefs, gentlemen of the Council, and by the Company, nor

shall it ever be broken or deviated from". A fresh treaty was signed with

the new Nawab-Wazeer on 21 st May 1775. Once of the fruits of this

treaty was that the cost of the Brigade was raised from Rs. 2,10,000 per

month to Rs. 2,60,000 per month; moreover the Circars of Benares,

Ghazipure, Chunar etc., were perpetually ceded to the 'Honourable

Company1; "and now, by this cession," says Major Bird, "the tribute was

carried directly into the coffers of the Company. Thus, while the

Company were requiring increased contributions from their Ally, they

curtailed the resources out of which he was to pay them. They burnt

their candle at both ends, with consistent indifference, seeing that the

cost was, in this instance, defrayed by the tallow-chandler".

For Balwant Singh's treachery at the Battle of Baksar (1764) he

was protected by the Company from the wrath of Shuja-ud-daulah, and

[ 45 ]

Chapter -II

Shuja-ud-daulah had to sign a 'Qaulnama' or Agreement on 6 th

September 1773, by which all the Zamindary, Mahals etc.. "which were

under the charge of Rajah Bulwant singh, deceased, I do hereby grant

and confirm unto you (Rajah Cheyt Singh) upon their former footing

etc".

Cheyt Singh, the son of the traitor of Baksar (Balwant Singh) was

confirmed in his patrimony by the Nawab's Qaulnam referred to above.

But the British, only true to their own interests, would not leave the son

of even their traitorous ally in peace. By the Article of the Treaty of 21 st

May 1775, Asaf-ud-daulah was made to declare that "he has given up of

his own free will and accord, unto the English Company, all the districts

dependent on the Raja Cheyt Sing, together with the land and water

duties, and the sovereignty of the said districts in perpetuity".

Nawab saddled with debts

Moreover Asaf-ud-daulah was made to sign an Agreement on the

same date, which laid down:

"In case of any persons having any demands, or having received

tuncaws on Rajah Cheyt Singh, or on the districts under him, agreeable

to my order, such demands or tuncaws do not depend on the said Rajah,

or on the said district, but are due from myself.

"The possession and sovereignty, in perpetuity, of the said

districts under the said Rajah, without encumbrances, delays, dues,

debts, tuncaws, etc., I wholly give up to the English Company at the

expiration of one month and a half."

Treaty of Fyzabad : Effects

This treaty of 21 st May 1775 was called the "Treaty of Fyzabad"

and we should thank Mukhtarud-daulah (Syed Murtuza Khan) for it. "It

provided the cession of the Zamindari of Banaras in its full sovereignty

[ 46 ]

Chapter -II

to the Company", says Dr. Qidwai, "This injury which Murtuza Khan

did to the state was irreparable as it paved the way for the disintegration

of the Kingdom of Awadh".

The Company's officers, including members of the Court of

Directors, had no moral scruples. They looked only to their interests and

changed their opinions as the occasion demanded.

"The conduct of the Directors, as connected with this Treaty, was

peculiar" writes M. Maseeh-ud-deen Khan. "In their letter of the 15 th

December 1775, remarking upon the resolution of the Council to

disregard the Treaties concluded with the late Nawab of Oude, they say,

'Although the death of Shooja-ood-Dowlah may render it necessary to

make new arrangements with his successors, we cannot agree with our

Council that our treaties with the state of Oude expired with the death of

that Nabob'. No sooner, however, were they made acquainted with the

new grant of revenue, and the new allowance on account of the troops,

than they thus wrote in their letter of the 24 th of December 1776:

'It is with singular satisfaction we observe, at any time, the

attention paid by our servants to the great interests of their employers;

and it is with pecular pleasure we here signify our entire approbation of

the late treaty concluded with Asoph-ood-Dowlah, successor of Shooja-

ood-Dowlah, by which such terms are procured as seem to promise us

solid and permanent advantages (Banaras yielding) "about seventy lakhs

of rupees per annum and bringing into the Company's coffers nearly

twenty-five lakhs of rupees net profit."

Much has been written about misery and oppression of the Awadh

people during the Native rule, but few people know the withering effect

of British supremacy supplanting that of the Nawab-Wazeer in Banaras.

During the fostering reigns of Shuja-ud-daulah and Asaf-ud-daulah the

people of Awadh, including that of Banaras, were happy and the country

[ 47 ]

Chapter -II

prosperous, admits Torrens...... "the peasantry fearless of unjust exaction

of personal wrong, cultivated their fields like gardens, and throve on the

fruits of their industry". But all this changed during the British rule.

Under the Company all the ruling powers of the Rajah of Banaras were

vested in the British Resident and the annual tribute payable to the

Company was raised to Rs 20 lakhs. The condition of the people can

best be described in the words of Torrens:

"Misery and distraction took the place which had recently been

occupied by comfort and content...........two years later, when Hastings

revisited the scene..........he found it one of desolattion.

The general condition of Awadh may best be imagined by the

following quotation from James Mill:

"Before the connection between the English and Oude", Writes

Mill, "the revenue had exceeded three millions sterling, and was levied

without being accused of deteriorating the country. In the year 1779

(during Asaf-ud-daulah's reign), it did not exceed one-half of that sum,

and in the subsequent years fell far below it, while the rate of taxation

was increased, and the country exhibited every mark of oppressive

exaction."

Notwithstanding the falling revenue and "oppressive exactions",

there was no abatement of the burdens with which the country was

saddled from year to year. Let us recapitulate: By the treaty of 7 th"

September 1773 (between Shuja-ud-daulah and the Company) it was laid

down that he should pay 2,10,000 Sicca rupees per month for one

brigade. By the new treaty signed with his son, Asaf-ud-daulah (on 21 st

May 1775), the Company increased the amount of Rs. 2,60,000 i.e. by

50,000 rupees more per month. But this was not all.

In 1777 "To the first (brigade) was added.... a second, called the

Temporary Brigade, because the express condition of it was, that the

[ 48 ]

Chapter -II

expenses should be charged on the Nawab 'for so long a time only as he

should require the corps for his service." As if it was not enough load

for poor Asaf-ud-daulah, he was further burdened with more

expenditure. "Several detached corps, in the Company's service, were

also placed in his pay," says Mill, "and a great part of his own native

troops were put under the command of British Officers...

"In the year 1779, the expense of the temporary brigade, and that

of the country troops under British Officers increased", writes Mill, "the

one to the amount of more than eighty, the other of more than forty

thousand pounds sterling, above the estimate. These particulars,

however, constituted only the military part of his English expense. The

civil expense resulted from an establishment under the Resident, which,

without an authority from the Court of Directors, or any record in the

books of the Council, had gradually and secretly swelled to a great

amount: and was increased by another establishment for another agent of

the Company, and be pensions, allowances, and large occasional gifts, to

various persons in the Company's service".

Nawab complains of excessive expenses

It seems that Asaf-ud-daulah could bear it no longer and, like the

proverbial worm, turned and blurted out:

"In that year, viz., 1779, the Nabob complained", says Mill, "that

the pressure was more than he was able to endure. "During the years

past", said he, "the expense occasioned by the troops in brigade, and

others commanded by European officers, has much distressed the

support of my household; insomuch, that the allowances made to the

seraglio and children of the deceased Nabob have been reduced to one-

fourth of what it had been, upon which they have subsisted in a very

distressed manner for two years past. The attendants, writers, and

servants, etc., of my Court, have received no pay for two years past; and

[ 49 ]

Chapter -II

there is at present no part of the country that can be allotted to the

payment of my father's private creditors, whose applications are daily

pressing upon me. All these difficulties I have for these three years past

struggled through and found this consolation therein, that it was

complying with the pleasure of the Honourable Company, and in the

hope that this Supreme Council would make inquiry from impartial

persons into distressed situation; but I am now forced to a

representation. From the great increase of expense, the revenues were

necessarily farmed out a high rate, and deficiencies followed yearly. The

country and cultivation is abandoned. And this year, in particular, from

the excessive droughts, deduction of many lacs have been allowed the

farmers, who are still unsatisfied. I have received but just sufficient to

support my absolute necessities, the revenues being deficient to the

amount of fifteen lacs ("stated by the resident, in his letter, dated 13 th

December 1779 to amount to twenty-five lacs, 250,000 pounds); and for

this reason, many of the old chieftains, with their troops, and the useful

attendants of the Court, were forced to leave it, and there is now only a

few foot and horse for the collection of my revenues; and should the

Zemindars be refractory, there is not left a sufficient number to reduce

them to obedience.' In consequences of these distressing circumstances,

the Nabob prayed, that, the assignments for the new brigade, and the

other detached bodies of the Company's troops. Might not be required,

declaring that these troops were not only quite useless to his

government, but, moreover, the cause of much loss, both to the 'revenues

and customs; and that the detached bodies of troops, under the European

officers, brought nothing but confusion into the affairs of his

government, and were entirely their own masters".

"This representation", according to Mill, "which events proved to

be hardly an exaggeration, and the prayer by which it was followed, the

[ 50 ]

Chapter -II

Governor-General received, with tokens of the highest indignation and

resentment. 'These demands, he said, 'the tone in which they are

asserted, and the season in which they are made, are all equally

alarming.' In the letter which was despatched in his words to the

Resident, the grounds on which the Nabob petitioned for relief are

declared to be 'totally inadmissible.'

t is further noted by Mill that "the complaint of the Vazir that they

and their officers (troops in addition to the brigade) acted as the masters

in his country, and as a source both of expense and of disorder, is

confirmed by Mr. Francis, who, in Council, pronounced it 'notorious that

the English army had devoured his revenues, and his country, under

colour of defending it.' Hastings' arguments in defence were declared to

be 'only a varnish placed upon injustice by fraud.'

o heed was paid to the genuine protests of the Nawab-Wazeer with

the result that "the debt with which he (Asaf-ud-daulah) stood charged

in 1780 amounted to the sum of 1,400,000 pound sterling. The Supreme

Council continued pressing their demands. The Nabob, protesting that he

had given up everything, that 'in the country no further resources

remained; and that he was without a subsistence,' continued sinking

more deeply in arrear: till the time when the resolution of Mr. Hastings

was adopted, to proceed to make with him a new arrangement on the

spot."

Hastings meets Asaf at Chunar

Sadr Jahan Begam and Amat-uz-zahra, better known as Bahu

Begam Saheba, the grandmother and mother respectively of Asaf-ud-

daulah, were peaceful living at Fyzabad. They were under the "special

protection" of the East India Company headed by Warren Hastings who

had "accepted the trust". The ladies were passing their days, bestowing

charities on the deserving and the needy, in the palace bequeathed to

[ 51 ]

Chapter -II

them by Shuja-ud-daulah but, unfortunately, "were supposed to have

derived under his will vast treasures". The increasing demands of the

Company had exhausted the Awadh treasury so much so that even

Barwell, a member of the Supreme Council of Bengal, had to admit that

the "impoverished state of the country loudly pleaded for a reduction of

the revenue, as absolutely requisite for its future welfare."

Hastings met the Nawab-Wazeer at Chunar on 11 th September

1781, "when the Nabob was, by treaty, allowed to seize the property of

the Princesses, and of others his relations; and, on the condition of

bestowing that property upon the English, actually rewarded for the

seizure, by obtaining relief from a permanent and oppressive expense."

But it is interesting to find that the above Treaty of 11 th September

1781 by which Asaf-ud-daulah was "allowed to seize the property of the

Princesses, and of others his relations".... for "bestowing that property

upon the English" has not been printed in the "collection of Treaties,

Engagements and Sanads" by Aitchison. The only reason for omission

seems to be that it portrays the East India Company in its true colours.

Hastings had hit upon a diabolical scheme which, in the words of

Torrens, was sordid "device for replenihsing the exhcequer of Calcutta

without exhausting that at Lucknow" (simply because the Lucknow

treasury was already exhausted!). Discussing the Chunar agreement Lord

Macaulay says: "It was, simply this that the Governor-General and the

Nawab Vazier should join to rob a third party, and the third party whom

they determined to rob was the parent (mother) of one of the robbers."

Attachment Orders

Macaulary, as usual with English writers, has cleverly tried to put

the odium of robbing the Begams on Asaf-ud-daulah and concealed the

real facts. It is on the authority of no less a historian than James Mill

that Hastings ordered Middleton, the Resident, who "issued parwanahs

[ 52 ]

Chapter -II

and then only Nawab attached the property under compulsion." It is on

record that Middleton issued parwanahs for attachment of Begams's

property and wrote to Hastings in his letter dated 9 th December 1781:

"His Excellency appeared to be very much hurt and incensed at

the measure; and loudly complains of the treachery of his ministers,

first, in giving you any hopes that such a measure would be adopted;

and, secondly, in promising me their whole support in carrying it

through. But as I apprehended rather than suffer it to appear that the

point had been carried in opposition to his will, he at length yielded a

nominal acquiescence, and has this day issued his own parwanahs to that

effct; declaring, however, at the same time, both to me and his

ministers, that it is an act of compulsion. But how strange that these

lamentations did not attract the attention of Macaulay!

The tortures applied to Jawahir Alii Khan and Bahar Ali Khan, the

confidential eunuchs of the Begams, to seize their treasures and other

activities of Hastings, at last, compelled the Court of Directors to take

notice of their Governor-General's activities in India. They did not agree

with Hastings as far as his dealings with the Begams were concerned

and in their letter, dated 14 th February 1783, ordered an inquiry into the

Begam's case but it was opposed by Warren Hastings.

Restoration of Jagheers opposed

After one year the helpless Asaf-ud-daulah formally applied to the

Governor-General "requesting that he might be permitted to restore, to

his grandmother and other relations, the jaghires which were taken from

them in the beginning of last year; the authority of the Governor-General

was sufficient to prevent, at the present time, the adoption of any

measure in their favour. And Poor Asaf-ud-daulah has ever since been

blammed for his supposed unfilial act of robbing his own mother and

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Chapter -II

grandmother, and nobody speaks of Hastings' compulsion and, later, his

preventing Asaf-ud-daulah from restoring the Jagheers to the Begams!

"From the Ist of February 1774 to the end of September 1783,"

writes Major Bird, "within a period of little more than nine years (as is

admitted in a dispatch of the Court of Directors, dated 18 th April 1789),

the Company had squeezed out of their Wuzier ally two crores and thirty

lakhs of rupees (£ 2,300,000 sterling), and the Directors allowed that the

dominions of the Wuzier were reduced to a deplorable condition in

consequence... Even Warren Hastings himself, speaking of the conduct

of the Company towards Oude," says Maseeh-ud-deen Khan, "remarks

'the number, influence, and enormous amount of the salaries, pensions,

and emoluments of the Company's service, civil and military, in the

Vizier's service, have become an intolerable burden upon the revenue

and authority of His Excellency, and exposed us to the envy and

resentment of the whole country, by excluding the native servants

and adherents of the Vizier from the rewards of their services and

attachment." Upon these tardy admissions of Warren Hastings, who

played the leading role in this tragic drams, how apt are the comments of

Major Bird, who says, "In short, it was evident to the factors themselves

that their milch cow was getting low in flesh, and that it must have

careful nursing unless they were ready once for all to realize the value

of its famished remains" and consequently the Residency was abolished

on 31st December, 1783.

Warren Hastings' Character

Warren Hastings, throughout his career in India, showed a

behaviour which, in the words of Edmund Burke, "broadly displays a

want of sense, a want of feeling, a want of decorum; a behaviour which

indicates an habitual depravity of mind, that has no sentiment of

propriety, no feeling for the relations of life, no conformity to the

[ 54 ]

Chapter -II

circumstances of human affairs...but the audacity of hardened, habitual,

shameless guilt; affording legitimate grounds for inferring, a very

defective education, very evil society, or every vicious habits of life."

But I cannot close this chapter of inquites without quoting from

Henry Dundas, President of the Secret Committee, who referring the

reports of the Secret Committee to a Committee of the House, on 9th

April, 1782:

"Expatiated on the misconduct of Indian Presidencies, and of the

Court of Directors; of the former, because they plunged the nation into

wars for the sake of conquest, contemned and violated the engagement

of Treaties, and plundered and oppressed the people of India; of the

latter, because they blamed misconduct only when it was unattended

with profit, but exercised a very constant forbearance towards the

greatest delinquency, as often as it was productive of a temporary gain".

How true!

Cornwallis lightens the burden

Warren Hastings left India in 1785, and was impeached before the

Parliament for robbing the Begams of Awadh and other charges (He was

ultimately acquitted). He was replaced by Cornwallis in 1786. He made

some remissions in the exactions and in the interference of the

Company. "The annual payments by the Wuzier to the Company

required by treaty amounted to little more than thirty-four lakhs per

annum; but in respect of the additional brigade thrust upon him by

Hastings, and on other pretexts," says Major Bird, "these payments had

been actually raised to as much as eighty-four lakhs. It was now agreed

that they should be reduced again to fifty lakhs, a sum still beyond the

stipulations of former treaties, but bearable in comparison with the

exactions which preceded it, and coupled with the assurance (to be

violated hereafter), that from the date of this agreement His Excellency

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Chapter -II

should not be charged with any excess on this sum, and no further

demands should be made.

"And though, at that time, Oudh was threatened with no particular

danger, and the expense attending the continuance of the Brigade at

Futtyghur exceeded the sum which he was entitled to exact of the Nabon

(Asaf-ud-daulah), he adhered to the resolution that the troops should not

be removed.

Shore succeeds Cornwall's: Agreements violated

Sir John Shore came to India as Governor-General in 1793 and the

solemnly ratified agreements of his predecessor, Cornwallis, were

shamefully violated. "Sir John Shore, required 'the wretched Vizier' (to

use the language of Mr. Mill) to add to his former subsidy the expense

of one European and one native regiment of cavalry' provided the annual

amount should not exceed five and a half lakhs of rupees. Thus the

agreement of Lord Cornwallis was shamefully violated."

Sir John Shore had gone to Lucknow on 20 th March 1797, and "by

means of threats, artifices," forced Asaf-ud-daulah to sign the above

agreement. Interestingly enough, the Agreement laid down that the

Nawab-Wazeer would pay for the "two regiments (the amount of which

expenses, however; the Governor-General cannot at present specify)

provided they shall not exceed upon any account five lakhs and a half of

rupees per annum."

Awadh continued to suffer from the "crooked politics and

shameless breaches of faith" of the Company's representatives.

Asaf-ud-daulah felt the methods used and the treatment mated out

to him by Sir John Shore, "who possessed the .reputation of being

sanctimonious in appearance and a lover of peace," and the drain on his

country so much that he fell ill, but would not take medicine till the

'cultured sway of Asaf-ud-daulah' came to an end. He died on 21 st

[ 56 ]

Chapter -II

September 1797 "and left the Company, as their custom was, to improve

the incident of a fresh succession."

[ 57 ]

Chapter -II

SAADAT ALT KAN (1798-1814)

Saadat Ali Khan Succeeds

Asaf-ud-daulah was succeeded by Wazeer Ali and formally

acknowledged by the Governor General as the former's son, without any

enquiry about his paternity, although it was very easy to do so, since

there was:

"a Resident at the Court of Lucknow whose duty it was to watch

and to report to the government, which the represented, everything of

the slightest public importance, the general disbelief of the claim of the

recognised son of the sovereign to the inheritance for which he was

destined should have been either unknown or disregarded by the British

Government."

Later Sir John Shore, the then Governor-General "discovered that

Saadat Ali was more eligible to the throne of Oude than Vazir Ali.

Saadat Ali was a brother of the last ruler and was living as a pensioner

at Benares...

"Sir John (Shore) opined for Saadat Ali, but he had not yet made

up his mind, or he had not yet ascertained what price Saadat Ali would

pay to the Company for his elevation to the musnad. Warren Hastings

had been accused of holding an auction at Lucknow, but Sir John, now

figured more in the light of an auctioneer in that city". In the words of

Major Bird:

"Seeing that a better bargain could be made with a brother of the

deceased Wuzier, Sir John Shore repaired to Benares, and proposed to

the latter, who was named Saadat Allie, to dethrone Vizier Allie,

offering the support of the Company on the intelligible condition that

the subsidy should be largely increased, and their support should be paid

for otherwise in money and kind.. To this stipulation, bold and

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Chapter -II

barefaced, the aspirant to the princedom 'cheerfully consented', and,

after a preliminary process at Lucknow, termed in the "Parliamentary

Return of Treaties" 'a full investigation', and purporting to be an inquiry

into the spuriousness of Vizier Allie's birth, Prince was deposed, and

Saadat Allie was proclaimed in his stead, at Lucknow, on the 21 st

January 1798". He ascended the throne with the title of Yameen-ud-

daulah.

A fresh treaty of seventeen articles was signed "in its principles

stipulations absolutely stinking of rupees" on 21 st February 1798 a list of

"Kistbundi (or Installment) for the payment of the Annual Subsidy"

totalling Rs. 76,00,000-0-0.

Company's Enormous Gains

"We append in a note", says Major Bird, "the substance of the

various articles seriatim, and the trial of rupees will be found to run

through them with a latitude and profusion which leaves to doubt as to

the motives of one of the parties to the document. The Wuzier is to pay

up arrears. The Wuzier is required to give up the fort of Allahabad, and

to pay eight lakhs of rupees to put it in repair for the presentees. The

Wazier is to pay three lakhs for repairing fort Furry Ghur (Fatehgarh).

The Wuzier is to pay expenses of moving troops, the number of lakhs

being as yet indefinite. The Wuzier is to pay the Company twelve lakhs

in consideration of their expenses in establishing his right. The Wuzier

is to pay a pension of one lakh and a half to his deposed rival. And

lastly, by Article 2, the annual subsidy paid by the Wuzier, and which

amounted to something over fifty-six lakhs, is now raised to seventy-six

lakhs, that is to say, from about £ 555000 a year, the subsidy is screwed

upto 760,000. In all, a million sterling, and the fort of Allahabad are

obtained in a single year by the East India Company, half of it in

violation of the engagement of Lord Cornwallis, and in virtue of the

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Chapter -II

union now growing firmer between themselves and the victim in their

coils. A few months later they even attempted to dispossess the latter of

the Doab country, and sir John Shore, then Lord Teignmouth, wrote a

letter, dated, October 3, 1798, to the Resident at Lucknow, with this

object. 'If, said he, 'we cannot take it as rulers and sovereigns, we might

manage to take on a lease, in the same manner as it is held by Almas

Allie Khan, and on his death we will take possession of the whole1. The

Resident was also instructed to induce the Nawaub Wuzier to disband

his own army, and replace it by Company's troops.

'People Sold'

Not unnaturally Sir Henry Lawrence caustically remarked:

"What will perhaps most strike the English reader of Sir John

Shore's treaty is the entire omission of the slightest provision for othe

good government of Oudh. The people seemed as it were sold to the

highest bidder. Vizier AM was young, dissolute, and needy; Saadat Ali

was middle-aged, known to be prudent, and believed to be rich. Being of

penurious habits, he had, even on his petty allowance as a younger son,

amassed several lakhs of rupees; and, in short a more promising sponge

to squeeze, than his nephew. From the general tenor of Sir John Shore's

life, we believe that his heart was in the right place, though this his

diplomatic transaction, might, if taken alone, lead us to a different

conclusion. Wherever his heart was, his head at least must have been

woolgathering. He set a bad precedent. He made the Masnad of Oudh a

mere transferable property in the hands of the British Governor and he

left the people of Oudh at the mercy of a shackled and guaranteed ruler.

This may have been liberality, but it was a liberality of a very spurious

sort. Much as we admire Lord Teignmouth's domestic character, we are

obliged entirely to condemn the whole tenor of Oudh negotiations.

Historians have hitherto let him down slightly, but his Lordship may be

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Chapter -II

judged by the same standard as other public officers; by the right or by

the wrong that he committed, and not by his supposed motives, or by his

private character."

After obtaining one million sterling and the fort of Allahabad, in

one single year, in violation of the engagement of Lord Cornwallis, the

lust for land was whetted and Lord Teignmouth intended to dispossess

Saadat Ali Khan, the ally of the East India Company, of the Doab

(Rohilkhand). Although the Treatly of 21 st February 1798, emphasized

"the mutual conditions of friendship and unity previously subsisting, and

also the former treaties, as far as consistent with the present, are

upheld", Lord Teignmouth (former Sir John Shore) wrote a letter

on .October 3,1798, to the Resident at Lucknow: in which he says:

"If we cannot take it (the Doab country) as rulers and sovereigns,

we might manage to take it on a lease, in the same manner as it is held

by Almas Allie Khan, and on his death we will take possession of the

whole".

Nawab to pay for Company's Army

This clearly gives away the Governor-General and proves,

unequivocally, the East India Company's policy of land-grabbing, by

hook or by crook! Not content with this the Governor-General also

directed the Resident to "induce" the Nawab-Wazeer to disband his army

which should be replaced by the Company's troops. The rumours of

Zaman Shah's invasion of India gave the necessary pretext to the

Christian Governor-General to force the "necessary reforms" although:

"From the correspondence which passed between the Governor-

General of India in Council and the Court of Directors, from the 17 th

April 1798 to the 15* May, 1799, it is perfectly clear and evident that

the Oude Government was under no apprehensions of any enemy either

from without or within, and therefore did not stand in need of any

[ 61 ]

Chapter -II

alliance, either offensive or defensive, with the Indian Government.

Such being the state of things, the Home authorities directed the Local

Government to disband the new troops they had raised in Oude, as from

there being no occasion for their services, they were only un-necessary

expense to the Government of that country. The Indian authorities,

however, did not think is proper to break up the strength of their Indian

army, but at the same time, anxious to exempt the Company from the

expenses occasioned by it, they saddled the Nawaub Vizier with them."

Awadh financially drained

"They drained the territory of Oude", says Major Bird, "of every

rupee they could wring from it. They played the part of great dacoits on

a scale most oppressive to its frugal ryots and industrious cultivators.

The plundered the revenues of Wuzier, nobles and people, on the plea of

defending those who were competent to defend themselves against the

force of any native adversary, and they appropriated their soldiers and

military resources, while they charged them tribute for the bereavement.

They took territory as well as revenues, and they curtailed income as

they increased expenditure. By the treaty of the 20 th March 1772, they

took the fort of chunar: by that of the 21 st May 1775, they took the

districts of Banares, Gazeepore, Caunpore etc. They had taken the fort

of Futty Guhr (Fatehgarh) in 1787. They took the fort of Allahabad in

1798; and they were now preparing to take the Doab, if they could

manage to get in on a lease - if, in short, they could get only a right of

entry. At the same time, through the instrumentality of a Resident, they

were admonishing, meddling, making, unmaking, and degrading , as far

as they could, the Princes of Oude into puppets after they had suceeded

in converting their dominions into a farm. At this stage they began to

remonstrate, and recommend reforms, with the sententious air of

benevolent bystanders, as if they, and they alone, were not entirely

[ 62 ]

Chapter -II

answerable for the mischief thus caused and which ever after they

persisted in as mischievously exaggerating".

Pretext for interference

Major R.W. Bird, being an Assistant Resident at Lucknow, has

correctly painted the picture of the Residents' interference by

"admonishing, meddling, making, unmaking, and degrading.......the

Princes of Oude into puppets" and thus creating, intentionally,

administrative confusion in the country to offer a pretext for the

Company to interfere. And these conditions were not peculiar to Awadh.

The Residents saw to it that conditions should prevail, mutatis mutandis,

in each Indian State for the benefit of the Honourable East India

Company.

Mornington as Governor-General

Mornington, better known as Marquis Wellesley, arrived as

Governor-General at Calcutta in May 1798. He was not slow to move. In

October, the same year, he had "under his consideration the best means

of securing the regular payment of the subsidy from Oude, and of

reforming the Nawab's army". But it was nothing but a series of

"pretentious strictures" and the real motive was different. " 'This

reform', says Hale, 'really meant the disbandment of the Nawab's regular

army, except as far as portions of it might be wanted for purposes of

state, or for the collection of the revenue, and the substitution of an

increased number of the Company's regiments of infantry and cavalry;

to be relieved from time to time, and to be paid by the Nawaub. The

Nawaub Wuzier, however, in alarm at this proposal, spoke of abdicating.

Lord Wellesly on this at once stated the grand object which he

considered the Company had in view, and this was 'The acquisition by

the Company of the exclusive authority, civil and military, over the

dominions of Oude.' With this a treaty was ultimately drawn up, the first

[ 63 ]

Chapter -II

article of which involved the virtual abdication of the Nawaub. But on

this being presented to him, the Nawaub positively refused to sign any

such agreement. The Governor-General entered into negotiations which

extended over several months, in the course of which he admitted that

'his original object was not merely to secure the subsidiary funds, but to

extinguish the Nawaub's military power' ". Wellesley was simply

following the "bad precedent set" by Shore.

Troops ordered into Awadh

It is interesting to note the peremptory attitude adopted by Wellesley

and his indecent haste:

"Without allowing the Nawaub time to draw up the remonstrance

above -mentioned, the additional troops had been actually ordered into

Oude; and the ground on which this measure was attempted to be

justified was this: that, as the Company was bound by Lord

Teignmouth's treaty to defend the Nawaub's possessions, that treaty

must be understood to confer upon them, by implication, the power of

augmenting the British forces stationed in Oude entirely at their

pleasure, and even in spite of the Nawaub's assent, whenever they

should think such a measure necessary to the discharge of their

defensive engagements with the Nawaub. It was further contended that

the latter was bound to maintain any number of troops which the

Company might station in his dominions, because one article of the

treaty obliges him so to do whenever any augmentation of his British

military force 'should be thought necessary'. As soon, therefore, as one

division of the troops, destined by the British authorities, in the manner

above described, to occupy certain portions of the Oude dominions, had

been stationed there, and the Nawaub had been compelled to become

responsible for their pay, and while another body was ordered to hold

[ 64 ]

Chapter -II

itself in readiness to march after them, the Nawaub Wuzier Saadat Allie

addressed the following memorial to the Governor-General."

Saadat Ali Khan remonstrates

Saadat Ali Khan, being a well-read, intelligent and efficient

administrator, saw through Wellesley's game and, on 11 th Januay 1800,

sent a well-argued memorial. After describing the dangers which

threatened his brother (Asaf-ud-daulah), he says:

"Notwithstanding these circumstances, it never once entered the

imagination of the British rulers to introduce such innovations, and carry

into effect such arrangements, as those now suggested by your

Lordship.... It will then be evident to every person, that the Company,

no longer putting confidence in the sincerity of my friendship, deprived

me of the direction of my own army, and spread their toops over my

dominions......my authority in these provinces could be annihilated; nor

would my orders be attended to on any occasion, whether trifling or of

moment....

"By a reference to this (the second) article, it will be evident to

your Lordship, that, on acession to the musnud, the force designed for

the defence of these dominions was increased beyond what it had been

in any former period, whilst, on my part, I agreed to defray the expense

of the said augmentation. But in no part of the said article is it written or

hinted, that after the lapse of a certain number of years a further

permanent augmentation should take place; and to deviate in any degree

from the said treaty appears to me unnecessary...

After the conclusion of the treaty in question, no further

augmentation is to be made, excepting in case of necessity; and that the

increase is to be proportioned to the emergency, and endure but as long

as necessity exists. An 'augmentation' of the troops, without existing

[ 65 ]

Chapter -II

necessity, and making me answerable for the expense 'attending the

increase', is in consistent with the treaty, and seems inexpedient.

It is stipulated, "that all transactions between the two States shall

be carried on with the greatest cordiality and hormony; and that the said

Nawaub shall posses full authority over his household affairs, hereditary

dominions, his troops, and his subjects.' Should the management of the

army be taken from under my direction, I ask where is my authority over

my household affairs, hereditary dominions, over my troops, and my

subjects?"

Unable to meet the arguments Wellesley made it "a pretext for

treating it as an insult" and simply declined to "making any remarks on

the paper" (the Nawab's memorial) and moved by 'righteous' indigation

declared, "in a letter to Lieut-Colonel Scott, the Resident at Lucknow:

Para 2- "His Lordship not thinking proper to receive, in its present

form, the written communication made to you by the Nawaub Vizier on

the 11 inst., as an answer to His Lordship's letter of the 5 th of November

last to His Excellency (Saadat Ali Khan), directs that you lose no time in

returning the original of the communication of His Excellency,

accompanying the delivery of it with the following observations, in the

name of the Governor-General.

Para 3- "The mode adopted in the present instance by His Excellency,

of replying to a public letter from the Governor-General, attested by His

Lordhip's seal and signature, and written on a subject of the most

momentous concern to the mutual interests of the Company and of His

Excellency, besides indicating a levity unsuitable to the occasion, is

highly deficient in the respect due from His Excellency to the first

British authority in India.

Para 4- "His Lordship, therefore, declines making any remarks on the

paper which you have transmitted, and desires that the Nawaub Vizier

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Chapter -II

may be called on to reply to His Lordship's letter of the 5 th of November,

in the manne prescribed, no less by reason than by established usage.

"If, in formally answering His Lordship's letter, His Excellency

should think proper to impeach the honour and justice of the British

Government, in similar terms to those employed in the paper delivered

to you (the Resident) on the 11 th instant, the Governor-General will

than> consider how such unfounded calumnies and gross

misrepresentations, both of facts and arguments, deserve to be noticed."

James Mills' Verdict

I will simply quote the verdict of the eminent historian, James

Mill, on the above correspondence, and leave the reader to form his own

independent opinion on the merit of the case:

"A party to a treaty", says Mill "fulfills all its conditions with a

punctuality, which, in his case, was altogether unexampled; a gross

infringement of that treaty, or at least, what appears to him a gross

infringements, is about to be committed on the other side; he points out

clearly, but in the most humble language, savouring of abjectness much

more than disrespect, the inconsistency which appears to him to exist

between the treaty and the conduct; this is represented by the other party

as an impeachment of their honour and justice; and if no guilt existed

before to form a ground for punishing the party who declines

compliance with their will, a guilt is now contracted which hardly any

punishment can expiate. This, it is evident, is a course by which no

infringement of a treaty can ever be destitute of a justification. If the

party injured submits without a word, his consent is alleged. If he

complains, he is treated as impeaching the honour and justice of his

superior; a crime of so prodigious a magnitude, as to set the superior

above all obligation to such a worthless connection."

Forcible Possession

[ 67 ]

Chapter -II

In another letter of 22nd January 1801 Wellesley asked the Nawab-

Wazeer either to abdicate and accept and annual stipend or to cede one-

half of his territorial possessions to indemnify for the expenses of the

two bodies of troops with which he had been saddled. The Nawab

protested but to no avail. The Governor-General in a letter to the

Resident, dated 28 th April 1801, authorised him "in the event of the

Wuzier not consenting to make over the said provinces to the Company,

to take forcible possession of the same." It is interesting to note the

reasons given by Wellesley (which were often repeated in future and

specially in the case of Wajid Ali Shah) as a justification for taking over

the country:

"I am satisfied", says Lord Wellesley, "that no "effectual security

can be provided agaisnt the ruin of the provice of Oude, until the

exclusive management of the civil and military government of that

country shall be transferred intact to the Company, under suitable

provisions for the maintenance of His Excellency and of his family. No

other remedy can effect any considerably improvement in the resources

of the state, or can ultimately secure its external safety and internal

peace."

Saadat Ali Khan, on hearing Wellesley's decision to take half of

his dominions exclaimed, "If such be, indeed, the case it will not be long

ere the remaining portions of the country will be wrested for me."

Forced Treaty (1801)

Without wasting any more time in lengthy dispatches the

Governor-General sent his brother and Private Secretary, the Hon'ble

Henry Wellesly, "to persuade" the Nawab-Wazeer. He arrived at

Lucknow on the 3rd September 1801, and saw the Wazeer on the

e^instant. At long last Saadat Ali Khan had to sign a treaty on the 10 th

November 1801, ratified by the Governor-General on the 14 th instant at

[ 68 ]

Chapter -II

Banaras by which territories yielding an annual revenue of Rs.

1,35,23,474 were "ceded" to the Company. The treaty was imposed to

have a legal justification of the loot; otherwise "to put the matter in its

true light," according to Major Bird, "they took away half his

possessions because they had exhausted his purse, and in token of their

'friendship and union' they made him bound to them- by a halter".

"Ceded Districts"

The above Treaty of 1801 (Ten Articles) laid down that "the

Nabob Vizier hereby cedes to the Honourable the East India Company,

in perpetual sovereignty, the under mentioned portions of his territorial

possessions".

STATEMET OF THE JUMMA

1. ChuklaKorah, Kurrah, and Chukla Etawah : 55,48,577-11-9

2. Kehr and others : 05,33,374-0-6

3. Furrackabad and others : 04,50,001-0-0

4. Khairaghur and others : 02,10,0001-0-0

5. Azimghur and others, Azimghur, Mownaut: 06,95,624- 7-6

Bunjun

6. Goruckpore and others and Butwul : 05,49,854- 3-0

7. Soubah of Allahabad and others : 09,34,963-1-3

8. Chuckla Bareilly, Asophabad, and Kelpoory : 43,13,457-11-3

9. Nabob Gunje, Kehly, and others : 01,19,242-12-0

10. Mohoul and others, with the exception of the : 01,68,378-4-0

Talo ok of Arwul

Total: 1,35,23,474-

8-3

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Chapter -II

The above territories were euphemistically called "Ceded

Districts" -Although they were grabbed at the point of the bayonet-

and later formed a part of the North-Western province (with its

capital at Agra). On a reference to the map of India it will be found

that the remaining territories of Awadh were now surrounded on

three sides by the Company. On the eastern side only its frontier

marched with the swampy areas of Nepal, locally called, the 'Tarai'.

Thus Awadh became a pocket-state inside the British dominions.

Wellesley, not a believer in procrastination, appointed - on the

same day when he signed the treaty- a Board of Commissioners and,

with indecent haste, nominated his own, brother, Henry Wellesly, its

President and Lieutenant-Governor of the new province. The Board

was to look after the "provisional administration and settlement of

the Ceded Districts."

"The Governor-General performed another duty on the same

day" (when the Treaty was signed), writes Mil, "which was that of

giving the home authorities, along with the intelligence of the

conclusion of the treaty, an intimation of the several advantages

which he wished them to believe it carried in its bosom. These were,

'the entire extinction of the military power of the Nawaub,' the

maintenance of a great part of the Bengal; army at the Nawaub's

expense; deliverance of the subsidy from all the accidents with which

it was liable to be affected 'by the corruption, imbecility, and abuse

of that vicious and incorrigible system of vexation and misrule,

which constituted the government of Oude'; The power acquired by

the Company of becoming 'the instrument of restoring to affluence

and prosperity one of the most fertile regions of the globe, now

reduced to the most afflicting misery and desolation, by the depraved

administration of the native government,: deliverance from the stain

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'on the reputation and honour of the British nation in India,

upholding by the terror of their name, and the immediate force of

their arms, a system so disgraceful in its principles, and ruinous in its

effects.'

Saadat poisoned

The Earl of Moira, on landing at Madras as the Governor-

General of India on 11 th September 1813, sent a letter to the Nawab-

Wazeer through Lt.-Col. Baillie, the Resident, who had harassed the

former for a number of years. Having known Saadat Ali Khan so

long and having dealt with him Baillie feared that he, being in the

good books of the new Governor-General, would have the whip-hand

now and he (Baillie) must atone for his past misdeeds. A stray

remark, on the receipt of the Governor-General's letter, strengthened

the suspicious of his enemies. A diabolical conspiracy was hatched

and Saadat Ali Khan, the most learned and efficient administrator

who ruled Awadh (barring Saadat Khan Burhan-ul-Mulk), was

poisoned to death on 11 th 1814.

[ 71 ]

Chapter -II

GHAZI-DEEN HAIDER

(Nawab-Wazeer 1814-1819: H.M. the King 1819-1827)

Ghazee-ud-deen Haider succeeded his father, Saadat Ali Khan,

in 1814 without "the usual incidence of the sacrifice of a fertile

province or of a hillock of rupees as the price of his succession" not

due to any generous impulse on the part of the English Company but

because, says Major Bird, "so much had been squeezed out of the

reluctant parent that really there was no hope of a further bargain

with himself. The "usuall mutual recognitions of existing treaties

were executed on the accession of the new savereign" and "it was

agreed that they should 'be observed and kept till the end of time'".

Whatever be the causes of non-interference, probably the

British did not wish to kill the goose for the golden egg and having

mulcted his father (Saadat Ali Khan) of half the dominions thought it

politic to give him the long rope to strut about. Ghazee-ud-deen had

to deal with the new Governor-General, the Earl of Moira, who after

the Nepalese War became the Marquis of Hastings.

"Trinity of Empire-Builders:

"Wellesley, Hastings and Dalhousie constitute the Trinity of

empire-builders in the Christian administration of India during the

nineteenth century". He was "as unscrupulous as Lord Wellesley"

because he admitted to have "followed in the footsteps of the

Marquess Wellesley".

An interesting light is thrown on the character and conduct of

the then highest representatives of the Company who came out to

govern its possessions in the subcontinent; this will also,

incidentally, explain the quick and easy manner in which the

[ 72 ]

Chapter -II

unsuspecting Indian Princes were defeated by the ungrateful

Britishers on the political front.

It is intriguing to know that the late Saadat Ali Khan had

helped the Earl of Moira, whose "Chief claims to fame had been his

friendship with the Prince Regent and his reputation for prodigal

expenditure", by sending six lakhs of rupees to him in London. This

timely princely donation had helped Moira to wipe off his

debts..........., in consequences, to be appointed as the Governor-

General of India. In recognition of this opportune help Moira took

the unusual step of addressing him (Saadat All Khan) his first letter

direct from Madras instead of adopting the usual procedure of

sending the despatch from Calcutta. Suspicious of the Resident

(Baillie) were roused, which were confirmed by some stray remarks

of the Nawab-Wazeer himself and he was poisoned to death on 11 th

July 1814.

When Moira came to Lucknow in October 1814, Ghazi-ud-

deen Haider (who had succeeded his father in the previous July)

duped by the hopes given out by Moira though indirectly, in his letter

to his late father of settling satisfactory the pending matters,

complained to the Governor-General about Baillie's undue

interference in day-to-day administration and his abnoxious

behaviour. The Governor-General knowing full well the truth of the

complaints, as his own Journal shows "under date, October 13,

1814", did not give any relief. On the contrary his reaction was

typical:

"Nawab Vizeer had reckoned" writes the Governor-General,

with somewhat impish pleasure, in his Private Journal on October,

13,1814 "on being emancipated from the imperious dominations of

Major Baillie under which His Excellency groaned every hour, but

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Chapter -II

that / have riveted him in his position. Major Baillie dictated to him

in the merest trifles, broke upon him at his palace without notice,

whensoever he (Major Baillie) and anything to prescribe, fixed his

(Baillie's) creatures upon His Excellency with large salaries, to be

spies upon his actions; and above all lowered, His Excellency in the

eyes of his family and his subjects by the magisterial tone he

constantly assumed".

"Uncle" paid back with ingratitude

Now Nawab Saadat Ali Khan (father of Ghazi-ud-deen Haider)

had, as mentioned earlier, paid off and cleared the debts of this

"prodigal" friend of the Prince Regent. Had it not been for the

unprecedented munificence of Saadat Ali Khan, Moira cold not have

cleared his mortgages and come out as the Governor-General of

India. Moved with a temporary sense of gratitude, perhaps, Moira

wrote the fateful letter to Saadat Ali Khan giving some hopes of

looking into his grievances withcost him his life. Later, when the

"hand that had fed him" was removed by poison, Moira thought

himself absolved of all feelings of gratitude towards the son. And

when Ghazi-ud-deen Haider believing the sentiments expressed by

the Governor-General in his letter, whom he addressed as "my

respected uncle," complained to him about "the imperious

domination of Major Baillie under which his Excellency groaned

every hour", the "respected uncle" instead of giving his confinding

'nephew' any relief, "riveted him in his position"!.

"Oudh Loans"

Before we can fully appreciate the metamorphosis in the

attitude of the British Governor-General later, we should recall a few

salient political facts. The Earl of Moira (later Marquess of Hastings)

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Chapter -II

arrived as Governor-General of India on the 1 st October 1813, and his

first military move was the war against Nepal. Before the declared

the war, while at Lucknow, on 1 st November 1814, the Blue Book

records that:

"At a conference between the Earl of Moira (then Governor-

General) and the Wuzeer, on the 14 th October 1814, His Highness

offered One Crore of rupees as a gift to the Company. It was refused

as a gift but accepted as a loan. The financial pressure, caused by the

protracted prosecution of the Nepaul war led the Governor-General

to ask the Vizier for another loan of One Crore, which obtained."

It is very interesting to find the Earl of Moira having turned

down the complaints of the Nawab-Wazeer against the Resident,

which were all true as admitted by him in his Private Journal, and

having "riveted him in his position", had not the least hesitation in

turning to the same person the very next day for no less a sum than

One Crore of rupees to prosecute the Nepal War.

The First Crore: Gift or Loan?

It must have been noted that the Blue Book records that

Ghazee-ud-deen Haider had offered the sum of One Crore as a gift to

the Company but the Governor-General accepted it as a loan and not

as a gift. But the facts are quite the contrary.

Lt.-Col. Baillie, in a letter, dated Lucknow 10 th January 1815,

to CM. Ricketts, Secretary to Government, writes:

"By the way, I have no recollection of the circumstances of his

Excellency's former offer of Second Crore of rupees. It was certainly not

made to me, nor his Lordship distinctly in my presence.... You told me, I

also remember, and so did Swinton and Adam, that at a conference from

which I was absent, his Excellency had offered the first Crore as a gift

[ 75 ]

Chapter -II

instead of a loan, and as much more as might be wanted; but his

Excellency's written offer to me of a Crore was expressed in by no

means so liberal terms; and as the paper is still with me, I insert a

translation of it here:

"You mentioned yesterday the necessity of a supply of cash for

the extra-ordinary charges of the Company. As far as a Crore of rupees I

shall certainly furnish by way of loan, but beyond that sum is

impossible, and a voucher for this sum must be given', & c.

This clearly proves that the statement, printed and published

officially, in the Oude Blue Book that "on the 14 th October 1814, his

Highness offered one crore of rupees as a gift to the Company" was a

total falsehood published simply to hood-wing the world!

Molar's Commitments

It seems that Ghazee-ud-deen Haider was suspicious of the

Company's intentions and had no faith in its representative in India.

Having ingratiated himself in the eyes of his "respected uncle" by

pouring One Crore of rupees, in the Company's treasury, Ghazee-ud-

deen Haider submitted to the Governor-General, on 12 th November 1814,

Ghazee-ud-deen Haider submitted to the Governor-General, on 12 th

November 1814, seven propositions out of which only "the first and

fifth" are given below "with the immediate answers and the further

promises which they elicited".

"Pro 1: Whatever portion of territory was held by me late father

(Saadat Ali Khan), until the hour of his decease, and by your Lordship's

placing me on the musnud, has described as an inheritance to me: let my

power and authority the exercised over it, as in the time of my father,

and let not a pergunnah or a village, therefore, on any occasion, or by

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Chapter -II

any change, be separated from my rule, but let it be confirmed to me and

my posterity to the latest generation.

"The following is the Governor-General's reply:

"I have no other view", he says, "than the placing the Nawaub

Vizier in that relative situation, with regard to the British Government,

which clear and undeniable justice demands, and which, therefore, must

be the wish of our nation. The effect of my procedure would be,

undoubtedly, to give to His Excellency's Government character and

efficiency in a degree which could not fail to satisfy all His Excellency's

wishes on that head".

Prop. 5: if any one of my relations, dependants, servants, or subjects,

shall to to your Lordship or to Calcutta to complain, any little attention

or regard to the subject of his complaint will be the cause of impairing

my dignity and consequence, and will excite others to follow the same

course, and be a source of trouble to your Lordship. I hope that

immediately on their being heard, this answer will be given to them:-

That they must go and refer their complaint to their own Sovereign. In

the event of their persevering and being urgent, let them be turned away

with a sharp reprimand, that this my authority and dignity may be

upheld, and the door be shut against evil; for three degrees of adawlut

(courts of judicature) have been established here; and if,

notwithstanding this, a person seeks to go from here, it is a proof that

his claim is unjust.

"Answer- 'I can have no hesitation in promising this in the fullest

manner, with no other reservation that what may be necessary for the

fulfilment of the engagement of the British Government, in cases where

its guarantee is pledged".

[ 77 ]

Chapter -II

"The last paragraph but one of the Governor-General's letter, containing

the answers to the proposition, and which is dated Camp. Mahonah, 12 th

of November 1814, contains, moreover, the following promise.

Nawab's independence emphasized

"The British Government is perfectly disposed to render the

succession to the musnud of Oude in the family of the present Nawaub

Vizier secure and unquestionable. If the line of that succession, as

defined by the law, and recognized in principle by the country, be

certified to the Governor-General, the British Government will have no

hesitation to guarantee it."

On the same date J. Adam, Secretary to the Government addressed

a letter (dated Camp, Mahonah, 12 th November 1814) to Baillie, the

Resident at Lucknow, in which the Secretary to the Government

distinctly says: "The reservations by treaty of a right to interfere with

advice or remonstrance upon any management of affairs within the

Nawaub's reserved dominions, which may injuriously affect the British

interests, clearly implies that, in all other respects, the administration of

the Nawaub is to be free; but indeed, it is evident from the whole tenor

of the treaty, that an uninterrupted exercise of his own authority within

the reserved dominions, was assured to him in order to justify the very

strong step which we took in appropriating to ourselves (as an exchange

for the subsidy) so large a portion of his territories. The Nawaub, is,

consequently, to be treated in all public observances as an independent

Prince. Essentially he must be subservient to the British Government;

but in proportion as that point is secure, personal attentions to him

involve no inconvenience, and on the other hand they cannot but be

productive of advantage'. "

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Chapter -II

The real independence of the Nawab-Vazeer, within the Reserved

Dominions, was further emphasized by the Governor-General in Section

83 of the Minute dated 3 rd February 1816.

"When the heavily reluctant assent of Saadat Allie was obtained

for the cession of a large portion of his dominion, in- commutation of

the pecuniary contributions which he was bound to pay for the

Subsidiary Force, the most distinct assurance was pledged to him by

treaty, for his independent exercise of authority within the remainder to

his territories.. The punctual observance of this contract was

imperiously binding on our honour, our probity, and our interests'.

The Governor-General further says in Section 86 of the same

Minute: "The policy which appeared to me recommened, no less by our

convenience than by our good faith, was to observe strictly the true and

obvious spirit of our engagements with the Sovereign of Oude, by

leaving him a free agent in the internal government of his own

dominions, interfering with that advice which to him must be injunction,

only in cases where the real importance of our mutual interests required

it.

The Second Crore

It seems that having received one crore of rupees from his

obliging 'nephew', Moira thought it proper to listen to Ghazee-ud-deen

Haider's genuine complaints against Baillie. But he was already feeling

the financial strain of the Nepalese War and "as without another Crore

Government may experience the most serious embarrassment" Moira

naturally thought fit to accept the complaints from the Nawab Wazeer in

the form of Propositions, and consider them favourably.

After putting the Nawab Wazeer in an expansive mood by

emphasizing "his independent exercise of authority within the remainder

[ 79 ]

Chapter -II

of his territories", Moira cautiously approached the Nawab Wazeer for

another crore of rupees.

On 18* February 1815, Q.M. Rickets, Secretary to Government;

again wrote to Baillie, the Resident at Lucknow:

" His Lordship is most anxious to hear the result of your

negotiations withthe Nawaub for furtehr pecuniary aid, as without

another crore: Government may experience the most serious

embarrassment. The war extraordinatires, indeed, are likely to press so

heavily upon our finances that his Lordship apprehends that the

additional core will be insufficient to meet the demands, and he will be

thankful, therefore, with reference to what you wrote about the Fyzabad

Begum, by your endeavouring to get her to advance a sum of money' ".

It seems that Ghazi-ud-deen Haider was not a simpleton as he has

been made out to be by writers on Awadh affairs. He was wide awake

and well-informed about the Company's dealings and proved, in writing,

that Moira's position was untenable, as is admitted by the following

letter Ricketts, dated 23 rd Febuary, 1815:

" I have received yours of the ll" 1, and Swinton has submitted to

his Lordship the Vizier's offer to advances an additional fifty lacks of

rupees. Lord Moira, however, hesitates about accepting the offeras....and

at the time of making the request his Excellency must have been aware

that we had not expended his first crore, and that in his the Nawaub's

letter he makes us apparently blow hot and cold in one breath, for he

says that we decline the offer of his troops because the urgency of the

case did not require it, but that we solicit pecuniary aid because a

necessity has occurred of raising troops....

" 'The times are, in truth, most critical. There is no hope of

subscriptions to a six per cent loan; and to open a public loan upon

[ 80 ]

Chapter -II

higher terms would be most unjust and unwarrantable procedure towards

the six per cent creditors; and yet, according to a statement just received

by his Lordship from Edmonstone, nearly three crores in addition to our

surplus revenue will be required to meet the war expenditure

extraordinary up to the 30 th April, 1816...

Moira's falsehood exposed

The first crore of rupees, which was negotiated in a conference

between Lord Moira and the Nawab-Wazeer, on 14 th October, 1814, was

obtained in November 1814. Writing about it to Sir George Nugent,

K.B. Vice-President in Council, the Governor-General Lord Moira says:

" 'At a subsequent conference his Excellency solicited my

acceptance of the sum as a free gift to the Honourable Company, but for

reasons which will be obvious to your Excellency in Council, I declared,

with suitable expressions of my sense of this additional proof of his

Excellency's friendship, my inability to receive the accommodation

except as a loan' ".

But, as stated earlier, Baillie his proved, by documentary

evidence, that the above statement of the Governor-General was nothing

but down-right falsehood!

As for the Second Crore of Rupees, offered in a letter dated 18 th

March, 1815, it "was obtained before long, whether by allurements or

menaces, or by the spontaneous goodwill of the Wuzier, it is vain now to

inquire; and the Governor-General expressed his high approbation of the

ability and address with which Colonel Baillie had conducted the

negotiations to this result".

When the Second Crore of Rupees was paid in the Company's

treasury Moira had not yet decided how to pay off the debt because

[ 81 ]

Chapter -II

Ricketts writing to Baillie from Shikaubad (Shikohabad), 4 th March,

1815, says:

"....... With regard to the proposed boon to the Vizier of

Khyreegurh much is to be said pro and con, and what his Lordship may

finally determines upon, either Adam or I will shortly inform you. It

would be more desirable to give the Nawaub some of the Nepaul low

lands (when we get them) instead of any of our own districts".

The "Honest Broker"

The Earl of Moira belonged to the nobility of England; and being

an "honest broker" would not accept even the second loan gratuitously

on behalf of the East India Company! The Nepal War was being

prosecuted with the loans from Awadh; and so why not pay off Nawab-

Wazeer with the Nepalese territories to be acquired in future? So argued

the noble Lord. In the meantime the Nawab-Wazeer could wait. The

Nepal War came to an end in March 1816, and

"On the 1st of May 1816, a treaty was entered into between the

Company and the Nawaub Vizier, consisting of four articles; by the first

of which the Company cedes to the Vizier the district of Khyreegarh,

also the low lands between Khyreegarh and the hills, and those between

His Excellency's territory further to the eastward and the hills. By the

second article the Nawaub Vizier, 'in return for the cession mentioned in

the preceding article, hereby annuls the debt of the British Government

to his Excellency of One Crore of Rupees, being the total amount of his

Excellency's second loan to the Company during the last year.'"

So the noble Lord robbed the Nepalese to pay the Nawab-Wazeer,

for the sum pocketted by the Company, with a territory over which the

East India Company had no claim till then because, according to

Aitchison (Article 1), "The Goorka orders of surrender of that tract will

[ 82 ]

Chapter -II

accordingly be made over to His Excellency the Vizier, and the British

Government hereby engages of establish His Excellency's authority in

the above-mentioned territory, the expense of which, most probably, the

Nawab-Wazeer must have paid. A very fine deal indeed!

It may be mentioned here, anticipating the historical events, that

"though this district was conveyed to the Wazier by a treaty dated in

1816, it was taken from his heirs by Lord Dalhousie, under a.

proclamation based on the treaty of 1801. Included in the common spoil

of the King's (Wajid Ali Shah) dominions, though it had been purchased

from his British allies out of his ancestor's savings, these same allies

having long since spent the million sterling they received as its purchase

money, now resumed the land they sold in virtue of a treaty made fifteen

years before the sale was effected.' "

Baillie Removed

After receiving Two Crores of rupees from the Nawab-Vazeer the

justice of his complaints against the Resident, which were already in the

personal knowledge of the Governor-General (as admitted by him in his

Journal) dawned upon the sublime mind of the Earl of Moira, and now

he considered them to be strong enough to be redressed. But, I think, the

real cause that tipped the scales of justice against the Resident was not

Ghazee-ud-deen Haider's remonstrance's but Resident Baillie's own

indiscretion. In his letter to Ricketts dated 10 th January 1815, Baillie has

clearly asserted that the first sum of Rupees One Crore was given "by

way of loan" and not offered as a gift as mentioned by the Earl of Moira

to Sir George Nugent and suported it by documentary evidence in his

possession. The Governor-General's palpable falsehood had been

exposed by record and it could not be condoned. Baillie was

consequently removed from Lucknow on 1 st October 1815.

[ 83 ]

Chapter -II

"A final representation was made by the Nawab", says James Mill,

"the objects of which were to secure the integrity of his dominions, and

to reserve the right of ruling his down territories, of determining the

cause to be followed in fislocal and judicial administration, and of

electing the persons to be employed; to deprecate the attention of the

Government to complaints against his measures preferred by his

relations and dependants, to be allowed permission to bestow charitable

endowments, and to have the privilege of going out on hunting-parties

whenever so inclined. The requests were generally granted, and, in

communicating the correspondence to the Resident, instructions

were added with regard to the spirit in which his functions were to be

exercised, and the connection with the Nawab maintained......The Nawab

was consequently to be treated in al public observations as 'an

independent Prince'. Agreeably to this recognition, the conduct of the

Resident was to be regulated by the deference due to regal rank, and to

be characterised by a respectful urbanity and a strict fulfillment of

establishment ceremonials. In an especial manner he was to refrain from

countenancing or encouraging any servant of the Nawab in

contumacious opposition to his master, and from recommending any

person from his own household for reception into the Nawab's

immediate service... With these monitory instructions the inquiry

terminated.... The Resident.... offended by the removal from the Nawab's

councils of persons whom he supported, and upon whom he relied, and

weakened in influence as well as wounded in feeling by the distrust

implied in Lord Moira's private inquires, and public injunctions, could

no longer restrain his indignation.

Baillie's letter to Moira

"A letter, dated the 29 th of April, but not transmitted till the 20 th of

September, was addressed by him to the Governor-General, in which he

[ 84 ]

Chapter -II

vindicated his conduct, and ascribed the proceedings of the Nawab to

factious intrigues, encouraged by the prejudice cherished against him by

Lord Moira. The Governor-General thought it incumbent upon him to

reply, and exonerate himself from the imputation of unfairness, or

prejudice against the Resident., but avowing his conviction of his

having, in his intercourse with both the late and the present Nawab,

exhibiting a grasping and domineering disposition, which justified the

jealousy and resentment felt by both the Princes... The Governor-

General, with the concurrence of his Council, removed Major Baillie

from his office, and left the Nawab of Oude to the uncontrolled

constitution of his own Cabinet, and the absolute direction of his own

domestic administration...

"But it is clear from Major Bailli's own language, as exhibited in

his correspondences, that he took little care to soften the harshness of

his public acts by the suavity of his private manners. He is ever

importunate and dictatorial; not unfrequently disrespectful, and

occasionally insulting. This is most manifest in his intercourse with

Saadat Ali. The evidence is less ample in regard to Ghazi-ud-deen......It

was not to be expected, however, that the degree of independence, which

he had acknowledged in the Nawab, would dispose that dispose that

Prince to follow his recommendation, or would be palatable to the

political representative who, long fortified by the unqualified confidence

of the Government, had possessed little less than regal sway, throughout

the principality of Oude. His retirement was, therefore, unavoidable for

the preservation of a good understanding with the Court of Lucknow."

Title of "King": Coins struck

After the termination of the Nepal war in 1816 the Governor-

General (hitherto Earl of Moira) was created Marquis of Hastings in

1817. Probably, in the fullness of heart, he thought of showing some

[ 85 ]

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spectacular favour to Ghazee-ud-deen Haider, which would not cost

anything to the East India Company but would rather further its political

designs, that would bind him in further bonds of loyality and vassalage

to the British. The King of Delhi, Akbar II, had rejected the request of

the Governor-General to allow him to sit in the Royal Presence and so

he devised the scheme of belittling the King of Delhi and obliging his

generous 'nephew' by bestowing on him the empty title of "King". "The

Nawab Gazi-ud-deen Haider", writes Sir Henry Lawrence, "was

encouraged to assume the title of King; Lord Hastings calculated on thus

exciting a rivalry between the Oudh and Delhi families".

"Little advantage to the principality (of Awadh) was to be

expected from a change which took place at this season (October 1819)

in the designation of its sovereign," says James Mill, "who, with the

consent of the Governor-General assumed the title and the style of

King".

"He had prepared the way for this elevation a year before",

continues Mill, "by striking coins in his own name, instead of that of the

King of Delhi-an invasion of the privileges of the Mogul which had not

yet been committed even by the East India Company. This elevation was

received with extreme indignation at Delhi..

Lord William Amherst (1823-1828)

Lord William Amherst, who had succeeded Hastings, reached

Calcutta and was installed as Governor-General on 1 st August 1823. "He

was brought in by a political shuffle in London rather than by any

particular merits and Canning excused him as amiable....upon the whole

he is a good a barren choice as could have been made.

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Chapter -II

Perpetual loan of one crore

The financial exigencies occasioned by the Burmese and

Bhurtpore wars induced the British Government to make another

application to the King of Oude for pecuniary aid, and accordingly a

treaty, dated September 08, 1825, was entered into between His Majesty

and the Company, in which it was stipulated by Article-1 "His Majesty

has given as a loan, forever, to the Honourable Company One Crore of

rupees, the interest of being five lakhs of rupees per annum will be paid

from 1st of Mahurrum, 1241, Hegira, to the persons hereafter

particularized...."

By Article-2 it was agreed, that "this loan is made in perpetuity;

the soverigns of the Kingdom of Oude shall never have the power to

take it back, nor shall they exercise any interference with its interest.

Referring to the above loan Lord Amherst, in a Khureeta (letter to a

Prince), dated October 14 th, 1825, says:

"It is now some time since I conveyed to Your Majesty, through

the Resideint, Mr. Mordaunt Rickets, my 'codial thanks for the instance

you have given me of your friendship, by advancing, upon certain

conditions, by way of loan, the sum of one Crore of rupees (£ 1,000.000

sterling), in case of extreme emergency and need, the Burmese war

having cost enormous sums of money.... the benefits and fruits of our

amity, which have existed from days of yore, are impressed upon the

heart of every Englishman, both here and Europe, as indelibly as if they

had been engraven upon adamant; nor will lapse of time or change of

circumstances efface from the memory of the British nation so

irrefragable a proof, so irresistible an argument, of the fraternal

sentiments of your Majesty".

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Loan of fifty lakhs

Lord Amherst in a letter dated 23 rd June 1826 to His Majesty Ghazee-ud-

deen Haider writes:

"On hearing that your Majesty, who imparts luster to the throne

and dignity to the State, has with the greatest courtesy and kindness lent

to the Honourable Company the sum of fifty lakhs of rupees, Lucknow

coin, which the officers of your Majesty's Government have duly

delivered into the treasury of the Lucknow Residency, I was greatly

delighted and obliged beyond expression, and herewith express my

grateful thanks for the same. May God Almighty keep your Majesty (The

Mine of Munificence) under his eternal protectionl"

Another fifty lakhs

Lord Amherst's second letter dated 23 rd of June 1826 to H.M. Ghazee-

oodeen, Padsha of Oude:

"I, your sincere well-wisher, having learnt that your Majesty, the

ornament of the throne of splendour and exalted dignity, has, out of your

great attachment and friendship, lent the sum of fifty lakhs of Lucknow

coin (5,000,000 rupees = £ 500,000 sterling) to the Honourable East

India company, and that your Majest's servants have accordingly

conveyed and deposited the same in perfect safety and security in the

Residency treasury, beg to assure your Majesty of my deep obligation,

and to acknowledge that I owe your Majesty a debt of heartfelt thanks

and boundless gratitude".

It may not be out of place to note here that M: Maseeh-ud-deen

Khan says that "this letter and the preceding one refer to two distinct

loans advanced by Ghazee-ood-deen to the East India Company, which

meant that on 23 rd June 1826, Ghazee-ud-deen Haider had lent Rupees.

One Crore to the Company. Probably the sum of money was deposited in

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two different installments, but on the same date i.e. 23rd June 1826, and

therefore they have been acknowledged in two different letters by the

Governor-General.

"The 'Mine of Munificence' was thus worked", says Major Bird,

"with cautious approaches, and pious ejaculations, and every fresh shaft

was opened with official prayer... In 1827 Ghazee-ood-deen died, and

paid the debt of nature, in addition to his other payments, as the

Company's productive 'Mine of Munifecience".

A talented King

"Ghazee-ood-den died in 1827. Although his education had been

exclusively Asiatic, this prince evinced talents of no mean order, talents

which the considerably improved by literary and scientific pursuits",

says Maseeh-ud-deen Khan. "He was deeply read in Oriental philology

and philosophy, and well acquainted with Mechanics and Chemistry. Of

a mild and benevolent disposition, he was so averse to acts of tyranny

that not a single one of oppression of violence has ever been laid to his

charge, or been known to have been perpetrated with his sanction".

Awadh prosperous

Company's officials, including Governor-General and English

writers, with very few exceptions, have generally painted Awadh as a

desolate and depopulated country. But the above mentioned loans

prove that "they were created by the economics of a State whose

income was in excess of its expenditure, at the time when it was

protected from meddling on the part of the Residents".

Apart from his remarks that "abstinence from interposition had

been attended by the happiest consequences" the Marquis of Hastings in

his letter of 1st April 1818, while on his way from Lucknow to

Goruckpore assured "the Nawaub (Ghazee-ud-deen Haider who was not

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yet created a King) of his unqualified approbation and satisfaction a

witnessing the high state of cultivation in which he found the country, as

well as its increased populous ness, and at the happiness and comfort of

all His Excellency's subjects".

Country: "A perfect garden"

"Lord Amherst left Calcutta in the beginning of August (Agust 4,

1826)," says James Mill, "and arrived at Cawnpore on the 16 th of

November (1826), where all the petty chiefs of Bundlekhand waited

upon him; and he visited by the King of Oude. In return, the Governor-

General repaired to Lucknow; and an opportunity was afforded him of a

confidential communication with the King with respect to the

management of his country. However well disposed towards his allies,

and receiving the Governor-General with the most cordial hospitality,

Ghazi-ud-din Hyder continued to deny the necessity of any interposition

in his affairs; appealing to the flourishing appearance of his country in

proof of the success of his administration. In truth, with occasional

exceptions, the lands were covered with cultivation, and the people

appeared to be contented. The assessment was light; and the revenues

were levied without difficulty, although the system of farming them was

adhered to, and tended to perpetuate extortion. The unfavourable

accounts of the condition of Oude had been much exaggerated and had

principally originated in the turbulent spirit which prevailed upon the

confines of the Kingdom bordering on the British districts, where a race

of refractory landholders, Rajputs by tribe and soldiers by profession,

considered it a disgrace to comply peaceably with the demands of the

State, and paid then-revenue only to military collectors. The belief that

the evil was, in a great measure, of limited extent, and the strong

objections of the King, had latterly induced the government to refrain

from urging suggestions of reform; and their forbearance had been

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requited by the opportune assistance of the hoarded treasures of Sadat

Ali."

"Ghazi-ud-din Hyder, although indolent and addicted to habits of

intemperance, was not devoid of sagacity or judgment; he perfectly well

understood the nature of the connexion with the British Government;

and in his correspondence with the Governor-General, had not

infrequently the advantage. He was encourager of letters and the arts;

was of a kind and conciliating disposition, and cultivated a friendly

familiarity with the successive Residents at his Court. He was too much

under the influence of self-interested advisers, the ministers, and his

Begums; but his reign was unstained by violence or cruelty; and he

afforded a not unfavourably specimen of an Asiatic prince".

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Chapter -II

KING NASEER-UD-DEEN HAIDER (1827-1837)

On the death of his father (King Ghazi-ud-deen Haider), Naseer-

ud-deen Haider ascended the throne on 18 th October 1827 as the second

King of Awadh at the young age of 25 years.

Loan not returned

In 1829, two years after his accession, "the 'Government

consented to receive by a treaty "as a special loan the sum of 62,40,000

rupees".... says Major Bird.... "but neither Parliament nor the public are

informed at the same time that Government never consented to repay it.

Nor did they pay the lapsed pension to His Majesty according to the

fifth article of the treaty, which was made in this behalf. Although

repeated applications were made for it, not one farthing ever found its

way into the royal treasury. No reply was ever vouchsafed to these

repeated applications, except upon one occasion, when an answer was

received from Sir Charles Metcalfe, dated the 10 th April 1834, stating

that he had instructed Major John Low, the Resident, who would give

full information on the subject to His Majesty. But Major low gave no

information; still less did the Company give back any rupees. They

consented, in short, to retain as a gift, the moneys they had consented to

receive as a loan, and in either case their consent was given as easily as

the consent of a Robson or a Redpath to a similar series of

transactions".

Observatory, Poor House, Hospital etc.

On November 4, 1830, Muntazim-ud-daulah Hakim Mehdi

became the Prime Minister. He was an educated, intelligent and

experienced administrator. He helped the King in establishing a Royal

Observatory in Moti Mahal grounds under Captain Herbet, which,

according to the author of Qaiser-ut-Tawareekh, was the best in the

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whole of India. Mouvi Ismail, who later led a mission to England,

became its head and S. Kamal-ud-deen Haider, author of the well-known

history Qaisar-ul-Tawareekh was also on the staff of the Observatory.

On 12 th December 1833, King Naseer-ud-deen Haider placed in

the Residency treasury rupees three lakhs at 4 per cent as a loan to the

British Government "in order that the interest of 12,000 rupees, or 1,000

rupees per month, might under the superintendence of the Resident of

their representatives, be distributed to the lame, the maimed, the blind,

the helpless aged, the lepers, and those who are destitute, and he further

agrees that 'it shall not be optional with the future Rulers of Oude, or

with may power whatever, to resume this money, or to appropriate it to

any other purpose; on the contrary, it is placed under the guarantee of

the British Government, for the express end that it may for ever remain

to be distributed to the poor, in the name of his present Majesty, and its

denomination shall be the charity of TSIusseer-ood-deen Hyder, King of

Oude."

He also established a Hospital called "Dar-us-shifa" with two,

separate sections, Allopathic and Unani, the former was under the

superintendence of Dr. Stevenson, and the later section was placed under

the supervision of Hakeem Mirza Ali Akbar.

The Royal Lithographic Press came into existence, probably for

the first time in Awadh, and one Mr. Archer was appointed to look after

it. He was paid Rs. 500 per month.

Slavery prohibited

"During his (Naseer-ud-deen) short reign", writes Major Bird, "he

granted a monthly allowance of 3,000 rupees to the students of Lucknow

College; he established hospitals for dispensing medicines and food to

the sick, poor; and he prohibited, by royal proclamation, the buying and

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selling of human beings, a practice which, though it had substantially

ceased in Oudh, still obtained in several parts of Hindostan".

King Naseer-ud-deen Haider's Zeal for public works so much

impressed even Col. W.H. Sleeman, when he was to Lucknow (1849-

54), that he expressed that wish:

"Had I come here when the treasury was full, and Nasee-ud-Deen

Hyder was anxious to spend his money in the manner best calculated to

do good and please our Government, I might have covered Oude with

useful public works".

Major Bird further says that "He made, moreover, such zealous

efforts to suppress and exterminate Thugs and Dacoits, and to provide

for the protection and security of his subjects, that his reputation on this

was known througout India".

Lord William Bentinck (1825-1835)

The British had already started casting covetous eyes on the rich

and fertile plains of Awadh; and when Lord William Bentinck assumed

charge as Governor-General of July 4,1828, Naseer-ud-deen Haider had

already been the King for nine months only. Bentinck, who "was a

candidate for the appointment of Governor-General (and was "only the

Sixth choice"!), was determined to please his masters by following "the

main principle of the British Government: profit to themselves and their

masters at the expense of people of India".

It had been decided to take over the Kingdom of Awadh, but to

conceal the unjust step a bit of window-dressing was necessary; and so

Bentinck paid a visit to Lucknow in 1831 and met the King Naseer-ud-

deen Haider. On July 11, 1831, he wrote:

"I thought it right to declares to his Majesty beforehand that the

opinion I should offer to the home authorities would be, that unless a

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decided reform in the administration should take place, there would be

no remedy left except in the direct assumption of the management of the

Oudh territories by the British Government".

Awadh-Target of New Policy

"The Company's abstention from interference in this native state,

whose government was discredited by many great and inherent defects,

had led to a crisis in which the home government, in April 1834, put into

practice the theory enunciated by Jones. After prolonged consideration,

grant, with the full consent of the Secret Committee, decided that the

Government of Oudh had so far deteriorated that it was incumbent upon

the Company to assume the government of that state. Instruction on

these lines were sent to the Governor-General, although their execution

was left to his discretion. By the time they reached India the general

aspect of affairs in Oudh was such as to justify the Governor-General in

refraining from applying them.

"Nevertheless, the revolution in the home government's attitude

towards the Company's subordinate allies was complete, and it had no

hesitation in sanctioning the annexation of the small states of Jaintia,

Cachar and Coorg, and in advising the Bengal Government to observe an

increasingly careful scrutiny of succession".

Why Awadh spared?

The previous pages conclusively prove that the 'black picture

painted of Awadh was simply to serve as a pretext to justify annexation

of the country. Highest authorities have been quoted earlier to show that

Awadh was populous, well-cultivated and the people contended. But

suppose, what the Company's propagandists and tried to make out ("that

the Government of Oude had so far deteriorated that it was incumbent

upon the Company to assume the government of that state") was true,

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Chapter -II

and, therefore, "Instructions on these lines were sent to the Governor-

General". Now if the conditions were really so bad, as stated above, then

why government of the country was not taken over as those of Jainta,

Cachar and Coorg? Was there any underhand reason that stopped the

powers that be to stay their hands?

The tragic scene

King Naseer-ud-deen Haider had acknowledged two youths,

Kaiwan Jah and (Mirza Rafi-ud-deen Faredun Bakht, alias, Muhammad

Mehdi Moona Jan) Moonna Jan, as his sons but later repudiated them.

Padshah Begam, the Dowager Queen, had adopted Moonna Jan and was,

therefore, determined to make him the King. But the British, in

pursuance of their policy, did not with to see young, intelligent person

on the throne who could be expected to prove an efficient administrator

and had the expectations of a long and useful career before him. That

was the reason why Col. Low, the Resident, did not recognise Moona

Jan as the heir of Naseer-ud-deen Haider. What happened afterwards has

been revealed in a letter, dated Lucknow, July 9,1837, and published in

the Asiatic Journal of the same year.

"This morning, a tragic scene occurred here, on account of death

of the King, in consequence of his son forcibly taking the sovereignty of

the kingdom, in opposition to the sanction of the British Government,

who selected an uncle of the late King, instead of his son. The British

troops were ordered down from cantonments to the Palace, and the

Resident (Col. Low) allowed the Queen Dowager (Badshah Begam) and

the young Prince five minutes to leave the throne, where they were

seated, and in the event of not complying, threatened to raze the Palace

to the ground. They did not pay my respect to this instruction, upon

which Colonel Low gave orders for the artillery to open a destructive

fire on the Palace and the people. The loss of life on the occasion was of

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Chapter -II

life on the occasion was lamentable, that is, on the part to the young

Prince and Queen Dowager.... The struggle ended in confining the

Prince and the Queen, and seating upon the throne the King's uncle. I

was present at the time, and the plunder made by the Company's sepoys

was immense; the throne was entirely stripped of its valuable gems".

Official Version

Another interesting account of the King's death and the following

events is given by Ursula Low, grand-daughter of Col. John Low, the

then Resident in Lucknow, from family papers:

"Three days later - a little before midnight on July 7 th - a

messenger was dispatched in all haste to the Residence to say that the

King was dying.

"Foul play was suspected. Nasir-ud-deen, in hourly fear of death,

had of late carried round his neck, night and day, the key of a private

well, from which only his two sisters were allowed to draw his drinking

water.

"John Low, accompanied by the Residency Surgeon, a Scotchman,

named Stephenson, and his First Assistant, Captain Paton, at once

started for the palace. They found Nasir-ud-deen's body laid out on a

bed. The doctor opened a vein; blood flowed freely, and it was evident

that death had only just occurred. It was rumoured later that one of his

sisters had been bribed to put poison into his last drink of Sherbet, but

he had been long in bad health, and from the expression, death appeared

to have been painless.

Naseer-ud-Daulah: "A prudent man"

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Chapter -II

"The situation was critical. The heir-apparent, the late King's

uncle, Nasir-ud-daulah, was not persona grata to a large faction at the

Court and in the city. He was known to be a prudent, some what

parsimonious old man, and fears were entertained that on accession he

would insist on the disgorgement of much ill-gotten wealth.

"The history of the next twelve hours has been fully and concisely

told in a memorandum which John Shakespeare drew up for his chief,

and which the latter endorsed and forwarded with his second report to

Government. At the moment the total number of British troops available

amounted to two and a half companies, one of which constituted the

Residency Escort. These men were left at the palace under the command

of Captain Paton, with instructions to distribute them at the inner doors

of the building and at the Treasury, and jewels and other valuables were

hastily sealed up, while the Resident returned home to draw up an

Agreement in Persian for the King-elect to sign.

"This was conveyed to the latter's house, about a mile away, by

John Shakespeare. Nasir-ud-daulah read it through and willingly affixed

his seal, and on receiving back the document, my grand-father returned

to the Farhat-Baksh to await his arrival, having dispatched both Captain

Paton and Lieutenant Shakespeare to conduct him to the palace.

"All the proceedings had taken time, and it was three ro' clock in

the morning of the 8 th before the did man arrived, accompanied by his

sons and other relatives and attendants.

"He was in very feeble health, and was conducted to an inner

room to repose on a couch for an hour or two before undergoing the

fatigue of the coronation ceremonies.

Padshah Begam arrives

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Chapter -II

"The three British officers meanwhile retired to an outer verandah

overlooking the Gumti, to confer about the arrangements for his

installation on the "Gaddi," when news was brought that the Padshaw

Begum was making for the palace, surrounded by this bodyguard and

followed by a large armed rabble. The possibility of this occurrence had

been foreseen, and the Resident, on the King's death, had dispatched a

native official, accompanied by two troopers, to enjoin the lady strictly

not to leave her palace, which was four miles distant...

"The Begum, however, knew exactly what she wanted.

Accompanied by her charge, the boy Moona Jan, her procession of

disorderly followers gathering fresh recruits all along the route, she

swept onwards, and on passing the house of the Kotwal (Head of the

City Policy), summoned him to attend the enthronement of his new

sovereign. The latter, however, after consenting, thought it more prudent

to retire and await the final outcome.

"On hearing the noise of a large approaching body of men,

Captain Paton rushed to the north-west gate, accompanied by a few

sepoys, just as the Begum was thundering for admission. He attempted

to parley, but –

"Before he could get a reply, the insurgents brought up an

elephant to force in the gate with his head. The first failed in the attempt

and drew back with a frightful roar.

"A second, urged on by a furious driver, broke in the gate; one

half fell with a cresh to the ground, and the elephant plunged in after

it...."

"The furious and confused mass rushed through the half-opened

gate, and beat Captain Paton to the ground with their bludgeons, the

hilts of their swords and their muskets.

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Chapter -II

"To the last minute the injured man tried to reason with his

assailants, but by the time one of his faithful sepoys had succeeded in

pushing his way through the crowd to meet the companies of the 35

Regiment under Colonel Monteith, which jad just arrived, he was

insensible from his wounds".

Moonna Jan on the throne

"John Low........demanded to be conducted to the Begum. By this

time, not only the palace, but the courtyard and the great hall of state (it

consisted of four vast halls, in one of which the throne was erected)

were filled by an armed rabble, by some computed" at 2,000 men.

"The child had already been placed on the throne, at the foot of

which the Begum had installed herself in a covered palanquin.

"A scene more wild, more utterly bizarre than the Farhat Baksh

palace presented from midnight to morning, can hardly be imagined.

"'The dead King lay in one chamber, the respectable but decrepit

Nasir-un-daulah, sat cowering in fear of his life in another, while a

furious mob of matchlock men and dancing girls filled the Burradurree,

of great hall of state with mad acclamations in honour of Moona Jan and

the Padshaw Begum' ".

"As the Resident entered, accompanied by John Shakespear

".....The band struck up "God save the King", answered by a

salute of blunderbusses within, and a double royal salute from the guns

in the northern courtyard through which the Begum had passed. Other

guns, which had been collected in the confusion to salute somebody

(though those who commanded and served them knew not whom)

continued the salute through the stress without.

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Chapter -II

".......At the same time the crowd, within and without, shouted

their congratulations at the tops of their voices, and every man who had

a sword, musket or matchlock, flourished it in the air amidst a thousand

torches.

"In the midst of all this, the Resident and his Assistants remained

cool under all kinds of foul abuse and threats from a multitude resolved

to force them to commit some act or make use of some expression that

might seem to justify their murder. The fired muskets close to their ears,

pointed others loaded and cocked, close to their breasts and faces, but all

in vain.

"The Resident in the midst of all this confusion, pointed out to the

Begum the impossibility of her ultimately suceeding in her attemp, - and

that if he and his Assistants were killed, his Government would soon

send others to carry out their orders.

" 'I am1 ", she said " 'in my right place, and so is the young King,

my grandson, and so are you. Why do you talk to me or anybody else of

leaving the throne and the Burradurree?'

"But some of her furious followers, afraid that she might yield,

seized him by the neck-cloth, and dragged him towards the throne, and

commanded him to present his offerings and congratulations on the

threat of instant death.

"At this juncture, the Begum's Vakeel, seeing that he gave no sign

of compliance, and realizing better than his imperious mistress the

consequences that would inevitably follow their assassination, rushed

forward, and shouting that it was by her order, safely conducted them

both into the garden, where colonel Monteith was stationed.

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Chapter -II

"A very disgraceful incident occurred about this time; a British

officer commanding a brigade in the late King's service, presented his

offerings to the throne, and then withdrew to await the turn of events.

Who poisoned Naseer-ud-deen Haider?

".....Hardly anyone at Lucknow at present doubts that the minister

and his associates caued the King to be poisoned, and employed Duljeet

and the two sisters, Dhunneea and Dulwee, for the purpose, in

expectation that the British Government would take upon itself the Oude

administration, as the only possible means of improving it".

Col: Sleeman clearly mentions two important facts:

(1) that "Moona Jan was his (Nasir-ud-deen Haider's) son" on the

authority of "a good many of the members of the royal family,

who were brought up from childhood with the deceased King,

Nusseer-ud-Deen Hyder, and near his person to the last"; and

(2) according to Col. Sleeman:

"Hardly any one at Lucknow at present doubts that the

minister and his associate caused the King to be poisoned, and

employed Duljeet and the two sisters Dhunnea and Dulwee, for

the purpose".

King Naseer-ud-deen Haider dismissed Hakim Mehdi, and "all

hope of permanent improvement departed with him. He was succeeded

in office by Roshan-ud-dowla, a person of respectability, but of little

talent, and unused to business."

According to Kamal-ud-deen Haider the King was not on good

terms with his Prime Minister (Roshan-ud-daulah) and he had serious

suspicions in his mind (against him) and would not take food or water

(the drinks and water for the King were in the custody of the Prime

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Chapter -II

Minister) from anyone except the trusted ones. On Friday evening the

King drank water-melon beverage brought (by Afzal-un-nisa Khanum)

from the Prime Minister's house and died shortly after. Kamal-ud-deen

Haider clearly says that "Many things are said about the death, but who

can prove it".

Najmul Ghani is more explicit about the incident. He clearly says

that Roshan-ud-daulah had become very powerful due to his alliance

with the British, and everybody used to obey him.

When the Resident, at the instance of the Governor-General

(Bentinck), put pressure on the Prime Minister (Roshan-ud-daulah) to

improve the administration of the country, the Minister, in self-defence,

stated his difficulties. But Roshan-ud-daulah, in the end told the

Resident Col. Low, that he would "cure the maladies of the sick man

(meaning the King Naseer-ud-deen Haider) for ever provided that he

(the Resident) would save his life and honour". The Resident (Col. Low)

simply said: "Adopt that policy which would be in the interests of the

Riaya (subjects) and for the good of the people........

Dhunnea and Dulwee, were absolutely loyal to Roshan-ud-

daulah......Dhunnea and others gave him (the King) water-melon drink

mixed with poison."

From the above conversation between Roshan-ud-daulah (who

was the Resident's man) and Col. John Low it is clear that the latter if

not the originator was an accomplice in the diabolical scheme of doing

away with Naseer-ud-deen Haider by poisoning, of which he (Naseer-

ud-deen Haider) had ample premonitions and tried to guard against it.

No enquiry-the reason

Everybody in Lucknow knew that the King had been poisoned to

death by Roshan-ud-daulah through his minions Daljeet and the two

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Chapter -II

sisters Dhunneea and Dulwee, as admitted by Col. Sleman about fifteen

years later in his Diary, which was secretly printed in the Lucknow

Residency in 1852, but no step was taken to punish the culprits.

The only reason for not holding any enquiry in the murder-case

was that Roshan-ud-daulah would have been convicted of the crime.

And Col. John Low did not wish it because, in the words of Sleeman

again, Naseer-ud-deen Haider had been poisoned to death, "in-

expectation that the British Government would take upon itself the Oude

administration, as the only possible means of improving it".

If we keep in view the progress of British domination in the

subcontinent and the stealthy step taken by the HonTjle (!) Company in

toplling the Indian States, one after the other, it is not difficult to

discern the same British pattern here. The political events fall in places

and fit in completely.

Links leading to murder:

(1) Resident Maddock reported to the Governor-General

(Bentinck) that Moonna Jan was not the son of Naseer-ud-deen

Haider, as admitted by him, on 1 st January 1831.

(2) Bentinck comes to Lucknow in April 1831, and on 11 th

July 1831 he warned the King that "unless a decided reform in

the administration should take place" the British Government

would assume the direct "management of the Oudh territories".

(3) Col. John Low, who joined the Lucknow Residency

in October 1831, also reported to the Governor-General Bentinck

on the admission of the King himself, that Moonna Jan was not

his son, so the legal position was that if Naseer-ud-deen Haider

was removed, either by deposition or by death, he had no lineal

descendant to succeed him.

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Chapter -II

(4) An abortive attempt was made to arrest the King and

depose him but if failed.

(5) Col. Low was more ingenious and, therefore, successful

in having the King removed (by poison) through Roshan-ud-

daulah. Naturally he did riot hold any enquiry in the King's

death, which was an open talk of the town and the murderers

were pointed out by name, as he would have been personally

exposed. So far so good. But now the pertinent question arises as

to why the British Government did not directly assume the

"management of the Oudh territories" as threatened by Bentinck

in July 1831? Bentinck's foreign policy

In order to understand the reason why the British stayed their

hands, after all these preparations - declaration that Moonna Jan was not

the son of King Naseer-ud-deen Haider and Residents Maddock and

Low's reports inl831-1832-We will have to find out the British foreign

policy at the time.

It is well-known that after visiting Lucknow in April 1831, Lord

William Bentinck, the Governor-General, went to the Punjab and met

Maharajah, Ranjit Singh at Rupar on the Sutlej on October 22, 1831,

"The meeting at Rupar", says Major Basu, "in the latter end of 1831, of

Bentinck with Ranjit Singh, was a covert attempt to spy out the military

strength of Ranjit Singh."

Russian threat to India

The panic that was created among the British politicians, from the

dreaded invasion of the subcontinent by Russia, was the secret of all the

British moves at the time.

"Lord William Bentinck, "says a modern writer, "was the first

Governor-General of India who was called upon to make suitable

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provision against the Russian invasion of India........Accordingly, the

main objects of his policy in this quarter was, "to convert the Indus into

the ditch of British India.... to associate the Sikhs and the Sind Valley

with us in its defence and to create a friendly Afghanistan as a buffer

State between India and any possible invader'."

It was in the interest of greater stakes the Awadh was spared at

the time and a make-shift arrangement was made by putting Naseer-ud-

daulah (Muhammed All Shah) on the throne.

Ursula Low, true to the usual pattern of British writers, has called

Moonna Jan "a vicious lad, who had been encouraged in habits of

atrocious cruelty by the Begum". But a higher authority has given a

direct lie to it so far as the character of Moonna Jan is concerned.

Moonna Jan of "Spotless Character"

Benjamin Disrareli, later Lord Beaconsfield (Prime Minister of

England) speaking on the Oudh question in the House of Commons of

July 27, 1857, said:

"And there was another reason why the Government of India

ought to have looked with indulgence on the personal conduct of the late

Sovereign of Oude (Wajid Ali Shah); because the Government of India

changed the line of succession in Oude, and placed the father of the late

King on the throne instead of the prince, who by custom and by law

ought to have succeeded. Of that prince I have some knowledge by the

informaiton I received some years ago from men most competent to

speak of him. He lives in a distant eastern city upon a pension allotted to

him by the Indian Government, and he was commended to me long

before the question of Oude interested public attention as a man of

spotlss character, englightened and amiable, and more competent,

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perhaps, to become a benevolent and judicious prince than, perhaps, any

other ■ that ever existed in the East".

This clearly explainis the reason why the Residents and the

Governors-General always preferred to ignore the claims of intelligent

and energetic young men who could be expected to run the country

efficiently. If, contrary to all expectations, the hand-picked wastrels and

drivellers tried to improve the administration then the "all-powerful,

meddling" Resident would peremptorily ask him, under various pretexts,

to stop doing so and have full confidence "in the friendship and good

faith of the Honourable Company"!

The end of Moonna Jan

Moonna Jan and Badshah Begam were arrested and deported first

to Cawnpore on 12 th July 1837 (8 th Rabi 11, 1253 H.) with eighteen

cartloads of goods and eighteen female slaves and Afzal Mahal, the

mother of Moonna Jan. Later, on 15 th October 1837 they were shifted to

the Fort Chunargarh (Mirzapur). A monthly stipend of Rupees Two

Thousand and Four Hundred (Rupees Sixteen Hundred to Badshah

Begam and Rupees Eight Hundred to Moonna Jan) was paid to them

from the Lucknow Treasury.

Monna Jan died on 15 th January 1846, and he was followed, about

one month later, by Badshah Begum. Both were buried at Chunargarh.

Moona Jan left behind two sons and a daughter who were granted a

pension of Rs. 300 per month. They were brought back to Lucknow by

the order of King Amjad Ali Shah (Wajid Ali Shah's father).

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KING MUHAMMAD ALI SHAH (1837-1842)

King Naseer-ud-deen Haider on the night intervening 7 th and 8 th

July 1837. Let us turn to the description of the events as given by the

Resident Col. John Low in a Memorandum submitted on 10 th July:

"Memorandum of the events which took place on the night of the

7th and morning of the 8 th July 1837, at the Palace of His Majesty, the

King of Oude".

"After giving an account of the death of Nusser-ood-deen Hyder

on the night of the 7 th of July, the writer proceeds to state:

"The Resident, with Doctor Stevenson, after inspecting the body

of his late Majesty, and issuing some necessary orders, returned, to the

Residency, leaving Captain Paton at the place to superintend the sealing

up of the royal property;. ..the Resident next had a short Persian paper

written out, to which he proposed to require Nuseer-ood-dowlah's

consent signature, previous to inviting him to the place.

"All this took some time, and it must have been about 1 A.M. of

the 8th instant, when the Resident directed his Second Assistant,

Lieutenant Shakespeare, to proceed along with the Residency Meer

Moonshee Iltifaut Hossain Khan, Bahadoor, and Moulvee Ghoolam

Yahea Khan, the Durbar Vakeel, to the house of Nawaub Nuseer-ood-

Dowlah, taking with him the Persian agreement above mentioned; these

three persons accordingly proceeded to the said place of residence, and

after some delay, which was caused by the visit being sudden and

unexpected on the part of Nawaub, they obtained audience. Lieutenant

Sakeshpeare presented and caused to be read to the Nawaub, the Persian

Agreement to which his signature was requested; the Nawaub willingly,

and without any hesitation, when it was read over to him, affixed his

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seal thereto and expressed his perfect acquiescence to the terms therein

mentioned".

Was it signed 'willingly'?

With regard to the signing of the Persian translation of the

Agreement, Major Bird says:

"This averment, however, is contradicted by the author of "How to

Make and How to Break a Treaty", who says, " 'When this treaty was

first proposed by the Resident, then Colonel Low, to His Majesty, the

King wrote a letter, in which he stated although personally willing to

make every sacrifice for the East India Company he could not sign this

treaty because he felt he was signing away the kingdom from his

children. That the terms systematic oppression, anarchy, and misrule,

&c, were so general that they would be difficult to define. To this,

Colonel Low replied that such things were not likely to happen in His

Majesty's reign. The documents will be produced in due course, and

show the repugnance of the poor King and the persuasion of the

Resident. The King knew the Treaty of 1801 did not give power to the

E.I. Government of interference quite as well as the Resident and

dreaded the result of the new Treaty of 1837'."

The Deed of Engagement which was asserted by the Resident John

Low, to have been signed by "the Nawaub willingly, and without any

hesitation" but has been contradicted by the author "How to Make and

How to Break a Treaty" in the most convincing manner, is given below

and speaks for itself:

"DEED OF ENGAGEMENT"

"Translation of a Deed of Engagement executed by Nawaub

Nusseer-ood-Dowlah, on the night of the 7 th July, 1837

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"Lieutenant-Colonel John Low, the Resident, has apprised me,

through Lieutenant Shakespeare, his second assistant, of the death of

Nusseer-ood-Deen Hyder, King of Oude. The Resident has also

communicated to me the substance of the orders of the Government of

India respecting the necessity of new engagements on the (Part of the?)

Company's Government with the Oude State; and I hereby declare, that

in the case of my being placed on the throne, I will agree to sign any

new Treaty that the Governor-General may dictate.

(True Translation) (Signed) J. Low, Resident".

"N.B. At the foot of the Persian paper, the present King wrote the

words "Cubool wo Munzoor ust" (It is accepted and agreed upon), and

affixed the impression of his seal".

"The Engagement recited above", says Major Bird, "with the

circumstances under which it was obtained, will doubtless be thought a

sufficient answer to the preamble of the Treaty of 1837, as far as the

latter testifies to the misgovernment of the Oude Princes".

Naseer-ud-Daulah becomes the king

Naseer-ud-daulah, a decrepit old man of 63 years with shaking

head and limbs, became the King, with the title of Muhammad Ali Shah,

on July 8, 1837. The new King, though infirm in health, possessed a

keen intellect and having been trained under the vigilant eye of his

father, Nawab-Wazeer Saadat Ali Khan, Yameen-ud-daulah, who had

proved himself to be an astute politician and had defeated Lord

Wellesley in polemics, was not a novice in State affairs or in

interpreting State documents. The very fact that he had raised objections

to the Resident John Low's document "that he felt that he was signing

away the kingdom from his children. That the terms systematic

oppression, anarchy, and misrule, &c, were so general that they would

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be difficult to define" showed that he possessed a penetrating mind

which could fully grasp the import and connotation of the various

clauses in a document. Time proved that he was quick enough to catch,

through the language of a State Paper, the deception caused by the

Governor-General and was bold enough to throw back the document in

the face of the Great Satrap himself!

Treaty of 1837

King Muhammad Ali Shah had been hardly two months on the

throne, after the Deed of Engagement, when he was made to sign a

Treaty of nine articles. It was executed at Lucknow on 11 th September

1837 (10th Jamadi-ud-Sanee, 1253 H) and was signed by Auckland A.

Ross, W. Morison and H. Shakespeare. The Treaty was "ratified by the

Governor-General of India in Council, at Fort William in Bengal" on

18th September, 1837, and bears the signature of W.H. Macnaghten,

Secretary to the Government of India.

The Preamble in keeping with the usual propaganda against

Awadh, refers to "the infraction of this essential engagement of the

Treaty (1801), and inattention to the duty of a Sovereign on the part of

several successive Rulers of Oude, have been continued and notorious."

Referring to this Major Bird says "The Engagement cited above,

with the circumstances under which it was obtained, will doubtless the

thought a sufficient answer to the preamble of the treaty of 1837, as far

the latter testifies to the misgovernment of the Oude Princes"

The most important Articles of this Treaty of 1837 are the 7 th and

the 8 th:

"Article : In modification of Article 6 th of the Treaty above referred to

(of 1801), it is hereby provided that the King of Oudh will take into his

immediate and earnest consideration, in concert with the British

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Resident, the best means of remedying the existing defects in the Police,

and in the Judcial and Revenue Administrations of his dominions, and

that if His Majesty should neglect to attend to the advice and counsel of

the British Government or its local representative, and if (which God

forbid) gross and systematic oppression, anarchy and misrule should

hereafter at any time prevail within the Oudh dominions, such as

seriously to endanger the public tranquility, the British Government

reserves to itself the right of appointing its own officers to the

management of whatsoever portions of the Oudh territory, either to a

small or to a great extent, in which such misrule as that above alluded to

may have occurred, for so long a period as it may deem necessary; the

surplus receipts in such case, defraying all charges, to be paid into the

King's treasury, and a true and faithful account rendered to His Majesty

of the receipt and expenditure of the territories so assumed.

"Article : And it is hereby further agreed, that in case the Governor-

General of India in Council should be compelled to resort to the exercise

of the authority vested in him by Article 7 th of this Treaty, he will

endeavour as far as possible to maintain (with such improvements as

they may admit of) the native institutions and forms of administration

within the assumed territories, so as to facilitate the restoration of those

territories to the Sovereign ofOude when the proper period for such

restoration shall arrive".

The most important point to consider about this treaty is, whether

the whole Treaty of 1837 was disallowed by the Home Government, as

is made out by Lord Dalhousie and his apologists, or "as the

Parliamentary Return mentions, "the Home Government disapproved of

that part of the above treaty which imposed on the Oudh State the

expense of the auxiliary force, and on the 8 th July, 1839, the King was

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informed that he was relieved from the cost of maintaining the auxillay

force, which the British Government had taken upon itself."

Poor Auckland has been blamed for concealing the fact that the

said Treaty, as a whole, was not approved by the Home Government, but

I cannot understand why Ellenborough and Hardinge (who has

specifically referred to the Treaty of 1837) who followed Auckland did

not speak out the truth and correct the wrong impression created by

Auckland's suppression?

Another loan of Rs. Seventeen lakhs

On 22nd November 1838, a Deed of Engagement (No. LXVI) was

executed by which "His Majesty the King of Oude has paid, and the

Right Honourable the Governor-General of India, on the part of the East

India Company, has received, in perpetuity, the sum of Lucknow Sicca

Rupees Seventeen Lakhs (17,00,000)". This loan was given at the rate of

four per cent annum and the total of the yearly interest amounted to

sixty-eight thousand (68,000) Lucknow rupees. "This shall be paid in

pension in four equal instalments, and in the proportions specified to the

following persons, and to their heirs, in perpetuity, on their receipts,

under their seals".

"Given at Lucknow, this Twenty-Second day of November, in the

year of Our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred, and Thirty-Eight

corresponding with the third of Ramzan, one Thousand Two Hundred

and Fifty-Four Hajira.

L. Low, Lieut,-Colonel, Political Resident at Lucknow"

Reforms introduced

"Notwithstanding his (King Muhammad Ali Shah's) advanced age

and many infirmities", says Major Bird, "he, however, greatly improved

the state of his kingdom, ameliorated the condition of the agriculturist,

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introduced reforms in the police, revenue, judicial, and finance

departments, encouraged commerce, erected several public works of

great utility, such as schools, colleges, serais or resting places for

travellers; dug tanks, wells, and filled the coffers of his treasury.

Colonel Low, the then Resident at Lucknow, reposed so much

confidence in His Majesty's wisdon and other statesmanlike qualities

that he told him, more than once, that it was not necessary for His

Majesty to consult him every point, possessing, as His Majesty did, so

much information, judgment, and knowledge of business."

Husainabad Imambara Trust

The most important construction of his time is the Imambara at

Husainabad, Lucknow (formerly) known as Jamania Bagh), popularly

known as Chota Imambara (in contradistinction to the Imambara of

Asaf-ud-daulah which is known as the Bara Imambara), and he also laid

out a first-class (from the Rumi Darwaza, the imposing gate of the Bara

Imambara) to his own Imambara at Husainabad (Lucknow).

On 23rd November 1839 King Muhammad Ali Shah executed a

Trust Deed No. LXVII) "at the rate of four (4) per cent annum"... by

which he deposited the sum of Rs. 12,00,000 "in perpetuity in the

Honourable Company's Treasury at the Residency of Lucknow, and the

interest amounting to forty-eight thousand (48,000) Lucknow Sicca

Rupees per annum has been bestowed as a gift upon the persons herein

mentioned, and for the expenses of Hossainabad Moobaruk, &c."

Similarly on 26 th January 1840, he executed a Trust Deed (No.

LXVIII) for the interests of Two Promissory Notes (One at 5 per cent

per annum and the other at 4 per cent annum) amounting to Rs. 3,40,800

which declared "I given and bequeath for the expenditure of the Hospital

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established in the time of the late King (Naseer-ud-deen Haider), in the

capital of Lucknow".

"ARTICLE 2nd, (of. No. LXVIII): "It is very necessary that the

whole of the interest arising from the above-mentioned sum may now

and hereafter be laid out in providing medicine and food for the sick

poor. Those patients who may prefer native medicines will be treated by

native physicians, who will be appointed by the Government; and those

who may desire European medicine will be treated by Dr. Steveson, and

after him by any gengleman who may be in the service of this

Government".

King Muhammad Ali Shah was so careful about the maintenance

and upkeep of the objects of the Trust that he mentioned in the above

Trust-deed specifically"

"For the expenses of Hossainabad Moobaruk, the Inn and the Tank and their

dependencies, as follows:

"For the expenses of Hossainabad

Mooobaruk per annum and its

Dependencies

:

Rs. 24,000

"For the repairs of the new Road Rs. 06,000 per

annum Rs. 30,000 per annum

The King also intended to construct a Meenar, probably

similar to the historic Qutub Meenar of Delhi but on less ambitious

scale, of seven storeis only. But he could not complete it; and the

four Khands (or stories), near the Hussainabad Tank, are still visible,

unfinished and unplastered, as a sad reminder of the good intentions

of this sagacious and benevolent King.

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Chapter -II

Similarly he started constructing a Jamey Masjid behind his

Imambara at Husainabad on an ambitious scale, it could not be

completed within his lifetime either. It is also, like the Sat-Khandra,

a mute reminder of the King's religious disposition.

King Muhammad Ali Shah died on 7 th May 1842 and was

buried in his own Imambara at Husainabad, Lucknow.

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Chapter -II

KING AMJAD ALI SHAH (1842-1847)

King Amjad Ali Shah succeeded his father, Muhammad Ali Shah,

at the age of 43 years and some months. "This Prince", according to

Masih-ud-deen Khan, "whose natural and acquired talents were of a very

high order, applied hiself assidously to the management and

administration of his dominions. Like his ancestors, he did all in his

power to conciliate and secure the friendship and support of the British

Government. Thus, when the Punjaub was broke out, His Majesty

manifested his steadfast adherence and fidelity as an ally by assisting

the Company with pecuniary advances, and by placing at their disposal a

considerable number of well-armed and disciplined troops, both horse

and foot".

Ever since the death of Ranjit Singh, on June 27, 1839, there had

been no settled Government in the Punjab. "There had, in fact, been

little more than anarchy," according to Henry Morris, "Chieftains and

ministers had been murdered, and all real power was in the hands of the

army." As early as February 1844, Lord Ellenborough, the then

Governor-General ,wrote. "It is to be hoped that the state of the Punjab

may not render necessary in December next an operation beyond the

Sutlej". In December 1845, Sir Henry Hardinge, the then Governor-

General, had to meet the challenge of the Sikhs in the sanguinary battles

of Ferozeshah, Mudki, and later at Aliwal, Sobroan etc. The resources of

the British Government were strained to the utmost, and it was touch

and go with the British power in the subcontinent. At this critical

moment the Awadh King came to its much needed help.

Punjab war & Awadh help

"It was during the Residency of Mr. I.R. Davidson that the first

Panjaub campaign was raging, All India was looking in terror at the

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fierce and uncertain contest. The enemies of the East India Government

did not hesitate to scheme and make proposals for the overthrow of their

Government'", writes the author of "How to Make and How to Break a

Treaty".

" 'Dinapore and Benaras were rife with intrigue. Whispered

messages to Napaul were daily increasing the uncertain position of the

East India Company. The government paper, that certain criterion of the

state of public feeling, was at the lowest point ever known. There was

then everything to induce the Oudh Government to assert their

independence, or at any rate give themselves airs. One move in that

direction, and the East India rule would have been thrown back one

hujdred years and who shall say to what extent the loss might not have

extended. But no; Oudh was firm. In the East India Government's peril

was clearly seen Oudh's constancy. Her men cheerfully given from her

own any for the Company. Her horses at the servcie of the Irregular

Corps, then being raised in hot haste, and her minister directed to tender

every and any aid that the East India Company might require (The

Minister Nawab Ameenood Dowlah received a letter of thanks on this

occassion). These are not wild, enthusiastic flatteries. These are the

accounts of well-known realities. If Lord Hardings has but an iota of the

magnanimity for which we give him credit, he will not fail to bear

witness to the gallant conduct of Oudh on this occsion, and we look to

him for it'. The author was not aware, when he made this appeal, how

impossible it was that his appeal could be answered."

Administration

Amjad Ali Shah was a strictly religious person and followed the

dictates of religion scrupulously. He performed his prayers and fasts etc.

which he never missed. He, for the first time probably, started

distribution of Zakat (amounting to lakhs of rupees) to those who were

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found qualified to receive it under the Islamic Law. The Mujtahid-ul-Asr

was the overall Superior for the purpose. He had appointed men of

learning and piety, who had confidence of the public, in various quarters

of the city, who looked after the distribution of the Zakat-money to the

orphans, widows, the needy and the 'Mustaheq 1.

It will be remembered that Ghazi-ud-deen Haider had already

mentioned in his Proposals to the Earl of Moira, on 12 th November 1814,

that "three degrees of Adawlut (Courts of Judicature) have been

established here". The appellate courts were looked after by the two

leading Mujtahids of Lucknow viz. Moulana Syed Muhammad (Sultan-

ul-ulema) and Moulana Syed Hussain (Syed-ul-ulema). Moulana Syed

Muhammad's eldest son, Moulana Syed Muhammad Baqir, was

appointed with the title of Munsif-ud-daulah to look after the Civil and

Criminal courts, and a Mufti was posted with every Nazim in a district.

Madrasah & Observatory

Amjad Ali Shah established a Madrassah (which is still existing in

Lucknow under the title of Sultan-ul-Madaris) which had hundreds of

students on its rolls. Every student used to get a stipend of rupees five

per month, and every twenty students had teacher to look after them, a

much better teacher-student ratio than what is prevailing in modern

times.

The Observatory (which took full ten years) was also completed

by King Amjad Ali Shah. Col. Wilcox, the Superintendent of the

Observatory, had drawn up a plan to publish important astronomical

works in a Press at Allahabad. Seven thousand rupees had already been

paid to him but, unfortunately, he deid and the whole scheme fizzled

out.

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Chapter -II

"Haft Qulzum"

It has been mentioned by Dr. A. Sprenger in his thired report,

dated 13 th March 1849, which was submitted by him to Lord Dalhousie,

the then Governor-General. Dr. Sprenger found seven volumes in the

Farah Baksh Library at Lucknow which were the Errata of the original

volumes which were not printed till then.

Oude frontier police force & a church

"At the request of the European inhabitants of Lucknow, he (the

King) presented them with a piece of ground for the erection of a

Church for public worship, and supplied them with the greater part of

the materials. During his reign, also, the requistion of the British

Government for an Oude Frontier Police Force, to be under the direction

of the Resident, under the command of the officer in the Thuggee.

Dacoitee Office, and officered by persons of his selection, was promptly

met; and this force, consisting of four companies of infantry, and two

troops of some fifty cavalry each, has been from that time maintained by

the Oude Government. In organising this force, the Oude Government

raised no difficulties about the employment of British officers, nor urged

that such was contrary to the treaty of 1801- a difficulty which Lord

Dalhousie subsequently brought forwardas a reason for dispensing with

this and all other treaties. On the contrary," says Major Bird, "the Oude

Government then, as always, complied with the requests of its allies, and

did everything that could be reasonably expected to promote their

objects."

He tried to develop Lucknow and provide for the public weal

within his limited means, during the short period of five years, and "had

by his amiable character and superior endowments won for himself the

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golden opinions, not only of his own subjects and of Indians in general,

but also of the English."

King Amjad Ali Shah died on 13 February 1847 and was succeded

by his son, King Wajid Ali Shah, the last occupant of the Awadh throne.

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SULTAN-E-ALAM KING WAJID ALI SHAH (1847-1856)

"There are many statements of history which it is immaterial to

substantiate or disprove", says Frattan. "Splendid pictures of public

virtue have often produced their good if once received as fact. But when

private character is at stake, every consientious writer or reader will

cherish his 'historic doubts'; when he reflects on the facility with which

calumny is sent abroad, the avidity with which it is received, and the

careless ease with which men credit what it costs little to invent and

progagate, but required an age of trouble and an almost impossible

conjunction of opportunities effectually to refute."

The above warning given by Fratten in his History of Netherlands

should not be forgotten. It should be thrice remembered, speciality, by

those who wish to know the facts about Wajid Ali Shah, as distinct from

the fiction woven round that unfortunately King by his British traducers-

the great 'Falsifiers of History' and their henchman.

Wajid Ali Shah was born on 30 th July 1822 when his grand-father

Naseer-ud-daulah (later King Muhammad Ali Shah) had no chance of

succeeding to the throne. He was given the title of Nazim-ud-daulah,

Mirza Muhamad Wajid Ali, Khan Bahadur. When his father became the

King he received the titles of Abul Mansoor, Sikandar Jah, Sulaiman

Hashm, Sahab 'Alam Waliahd, Mirza Muhammad Wajid Ali Khan

Bahadur.

He succeeded his father (Amjad Ali Shah), after the formal

confirmation of his death by the Residency Surgeon Dr. Logan, on

February 13, 1847 (26 th Safar, 1263, A.H.), at the young age of 25 only:

He went to the Baradari and, as usual, entered the Special

Chamber

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where after offering Prayers (of Thanks giving) he ascended the

throne. The

Resident, Col. Richmond, put the Crown on his head and

proclaimed Wajid Ali

Shah as the King of Awadh. Ameen-ud-daulah, the Prime

Minister, was the first to offer the Nazr and others followed. The

Resident remained seated below the throne, while the other British

officers remained standing all the time. The first signature he put as a

King, was to the names of five Sadat-e-Hasani (descendants of Imam

Hasan, the second Imam of the Shia faith) to mark the propitious

beginning of his reign. After remaining seated on the throne for one

hour he was escorted to the Takht-e-Rawan by the Resident and the

Brigadier of the force, which took him to the Mahalsara.

Education

On attaining the age of discretion (generally four to six years

when private tutors were appointed, in Awadh, to initiate the children in

the mystereis of knowledge with the Quran Shareef), Nawab Ameen-ud-

doulah Syed Husain Khan was appointed Ataleeq to the young

Murshidzadah.

His father, King Amjad Ali Shah, who himself was a very

religious man (who was the fist and perhaps the only King except Wajid

Ali Shah) who distributed Zakat and Khums on his yearly income, gave

him a sound religious education. Nawab Ameen-ud-daulah, his Ataleeq,

was also a religious person who observed practically all the injunctions

of his faith. He regarded Music and Dancing as Haram (forbidden under

the Canonical law); but ironically enough, Wajid Ali Shah was born

with a love for the Muses. Neither the admonitions of the loving father

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nor the chastisements of his Ataleeq could wean away the young Prince

from his devotion to Music.

An Erudite Scholar

Although no details are available about his tutors who gave him

lessons in the different branches of learning, he was regarded as a great

scholar by his contemporaries. His writings also show high proficiency

in the subjects on which he wrote, with great facility, both an Urdu and

Persian. Moulana Abdul Haleem Sharar, the well-known Urdu novelist,

who had spent his childhood and youth "under the protection of the

King" at Matia Burj (Calcutta), speaks very highly of his literary

attainments. Moulan Sharar says that "Wajid Ali Shah's literary taste

was of a very high order. In fact, he had a natural gift for (i) Literature

and Poetry, and (ii) for Music... His literary attainments were very high.

Although not an Arabic Scholar, but in Persian he was probbly a little

less proficient than Abul Fazl (of Akbar's Court, the well-known author

of Aleen-Akbari). He could write, in a very short tme, Persian prose of

the highest diction which would remind one of the best classical writers

in that language. Similarly, it was difficult to find another more

naturally gifted poet than Wajid Ali Shah. He composed hundreds of

Marsias, Salams etc., and wrote so many books in prose and poetry that

it is difficult to remember them now; and every composition had a

different and natural style.... He could dictate Marsia and Salam, to two

different scribes simultaneously......

Munshi Muhammad Maseeh-ud-deen Khan Bahadur, Special

envoy of King Wajid Ali Shah, accompanied the Oudh Commission to

England to represent the King's case, against the annexation of Awadh,

to Queen Victoria and the British public. He says:

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"His present Majesty (Wajid Ali Shah), who has received a liberal

Eastern education, is well versed in ancient and modern history and

literature, and, besides being the author of several Persian and Oordoo

poems of considerable merit, has written many useful and popular works

which are to be found in most of the public libraries of Europe.

"Of an amiable disposition, rendered still more attrative by affable

and engaging manners, Wajid Allie is much beloved and respected by

his subjects, from the highest to the lowest, from the rajah to the ryot,

and this the more so, as he has ever discharged the duties of his high

office justice tempered by mercy".

"In a lecture of M. Garcin de Tassy, member of the French

Institute, and Professor of Hindostani at the Ecole Imperiale, and which

lecture was deliverd at the opening of his course in December last

(probably 1856), this distinguished scholar thus spoke of these literary

productions of His Majesty":

(Translation of the original French): 'I do not want merely an

appreciation of this resoltion which is politically oriented; neither do I

want to estiamate the qualities and faults of Wajid Ali, as a Soverign;

but I am interested in him as a distinguished literary figure and an

eminent Hindustani poet."

S. Ameer Ali Khan was leading Vakeel of the Sudder Diwani

Adalat, Calcutta. He was appointed Minister (with the tittle of Wazeer-

us-Sultan) by the King, at Matia Burj, and was in close touch with him.

He also says that eminent scholars and Ataleeqs were appointed to

educate and train Wajid Ali Shah in his childhood and, being very

intelligent, he mastered the subjects in a very short time.

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Administrative Experience

Wajid Ali Shah's training in administrative affairs was also not

neglected. Following the custom prevailing in the Awadh Royal Family,

his father gave him administrative training by selecting him as a

Minister dealing with administrative matters. Wajid Ali Shah himself

says: "The author (of this book) was selected at the age of fifteen, by my

father as his Heir-apparent and was made a Minister. At the age of

twenty I sat on the throne.........and at the age of thirty, without

committing any oppression, or injustic of any injury to the ryots, or for

any fault whatsoever, I was deprived of my throne....

Literary attainments

When Wajid Ali Shah ascended the throne in 1847 he was, besides

having administrative experience, well-versed in those branches of

learning which were then in vogue in the upper circles. His literary

attainments in Persian and Urdu must be accepted to be a very high

order which has been specially stressed by eminent scholars and writes

like Munshi Maseeh-ud-deen Khan, Mir Munshi of the Persian

Department of the Governor-General's Secretariate; M. Garcin de Tassy,

member of the French Institute and Professor of Hindustani at the Ecole

Imperiale (Paris); S. Ameer Ali Khan (Wazeer-us-Sultan), and last but

not the least, Moulana Abdul Haleem Sharar, the eminent Urdu novelist,

who had unique opportunisties of watching the King and studying his

literary compositions at close quarters.

As an example of his chaste Persian prose his book 'Bahr-e-

Hidayet' may be cited. It is no more than a compilation of questions on

Fiqh (Canonical law), submitted by him, during his childhood, to the

Mujtahid-ul-asr (Sultan-ul-Ulema), and their answers. The questions are

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in Persian, which he submitted for answers. They show not only a grasp

of the subjects discussed but also a complete mastery of the language.

Civil and military reforms

After the usual funeral ceremonies of the late King were over, the

first thing that attracted Wajid Ali Shah's attention was the deplorable

condition of the Army.

He started by enlisting a few regiments of Infantry and Cavalry.

They were given new uniforms and arms. The Troops of Cavalry were

called "Banka" and "Tircha", while Infantary regiments were named

"Ghangghore", "Akhtari" and "Nadiri". He introduced words of

command in Persian and went to the Paradeground early in the morning,

on his favourite horse, and supervised the military manoeuvres for three

or four hours at a stretch "in the heat of the sun and amidst clouds of

dust", and watched the movements and tactics of the cavalry and the

regiments with a critical eye. The creditable performances of the army

were recognised with proper rewards and sometimes with suitable titles

too.

Complaint Boxes

In order to improve the administration of the country and to

receive public complaints, at first hand, he introduced Complaint Boxes.

They were placed in the public streets "for the reception of complaints

and petitions". Two silver boxes were also carrried in front of his

processions. They had apertures, like letter-boxes, to put in complaints

and petitions. The keys of the Complaint Boxes were kept by the King

himself who opened them with his own hands and passed appropriate

orders. This was called Mashghala-e-Nausherwani or, as some have

mentioned, Mashghala-e-Sultani.

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After Royal orders were passed and signatures were affixed all the

petitions and complaints were sent to the Despatch Section daily, to be

issued. And, after a "fixed period", without any delay the despatch

orders and their receipts were submitted to the King.

I do not think any contemporary of Wajid Ali Shah, Indian of

European, could have done better. Was there any appreciation of his

efforts to improve the administration? No, it rather invited the wrath of

the British!

Anticipating the events, let us turn to Paragraph 15 of Major-

General Outram's Report, dated Lucknow Residency, March 15, 1855,

which says;

"The King has not, since the Governor-General's visit in October

1847, shown any signs of 'being fully aware of the responsibility he

incurs',..... In fact, I do not think that His Majesty can ever be brought to

feel the responsibility of sovereignty strong enough to be induced to

bear that portion of the burden of its duties which must necessarily

devolve upon him"....

Again Outram, on the same page, says:

"His Majesty has ulterly disregarded the advice then given by the

Governor-General (Hardinge): he has done nothing to improve the

administration, abstained from no personal indulgence, given no

attention whatever to public affairs."

This was one of those charges, (others will be dealth with later)

which were levelled against Wajid Ali Shah in all seriousness, and

which formed the basis of Lord Dalhousie's Minute of June 18, 1855, in

which all such allegations are paraded with suitable embellishments.

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King's reply to above

It will be seen that even the highest representatives of the British

Imperialists in India, not to speak of their agents called Residents who

were planted with a set purpose in the local Durbars, would not feel the

least qualms of conscience in distorting the truth.

Wajid Ali Shah, when he received a copy of the Oude Blue from

London in the-closing months of 1856 at Matia Burj (Calcutta), has

answered each and every charge with a wealth of details that is simply

astounding. To the above he says:

"The fact is, that after ascending the throne, it appeared fit to me

to examine and understand all public affairs to correct what appear to

require revision, and, after upholding what required confirmation, to

establish a proper system of administration, in order that business should

be properly transacted. It is evident I did not assume the charge of a new

Kingdom which required new modelling, but which had an established

system, which only required to be put in force. I, therefore, applied

myself from the very commencement to test the manner in which justice

was administered. I had boxes for the reception of complaints and

petitions placed in the public streets, and on referring to those petitions,

I found that our long established Courts of Justice were unimpeachable,

and that justice was administered to the rich and the poor in confirmity

to the precepts of Mahomedan Law; no such case, in which injustice

could be established, having been brought to light. It also appeared that

the Judges were men of ability, acquainted with Mahomedan Law, and

of upright character. Hence I unhesitatingly affirmed things as they

were.

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Re-organization of the army

"Subsequently I intended to have re-organized the Army, and

infact reinstead several officers who had served my predecessors, and

who had been removed; and I also purposed to have inspected the entire

forces in person, and made some arrangements regarding them, but the

Residents Colonel Richmond and Golonel Sleeman, immediately

complained and spoke to me about it. Considering that even if I re-

orgaized a small body of troops, the English Government would be

displeased, and suspicion might, arise, and relying upon the friendship

of the Honourable East India Company, on whom rested the entire

responsibility for preserving the kingdom from domestic and foreign

foes, I at once abandoned this project, and devoted my attention to

public affairs."

From the above it is quite clear that immediately after ascending

the throne Wajid Ali Shah Started, as he has asserted in so many words,

reorganizing the Army and improving the administration of the country.

After being stopped from carrying out reforms in the Administration and

the Army, by the British Residents at the behests of the Governors-

General, Wajid Ali Shah made one more effort. Not being "sunk in the

uttermost abysses of enfeebling debauchery", as Sir John Kaye, the

Secretary of the Political and Secret Department of the India Office in

England says, Wajid Al Shah devoted his attention, as he categorically

affirms, "to public affairs". But the British with ulterior motives

thwarted him as will be seen later, even in this attempt. And all these

years, since 1847, the stagements of the Residents have been flaunted

before, us, with suitable frills, that Wajid Ali Shah "has done nothing to

improve the administration; abstained from no personal indulgence;

given no attention whatever to public, affair"; while they knew, all the

time, that they were uttering nothing but downright falsehood!

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Chapter -II

Before proceeding any further let us cast a look behind to see, at a

glance, what were the conditions prevailing in the country before King

Wajid Ali Shah came to the throne inl847; whether Awadh was ruined

by anarchy and choas, or the people were living orderly and peaceful

lives.

Pre-1847 Awadh

A series of reports were submitted by the Residents at Lucknow to

the Governors-General about the misgovernment and ruin of the

territories of Awadh according to a set design. "These complaints are

paraded in Lord Dalhousie's Minute of June, 18, 1855; but they are not

set forth at length, and their historical context is not exhibited; while

there is no recognition of the counter-statements which we have already

cited, and to which it would be easy to append many additional ones",

says the author of Dacoitee in Excelsis, "There is the testimony, for

instance, of Captain Shakespeare, who preceeded Mr. Davidson as

Resident, and who, having risen through almost every grade of the Civil

Service, was better qualified to take a more extended veiw than the

generality of such officers, yet who reported to the effect that he had not

found more crime and violence in Oude than in those portions of the

East India Company's own dominions which he had superintended.

There is the testimony, dated 29 th May, 1846, and which has not hitherto

been published, of his successor Mr. Davidson, a most honourable

gentleman, to the comparative ordierliness of the Oudh population and

territories. To Mr. Davidson succeeded Colonal Richmond, during

whose Residency his present Majesty (Wajid Ali Shah), at the age of

twenty-five years, ascended the throne. This officer may have had

differences with the King upon minor questions, but the harmonious

terms which subsisted between them, and at which Lord Hardinge, at his

visit in 1847, to be mentioned presently, expressed his great

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satisfaction, is a conclusive proof that he saw nothing in the Royal

Government to warrant the lurid colouring bestowed on it by Lord

Dalhousie."

The testimony of three British Residents viz., Shakespeare,

Davidson and Richmond have been quoted, from official reports, to

show that crime and violence in Awadh were not more than "in those

portions of the East India Company's own dominions which he

(Shakespeare) had superintended."

Then there is the testimony of Davidson, dated 29 th May, 1846 "to

the comparative orderliness of the Oude population and territories." But

these testimonies have been suppressed because, if published, they

would have given the direct lie to the case made out by Dalhousie for

annexing the country.

Hardinge's visit to Awadh

"On his return journey to Calcutta", writes Henry Morris, "Lord

Hardinge paid a visit to the Nawab of Oudh at Lucknow for the purpose

of remonstrating with him regarding the mismanagement of his

dominions, which in fact, amounted almost to anarchy".

On 1st November 1847 (21st Ziqaad 1263) Mr. Elliot, Secretary to

the Governor-General, arrived at Lucknow and, with the Resident Col.

Richmond, saw the King. Elliot remained at Lucknow for a week and,

after selecting the most important historical works, which was his usual

practice wherever he went, from the Royal Library, he went back to

Kanpur.

On 2nd November (22nd Ziqaad 1263) Mirza Wasi Ali Khan, with

the necessary 'Julus' was sent ahead to Kanpur for making necessary

arrangements for the tea-party to the Governor-General. He received a

Khillat of elevan pieces.

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On Thursday the 4 th November (24 th Ziqaad 1263) news was

received of the Governor-General's arrival of Kanpur.

On Saturday the 6 th November 1847 (26 th Ziaqaad 1263) the King,

Wajid Ali Shah, in the morning went to the Camp laid out on this side of

the Ganges (in the Awadh territory). The Camp was beautiful arranged

by Rajah Darshan Singh Ghalib Jung which specially pleased the King.

The King reached the Camp at about 1-0 P.M. when it was raining

heavily. The rains continued till Monday, the 8 th November.

When the rains did not cease even on Monday, the whole day, the

King came out of his tent, at about one hour to sunset, and prayed to

God for cessation of the rains in accordance with the form prescribed for

the purpose in religious books, and "the God's creatures were saved from

ravages of the storm."

On Tuesday the 9 th November, Mr. Elliot, Secretary to the

Governor-General, with two sons of Lord Hardinge, came to see the

King in the afternoon for the final approval of the arrangements of his

visit on the next day.

On Wednesday morning, the 10 th November 1847, General Saheb

(the King's brother), Mirza Khurram Bakht Bahadur etc. preceeded the

Royal Cavalcade. The King, half an hour later, proceeded in a golden

Nalki. On crossing the bridge of boats on the River Ganges the King

mounted an elephant and, as usual, rupees were showered on the King as

charity for the poor people who had surrounded the King's elephant.

Even British soldiers came out of their barracks and struggled with the

Shodas (professional beggars who used to follow rich people's

conveyances to get the alms) and had the worst of it. The Resident

seeing the plight of his countrymen (which probably wounded his racial

feelings) made a sign to the King to have it stopped. It is said that the

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total amount distributed as charity in such a short time came to Rs.

3,465.

Hardings receive the King

The Governor-General received him (the King on an elephant and,

after seating the King next to him, entered his Camp. The entry in the

Governor-General's Camp was with tickets. There were 26 ticket-

holders. Mirza Wasi Ali Khan was in charge of the tea arrangements.

After an hour, Secretary Elliot requested the King, on behalf of the

Governor-General, to join the banquet.

In his banquest speech the Governor-General referred to the old

friendly relations between the two States, to the Resident as his

spokesman for proper advice and that the King was, after all, the

undisputed master of his country.

On departure Governor-General put a necklace of pearls, with his

own hands, round the King's neck and 51 trays of costly woolens were

presented to the King; 30 trays were presented to the Heir-Apparent and

26 to Mirza Sikandar Hashmat (King's brother). Beside elephants, horses

and a tray full of jewels was also presented to the King.

King receives Hardinge

On Thursday the 11 th November 1847, the Governor-General

crossed into Awadh at 9-0 in the morning, and was received by the King

and, after seating the distinguished guest him on the same elephant, the

King arrived at the Camp which was sumptuously decorated. After an

hour when the Governor-General departed, the King, likewise, put a

necklace of pearls round Lord Hardinge's neck; his sons and ladies were

also given chains of pearls, and 51 trays of costly cloths etc. were also

presented.

Handings in Lucknow

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On Wednesday the 17 th November 1847, Lord Hardings entered

Lucknow and, after the usual festivities, met the King in private.

After meeting Wajid Ali Shah on 22nd November 1847 at 3-0 p.m.

when they were closeted together for two hours, Hardings left Lucknow

the next day in the moring for Kanpur.

HARDINGS DISPATCH

No. 33 Dated 2nd December 1847

Later, on 2nd December 1847, he addressed a Dispatch (No. 33) to

the Court of Directors from "Soonamookhee Yacht, on the Ganges off

Monghyr".

This Dispatch of 38 paragraphs is important in more than on

respect because it deals, while discussing the future of the Kingdom of

Awadh and its King, with the British policy towards the Muslims in and

outside India. That this Dispatch is highly important is also evident from

the fact that so far it has been kept a closely guarded secret and, as far

as I know, it has also not seen light of the day.

In view of the importance of the Dispatch we will discuss some of

the paragraphs in detail.

The 'warning'

Hardinge mentions the "Note, of what passed between us at the

interview on the 22nd November (1847), appended to the Memorandum"

(para 30).

It seems that before he left Lucknow, Hardings signed the later

containing the much publicised 'warning' because we find that 'the

warning letter of Lord Hardinge, above mentioned, was dated 23 rd

November 1847".

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The Dispatch is very important for the reason that when Wajid Ali

Shah ascended the throne on 13 th February 1847, Lord Hardinge was the

Governor-General of India. Hardinge had the following reprot of

Captain Shakeshpeare about the then Heir-Apparent (i.e. Wajid Ali

Shah) before him:

Shakespeare' Report

"The incapacity of the King (j.e Wajid Ali Shah) for the duties of

his high position was early foreseen by Captain Sakespeare, the

officiating Resident', says General Outram, "who, on the 29 th of

September 1845 (when Hardinge was the Governor-General) thus

alluded to His Majesty, then Heir Apparent:

"The prospect which the present reign offers is truly a melancholy

one, and in case of anything happening to the King, I should much dread

that the future will become still more clouded. The Heir Apparent's

character holds out no prospect of good. By all accounts his temper is

capricious and fickle. His days and nights are passed in the female

apartments, and he appears wholly to have resigned himself to

debauchery, dissipation and low pursuits".

This lurid picture, painted by the offciating Resident, was before

the Governor-General. If he believed the aspersions cast on Wajid Ali

Shah's character by Shakespeare, he should not have consented to his

ascending the throne. His elder step-brother, Mustafa Ali Khan or his

son, Mirza Waliahd Bahadur, should have been put on the throne, as the

Queen-Mother, Malka Kishwar, suggested during her interview with the

Resident, Major-General Outram, on 1 st February 1856.

Lord Hardings having consented to Wajid Ali Shah's succession to

his father as the King of Awadh, indirectly admitted that he did not

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believe in the strories submitted by the Resident. They were put in store

to be utilized, if necessary, on suitable occasions in future.

"Your Hon'ble Court will have perceived by the correspondence

which has passed between me and the Resident during the last eight

months since the King's accession to the throne in February 1847 I have

great reason to be dissatisfied with the manner in which the Government

of the country has been carried on; and that much of the evil complained

of is attributable to the weakness of character and misconduct of the

King".

Hardinge's falsehood exposed

During this crucial period i.e. "the last eight months since the

King's accession to the throne in February 1847", Wajid Ali Shah tried,

as best as he could, to improve his Army (or whatever he was allowed to

maintain by the British) and the Administration, a fact which has been

admitted by all writers on Awadh history, even by Syed Ameer Ali

Khan, who was said to be a British Agent planted to keep an eye on

Wajid Ali Shah at Matia Burj (Culcutta).

Moreover, the fact that Wajid Ali Shah was prevented through the

Resident, Col. Richmond, from carrying out his reforms has been stated

in so many words by Wajid Ali Shah himself in his Reply to the Oude

Blue Book and even by that rabid anti-Awadh writer Najm-ul-Ghani

Rampuri. The fact that reports about Wajid Ali Shah's attempts at

reforms were submitted by the Resident to Lord Hardinge cannot be

denied because Col. Sleeman two years later, in his Report dated June

21, 1849, mentioned these facts, still Lord Hardinge had the hardihood

to write that "I have had great reason to be dissatisfied with the manner

in which the Government of the country has been carried on; and that

much of the evil complained of is attributable to the weakness of

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character and misconduct of the King". These remarks of the Governor-

General clearly show that he was working according to a certain pre -

determined policy. Hardinge would not allow Wajid Ali Shah, from the

very first day of his succesion to the throne, to introduce reforms for

improving the administration of the country and still attribute all the ills

of the Kingdom to the "misconduct of the King".

"It became evident shortly after His Majesty came to the throne

that his authority was not exercised through his Minister, but through

the influence of singing and Dancing men with whom His Majesty

passes the greater portion of his time".

"These men made overtures to the Minister, promising him their

support if he would engage to share the patronage and profit of his

office with them; and on the rejection of these proposals, they proceeded

to issue orders in his Majesty's name, without the knowledge of the

Minister, for the purpose of compelling him to resign."

The above two paragraphs, besides being contrary to actual facts,

are contradictory in terms also.

Hardinge says that "shortly after His Majesty came to the throne

that his authority was not exercised through his Minister". Now, it been

shown above, from reliable and authentic sources that Wajid Ali Shah

personally attended to public affairs and tried to introduce reforms in the

administrative machinery and Army but was stopped by the British

themselves. Moreover, in the first few months Ameen-ud-daulah was the

Minister who, according to Hardinge himself, was an illiterate opium

eater and "was unqualified for several hours of each day for transacting

the public business". Therefore, there was no question of exercising any

"authority" through such a person or making "Overtures to the Minister,

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promising him the support if he would engage to share the patronage and

profit of his office with them",

Destruction of Hindu temples

"This proof of the power they had obtained over the King, was

shown in a very marked manner by the order issued by these men in His

Majesty's name for the destruction of Hindoo Temples, on false reports

made by persons totaly unworthy of credit. The Minister was kept

waiting at the Palace and denied access to the King of public business,

with the knowledge that His Majesty was engaged in low and degrading

amusements with his favourites".

This paragraph is an astounding proof of the fact that even the

Governor-General could stoop to the lowest and meanest tacties to give

a bad name to Wajid Ali Shah.

The facts of incident, as given by M. Najmul Ghani Rampuri who

by no stretch of imagination can be accused of being partial towards

Wajid Ali Shah, are as follow:

During the ministership of Ameen-ud-daulah (the illiterate opium

eater) the news was conveyed to the King that Gulab Rai Jeweller, who

was the cashier and companion of Ameen-ud-daulah had constructed a

big new temple. On that day idol would be installed.in the temple and,

therefore, a Brahmin boy would be offered as a sacrifice. The Knig

became very angry, and Meer Mahdi was ordered to take proper steps.

He (Meer Mahdi) dismantled the newly constructed dome (of the

temple). Moreover, in mohalla Haider Ganj, near his own house, Meer

Mahdi started dismantling two Shivalas and issued an order to demolish

a temple in Mohalla Bhadewan although the King had not given orders

to demolish these temples.

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Temples reconstructed

The Hindus became very agitated and took a procession to the

King's Palace. On enquiry Meer Mahdi was found at fault. He was

arrested and interned in his house, and the King gave orders for re-

constructing the temples and the Shivalas, at the State expense.

The most interesting point is that Meer Mahdi was neither a Dom

nor a Mirsai (i.e. a professional singer or a dancer) but highly

resepectable Syed and was appointed a Minister. The King had asked

him to stop human sacrifice, but he went much beyond his assignment.

Wajid Ali Shah once took proper steps. The offender (Meer Mahdi) was

interned and the temples and Shivalas were reconstructed. What else

could Wajid Ali Shah do?

According to another report, the jewellers (Hindus) took a

procession to the Resdient at the Mandion cantonment (in the suburbs of

Lucknow) and complained about it. One of the jewellers, Gulab Rai, was

the factotum of Ameen-ud-daulah. This displeased the King. The

Resident did not interfere in the matter at all but simply sent a report to

Calcutta.

This clearly proves that Ameen-ud-daulah was the protege of the

Resident, and therefore, he did not take any notice of it. But Hardinge

has thrown the blame on the King and absolved Ameen-ud-daulah by

saying. "The Minister was kept waiting at the Palace and denied access

to the King on public business, with the knowledge that His Majesty was

engaged in low and degrading amusements with his favorites".

What a travesty of facts! Ameen-udrdaulah's Case

Only two months after Wajid Ali Shah's succession to the throne

the Minister, Ameen-ud-daulah (a favourite of the last King), was

assaulted publicly in broad daylight in the month of April 1847. He was

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dismissed by Wajid Ali Shah and replaced by Ali Naqi Khan as his

Prime Minister.

This incident has been much publicised as an instance of

maladministration. Ameen-ud-daulah's dismissal has even been citied by

the writers as the main cause of the Resident's displeasure. Hardinge

also refers to the incident in above paragraph in these words:

"The Resident's advice to retain him (Ameen-ud-daulah) as his

Minister was rejected by the King, and I deemed it expedient not to

force His Majesty to adopt this advice against his will, so long as His

Majesty was held responsible for the good Government of his

Kingdom."

Ameen-ud-daulah being an incompetent person knew that he

would not be continued in his office by the new King. Wajid Ali Shah

knew his habits since his childhood when Ameen-ud-daulah was his

Ataleeq. Therefore, on the very next day of Wajid Ali Shah's 'Julus'

(coronation) he approached the Resident (Richmond) to see that he was

not dismissed by the new soverign. He also approached King's mother

and grand-mohther. Wajid Ali Shah listened to the Resident's

recommendation, but after the public assault he was dismissed. The

question is: why the Resident was so much interested in Ameen-ud-

daulah that after being beaten in a public thoroughfare, in broad

daylight, the Resident wanted him to be retained as a Minister? He even

wrote to the Governor-General about it as mentioned by Hardinge in the

above paragraph.

I should also be noted that after the assault on Ameen-ud-daulah

in the public street in April 1847, he was not dismissed rightaway.

Wajid Ali Shah continued him in his post for three months more.

Ameen-ud-daulah remained at his post for five months. When he was

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found absolutely incompetent and incapable of discharging the duties of

his office he was dismissed on Saturday the 9 th July 1847. Meer Mahdi,

alias Meeran (Amir-ul-Umara), was tried as a Minister but as he

mishandled the Temple case he was discarded. Later Ali Naqi Khan was

appointed to the post on 5 th August 1847.

All the writers on Awadh history have extolled the virtues of

Ameen-ud-daulah. He was a God-fearing person devoted to religious

practices. In short, he was an able man who, due to the 'capricious and

fickle temper' of the new King who had 'wholly resigned himself to

debauchery, dissipation and low pursuits', as Hardinge put if, could not

be tolerated in the new environment. But luckily for us Hardinge has, in

an unguarded moment, himself raised the curtain from the habits and

attaiments of Ameen-ud-daulah. In Paragraph 8 he says:

"Mr. Davidson about this time had proceeded to Lucknow and

after a residence of eight months he reported on the 29 th May 1846 that

the Minister thus removed by the King was quite unfit for his ojfice-that

he could neither read nor write-and being on Opium Eater, was

disqualified for several hours of each day for transacting the public

business."

Now this was the man who was being thrust upon Wajid Ali Shah

as Minister by the Resident Richmond; and when his 'advice' was

rejected by the King, he (Richmond) complained to the Governor-

General. Richmond was interested in Ameen-ud-daulah because the

latter was the Resident's spy on the King and entirely in his grip. The

Resident was the only person in the whole of Awadh who could force

the king to accept even such as his minister. Wajid Ali Shah showed, in

this case (as in others to be mentiond later), sufficient strength of

character to defy the 'all powerful' Resident and rejected his 'advice 1.

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In the next paragraph Hardinge says: "I notice these conflicting

opinions so recently reported, in order to show the difficulty of arriving

at just conclusions in matters where the judegment must in a great

degree be formed on the information of others liable to be misled by

parties interested in concealing the truth". The Governor-General, here

at least, admits that there were "parties interested in concealing the

truth" in the Lucknow Residency. He further says that "The Resident is

stationary at the capital and has no Agents whom he can depute to visit

the interior of the country and to report faithfully from personal

observation its real state". This a clear hint to depute special emissaries

in the intetior to collect 'evidence' against the local authorities which

was acted upon by Dalhousie through Saleeman.

In above paragraph Hardinge goes on to reveal:

"The Resident in a letter of May 1847, suggested the propriety of

my addressing a letter to the King, recommending His Majesty to attend

to the advice of the Resident and to avoid the low companies by whom

he was surrounded- I declined to do so by letter; but as the Resident's

Despatches described the King's character and conduct in unfavourable

terms, I determined to pay His Majesty a visit on my way to Culccutta

and to endeavour to ascertain by personal enquiries and observation that

real state of affairs in Oude".

The above paragraph reveals two facts:

(1) British Resident was so much master of the situation that he

wanted the King to attend to his 'advice'- which was

practically 'commands' issued by the Resident to be meekly

followed by the King.

(2) Richmond tried to have the permission of the Governor-

General to interfere in the King's private affairs. By dubbing

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the King's courtiers as "low companions" Richmond tried to

have them dismissed and surround the King with his 'own

men'. But this was too big a pill to swallow even for

Hardinge! H did not like to commit himself in writing and,

therefore, "decline to do so by letter". Instead he decided to

visit Lucnow, assess the situation on the spot personally, and

after detailed discussion with the Resident to give him oral

directions to suit exigencies of the time.

In Paragaph II Hardinge again repeats: "It was evident that the

King's Government had during the last eight months since his father's

death, rapidly declined in public estimation and in the power to enforce

obedience;" but Hardinge being and Honourable (!) man does not

mention the King's efforts at reforms of the Army and Administration

which he himself stopped through the Resident, Col. Richmond!

Hardinge further adds: "and that this change was chiefly to be

attributed to the weakness and contempt felt for a Ruler who was known

to be given up to debauchery and governed by low disreputable men".

Wajid Ali Shah's so-called debauchery will be discussed in a later

chapter; and as to the 'contempt felt' for him, it was amply shown by the

gallant people of his dominions who rose againt the British to avenge

the insult meted out to their King, and the revenge was swift even for

the British. G.W. Forrest admits: "In the course of ten days, English

administration in Oudh had vanished like a dream, and not left a wrack

behind."

The Governor-General then asked the Resident and the District

Officers, as the mentions in above paragraph, "to report their sentiments

as to the present and past state of the country".

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Taking the cue from the Governor-General, the Resident and the

British Magistrates and Collectors of British frontier districts vied with

one another in building up a case against Wajid Ali Shah and his

government. In above paragraphs 13 to 22 (whcih should actually be 24

because three paragraphs have been numbered as 16) instances of

mismanagement and maladministration, based on the Resident and

Dstrict Officer's Reports, have been cited. They will be dealt with when

the historic Minute of Lord Dalhousie, dated June 18,1855 will be

discussed.

In paragraph 23 the Governor-General comes to the concisions, on

the basis of the hearsay evidence quoted above,*'that "altho' these

reports are necessarily made on the observations and statements of

others, the evidence is sufficiently strong to leave no doubt that the state

of the country since February 1847 (the date of Wajid Ali Shah's

succession) is in a much worse condition than then when Mr. Davidson

made his report in May 1846 (during the reign of Amjad Ali Shah, the

father of Wajid Ali Shah), which upon the whole was of a satisfactory

charcter". This statement will also be dealt with when discussing The

Minute of Dalhousie dated June 18,1855 mentioned above.

In paragaraph 24 Col. Richmond, the Resident, is quoted for the

assumption that 1,00,000 people perpetually in conflict with the King's

forces. Naturally the country is at a great disadvantage when compared

with "the system of Law and Order which we have substituted in our

Provinces".

In paragraph 25 the Governor-General says: "There are however

many influential classes of the community who would prefer the

continuance of this state of anarchy in Oude to the ease and security

which the great mass of the

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•people enjoy in our Provinces from just and equal laws..........but

on the other hand the cultivators of the soil, the small traders and shop-

keepers, who firm the great mass of the people, would rejoice in being

delivered from the bondage in which they live......."

According to Hardinge the influential classes did not leave Awadh

because they enjoyed the prevailing anarchy as it benefitted them. As for

"the cultivators of the soil, small traders and shopkeepers...........(they)

would rejoice in being delivered from the bondage in which they live",

but independent witness tell a different tale.

Rev. Reginald Heber, Lord Bishop of Calcutta, paid a visit to

Lucknow during the reign of King Ghazi-ud-deen Haider in 1824.

Among other things he says:

"I asked also if the people thus oppressed desired, as I had been

assured they did, to be placed under English government? Captain

Lockitt said that he had heard the same thing; but on his way this year to

Lucknow, and conversing, as his admirable knowledge of Hindoostanee

enables him to do, familiarly with the the Suwarrs who accompanied

him, and who spoke out, like all the rest of their countrymen, on the

weakness of the King and the wickedness of the Government, he fairly

put the question to them, when the Jemautdar, joining his hands, said,

with great fervency, "Miserable as we are, of all miseries keep us from

that!"

A good word for Lucknow

It is surprising to find Hardinge, side-stepping from the long

diatribe on 'misgovernment and maladministration', bestowing some

praise on Lucknow. In above paragraph 26 Hardinge admits: "I have

come, after the perusal of the evidence, to the conclusion; that since the

present King's accession the administration has fallen into greater

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disorganisation that of late years, altho' as far as the properity of the

Capital is concerned there is no appearance of mis rule. The expenditure

of the Court is great the presence of Troops and a numerous Police

keeps the people in awe and Lucknow shows no signs of a bad

Government in the state of the steets, the Bazaars and the Public

Buildings, which are all kept in the most prefet order- and I understant

the proportion of crime, does not exceed that of Cities in our own

Provinces".

This is the first tardy admission of the Governor-General that, at

least, "as far as the prosperity of the Capital is concerned there is no

appearance of mis-rule"........"and Lucknow shows no signs of bad

Government in the state of streets, the Bazaars and the Public Buildings,

which are all kept in the most perfect order". But the most important

admission is about the Law and Order situtation. The Governor-General

unequivocally admits: / understand the proportion of crime does not

exceed that of Cities in our own Provinces". In other words. Wajid AH

Shah was a good administrator as far as Lucknow was concerned; but

the opinion the Hardinge, he was a 'hopeless imbecile' when he had to

deal with the rest of the country!

The subsequent paragraphs deal with the personal misconduct;

Treaty of 1801; Two years of grace; Interview with the King (given

above para); Secret Committee Despatch of 1838 - to be discussed later,

but here I wish to draw the attention of the reader to the following

paragraphs particularly.

In above paragraph Hardinge clearly says: "/ should strongly

deprecate any policy which would deprive the reigning family of its just

power under the Treaty of 1801. It is most desirable to maintain the

reputation of the East India Company for good faith in their transactions

with Native Princes and States-the fame of our rule is a Tower of

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strength, not only as regards our connection with the Native States of

Asia, but also with Europeans powers: and / am confident your Hon'ble

Court would repudiate any compulsory arrangements by which the

British Government could be accused by deriving a profit at the expense

of a faithful but powerless ally. No Native state has ever made greater

pecuniary and territorial sacrifices to secure British protection than the

Kingdom of Oude, and its Princes during the century have shown in

every genertion, a fidlity to the Brtish alliance which has never been

suspected. In short the sovereign by his loyality to us is entitled to every

consideration consistant with the duty which we owe to the people as

guaranteed to them by Treaty, and I can see no reason why forbearance

and generosity to the Prince, cannot be reconciled with mercy and

justice to three millions of his people."

In the above paragraph Hardinge admits the sustained loyality and

"territorial and pecuniary sacrifices" of the Rulers of Awadh to the Eash

India Company. Hardinge, as clever politician, was anxious "to maintain

the reputation of the East India Company for good faith in their

transactions with Native Princes and States". He, therefore, deprecated

"any policy which woud deprive the reigning family of its just power

under the treaty of 1801". But as a British politician, he would not

oppose the annexationist policy of his masters. He, therefore, as a

plausible excuse trots out the "duty which we owe to the people as

guaranteed to them by Treaty". How far the British themselves observed

the terms of the Treaty (of 1801) is a different story!

This clearly shows that the "Annexationist Lobby" (to be

discussed later) in London had already decided to take over the

Kingdom of Awadh. And the decision was made, if not earlier, at least

in 1847-the very year when Wajid Ali Shah ascended the throne. The

only question remained was to find ways and mans to execute the

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deicision. Hardings might have gone to Lucknow under orders from

above but he foresaw the resultant evils and raised his voice against the

step. He tried to soften the blow as much as possible.

Reliance on Shia-Sunni dissensions

The Machiavellian policy of the British administrators in India is

clearly proved by his answer to the objection that "however absolute the

necessity of our interference, our motives will be misunderstood, and we

shall be accused of usurpation by all Native States".

To the above objection Hardinge replies in above paragraph: "If

the charge of usurpation be confined to Mahomedan States and people,

and that British interference in Oude would exasperate Mussulman

bigotry and hatred, to the former answer may be added the fact that the

King's Family being of the Shiah sect is the most unpopular amongst the

great body of the Mussulmans of Hindoostan, and that in our present

state of power, even if any religious sympathy, with an incapable King

of Oude could be raised it would really not deserve our consideration,

provided the course we were pursuing be just to the people and in

confirmity with existing Treaties."

This shows that Shia-Sunni differences were exploited to the full

by the cunning British and they considered themselves safe in following

any policy, however unjust, towards the Shia rulers and Awadh.

Who knows how many unsuspecting simple-minded Muslims were

not carried away by sectarian prejudices of which some stray instances

are found in works of history, to have a fling at poor Wajid Ali Shah and

earn a reward from their Brtish masters besides the hope of some

recompense in the World to come!

Polical Inconvenience

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Another reason for extinguishing this Muslim Kingdom, given by

Hardinge in paragraph 35 is as follows:

"The Policy of maintaining a Mahomedan Dynasty and

Government in Oude, situated, as that Kingdom is, so far inland, is fully

admitted-whilst on the other hand, nothing could me more inconvenient

than to increase the importance and the power of the Mussulman

population in the North-West Frontier, and on the Indus, bringing us

into close contact with the Mussulman Tribes of Central Asia, by the

only enterance, through all the invasions of India have been made".Z

The Governor-General was encouraged to interface directly as he

was convinced that "the occassion is favourable, and the power of the

Government ample, to correct any error which may unintentionally be

committed".

RESUME OF THE ABOVE PARAGRAPHS

After carefully perusing the above Despatch of 2 nd December,

1847, we find that Lord Hardinge followed the old principle of divide et

impera:

(1) Hindu-Muslim feelings (Aboveparagraph)

He has tried to excite the Hindu-Muslim feelings by referring to

"the destruction of Hindu Temples on false reports".

(2) Shia-Sunni differences (Above paragraph)

In above given paragraph he has also tried to show that "the

King's Family being of the Shiah sect is the most unpopular amongst the

great body of the Mussulmans of Hindoostan, and, that in our present

state of power, even if any religious smpathy with an incapable King of

Oude could be raised, it would be really not deserve our consideration".

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Chapter -II

Hardinge was sure that even if injustice was done to the King of

Oude the Mussulmans were too divided among themselves, by sectarian

prejudices, to combine for his cause; and even if they did, "in our

present state of Power.... it would really not deserve our consideration".

(3) Grievances of Sepoy pensioners (Aboveparagraph)

As for the Hindu subjects of Wajid Ali Shah, the Governor-

General had already mentioned "the destruction of Hindoo temples on

false reports" but to make it doubly sure that anti-Muslim feelings were

raised to the highest pitch, the Governor-General refers to the neglect of

cases of Sepoy Pensioners who were mostly Hindus. In above given

paragraph, he says: "there are in round numbers, 16,000 of our Pesioners

residing within the Oude territory entitled to

British protection.............Their grievances and the imputed

neglect of the British Government in affording them protection..........are

calculated...........to lower the confidence of the solidiery in the power of

the British Government to protect their families against Mussulman

oppression".

(4) Protection of Bengal Army Sepoys (Above paragarph)

One more reason has been added, by Hardinge, for annexing

Awadh viz., the duty of the British Government to protect Sepoy

Pensioners of the Bengal Army, residing in Awadh, and "their families

against Mussulman Oppression".

(5) King's weakness & misconduct

As for Wajid Ali Shah, the less said about him the better!

Hardinge says"

(a) Above para: "During the last eight months since the King's accession

to the throne in February 1847, that I have had great reason to be

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dissatisfied with the manner in which the Government of the country has

been carried on; and that much of the evil complained of is attributable

to the weakness of character and misconduct of the King".

Singer & Dancers (Above given para)

(b) Above para: "It became evident shortly after His Majesty came to the

Throne that his authority was not exercised through his Minister, but

through the influence of Singing and Dancing men with whom his

Majesty passes the greater portion of his time".

King's low companions (Above given para)

(c) Above para: "The Resident in a letter of May 1847 suggested the

propriety of my addressing a letter to the King recommending His

Majesty to attend to the advice of the Resident and to avoid the low

companions by whom he was surrounded...I declined to do so by letter"

(This was after the incident of Ameen-ud-daulah, when Wajid Ali Shah

rejected the 'advice' of the Resident to reinstate him as the Minister).

King "given up to debauchery"

(d) Above para: "It was evident that the King's Government had during

the last eight month since his father's death, rapidly declined in public

estimation and in the power to enforce obedience, and that this change

was chiefly to be attributed to the weakness and contempt felt for a

Ruler who was known to be given up to debauchery and governed by the

disreputable men."

State of the country worse

(e) Above para: "...............the evidence is sufficiently strong to leave no

doubt that the state of the country since February 1847 is in a much

worse condition than when Mr. Dadivdson made his Report in May

1846, which upon the whole was of a satisfactory character".

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People in "most abject wretchedness"

(f) Above para: "............Nevertheless as regards the interior of the

country, every report is clear and consistent that the people are in a state

of the most abject wretchedness and under an incapable Ruler there is no

hope or chance of recovery.....there can be no doubt that the interests of

three millions of people, whom the British Government is bound protect,

ought not to be sacrificied out of consideration for a Prince, whose

authority and dignity we are anxious to up-hold, but whose personal

misconduct is in a great degree the cause of the evil complained of."

Supreme power should be with Resident

(g) (h) Above para: "I do not think the present King, or his Minister, has

the energy and ability to reform abuses and secure good Government in

Oude by Native Agency. If in the course of the next year.... the state of

the country should become worse, I am of opinion no system will suceed

which does not entrust the Supreme Power to a British Resident assisted

by British Agents, controlling every Department of the State."

The 'Period of Grace'

Much has been made of the 'period of Grace' (two years) given by

Hardinge to the King "in the attempt to rescue the country from its

degraded condition".

In order to grasp the full significance of this magnanimous gesture

(the 'Period of Grace'), let us read above paragraph a bit carefully.

Above paragraph: "Under this conviction that British inteference

would shortly become inevitable, I drew up the Memorandum addressed

to the King. In that Paper I assured His Majesty that the British

Government would give him and his Minister a fair trial, in the attempt

to rescue the country from its degraded condition and every possible

assistance in carrying the Minister's measures into effect. I deemed it

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prudent to specify the period of two years, because within that period

the succes or failure of the attempt could be ascertained, affording time

to the Government of India during the interval te collect further

ezidence of the state of country and to devise such remediel measures as

the case may require."

Hardinge was clear in his mind and it was his "conviction" that

"British interference would shortly become inevitable". It was simply to

afford "time to the Government of India during the interval to collect

furtehr evidence of the state of the country and to devise such remedial

measures as the case may require."

But what could have stopped Hardings from annexing the country

rightway and saving "the people (who) are in a state of the most abject

wretchedness and under an incapable Ruler"?

Reason behind the Period of Grace

The real reason behind the magnimous gesture, which stayed

Harding's hand, was that the Governor-General was convinced that the

war-clouds in the Punjab had not cleared away and, very soon, there

would be a bloody contest with the Sikhs again. The treaties (of Lahore

and Bhairowal) of 1846 had humbled the Sikhs but not crushed them.

Writing the above Despatch on December 2, 1847, Hardinge knew that

the Britishers would be involved, very shortly, in a life-and-death

struggle with the Sikhs. He depended on the province of'Oudh, the

nursery of soldiers' for its man-power to carry the Union Jack to Punjab

and therefore, by announcing the 'Two Years of Grace', he gained two

objects; he gained breathing time for the final contest in the Punjab. And

as he knew that there was not evidence against Wajid AM Shah, he

afforded an opportunity to his successor, Lord Dalhousie, to collect

'grievances' against the Government of the country, rake up old decided

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cases of the Sepoy pensioners or trumped up cases to give a bad name to

Wajid Ali Shah and his government. Events proved that Hardings was

correct in his prognosis. Dalhousie reached Calcutta on January 12,

1848, and by April he was involved in the Multan incident which led to

the Second Sikh War and on "the 29 th March, 1849, his Lordship issued a

proclamation tolling the death-knell of the Sikh Raj".

Hardinge must have discussed the Awadh case with Dalhousie

who took charge on January 12, 1848, while Hardinge left on 18 th

January 1848. They were together for 6 days and must have discussed

the future action regarding this province.

We find that Dalhousie, like on obedient pupil, acted on the

advice suggested by Hardinge that the two years 'Period of Grace' should

be utilised by the Government of India in collecting "further evidence of

the state of the country and to device such remedial measure as the case

may require".

Intentional vagueness

As regards Memorandum given to the King, Hardinge says:

Above para: "I have endeavoured to word the Memorandum as not

to compromise, the future action of the Government of India. In

substance it carries into effect the intentions of the Home Authorities,

that on any failure in His Majesty's duty, he should be solemnly warned

of the consequence he may entail upon himself by a systematic neglect

of the Resident's advice, to which he is bound by Treaty to

conform..........

Despatch to assume direct management

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"A period of sixteen years has elapsed since Lord William

Bentinck addressed Your Hon'ble Court", continues Hardinge, "and

received a discretionary power to assume the direct management of

affairs in Oude by your despatch of the 16 th July 1834. That despatch

appears to me to provide for any serious case of necessity which may

arise, justifyin British interference and to contain a very full and clear

expositoin of the measures which ought to be adopted".

After reading the above paragraph it is clear that Lord Hardinge

kept the language of the Memorandum vague so as "not to compromise

the future action of the Government of India" and further that "it carries

into effect the intentions of the Home Authorities".

Those who blame Wajid Ali Shah for inability, inefficiency,

neglect of administration due to engrossing devotion to the Muses and

what not, of course taking the cue from the British propagandists, would

be shocked to know that the course of action regarding the Kingdom of

Awadh was decided and communicated to the Indian Authorities as far

back as 1834, i.e. thirteen years before Wajid Ali Shah came to the

throne!

Annexation delayed by King's death

The next above paragraph deals with the Court of Directors'

despatch of 11 th April 183 8 and the Secret Committee's communication

of 10 th April. They will be discussed later along with other despatches

and treaties.

Above para: "If apprehensions be entertained that our direct interference

will do more harm than good to the people whom we mean to assist, I

must observe that our interference has on several occasions been found

most beneficial in correcting the abuses which the Subsidiary, or double

system of Government, may be assumed to have entailed in Native

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States-and that the reform of a positive and grievous evil ought to be

neglected, when the occasion is favourable, and the power of the

Government ample, to correct any error may unintentionally be

committed."

Hardinge thus admits that there abuses in the Subsidiary System

forced on Indian Princes by Wellesley. Hardinge, very naively, suggests

that the abuses of the Subsidiary Alliance have been corrected by "our

interfernce" and, therefore, is should be resorted to.

It seems that after 'making out a case for the annexation of the

country1 under orders from the Court of Directors, Hardinge had some

qualms of conscience; and as he could not silence the 'Inner Voice', he

blurted out the real truth, and nothing but the truth.

In above paragraph of the Despatch, Hardinge unequivocally

admits:

"If the evidence of the misrule in Oude were stronger and more

specific than that contained in the annexed Documents, I should

nevertheless have considered it an indispensable act of justice not to

have held the King responsible for the abuses which had grown up under

His Majesty's predecessors".

Nothing could be more clear and authoritative in wiping out the

stains of abuses with which the fair name of Wajid Ali Shah has been, so

far, unjustly tarnished than the above explicity written verdict of Lord

Hardinge himself, who Two years' Period of Grace, has so much been

made of by Dalhousie and the British propagandists. Hardinge calls it

"an indispensable act of justice not to have held the King responsible for

the abuses which had grown up under His Majesty's predecessors".

Wajid Ali Shah's name has become, thanks to British propaganda,

synonymous with misrule, oppression, debauchery etc. We must be

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thankful to Hardinge for being honest enough, at least for once, for

raising the curtain from British official policy and revealing the truth.

No better evidence can be adduced to hold Wajid All Shah 'not

guilty' at the bar of public opinion.

Lord Hardinge in the last paragraph of this most important

Despatch suggests the fatuer programme for the benefit of his successor.

The details that have been left out this pulic document must have been

discussed, in the light of the retiring Governor-General's experience,

during the last six days (from 12 th January to 18 th January 1848) when

Hardinge was with Dalhousie in Calcutta:

Above para: "I am in daily expectation of receiving the King's answer,

which will probably not require the Government of India to issue any

orders before the end of this month; at the same time it appears to me

essential in the present condition of the Country that no time should be

lost in employing competent persons in the course of this autumn to

traverse the country under instructions from the Resident, in order to

obtain the most accurate information of the real state of the Ryots and of

the agriculture. The next year will probably disclose whether any and

what further it may be expedient to adopt."

The most important points to be noted in this paragraph are that

Hardinge chalks out the following programme for the benefit of

Dalhousie, the succeeding Governor-General. He suggests that

(1) Dalhousie should employ "competent persons in the course of this

autumn to traverse the country under instructions from the Resident, in

order to obtain the most accurate information of the real state of the

Ryots and of the agriculture". Hardinge further suggests that

(2) "The next year will probably disclose whether any and what further

measures it may be expedient to adopt"

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So here we have the future course charted out for Dalhousie. Who

were the "competent persons" employed to "obtain the most accurate

information of the real state of the Ryots", and why Awadh was annexed

in 1856 and not in 1849, as suggested by Hardinge, are questions to be

dealth with in the next chapter wherein we will examine the

administration of Dalhousie and the methods followed by him in

painting the subcontinent red.

THE MARQUIS OF DALHOUSIE (1848-1856) The new Governor-

General

Before we proposed any further let us try to understand the

character and temperament of this highest functionary of the East India

Company in India. "The native of Scotland bearing the surname of

Ramsay but better known as Lord Dalhousie, was the last maker of the

British Indian Empire proper, for after him no other portion of India has

been dyed red.

"The Scotch nobleman was unscrupulous in the extreme", says

Major Basu "and he believed, as an Occidental diplomatist and follower

of Machiavelli that the end justifies the meas. But perhaps he is not so

much to be blamed as his masters, whose faithful though unscrupulous

servant he was ".

"One of his successors in the Governor-Generalship of India- a

compatriot of his enjoying the name of Earl Elgin, and did not hesitate

to declare from his place, in the Supreme Legislative Council of India

that the representative of the Sovereign of England in India has no

policy of his own but has to act upon the 'mandate' he receives from the

Secretary of State for

India..........If we remember this theory of the 'mandate', we shall

be able to understand the land grabbing policy of the period during

which Dalhousie was the Governor-General of this country".

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Dalhousie's Ex-convict uncle

As luck would have it, "Unfortunately for India, the man charged

with the porfolio, of Indian affairs during Lord Dalhousie's Governor-

Generalship, writes Major, Basu, "was an ex-convict and an

unscrupulous politician who, before being ennobled as Lord Boughton,

was known as Sir John Hobhouse. Regarding Habbousse's antecedents, it

is recorded by an English historian that he was a man of ability but

wanting in discretion, who had once been imprisoned for breach of

privilege. The Ex-convict Hobhouse......was an unch of Dalhousie".

About Dalhousie's temperament and conviction, says Smith:

"He believed, that the promotion of civilization meant the

promotion ol western reforms that western administration and western

institutions were as superior to Indian as Western arms had proved more

potent...........His temperament suited his convictions and combined with

the growing self-confidence of the British in India to impart a certain

arrogance to official benevolecne and a certain hardness to the tone of

the government. The consiousness of conquest competed with the sense

of moral mission and increasingly combined with the latter to produe a

sense of ingrained superiority. The old sense of caution and humility in

the presence of the problems of a subcontinent was now submerged in

the flood of military success, and by the self-confidence of a people who

believed that their civilization was superior to all others in actual

achievements, and by virtue of its discovery of the secret of progress,

increasing its lead year by year. .......

Dalhousie's guiding principle

"When Dalhousie arrived," continues Smith, "misgovernment was

more widespread and humanitarian opinion stronger than ever

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before Dalhousie believed that Brisith administration was immensely

better than the contemporary India; he regarded states as obsolete in the

new India he envisaged, and he was very sensitive to the charge of

princely misgovernment, which he considered a slur on the name of

British rule in India..... His predecessors had acted on the principle of

avoiding annexation if it could be avoided. Dalhousie acted on the

general principle of annexing if he could do so legitimately."

Dalhousie and his wife reached Calcutta on January 12, 1848.

"The contrast between the new Governor-General and the departing one

was very striking. The one was the veteran hero of a hundred battles,

who had grown old in his Sovereign's serive, and who was new eager to

retire, if he could be permitted to do so, into the quiet of private life.

The other, in the prime of manhood, the youngest man who had yet

undertaken the responsibility of a Government such as that of the Indian

Empire; but full of projects for its benefit, and anticipations of peaceful

progress. The personal contrast between the two was equally striking.

Both were of rather short stature; but, while one was grey and worm

from length of honourable service, the other had a fresh and youthful

look, with an aristocratic and even haughty bearing, and a manner which

showed that he was not to be lightly trifled with or opposed. The two

spent nearly a week together, and the Governor-General had the

advantage of hearing from Lord Hardinge's own lips his views and

impressions of public affairs, and it is pleasing to learn from the son of

the latter than their discussions led to a satisfactory concurrence

ofopnion.

The above extract has been quoted in extenso to understand the

man who was now selected has been objects of the Court of Directors. It

is also clear that the discussions between Dalhousie and Hardinge, for a

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week, "led to a satisfactory concurrence of opinion". So, no change in

policy could be expected.

Having peeped into the mind of Dalhousie and knowing his

temperament, convictions and the guiding principle, it is easy to follow

his triumphal march against the Indian states.

Three "planks" of annexation

"The first part of his annexation policy was the doctrine of

Lapse.......

The second plank, as it were, in Dalhousie's annexation platform

was misgovernment.... The third plank of the annexation platform was

the abolition of titular sovereignties which Dalhosie regarded as

absolete.

Armed with these self-evolved "planks of annexation" Dalhousie

started his campaign of swallowing up the Indian states from one end of

the country to the other. The first to be gobbled up was the Hindu state

of Satara:

But we note here about Dalhousie's annexation desire of Awadh

which is concerned to my own 'Topic'.

AWADH (1856)

Dalhousie having disposed of states and claims was now ready for

the final pounce, "his Waterloo-the crowning victory of annexation".

It will be shown, later, that Dalhousie had an eye on "Awadh'

from the day he set his foot on the Indian soil. The cupidity of the

Scotch was stirred by the fertile country and a full Treasury. As for

rulers of the Kingdom of Awadh, let us quote Major-General Sir John

Low, a member of Dalhousie's own Supreme Council at Calcutta:

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"It will be admitted, I think", writes Major-General Low, "that I

have had good opportunistic of knowing the real characters of those five

Princes, when I state the fact that I have been personally acqainted with

them all, and that, with three of them, I have been very intimataly

acquainted, and have transacted much public business with those three

Princes, in the course of the eleven years that I held the office of

Resident at Lucknow.

"So much has been published in newspapers respecting real and

alleged misrule in Oude, during the last thirty years, with no one to

write on the opposite side, or explain misstatements, and it is, moreover,

so frequent a habit on the part of many of my countrymen who have

never sojourned in native States, to lay the blame of all acts of violence

that occur in those States on the individual native Ruler at the head of it,

that it has occasionally happened, to my positie knowledge, that the

Kings of Oude have been spoken of in English society as merciless

tyrants over their own subjects, and as men who had no feeling of

gratitude for the protection, or the forbearance, of the British

Government.

"Now, that sort of language is positively untrue, as regards every

one of the last five Kings' they have sadly mismanaged their own affairs,

I admit; and I also admit fully that it has become quite necessary to

deprive them of all political power; but their general conduct towards

us, both as useful public allies of our Government, and as individual

Princes conducting business in a regular, attentive, courteous, and

friendly manner with our public functionaries, has been unusually and

praiseworthy; and we have gained so many solid advantages from that

conduct on the part of those Kings, that, in my opinion, the present King

(if he shall sign the Treaty we propose to him), and his heirs and

successors after him, are well entitled to most libeal treatment in a

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pecuniary point of view, after we shall have deprived them of the power,

and dignity, and freedom, and wealth, which heretofore have belonged

to their position as Sovereigns of Oude".

General Low' testimony

No better testimony could be adduced than that of General Low,

who has been for eleven years Resident at Lucknow, about the character

and conduct of the "last five Kings" i.e. Ghazi-ud-deen Haider (1814-

1827); Naseer-ud-deen Haider (1827-1837); Muhammad Ali Shah

(1837-1842); Amjad Ali Shah (1842-1847) and Wajid Ali Shah (1847-

1856).

The long, velifying campaign agaisnt the rulers of Awadh was

carried on with so much zeal and persistence that people not conversant

with the mysteries of British diplomacy began to believe all the half-

truths and falsehoods dished out by the Government machinery for

public consumpsion. General Low clearly asserts that "So much has

been published in newspapers respecting real and alleged misrule in

Oude, during the last thirty years, with no one to write on the oppsite

side, or explain misstatements... that the Kings of Oude have been

spoken of in English society as merciless tyrants over their own

subjects.......".

"That sort of language is positively untrue" says General Low, "as

regards every one of the last five Kings.........their general conduct

towards us, both as useful public allies of our Government, and as

individual Princes conducting business in a regular, attentive, courteous,

and friendly manner with our public functionaires, has been unsually

meritorious and praiseworthy".

This was the considered opinionof Genral Low about Wajid Ali

Shah, besdies the otehr four Kings, while writing the "Note A, dated

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Chapter -II

August 15, 1855," to his Minute on Oude, Affairs, as a member of Lord

Dalhousie's Supreme Council at Calcutta. It becomes all the more

important when we learn that this Note of Low's was submitted to the

Court of Directors along with "the Minutes of the members of the

Council at Calcutta on the Minute recorded by the Governor-General".

After this unbiased evidence of personal knowledge, recorded by

General Low and corroborated by other independent witnesses, Wajid

Ali Shah should have been exonerated of the charges, generally of

'maladministration' and "alleged misrule in Oude", but we find that he

was not only deposed but his country was annexed. And in order to

conceal the enormity of the guilt the character of Wajid Ali Shah has

been besmirched as much as possible.

Unlike Delhi, Agra and Jaipur, Lucknow was an un-walled town

that expanded along the banks of the river. It had neither the formal

avenues of Shahjahanabad, nor a Jama Mas)id dominating the skyline.

The Nawabs and the Europeans raised buildings in no apparent order

(Blom-field, 1992). Llewellyn-Jones (chapter 3) describes the

architecture of Nawab Asaf-ud-Daula and his successors after 1775—not

of marble and sandstone, but stucco and gilt, as attractive without being

awesome. This 'baroque' architecture could be described as post-modern,

for its catholic borrowing of styles ranged even more widely than the

provenances of the various courtiers. The grand Rumi Darwaza was a

copy of a gateway at Istanbul, while the facades of some palaces

reminded Fanny Parks of Naples and Rome (Parks, 1850, 1: 184).

Between 1775 and 1856, the successive riverside palace-complexes—the

Macchi Bhawan, the Daulat Khana and the Chattar Manzil—were

supplemented by a formal garden-complex (Kaiserbagh) and a

ceremonial street (Hazratganj). But as early as the end of the eighteenth

century, the distinctive architectural feature of Lucknow, the Imambaras

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Chapter -II

(ceremonial halls used during Mohurram) had been built. The French

merchant-soldier, Claude Martin, was engaged in the construction of

Constantia, the mansion which became his.mausoleum (Llewellyn-Jones,

1985 and 1992), The British Residency was built as soon as the capital

was moved to Lucknow, in 1775 and was located, with the Nawab's

friendly acquiescence, not at a distance but very near the first pa lace-

complex, the Machhi Bhawan (1766). In 1857 it was Indian rebels who

Beesieged (but could not capture) the Residency, in contrast with Delhi,

where it was British forces that Beesieged the walled city

(Shahjahanabad) which was held by the rebels. The overall result of the

architectural experiments was to produce a surprisingly beautiful city.

Bishop Heber found Lucknow more impressive than Moscow, and

William Russell found time to admire it even in the tense days of 1858,

before so much of it was destroyed. The mood typically depicted was

that of a city at dusk, when the lights shone out. 'We were delighted with

the place and the scene altogether—the time being even ing, and the

streets crowded with natives' (Parks, 1850 I: 179). In Hindustani people

spoke of subah-e-Banaras, shaam-e-Awadh and shab-e-Malwa (the

morning light of Benaras, the evening light of Lucknow, and the beauty

of night in Malwa).

The development of Lucknow as a prime centre of baroque

architecture continued, remarkably unaffected by the political

vicissitudes through which Awadh passed. In 1764, the East India

Company's troops had defeated a coalition which included the Nawab

along with the Mughal Emperor who, by a bizarre reversal of roles, had

been made the Nawab's protege. From then, the East India Company

made frequent demands on the Nawab. Later, in 1801, a humiliating

treaty was forced on Awadh, by which the Nawab ceded still more

territory and became a 'subsidiary' of the Company (Fisher, 1987;

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Chapter -II

Mukherjee, 1982). The final coup de gracewzs to come in 1856, when

Awadh was annexed and the Nawab deposed. In the same period, the

Mughal capital, Delhi, also underwent successive crises. The Afghans

defeated the Mughal-Maraiha armies near Delhi in .1761. After a brief

exile in Allahabad, the Mughal Emperor returned to his capital but had

to rule with the Maratha chief, Scindia, standing behind his throne. In

1803 the Company's forces defeated another Mughal-Maratha army on

the east bank of the Yamuna across from Delhi; the Emperor entered

perforce into an alliance which put him under the control of the local

British Resident. Viceroy Dalhousie intended the Mughal dynasty to

come to an end when the Emperor Bahadur Shah died. Delhi would have

had the same fate as Lucknow had the Revolt of 1857 not intervened.

When conditions at the court of Delhi deteriorated, poets, artists

and craftsmen left for alternative centres of patronage like the relatively

sheltered Lucknow, which could offer asylum and appreciation. As a

result 'Nawabi' Lucknow developed a distinctive culture, unforgettably

delineated by the novelist Abdul Halim Sharar (1860-1926), who spent

his youth in the company of the sons of Wajid Ali Shah, the last Nawab,

in their exile in Calcutta (Sharar, 1975).

More than the city's compellingly beautiful appearance, it was a

rich culture that made Lucknow distinctive, and gave a special meaning

to the adjective Lakhnavu used pejoratively, this term suggests

foppishness, fastidiousness, mannerist behaviour, reflected in costume

and over-elaborate etiquette—the idle preoccupations of a powerless

aristocracy with a surfeit of enforced leisure (Premchand, 1978). In

today's frazzled urban landscape, there is something soothing and

agreeable about this lifestyle, even if we can enjoy it only vicariously,

by reading about it.

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Chapter -II

Lucknow's culture was shaped equally by men and women. In

general women of aristocratic families enjoyed positions of dignity at

the court. Several among them commanded great wealth, which they

spent on works of charity or religious rituals. The role of the Begums of

the Nawabi family in reinforcing Shia ceremonial (Juan Cole, chapter 5)

anticipated Begum Hazrat Mahal, another woman of great will-power

who controlled Lucknow in the difficult days of 1857-58 (Mukherjee,

1984). The courtesans too shaped much of the culture of Lucknow. The

term is particularly appropriate since it was the connection with the

court which enabled them to develop their skills in music and dance,

while their counterparts in Orissa and Tamilnadu refined techniques of

dance under the auspices of the temples. The Lucknow tawaif survived

with some difficulty the onslaught of Victorian morality in the later

nineteenth century (Oldenburg, chapter 8). Carefully trained in social

graces and confident in their ability to set fashions in dress and

accessories, they helped to develop music and dance forms, and even

influenced the spoken language. The quarter known as the Chowk was

associated with them, and they owned considerable properties. They

served as a link between town and country, and were able to build

bridges between Hindus and Muslims, between the Awadhi and Urdu

languages, and between the bhakticults (particularly that of Krishna) and

Shi'ism. Unlike the aristocratic Begums of the court, the courtesans were

usually girls who had been kidnapped from the countryside and brought

to Lucknow (Ruswa, 1961). Their training supplemented the skills of the

innumerable music-groups the rulers patronised, ranging from minstrels,

to those who sang in the Tansen tradition, from kathaks to classical

musicians (Kippen, chapter 11; Neuman, 1980, and Wajid Ali Shah's

own plays and writings on music). The formative period of modern

Hindustani music was the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

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Chapter -II

Lucknow was synonymous with music in the same way as were Dharwar

and Tanjore in the south of India. The courts of these towns provided

points of intersection between cultural zones as well as between urban

and oral traditions. The gharanas of Lucknow are legendary, and first

impressions of the town were as mucli oral as visual. 'From all parts of

the old town, we heard, the sound of music and the jingle of anklets'

wrote Ashu Chattopadhyaya (1993), describing his arrival in, Lucknow

at dusk on a day in 1938.

After the Revolt of 1857 was quelled, the Nawab's family was 'de -

ported' to Matia Burj in Calcutta, where together with their entourage,

they-.created a vivid mini-Lucknow, replete with musical traditions

(shreepantha). A bizarre side-result was that Lucknow's khayal and

thumri were exported to Trinidad when some of these exiles opted for a

more distant exile. Although they departed as indentured labourers, they

stubbornly refused to do manual labour, since they were 'artistes'

(Samaroo, forthcoming). The preoccupation of the Nawabs with music,

dance and the Krishna cult exasperated officers like William Sleeman,

who saw in it only 'intrigue', corruption, depravity and neglect of duty

and abuse of authority (Sleeman, quoted in Penible, 1977: 97). Urdu,

which had evolved principally in Hyderabad and Delhi, was the court

language at Lucknow. In the days before printing, poetry was

'performed' for an audience. When political crises left Delhi poets bereft

of patronage, they-migrated to Lucknow. The unhappy Mir Taqi Mir and

Sauda are the best known. Sauda went to Lucknow in 1770 and lived

there till his death in 1781; Mir was invited by the Nawab in 1775 and

remained in Lucknow, all the while pining for Delhi, till he died in

1810. The ruins of Shahjahanabad were ten times better than Lucknow.

Oh that I had stayed there to die; not come to live distracted here

(Haque, 1992; Russell and Islam, 1969). Like most of the Mughal rulers,

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the Nawabs themselves were enthusiastic amateur poets, able to

commandeer the help of gifted ustads. Lakhnavi Urdu became a

distinctive tongue (Nairn and Petievich, chapter 10).

Another distinctive feature of Lucknow was its Shia culture. In

number the Shias were a minority amongst Sunnis and Hindus, but they

were more visible and, until 1856, dominant at the court. Shia scholars

in Lucknow had close links with seminaries in Iran, thus reinforcing the

early link. But this did not mean that the Shias went intolerant of others.

The Nawabs were cordial to Hindus and Sunnis, and the Shia

ceremonials, particularly Mohurram, were shared by all communities

(Hasan, chapter 7). Reminiscent of medieval munazara (public debates)

at Baghdad and Sikri were the munazara between Christian preachers

and Muslims at the court of the Nawab, with the British Resident in

attendance, in 1833 (Powell, 1993).

Even though the Nawabs were controlled by the East India Company,

Lucknow was luckier than Delhi in that it was never 'invaded' or

ravaged. It was also fortunate in that it did not become a deserted town

after being affected with the blight of military defeat, in 1801 (as had

Siraj-ud-Daula's Murshidabad and Tipu Sulran's Srirangapattanam

around that time). The Revolt of 1857 took many people by surprise

(Nilsson and Gupta, 1992). But soon after it began, and certainly after it

was crushed, the British were quite convinced that Lucknow had brought

her troubles on herself, and deserved punishment. Even over a century

after the event, Pemble could write, with Old Testament severity. So

Lucknow, Babylon of India, lay prostrate before her vanquishers,

condemned to a chastisement doubly severe now that she had added the

sin of defiance to those of luxury and vice (Pemble, 1977:230; also see

Farrell, 1985). The culture of me court was described as dissolute, and

the very architecture that only a few years earlier had been admired, was

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labelled decadent. The retribution was on a truly awful scale, wholly

disproportionate to the offence. To British contemporaries, however, it

seemed that justice was being done, so traumatised were they by the

long drawn-out siege (Pouchepadass, chapter 6). As in Delhi and

Kanpur, the people of Lucknow were to be made to realise how terrible

had been their 'crime'. There were mass hangings. As in Delhi, residents

watched helplessly as a great swathe was cut through their city, and the

cantonment was relocated from north of the river to the southwest

(Oldenburg, 1984; Gupta, 1981). Many palaces and many areas were

bulldozed, and many individuals reduced to penury.

But no town can be destroyed, unless it is uprooted or levelled to

the ground. The Chowk still meant a great deal to the people of

Lucknow. As for music and dance, its artistes found patrons in the

taluqdars who were now the new elite (Oldenburg, 1984). The town was

bisected by a railway line. The plaster Indo-Saracenic Charbagh railway

station was the Public Works Department's contribution to Lucknow's

architectural wealth. Hazratganj became a fashionable European-style

shopping precinct (see Ahmad, chapter 15, on the joys of 'gunj-ing, akin

to New Delhi's 'Going to C.P.', i.e. Connaught Place). Very similar

changes occurred at the same time and for the same reasons in post-

Revolt Delhi. Both towns were 'disgraced' by being officially reduced to

the status of mofussil. Half a century later, in 1912, Delhi recovered its

importance when the capital was transferred there. Lucknow replaced

Allahabad as the capital of the United Provinces in 1920, thanks to

energetic canvassing by Sir Harcourt Butler. While Baker and Lutyens

were designing the city of New Delhi, Butler concentrated not on

building another urban complex, but on planning the development of

Lucknow for the next fifty years (Robinson, chapter 12). He had the

privilege of receiving help from the planner Patrick Geddes, whose

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services at the time were in great demand in many Indian towns. In the

1920s, the Legislative Council Chamber (its architect was A. V.

Lanchester, an associate of Geddes), and the Courts, as well as the

University (made possible by contributions from the taluqdars) were

built. One wonders whether Asaf-ud-Daula would have admired these

buildings. 'New Lucknow', like 'New Delhi', created a new snobbery, but

because the two areas were not separate, as in the case of Delhi, the

'Nawabi' and the British areas did have considerable interaction.

In the aftermath of'the Revolt of 1857 poets and writers connected

with the erstwhile Awadh court had good reason to mourn the eclipse of

their benefactors. Recalcitrant rajas and Nawabs., some of whom had

revolted against the British and were consequently humbled, bemoaned

the passing of an era. The ulama and the mashaikh spent sleepless nights

worrying about the future of Islamic tenets in a society dominated by

Western ideas and institutions. (Such apprehensions had, in fact, led

Maulvi Fazl-i-Haq Khairabadi, a reputed scholar, to take part in the

1857 revolt).

It is hard to imagine anyone in Lucknow or its environs not being

influenced by colonial rule or by the effects of the Great Western Trans -

mutation. Some were haunted by the prospect of Western thought

undermining the moral and spiritual basis of their society. They had no

cause to celebrate Great Britain's political hegemony in an area that had

broadly remained insulated from the changes taking place in parts of

Eastern and Western India. But most were prepared, albeit grudgingly,

to make the colonial government work, seek adjustments within existing

institutions and secure benefits from the newly-created administrative

and bureaucratic structures. They were inclined to arrive at a workable

modus vivendi with the new rulers and carve out new channels of as -

pirations and spiritual creativity. Hence the growth of schools and col -

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leges, the bold steps taken by some forward looking Muslim

personalities (Minault, chapter 9), the incentive to join the 'heaven

born1, and the clamour for a share in decision-making bodies.

The Nadwat al-ulama, founded in 1894, symbolised this spirit of

compromise. Its founder, Shibli Nomani, was sensitive to the winds of

change and chose Lucknow as the locale for synthesising the traditional

system of learning with Western methods. The Firangi Mahal, also in

Lucknow and a reputed centre of Islamic education, reflected the same

spirit of compromise. The traditional ulama maintained their eclectic

character and refused to be drawn into sectarian conflict (Hasan, chapter

7). Maulana Abdul Bari, heir to Firangi Mahal's lively intellectual

traditions, played a crucial part in fostering a Congress-Muslim League

entente during the Khilafat and Non-Cooperation movements.

By the turn of the century, there remained a few hard nuts to

crack. But the colonial government thwarted their challenge through

conciliation and compromise and a policy of balance and rule between

what they conceived as the two great communities, the Hindu and the

Muslim. Members of landed families and of service communities,

principally Kayasthas and Kashmiri Pandits, were integrated into the

extensive ad-ministrative apparatus with Lucknow as the focal point.

Traders and commercial men vastly benefitted from the infrastructure

created to serve imperial interests. They turned to Lucknow for

inspiration and -legitimacy, though the changing fortunes of Lucknow

(traced by Reeves, chapter 13) culminated in its formal recognition as

the state capital only in 1947.

Lucknow was, as Robinson underlines (chapter 12), a great centre

of landed power. In 1900, the taluqdars numbered well over 250, con -

trolled two-thirds of the territory of Awadh and realised one-sixth of the

toral revenue of the province. Their position was fortified by a series of

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legislative enactments. But not for long. The stormy peasant unrest in

the early 1920s, organised by the Kisan Sabhas and the Congress in U.

P., was a warning signal to the complacent rajas and Nawabs who

presided over their durbars with scant regard for the impoverished raiyat

(peasant) and the mounting dissatisfaction in their own taluqdaris. James

Meston and Harcourt Butler, chief architects of a pro-landlord policy in

U.P. alerted them to the dangers. But they were unmoved and paid no

heed to their warnings.

In die 1930s, the Congress movement, having accorded high

priority to the agrarian agenda, systematically eroded the economic and

political base of the taluqdars. The landlords' party was routed in the

1937 elections. The message embodied in the U.P. Tenancy Ace of 1939

was loud and clear. The disappearance of the zamindari system in 1951

stripped the large landlords of the bulk of their estates and awarded the

land to the cultivators.

Not many shed tears over the collapse of an exploitative land

system. The Awadh taluqdars, as also their counterparts in Western

U.P., lost their raison d'etre in a society that was rapidly changing under

the influence of mass politics, the gradual -introduction of adult

suffrage, the emergence of'new classes' poised to stake their political

and economic claims, and the political awakening in the countryside.

The kisan agitations generated, often independently of the Congress,

unprecedented consciousness among the peasants and sensitized them to

the inequities of the system to which they were subjected. The Gandhian

movements, starting with the Rowlatt Satyagraha in 1919, infused

confidence in the kisan's ability to protest, agitate and eventually

undermine the exploitative land system as well as the authority of its

beneficiaries.

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The eclipse of the taluqdars, many of whom had built their

palaces, havelis and imambaras in Lucknow and flirted with the British

India Association or the National Agriculturist Party, did not

substantially influence the political currents in Lucknow and its

neighbouring districts. Lucknow had, after all, served as the venue of

important national gatherings, especially those connected with the

Congress, and the centre of several critical agitations. The protest

against Anthony Macdonnel's Nagri resolution (April 1900), which

triggered off the Hindi-Urdu controversy in North .India, was

masterminded in Lucknow. The historic Congress-Muslim League

session was held at Baradari in December 1916 and was hosted by the

Raja of Mahmudabad, one of the early supporters of the Home Rule

movement and a patron of Raja Ghularn Husain, editor of New Era,

Syed Wazir Hasan, lawyer-politician with nationalist leanings, and

Choudhrry Khaliquzzaman, an up-coming lawyer linked with the Nehru

household. The Raja also played host to Annie Besant, Tej Bahadur

Sapru and Motilal Nehru at Mahmudabad House in Qaiser Bagh.

Finally, the presiding genius of the pan-Islamic enterprises lived

in Firangi Mahal, playing host to Gandhi, the Alt brothers and other

Congress leaders and devising plans to mount pressure on the

government to redress the Muslim grievances over the Khilafat and the

safety of the Holy Places.

The city was, for decades, the home of prominent public

figures, .successful lawyers, newspaper editors, Urdu and Hindi writers

and poets. Some were born and brought up in Lucknow; others had

moved out of neighbouring qasbas in search of a better career. They

carried with them the graces of and the refinements associated with

qasbati living. They read poetry and classical literature, and listened to

music with friends or in the company of the courtesans in Chowk. They

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Chapter -II

moved about regardless of caste and community barriers. They shared

food, customs, practices and traditions. They celebrated both Id and

Diwali, and observed Muharram with equal solemnity. There can be no

doubt that this degree of composite living imposed an unmistakable

imprint on, and led to the creation of, a composite political culture in

Lucknow. Religious differences surfaced time and again, but they did

not weaken the intercommunity networks. Shuddhi and sangathan sabhas

and tabliqh and tanzim societies imposed severe strains on secular

loyalties but did not destroy the secular underpinnings of Lucknow

society. Even when most parts of the country were rocked by Hindu-

Muslim violence during the early 1920s and on the eve of India's

Partition and thereafter, Lucknow remained an island of peace and

sanity. Its record, barrring some isolated and sporadic incidents, has not

been tarnished since Independence.

Lucknow's political equilibrium was disturbed by the elections in

1937 and the controversies thereafter. The Congress and the Muslim

League fell apart over the coalition issue, with Choudhary

Khaliquzzaman, the Raja of Mahmudabad and Nawab Mohammad Ismail

Khan opting to revive the defunct Muslim League in the United

Provinces. In fact the U.P. Muslim League emerged as a political factor

after and not before the coalition impasse. The formation of the

Congress Ministry also triggered off disputes and conflicts of a wide-

ranging nature. The landlords were up in arms against the U.P. Tenancy

Bills, so were the kisans who staged demonstrations in Lucknow against

the agrarian policies of the Congress Ministry. The Shias and Sunnis

fought their battles on the streets of Lucknow; the magnificent

imambaras were a mute witness to the depth of sectarian feelings in a

city that had set exemplary standards of harmonious living for its

citizens. Yet, Lucknow continued to provide the lead, remained the main

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arena and the focal point of nationalist activities. It was the home of an

impressive generation of Congress leaders, who championed the cause

of freedom with remarkable tenacity. They were active in the local

arena, as also in provincial and nationalist poli tics. Kamalapathi

Tripathi, G.B. Pant, Sampurnanand, Charan Singh, Rafi Ahmad Kidwai

and H.N. Bahuguna were tutored in the political traditions of Lucknow,

which bore the stamp of its history, cul ture and ethos. Some upheld

those composite political traditions after independence; others chose not

to do so.

Independence brought joy and raised hopes if a better future, but

it was, also, accompanied with the partition of the country. Lucknow so -

ciety was split and fragmented; the Lakhnavi culture was bruised. Fami -

lies were divided, some deciding to stay while, others elected to migrate

to Luckow. Lakhnavis were tormented by the1 happenings around, but

could do little to stem the tide of hate, anger and violence. An Abdul

Halim Sharar, who took great pride in his city, would have surely

bemoaned the collapse of a composite social and intellectual order that

the Lakhnavis had so assiduously built since 1857. A nation was born

but a nation was also divided, casting its long shadows on a wounded

culture and civilisation. The civilisational rhythm of the subcontinent

was broken, a fact Mir Anis, Lucknow's legendary poet, would have be -

moaned in his mamyas (elegies). Yet, the Lakhnavis who had lived

through the vicissitudes of history and had experienced many traumatic

changes were able, after Independence, to get their act together and

surge ahead, along with other fellow-citizens, in their quest for a better

life. Bitter memories were shrugged aside in search of a prosperous

future.

Lucknow in those years was not an isolated case. The whole

country was surging forward and, even in the cities which had been torn

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apart by the tragedies of partition, people were neither sceptical, nor

disillusioned. They retained faith in their leaders. The giants of the

freedom struggle were in full command- In violence-haunted Calcutta,

Dr. .B.C. Roy had the necessary authority to lay the foundations of the

truncated State of West Bengal. In the more peaceful Lucknow,

G.B.Pant, the Chief Minister, was able to demonstrate that he was not

only a formidable administrator but also a tough politician.

Let us recall this early period. At an All-India level, the Congress

party was going through a transitory phase of adjustment. The members

of its socialist wing having been forced out, two major group tendencies

stood face to face, strangely enough with the exception of Sardar Patel,

most of the protagonists belonged to Uttar Pradesh. Accordingly, from

the very first days of Independence, Lucknow appeared as a privileged

arena for national politics (Weiner, 1957; Brass, 1968).

As far as old promises regarding land ownership were concerned,

there were no major differences within the leadership. In UP, contrary to

what was to happen in Bihar, land reforms were pushed vigorously; they

were to affect deeply the relationships in the rural areas. Peasant middle

castes, now concerned with political power, emerged as a direct threat to

the hegemony of the upper castes, and changed completely the fortunes

of the Congress party.

The early conflicts in UP had been of a different nature. They had

crystallized in 1950—31 around the personality and views of the newly

elected Congress President, Purushortam Das Tandon, the spiritual heir

of Pandit Madan Mohan Malawiya, the founder of Benares Hindu Uni -

versity, and the progressives, who appeared to have won the day. How -

ever, theirs was a short-lived victory, and later political leaders

espoused progressively more reactionary Hindu views. In the 1952

general elections, a new party claiming to speak for the Hindu nation,

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the Bharatiya Jan Sangh (BJS), managed to secure many votes (see

charts in Graff pp. 258-68). In the State Assembly, its number of seats

increased steadily. It was left to Prime Minister Nehru to allay the fears

of the Muslims, whose position after Partition was extremely difficult.

The Congress was to rule supreme until 1967 when, for the first

time, various caste groups and also a number of Muslims, rebelled

against the dominance of the ruling party and tried to assert themselves,

as Dr Sampurnanand, who had warned his colleagues against 'opening

the doors (of the Congress) to the backward classes', had foreseen in the

fifties. There followed tumultuous years, which saw the diminishing

fortunes of the Congress parry and the increasing volatility of the

electorate: chequered coalitions, saffron crusades, and, in the end, an

entirely new political landscape (Graff, chapter 14).

How much has Lucknow itself been affected by these

developments? One is tempted to say that it has simply carried on,

trying to survive the successive traumas, while fighting rather feebly to

retain the old cherished atmosphere. The result is a strange mixture.

True, the city still has the graces that an industrial towns like Kanpur

lacks, but it has not remained unaffected by the passing of time, the

carelessness of the municipal corporation, the lack of funds, the

indifferent behaviour of the new elites whose culture, in the judgement

of old Lakhnavis, is 'no culture', and the huge increase in population. Is

it then surprising that old Lakhnvis remember with nostalgia the

Lucknow that was. Fortunately there are places where it is possible to

reconcile the past and Chattar Manzil, the palace of Nawabi fame,

shelters today one of the most famous institutes of modern India. Claude

Martin can rest in peace in the vault of La Martiniere.

Present Lucknow

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Lucknow is the capital of India’s most populous State, Uttar Pradesh and

is situated about 500 km southeast of New Delhi in the heart of the state.

The City has a humid subtropical climate with a cool dry winter from

December to February and a hot summer from April to June. The

temperature extremes vary from about 45degrees Celsius in the summer

to 3 degrees Celsius in the winter. The City receives about 100 cm of

annual rainfall mostly from the southwest monsoons between July and

September. The city lies at an average altitude of 110 meters above

mean sea level and generally slopes to the east. Lateral slopes are

towards the River Gomti, which flows from north-west to south-east

through the heart of the city, dividing it into the Trans-Gomti and Cis-

Gomti regions.

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Map.4.0 Present Lucknow

The more densely populated areas of the city are on the southern

bank of the River Gomti and several planned residential colonies have

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been developed to the north of the River. Lucknow is known for its

cultural heritage.

Demographic and Social Profile

Lucknow Urban Agglomeration (LUA) became a million-plus city

in 1981. Beesides the areas underjurisdiction of the Lucknow Municipal

Corporation, the agglomeration also includes the Lucknow Cantonment.

Census 2001 estimated the population of the Lucknow Urban

agglomeration at 22.46 lakhs. This included an estimate of about 60,000

as population of the Lucknow Cantonment and 21.85 lakh population of

Lucknow City. The population of the Lucknow Cantonment has

remained constant in the last three decades.

Demographic data for the Lucknow Urban Agglomeration and

Lucknow City from Census 2001 and other available documents was

analysed to understand the growth patterns. Growth rates have been

arrived at through projecting geometric growth, arithmetic growth and

incremental growth rate methods and adding an additional population of

100,000 every five years for additional areas that might get incorporated

within the city. This seems a conservative estimate however, given the

current pace of real estate development and the intention of government

to attract new investment in Lucknow.

Migration into Lucknow accounts for 36% increase in population

over the last decade. Of the 5.76-lakh people added to the LUA during

1991-2001, about 2 lakh were migrants. In comparison, the natural

growth was 3.68 lakh.

Lucknow offers better social and physical infrastructure and

amenities compared to other cities in the state. With a population

density of 67 persons per hectare, Lucknow is recognized as a low-

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density - low-rise city with open spaces and greenery. The City is also

comparatively cleaner than most other cities in the state.

The City offers better employment opportunities and education

facilities. Lucknow’s position as a city bordered by smaller towns like

Hardoi and Sitapur in the northwest; Bara Banki in the northeast, Rae

Bareli in the south-east and Unnao in the south west attracts migrants in

search of better employment opportunities and higher order services like

education and health. According to the census, 22% of the migrants from

rural areas and 27% from urban areas cited ‘employment’ as the reason

for migration. The other reasons for migration include business reasons,

education opportunities, marriage etc.

Gender Ratio

In the Lucknow Municipal Corporation, in 2002, there has been a

steady increase in the number of women per 1000 men – from 829 in

1971 to 849 in 1981, 862 in 1991 to 893 in 2001. While this rise is

attributable partly to natural growth, discussions with the LDA identify

the cause as being the ‘security’ that the city offers and the good

education facilities – factors that have meant that a lot of women and

children are staying in Lucknow even when the male members of the

family are working elsewhere. An additional factor could be that entire

rural families are migrating in search of employment instead of the

general practice of only men migrating.

Literacy

Despite comparative economic prosperity and better infrastructure

and education facilities, literacy levels in the City vary from those in

other cities of similar size. The literacy rate in the Lucknow Municipal

Corporation area recorded in 2001 was 67.46% .However, within the

state the City has a relatively high level of literacy – as could be

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expected in line with general trends about differences between urban and

rural areas.

Key Demographic Issues

Although current levels of migration are lower compared to cities

of similar size, population growth in Lucknow City growth over the next

few years will likely be somewhat higher than elsewhere (around 4

percent). The majority of migrants are coming from the surrounding

districts. The upward trend needs to be taken into account in city

planning.

The city’s demographic profile has shown an increase in the

number of women relative to men, and an increase in female literacy and

employment. The social and economic implications may be significant

and would need to be taken into consideration in the planning and

preparation of projects, as well as arrangements to involve citizens in

city governance.

Economic Base

The major industries in the Lucknow Urban Agglomeration

include aeronautics, machine tools, distillery chemicals, furniture and

chikan embroidery. Lucknow has traditionally been associated with

chikan embroidery work on readymade garments, sarees, etc. with most

units being small-scale and household based and located in the old city

area.

Lucknow is also a major centre for research and development

(R&D) and an education centre. Prominent R&D centres located in the

city, include the National Milk Grid of the National Dairy Development

Board, Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI), Central Institute of

Medical and Aromatic Plants (CIMAP), Industrial Toxicology Research

Centre (ITRC), National Botanical Research Centre Institute (NBRI),

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National Handloom Development Corporation (NHDC) Ltd., Pradeshik

Cooperative Dairy Federation Ltd (PCDF), Research Design and

Standards Organisation (RDSO), and U P Export Corporation.

The Principal educational institutions in the City include the

University of Lucknow, King GeorgeMedical College, Indian Institute

of Management, Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeo-Botany, the Board of

Technical Education, Institute of Engineering and Technology, Institute

of JudicialTraining and Research, Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute

of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS),the Bathkhande University of Indian

Music, the Central Veterinary Research Laboratory and theBuilding and

Road Research Station and Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research.

Lucknow, being a tehsil headquarter, a divisional headquarter and

the state capital, is a prominent administrative and commercial centre of

the state. The proportion of working population of Lucknow has

remained more or less constant since 1981, at around 28%

Heritage

Lucknow is known for its rich history and culture – manifest not

just in its many magnificent monuments but an intrinsic part of its

lifestyle. While the city has archaeological remains dating back to 3000

BC, the first documented reference to Lucknow is from the thirteenth

century when Emperor Akbar divided the Mughal Empire into twelve

provinces and chose Lucknow as the seat of Government for Oudh - the

most prosperous province of the empire.

In the late 18th century, the Shia Nawabs of Lucknow built

several imposing structures, commercial and trading centres that

increased the grandeur and opulence of the city. At the time of the first

war of independence in 1857, the city suffered a lot of damages and the

old past was replaced with new developments during the British period.

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After independence the city experienced tremendous growth and the

distinct “Lucknow” culture – composite, refined, rich and vibrant is

slowly disappearing. While there are many magnificent monuments

symbolising the glorious past of the city, the following are the better-

known monuments.

[ 186 ]

Chapter IIITHEORY OF SOCIO-ECONOMICS IN

SOCIOLOGY

Economic sociology constitutes its own distinct subfield in

sociology and can be briefly defined as the sociological analysis of

economic phenomena. Economic sociology has a rich intellectual

tradition and traces its roots to the founding fathers ofsociology,

especially to Max Weber and his Economyand Society (see Swedberg

1998). It should be noted that not only sociologists but also economists

have made important contributions to economic sociology. This is

particularly true for today’s economic sociology, which is the result of

works not only by sociologists (such as Mark Granovetter and Harrison

White) but also by economists (such as Gary Becker and Oliver

Williamson).

To define economic sociology as ‘‘the sociological analysis of

economic phenomena’’ may seem bland and even tautological. It is

therefore important to stress that it entails a definite conception of what

topics may be studied by sociologists; that it implies a certain division

of labor between economists and sociologists; and that it also has direct

consequences for how the relationship between economic theory and

sociology is conceived. That this is the case becomes very clear if we

contrast this definition with two other ones that are commonly used: (1)

that economic sociology primarily deals with a particular dimension of

economic phenomena, namely their social dimension; and

(2) that economic sociology is the study of social structures and

organizations in the economy.

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That economic sociology deals with economic phenomena in

general (our definition) means that it addresses issues not only at the

periphery of the economy (such as, say, the influence of religious values

on the economy or of ethnicity on entrepreneurship) but also at its core

(such as the way markets operate or investment decisions are made).

Sociological theory here emerges as either an alternative to economic

theory or as a direct challenge to it. To look at the social dimension of

economic phenomena (the first alternative definition) means, on the

other hand, that sociologists only look at a limited number of economic

issues, usually those that are left over once the economists have finished

with their analyses. Economists may, for example, decide with the help

of standard economic theory what salaries and prices are like in a certain

industry, while sociologists, by looking at a factory or a work group as a

social system, may then add some additional information. Economic

theory is not challenged by this type of economic sociology, since it

only deals with those topics for which there is no economic theory. That

economic sociology focuses on social structures or on organizations in

the economy (the second alternative definition) means that a purely

economic analysis may be regarded as economic sociology as long as it

deals with certain topics. Why a firm rather than the market is used for a

specific type of transaction may, for example, be explained by the fact

that transaction costs are higher in this specific case in the market. This

type of economic sociology is close to economic theory and basically

dispenses with traditional sociology (although not necessarily with

rational choice sociology; see, e.g., Coleman 1990).

These three ways of looking at economic sociology all have their

followers. The one which emphasizes that the sociological perspective in

principle can be applied to all types of economic phenomena is,

however, the one that has been used most frequently throughout the

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history of economic sociology. That this is the case will become clear

from the following brief overview ofthe field. That the two other

definitions—economic sociology as the analysis of the social dimension

of economic phenomena, and economic sociology as the study of social

structures and organizations in the economy—also have their adherents

will become obvious as well.

Since the mid-1980s economic sociology hasbeen going through

something of a renaissance in the sociological profession, not only in the

United States but also in other countries. The advent of what is usually

referred to as ‘‘new economic sociology’’ represents one of the most

dynamic areas in contemporary sociology. Before the mid- 1980s three

separate attempts had been made to create a vigorous economic

sociology, and something needs to be said about these. The first attempt

was made in the early twentieth century by a group of German scholars

of whom Max Weber is the most important. The second attempt was

made during the same time period by Emile Durkheim and his followers

in France. And the third attempt was made by some American

sociologists, such as Talcott Parsons and Neil Smelser, in the 1950s. A

few words shall be said about each of these attemptsbefore we discuss

the contemporary situation.

HISTORICAL ATTEMPTS AT ECONOMIC SOCIOLOGY

The first significant attempt to create a solid economic sociology

was made in Germany during the period 1890–1930 by a group of

scholars who were all trained in economics. The three key figureswere

Max Weber, Werner Sombart, and Joseph Schumpeter. A major reason

that economic sociology developed so forcefully in German-speaking

academia was probably its strong tradition of historical economics.

There was also the fact that toward the end of the nineteenth century

Gustav von Schmoller, the leader of the historical school of economics,

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became embroiled in a bitter academic fight with Carl Menger, one of

the founders of marginal utility analysis. By the time Weber and

Sombart became active, German economics had been polarized into two

camps through the socalled battle of the methods, or the Methodenstreit:

one that was overly theoretical and one that was overly historical. The

idea of ‘‘economic sociology’’ was conceived by both Sombart and

Weber as an attempt to get out of this dead end and to function as a kind

of bridge between economic history and economic theory. Economic

sociology should be analytical in nature, but historically grounded.

While Sombart, however, wanted economic sociology to totally replace

economic theory, Weber thought differently. In his mind, a healthy

science of economics (Weber used the term Sozialoekonomie, or ‘‘social

economics’’) should be broad and simultaneously draw on economic

theory, economic history, and economic sociology (Weber 1949).

Schumpeter basically shared Weber’s opinion, although economic theory

would always rank higher in his mind than in Weber’s. The idea of such

a broad-based social economics, however, never caught on. Weber,

Sombart, and Schumpeter all made a series of first-rate contributions to

economic sociology.

For one thing, all of them produced major studies of capitalism:

Weber ([1921-22] 1978) in Economy and Society; Sombart ([1902]

1987) in Dermoderne Kapitalismus; and Schumpeter ([1942] 1976) in

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy . Weber emphasized that

capitalism was becoming increasingly rationalized; Sombart was

particularly interested in looking at the different historical stages of

capitalism; and Schumpeter argued that modern capitalism was digging

its own grave and was soon to be replaced by socialism. These visions of

capitalism still dominate our thinking and are therefore of great interest.

And so are many of the shorter studies by Weber, Sombart, and

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Schumpeter, such as Sombart’s ([1906] 1976) study of why there is no

socialism in the United States, Weber’s ([1904–5] 1930) analysis of the

relationship between Protestantism and the spirit of capitalism,and

Schumpeter’s ([1919] 1954, [1918] 1971) two superb articles on

imperialism and the tax state.

A special mention must also be made of Georg Simmel’s ([1907]

1990) The Philosophy of Money.This work contains an ingenious

analysis of money that ranges from philosophy to sociology. No general

theory of money is developed, but the author takes on a series of

interesting topics, including credit, checks, and small change. Simmel

should not only be credited with having made a serious attempt to

develop a sociological approach of money; he was also the first

sociologist to realize what an important role trust plays in economic life.

The only one to make a sustained effort to lay a theoretical

foundation for economic sociology, however, was Max Weber. He did

this in a chapter of Economy and Society (Weber [1921–22] 1978)

entitled ‘‘Sociological Categories of Economic Action.’’

When Weber lectured on this chapter to his students, they found

his analysis abstract and dry. He therefore decided to give a lecture

course in economic history to supplement his theoretical ideas. This

course became what is today known as General Economic History

(Weber [1923] 1981), and it should be read together with Economy and

Society. In the latter work Weber carefully constructs the various

analytical categories that are needed in economic sociology. He starts

with ‘‘the concept of economic action’’ and ends with macroeconomic

phenomena, such as ‘‘market economies and planned economies.’’ He

also defines and discusses such basic concepts as trade, money, and the

market—all from a sociological perspective. At various points in his

discussion Weber carefully underlines when economic theory and

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economic sociology differ. It is, for example, imperative for economic

sociologists to use the concept of economic power in their analyses,

while this plays no role in marginal utility theory. In economic theory it

is assumed that consumers are price givers, but economic sociology

assumes that they are price takers. In economic theory it is usually

assumed that prices are simply the result of demand and supply, while in

economic sociology it is necessary to look at the strength of the various

social groups in order to understand the unfolding of the ‘‘price

struggle.’’ Finally, in economic sociology economic action must in

principle be oriented to the behavior of others. Economists exclusively

study rational economic action, Weber concludes, while sociologists

have a much broader focus.

During about the same time that Weber, Sombart, and Schumpeter

were active in Germany, a similar, though independent, effort to create

an economic sociology was made in France. The key figures here are

Emile Durkheim, Marcel Mauss, and François Simiand. All three felt

that since economic theory is not a social theory (in the sense that it

does not assign analytical priority to society as opposed to the

individual), it should be replaced by a sociological approach to the

economy or, more precisely, by economic sociology. In this they echoed

Auguste Comte’s critique in the early 1800s of economic theorists for

ignoring the fact that the economy is part of society and that, as a

consequence, there is no need for a separate economic theory (Swedberg

1987). The two most important studies in the French school of

economicsociology are The Division of Labor in Society by Durkheim

([1893] 1964) and The Gift by Marcel Mauss ([1925] 1969) (see also

Simiand 1932). The latter work not only covers gift-giving but also

contains a series of brilliant remarks on credit, interest, and

consumption. In The Division of Labor in Society Durkheim raises the

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question of how to bring about solidarity in industrial society. His

answer, which is further elaborated in other works (see especially

Durkheim [1928] 1962, [1950] 1983), is that no society in which the

economic element predominates can survive. Economic life has to be

restrained by a moral element; without a common morality, all persons

would be at war with one another.

Both German and French economic sociology petered out in the

1930s. At around this time European sociology was exhausting itself,

while U.S. sociology was in ascendency. Among the multiple subfields

that appeared at that time, several are of interest to economic sociology,

such as industrial sociology, the sociology of professions, and

stratification theory. None of these, however, dealt with core economic

problems or with economic theory. Instead there was a firm division of

labor in U.S. social science at this time between economists, who only

studied economic topics,and sociologists, who only studied social

topics. In the 1950s, however, some sociologists decided to challenge

this division of labor, and their efforts have become known as the

‘‘economy and society approach,’’ so called both because two works

with this title now appeared (Moore 1955; Parsons and Smelser 1956)

and because a conscious effort was made to bring closer together two

bodies of thought in the social sciences—economics and sociology—that

most social scientists felt should be kept separate (see also Polanyi et al.

1957). Talcott Parsons and Neil Smelser (1956) argued, for example,

that the economy is part of society or, in their terminology, ‘‘the

economic sub-system’’ is part of ‘‘the social system.’’ In this sense they

assigned a certain priority to society and implicitly to sociology. On the

other hand, they also felt that economic theory was essentially correct-

even if it needed to be complemented by a sociological approach.

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NEW ECONOMIC SOCIOLOGY

During the late 1960s and the 1970s little of interest happened in

economic sociology. Since the mid-1980s, however, there has been a

sharp increase of interest in this topic, and a new type of economic

sociology has come into being (see Friedland and Robertson 1990;

Granovetter 1990; Zukin and DiMaggio 1990). Not only sociologists but

also economists have contributed to this development.

Since the mid-1970s mainstream economists have become

increasingly interested in the role of social structures and organizations

in the economy. This has led to a movement usually referred to as ‘‘new

institutional economics’’ (e.g.,Eggertsson 1990). Sources of inspiration

for this new institutionalism include transaction cost economics,

agency–principal theory, and game theory.

Gary Becker (1976), for example, has convinced many economists

that social phenomena can be analyzed with the help of the economist’s

tools; Kenneth Arrow has written about the role of organizations in the

economy; Thomas Schelling (1960) has used game theory to develop a

science of ‘‘interdependent decision’’; and Oliver Williamson (1975)

has popularized the concept of transaction costs through his best-selling

Markets and Hierarchies (see also Coase 1937; Swedberg 1990). Three

Nobel Prizes have also been awarded to economists who in one way or

another focus on the social aspects of the economy: R.H. Coase (1991),

Gary Becker (1992), and Douglass North (1993).

As a result of these and other events, mainstream economists

today are interested not only in traditional issues relating to price

formation but also in economic institutions and how these change. The

last time this happened in the United States was in the early twentieth

century, when American institutionalism was born (see, e.g.,

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Commmons 1924; Gruchy 1947; Veblen [1899] 1973). There exists,

however, an important difference between the old form of

institutionalism and new institutional economics. While Thorstein

Veblen and his contemporaries tried to analyze economic institutions

with the help of an approach that was very close to that of sociology,

Becker and other current theorists claim that the reason economic

institutions work the way they do can be analyzed with the help of the

economist’s traditional tools (efficiency, rational choice, etc.). This

approach has been severely criticized by some sociologists on the

grounds that it simplifies and distorts the analysis (e.g., Etzioni 1988;

Granovetter 1985).

Since the mid-1980s, as already mentioned, there has been a major

revival of economic sociology, and what is usually referred to as ‘‘new

economic sociology’’ has come into being. The date of birth of this

movement is usually set to 1985, since that year a highly influential

article, which was to create much interest in economic sociology, was

published. This was Mark Granovetter’s ‘‘Economic Action and Social

Structure: The Problem of Embeddedness,’’ published in The American

Journal of Sociology. The very same year, it can be added, Granovetter

introduced the notion of ‘‘new economic sociology’’ in a brief paper at

the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association.

In his 1985 article on embeddedness, Granovetter sharply attacked

the attempts by economists to explain the functioning of social

institutions and accused them of simplicity. Just as economists have a

tendency to ignore social relations through an ‘‘undersocialized concept

of man,’’ Granovetter said, some sociologists view the individual as a

reflex of the social structure, and they consequently have an

‘‘oversocialized concept of man.’’ The proper way to proceed,

Granovetter suggested, is to tread a middle way between these two

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opposites, and this can best be done by assuming that individual actions

are always ‘‘embedded’’ in social networks.

Granovetter’s article has been followed by a minor avalanche of

writings in economic sociology, and there exist good reasons for arguing

that new economic sociology today constitutes a minor school of its

own. A large number of articles and quite a few monographs have been

produced; a couple of introductory readers can be found on the market;

and in the mid-1990s a huge Handbook of Economic Sociology was

published (Smelser and Swedberg 1994). Other signs that a certain

institutionalization of economic sociology has taken place is that a

section in economic sociology has been organized at the American

Sociological Association, which has also published a volume with

course outlines and similar teaching materials (Green and Myhre 1996).

Before saying something about the concrete studies that have been

produced since the mid- 1980s, it should be pointed out that new

economic sociology is primarily a creation of North American

sociologists. In Europe and elsewhere in the world there also exists an

interest in economic sociology, but it tends to manifest itself in a less

cohesive form than in the United States, and it is not held together

through recurring conferences and the like. This is especially true for

Europe.

Most of the major European sociologists have written on

economic topics in some work or another,but this is rarely perceived as

an interest in economic sociology (e.g., Boltanski 1987; Bourdieu 1986;

Luhmann 1988). There also exist articles and monographs by European

sociologists who identify themselves as economic sociologists—but, to

repeat, these tend not to be much noticed, since they are not held

together by a strong and selfconscious tradition (e.g., Beckert 1997;

Dodd 1994; Gislain and Steiner 1995). Finally, quite a bit of economic

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sociology has also been produced under the auspices of the section on

economy and society within the International Sociological Association

(e.g., Martinelli and Smelser 1990).

New economic sociology has advanced the understanding of

economic phenomena in a number of ways, and it has especially been

successful in analyzing the following three topics: (1) the role that

networks play in the economy, (2) the way that culture and values

influence the economy, and (3)what causes firms to be organized the

way they are.

Something will be said about each of these topics,but before doing

so it should be noted that some interesting advances have also been

made in many other areas, such as consumption, finance, and the role of

gender in the economy (e.g., Abolafia 1996; Biggart 1989; Warde 1997).

Finally, social capital is a topic that has attracted attention from

sociologists as well as from political scientists and economists (e.g.,

Bourdieu 1986a; Coleman 1988; for an overview, see Woolcock 1998).

Network Analyses

Network analyses are often empirical in nature and sophisticated

in their methodology, and this is also true for network studies in

economic sociology. This latter type of studies made its first

appeareance in the 1970s, something which Granovetter’s well-known

Getting a Job (1974) is a reminder of. The same is true for studies of

interlocks, that is, studies of the kind of links that emerge when some

individual is a member of more than one corporate board. Interlock

studies became popular with Marxist sociologists, who felt that they had

found a way to document how the ruling class controls corporations

(e.g., Mintz and Schwartz 1985). A more subtle version of this argument

can be found in Michael Useem’s The Inner Circle (1984), based on

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interviews with chief executive officers (CEOs), whose main point is

that CEOs who are members of several boards have a better overview of

the economy, something that enables them to better defend their

interests.

The simplistic type of interlock studies have been severely

critized, primarily on the grounds that it is unclear what the

consequences are of the fact that two or more corporations are connected

through interlocks. In one interesting study, it was also argued that if for

some reason a link between two corporations was severed, it would have

to be reconstituted relatively soon if this type of link indeed is as

important as is often claimed. This study showed that only a minority of

so-called broken ties were actually re-created (Palmer 1983; see also the

discussion in Stearns and Mizruchi 1986). As of today, the opinion of

many economic sociologists is that interlock studies can be quite

valuable, but only on condition that they are complemented with other

material, such as historical studies, interviews, and the like.

A few words must be said about Granovetter’s Getting a Job

(1974), since it represents a particularly fine example of what an

empirically sophisticated and theoretically interesting study in economic

sociology can look like. As Granovetter notes in the second edition of

this work from 1995, his study has inspired quite a bit of research since

its original publication in the 1970s. The main thrust of the study is to

challenge the notion of mainstream economics that social relations can

be abstracted from an analysis of how people get jobs.

Through network data he had collected in a Boston suburb,

Granovetter succeeded in showing that information about openings in

the job market travels through social networks, and the more networks

you belong to, the more likely you are to find this type of information.

Having a few very close and helpful friends is not as effective in terms

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of getting information as being linked to many different networks (‘‘the

strength of weak ties’’). A corollary of this thesis, Granovetter shows, is

that people who have had several jobs are more likely to find a new

position when they become unemployed than those who have had only

one employer.

Since the mid-1980s network studies have become very popular in

economic sociology, and a number of advances have been made (see the

studies cited in Powell and Smith-Doerr 1994).

Several new topics have also been added to the repertoire,

including industrial regions and ethnic entrepreneurship. A special

mention should be made of Ronald Burt’s Structural Holes (1992), in

which competition and entrepreneurship are analyzed from a network

perspective. Burt’s study is centered around the argument that when an

actor is the one and only link between two networks, he or she is in a

good position to exploit this situation ( tertius gaudens, or ‘‘the third

who benefits,’’ in Simmel’s terminology). Granovetter (1994) has also

suggested that the network approach can be used to study so-called

business groups, that is, the kind of social formations that are made up

of corporations that are bound together in some formal or informal way

and that display a certain amount of solidarity. The applicability of the

notion of business groups to the Korean chaebol or to the Japanese

keiretsu is obvious, but it also appears that business groups exist in most

Western countries.

The Influence of Culture and Values.

A few economic sociologists have approached the study of the

economy from a different perspective and emphasize the way that

culture and values influence economic phenomena. The two most

prominent contributors to this type of economic sociology are Paul

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DiMaggio (1994) and Viviana Zelizer (1979, 1985, 1994); the studies

they have produced are of two kinds-general theoretical statements and

empirical studies of a historical and qualitative character. Zelizer (1988)

has sharply critiqued what she sees as an attempt in much of current

economic sociology to eliminate values and to reduce everything to

networks. Economic sociology, she argues, needs to introduce culture

and values into the analysis, while simultaneously paying attention to

the social structure.

Zelizer has also produced three empirical studies in which she

attempts to show the impact of culture and values on economic

phenomena. In the first of these, Zelizer (1979) looks at the development

of the life insurance industry in the United States, showing how difficult

it was to get people to accept that an individual’s life can be evaluated

in purely monetary terms. In her second study, Zelizer (1985) looks at

the same development but, so to speak, in reverse-namely, how

something that had an economic value at one time in history can turn

into something that has a sacred value at another. In the nineteenth

century, as she shows, children were often seen as having an economic

value, while today they have an exclusively emotional value. In her

latest study, Zelizer (1994) looks at money, arguing that people usually

distinguish between different types of money. Money- and this is the

main point-is not some kind of homogeneous, asocial medium, as

economists claim, but is social to its very core. Pin money, for example,

differs from the kind of money that is set aside for ordinary expenses;

and when money is given away as a gift, an effort is usually made to

disguise its nature as money.

Organization Theory

For a number of reasons there exists a clear affinity between

organization theory and economic sociology. One reason for this, no

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doubt, is that sociologists of organization often analyze economic

organizations; another is that organization theory was to incorporate

much of industrial sociology when this field disappeared in the 1970s.

And, finally, roughly during the 1990s, business schools often hired

sociologists to teach organization theory. Three schools or perspectives

in organization theory have been of much importance to economic

sociology: resource dependency, population ecology, and new

institutionalism.

The basic idea of resource dependency is that an organization is

dependent on resources in its environment to survive. This perspective,

as especially Ronald Burt has shown, can be of some help in

understanding how the economy works. At the center of Burt’s work on

resource dependency is his concept of structural autonomy, or the idea

that a corporation has more room to maneuver the fewer competitors it

has and the more suppliers and the more customers there are. That a

corporation has more power if it is in a monopoly position is clear; from

this it follows that suppliers as well as customers are less powerful the

more competitors they have. If Corporation A, for example, has only one

supplier and one customer, both of these can wield quite a bit of power

over Corporation A. Using a huge input–output data set for U.S.

industry, Burt has also shown that the idea of structural autonomy has

some support in empirical reality; in brief, the more structurally

autonomous a corporation is, the more likely it is that profits will

increase (Burt 1983).

Population ecology, as opposed to resource dependency, uses as

its unit of analysis not the single corporation but whole populations of

organizations. That these populations go through fairly distinct phases

of growth and decline has been shown through a number of empirical

studies, many of which are highly relevant to economic sociology since

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the organizations being studied are often economic organizations.

Population ecology also looks at competition between organizations and

the processes through which new organizational forms become accepted.

The fact that population ecology typically looks at large populations of

organizations means that relatively high powered statistical methods are

used. There is, however, little theoretical renewal going on in population

ecology, and unless this changes, this perspective risks being exhausted

in a few years.

A considerably higher degree of flexibility and creativity

characterizes new institutionalism, or the kind of organization theory

that has emerged around the work of John Meyer (e.g., Meyer and

Rowan 1977; cf. DiMaggio and Powell 1991). A fundamental thesis in

this approach is that rationality is often only a thin veneer and that

organizations usually look the way they do for other than rational

reasons. There also exist more or less distinct models for what a certain

type of organization should look like, and these models are typically

diffused through imitation. Since new institutionalism has such a

flexible core, it can be used to analyze a variety of topics, in contrast to

population ecology, which is considerably more limited in scope.

Two studies that illustrate this flexibility are Neil Fligstein’s The

Transformation of Corporate Control (1990) and Frank Dobbin’s

Forging Industrial Policy (1994). The former is a study of the huge

American corporation since the end of the nineteenth century that

challenges several of Alfred Chandler’s theses. According to Fligstein,

U.S. corporations have created different concepts of control during

different periods of time; by control, he means the general strategy that

corporations follow for surviving and making money.

While cartels, for example, represented a common strategy around

the turn of the century in the United States, they were later replaced by

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vertical integration, the idea of conglomerates, and other concepts of

control. Fligstein also shows not only that the famous multidivisional

form was a response to the economic environment, as Chandler claimed,

but also that it was diffused through imitation.

Fligstein, as opposed to Chandler, also points out that the state

influences the way corporations operate and the way they decide on a

certain concept of control. Dobbin makes a similar point in Forging

Industrial Policy (1994), but the emphasis in this study is primarily on

regulatory or industrial policy cultures. Drawing on empirical material

of a historical character from France, England, and the United States in

the nineteenth century, Dobbin shows how each of these countries

developed different regulatory and industrial policy cultures, and in

particular how they treated railroads in different ways. The state, for

example, was actively involved in the railroad business in France but

played a more passive role in England and the United States. Dobbin

argues convincingly that there exists no single best way of doing things

in the economy, as mainstream economists seem to think; what may

seem natural and rational to do in one country does not seem so in

another.

New economic sociology has also made some interesting progress

in the analysis of the market. The reason this topic has attracted quite a

bit of attention among sociologists is that the theory of the market

constitutes the very heart of mainstream economics; and to challenge

mainstream economics one first and foremost has to challenge its theory

of the market. Of the empirical studies that sociologists have produced,

the most innovative may well be Mitchell Abolafia’s Making Markets

(1996) (see also Uzzi 1996). Abolafia has investigated three important

markets on Wall Street (bonds, stocks, and futures markets) through

participant observation; in particular, he has looked at the way that these

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are regulated. His major conclusion is that markets are social

constructions and that regulation is related to ‘‘cycles of opportunism.’’

When the existing regulation of a market is mild, opportunistic

actors will take advantage of this fact, which will lead to a tightening of

the rules; when regulation has been strong and effective for some time,

demands are likely to be raised that milder rules should be introduced.

While most empirical studies of the market have focused on some

aspect of the market rather than on its core, there do exist a few

theoretical attempts by sociologists to explain the very nature of the

market. Two of these are particularly interesting, namely, the analyses

of Harrison White (1981) and of Neil Fligstein (1996). White’s

argument, which takes its departure in the typical production market

with only a handful of actors, can be summarized in the following way:

When a few actors produce similar products at similar prices, they may,

by watching one another, come to realize that they make up a market

and also behave according to this perception. More precisely, it is by

watching the terms-of-trade schedule that this process takes place; and

as long as the producers feel that they fit into this schedule, the market

will continue to exist. By modeling his argument about the terms-of-

trade schedule, White is also able to show under which theoretical

conditions a market can come into being and when it will unravel.

While only a few attempts have been made to work directly with

White’s so-called W(y)-model, its general impact has been large in new

economic sociology, especially through White’s argument that a market

comes into being when actors orient their behavior to one another in a

role like manner.

The most suggestive of the studies that have been influenced in a

general way by the W(y)-model is Fligstein’s theory of markets. Like

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White, Fligstein uses the typical production market as his point of

departure, but the emphasis in his theory is quite different. Market

actors, according to Fligstein, fear competition, since this makes it hard

to predict what will happen, and they therefore attempt to introduce

stability into the market. This can be done in different ways, and for

empirical illustration Fligstein draws on his study of the evolution of the

huge American corporation (Fligstein 1990). In certain situations,

competition can nonetheless be very strong, but this is usually

accompanied by attempts to stabilize the market. As examples of this,

Fligstein mentions the situation when a new market is coming into

being, when a major innovation is introduced into an already existing

market, and when some major social disturbance takes place.

POSSIBLE FUTURE DIRECTIONS

If one were to summarize the situation in economic sociology at

the end of the twentieth century, it could be said that economic

sociology, which played such an important role in the classic works of

sociology, has once again come alive. New and provocative studies have

been produced, and a steadily growing number of sociologists are

becoming interested in economic sociology. If one adds to this that

mainstream economists are increasingly realizing the importance of

institutions in the economy, it may well be the case that economic

sociology will become one of the most interesting fields in sociology

during the twenty first century.

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Plate 1. Fig.1 : A child of a Nawab family working on a piece of cloth for Rs 30 a week.

Fig. 2 : A Nawab explaining his day to day life problems

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Chapter IVTHE DAILY GRIND: DAY TO DAY PROBLEMS OF

THE NAWABS

The global recession might end soon, but there are no signs of

settling down of the woes of the poor in third world countries. The

impact of recession is huge- there are definite signs of job losses, loss of

income, high expenditures and an unusual increase in food prices. It then

becomes just unimaginable when we take into account the poor from the

third world countries, whose life depends upon the earnings, which are

vulnerable to economic fluctuations and seasonality. This dilemma of

poverty becomes more pathetic when these earnings are just less than

2$, working for more than eight hours a day. Living on less than two

dollars a day for a household is nothing but misery which is

compounded when their earnings are marred by seasonal fluctuations

and irregularities. Their daily diet, education of their children and the

health of the household members are often compromised with. These

impacts are invisible, but in the truest sense – are irreversible for the

dent they make in the future of their families. Their choices are minimal

which makes it impossible for them to plan out expenditure and

calculate one’s own capacity to save or repay. Thus, the present study is

an ethnographic account of the Shia population, especially in this

context the descendents of Nawabs attached to Zardozi (embroidery) in

Lucknow, who are reeling under intense poverty and suffering as a result

of living on pittance.

Subir belonging to a family of Nawabs in Husainabad was 37

when I met him and his wife Mumtaz only 29, though their oldest son

Iqbal was by then at least 14. They had three more children, all sons,

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and Mumtaz was pregnant again and delivered her fifth son midway

through the research year ("No more!" she told us). Day by day, Subir

and Mumtaz focused on managing life on a dollar a day per head – and

sometimes less. Their strategies, and those of other interviewers, are the

subject of this chapter. I will see how their money management respond

to the challenges of living on income that is both low and uncertain, and

how doing so determines much of their financial lives.

Our opening chapter assert that it is not just the low value, but

also the uncertain timing of their incomes that makes money

management so important for poor households, and so it was for Subir

and Mumtaz. Institutions such as the United Nations and the World

Bank usually focus on explaining why incomes, totaled over the year,

are so low, and what can be done to raise them. But the unpredictable

ups and downs of income are also an important part of what it is to be

poor, and they cause many of the specific challenges faced by the

households I came to know.

The low returns and uncertain availability of work opportunities

lead households like Subir's to patch livelihoods together from different

sources, each irregular and unpredictable. For a while, Subir, who

generally pedaled a hired rickshaw. On good days, he earned Rs112.5 $

2.50. Most of the time, though, he pedaled a rickshaw – extremely

demanding work that only the very fittest can do day after day. Subir,

like most men of his age, found it too exhausting to do for more than

four days a week. Even when he was working, his earnings fluctuated

with weather conditions, political strife, harassment by the police, and

simple good and bad luck.

Towards the end of the year, their teenage son, Iqbal, got a job in

a garment factory at Rs 1215 ($ 27) a month, Iqbal, who had never

attended school regularly, then gave up scavenging for scrap materials

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for a dealer in their area. His younger brother Salauddin, 10 continued to

rag-pick, and earned Rs 270 ($ 6) in a good month. After the new baby

was born, Mumtaz returned to a job working as a maid, earning some Rs

450 ($10) a month. Taken together, total house-hold income peaked at

an average of Rs 141.3 ($ 3.14) a day for the seven of them. In bad

times, it fell as low as Rs 85.5 ($ 1.90) a day.

Making these uncertain income flows deliver a stable home life

was a constant preoccupation for Sabir and Mumtaz. Most of the time

they succeeded. They never had to beg, but they did skip meals and the

quality of their food varied. Sometimes I found them eating hot meals

three times a day – mostly rice and lentils, sometimes a bit of fish, or, as

a rare treat, beef. Usually, though, they ate twice, and in really bad times

just once a day. But at least they ate something every day, and it is a

tribute to their resourcefulness that they managed that.

Subir and Mumtaz and their family survived thanks in part to

financial tools. In the year I spent with them, Subir and Mumtaz did not,

for example seek a "microcredit" loan to fund the expansion of a small

business. True, Subir could have earned more if he owned his rickshaw

rather than renting, and a loan would have hastened the purchase. But, as

I show below, he had good reasons not to do so. Others looking at the

couple's situation might instead stress the importance of helping people

like them to save to build up meaningfully large assets. Borrowing and

saving for the long term are indeed important to poor households, as

later chapters show but long-term goals Ire not the primary financial

concern of most households I met. Instead households like that of Subir

and Mumtaz borroId and saved mostly to meet pressing short-term

needs, their main objective was cash-flow management. Being able to

manage immediate needs is a precondition for considering long-term

ambitions – but the way that poor people achieve it has received scant

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attention from policymakers and others arguing for financial access for

the poor.

The most basic objective for households like that of Subir and

Mumtaz is to make sure that there's food on the table every day, and not

just on days when income flows in. The poor households I met actively

employ financial tools not despite being poor but because they are poor.

When it came to managing money, Subir and Mumtaz put a premium on

the flexibility and convenience of their financial tools, even though

those tools Ire not always reliable. Their juggling reminds us that money

is fungible – it can be split and combined in a number of ways. I argue

in the concluding section that embracing this flexibility of money can

open vistas for financial providers looking for better ways to serve poor

households.

The next section of this chapter describes the importance of

frequent and small transactions used for basic money management. The

sections that follow show why this pattern holds: multiple occupations

leading to low incomes – often patched together from uncertain parts –

result in a "triple whammy" of incomes that are not just small but also

irregular, and that, have to be managed with financial instrument that do

not always fit the household's cash flow patterns. The balance of the

chapter describes how households cope with the triple whammy – and

where hidden costs lie. The concluding sections brings together ideas on

ways to help poor households cope with their most basic, daily

challenges.

SMALL BALANCES, LARGE CASH FLOWS

The story is revealed when I look at cash flows rather than

balance sheets. During the year, all of the households pushed and pulled

through financial instruments amounts far greater than their year-end net

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worth. By "push" I mean deposit, lend, or repay. By "pull" I mean

withdraw, borrow, or accept deposits. If cash flowing into the household

is not immediately consumed or invested, it is pushed or pulled through

a financial instrument in one way or another. I use the expression

"turnover" to mean the total sum of money being "pushed" into

instruments plus the money being "pulled" out of them.

Subir and Mumtaz's portfolio for the research year 2007-2008 is

given in greater detail in Table 1.0. For each of the categories of

instruments they used I show the closing balances.

Table 1.0: Portfolio Summary for Subir and Mumtaz over the Research Year

Closing Balance TurnoverFinancial AssetsSemiformal InformalMicrofinance savings 10.20 49.40Private loans out 30.00 117.00Home savings 5.00 18.00Subtotal Rs2034($45.20) ($184.40)

Rs8298Financial LiabilitiesSemiformal InformalMicrofinance loan 30.00Interest free loan 14.00Private loan 15.00Pawn loan 0Money guarding 2.00Shop credit 4.00Subtotal ($865.00) Rs

38925Financial net worth –$19.80Total Turnover Rs24588 $546.40

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I also show the total turnover during the year (the flows in and out

of each class of instrument). By placing the balances and the flows

alongside each other, I highlight one of the big points made above:

balances are small relative to flows.

Balances are sometimes so small that one might conclude this is

not a "portfolio" at all, in the sense in which a modern financial adviser

would use the term. Nevertheless, the fact that there are many different

instruments and that the flows are relatively large, shows, clearly, that

Subir and Mumtaz, and households like them, are financially active. I

need to pause for a moment and adjust our perspective if I are to

understand the real importance of these poor-owned portfolios.

Multiple and Uncertain Occupations

Understanding the reasons for high turnovers is the starting point

for understanding the financial lives of these households. I move to that

task by showing how, despite a wide variety of occupations, the income

characteristics of diary households led them to the predicament that I

call the "triple whammy".

Some of my diary households are headed by someone with a long-

term permanent waged or salaried job. But these are the exceptions. For

example, there are only two households out of 60 that obtain most of

their income from a single permanent job: both are private car drivers

living in Lucknow. There are other waged jobs – are like Subir and

Mumtaz and have one or more members of the household working in the

Zardozi karkhana – but as with that couple, these jobs provide only part

of the total household income, the rest coming from self-employment,

casual employment, or petty businesses. Jobs that appear permanent may

turn out not to be. There also many women from the Nawab households

who are involved in Chikan kari (embroiderywork) working from inside

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Plate II : Fig 3. A woman working on chikan embroidery

Fig. 4 : Women from Nawab households help their male counterparts in

the household finances.

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Chapter -IV

their houses they earn small amount to help out ease their day to day

challenges. Widely portrayed as a leisure-time activity, embroidery

production employs poor. Muslim women workers on piece rates. The

embroiderers' distinctiveness is used to shore up primarily urban,

middle-class ideals about tradition and heritage that are necessary in

order to create demand for handicraft products.

What is surprising is the comparative scarcity of sociological or

historical accounts that take a more critical approach, not only to the

understanding of poverty and handicrafts as economic activity, but also

to the kind of rhetoric that has arisen around them.

Using insights drawn variously from socialist-feminist and

Marxist-feminist theory, it argues that the cultural value of women's

work depends upon, and at the same time denies, the alienated

production of handicraft commodities for the market. I start with an

example drawn from my own research on chikan embroidery production

in Lucknow, India.- where analysis of the relationship between

productive conditions and discourse provides a model and framework for

the examination of other women's crafts and how it has helped the

Nawabs to sustain their livelihoods since the past three decades.

Chikan is a major manufacturing industry in the city of Lucknow,

located in north India, with an output made up mostly of embroidered

garments. Chikan is made in stages. Male workers dominate all the

stages but the embroidery itself, where over 90% of workers are Muslim

women. Female embroiderers are differentiated primarily in terms of

skill. Inside the old city and in well-established mohallas

(neighbourhoods) on the north bank of the river that transects Lucknow.

a small number of women belonging to the Nawab househ olds make

embroidery to sustain their livelihoods.

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Chapter -IV

Highly skilled embroiderers know many stitches, and they use

complex mental and manual abilities to design and execute embroidery.

They conceive of chikan in a completely different way from the low-

skilled, deploying their knowledge and ability in a way not at all unlike

the craftspeople whose integrated skills gave way to the fragmented

labour processes of the European industrial revolution. None, however,

relies solely upon sale of line work to make a living: demand for fine

work is a small component of the market, and is subordinated to fonns of

embroidery that can be rapidly mass-produced. This kind of work is

entirely controlled by independent traders and shopkeepers, who pay

piecework wages to craftspeople at all stages of production of chikan.

Low-skilled women., who make up the vast majority of embroiderers

learn to make one stitch only, an instance of de-stitching that is

consistent with the intensification of production for a mass-market. The

latter are relatively new to the industry, whereas the highly skilled have

family histories of embroidering going back two to three generations, as

far as the time when men (who remain a small minority of chikan

embroiderers today) dominated the ranks of fine embroiderers.

Embroidery knowledge is kept within families, and so the low skilled

have few social opportunities to come into contact with, still less learn,

higher level skills. Yet the core of skilled embroiderers' subsistence

come from subcontracting cheap work fusing one kind of stitch) to

women with lesser skills than their own, either in the neighbourhood, or

in more far-flung communities.

Taking no account of these social variables-of which they are

certainly not unaware-embroidery traders (those who coordinate

production and sell the product) persistently describe the work of all

female embroiderers as 'free-time' labour, intrinsically incapable of

rising to the heights of professionally-made (i.e.literally 'man'-made

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Chapter -IV

chikan). They are not alone in this view: it is encountered among

middle-class residents of Lucknow of all kinds, as well as government

officials, and is printed in the pages of books and magazines about

chikan. Its apparent plausibility stems from several distinct but related

discourses about craft, women, and Lucknow itself: crafts have been

corrupted by modernity and the market: contemporary Muslim, female

embroiderers are incapable of matching their predecessors in the quality

of their work: and Lucknow has undergone an absolute decline in its

status as a cultural and artistic centre.

Some nineteenth-century accounts suggest that Lucknow chikan

was not made by embroiderers for their personal use. but primarily, if

not exclusively, for exchange.'' The differentiation of fine from cheap

work was evident well over 100 years ago. William Hoey's account of

northern Indian industries and George Watt's catalogue of the 1903

Delhi handicrafts exhibit some 20 years later allude to women (and

children) as the makers of cheap work, meaning that all other workers,

by default, must have been men.-- Men appear to have tnade fine work

to order in their karkhanas (workshops), while women and children

worked at home under their direction on cheap piece work, typically

containing only one kind of stilch (as the cheapest work does today).

Possibly, early female embroiderers were upper-class women whose

families fell on hard times following the Uprising of 1857, although

whether they were applying a skill previously adapted to use value

production or only encountered embroidery as exchange value

production is unknown.'' Fine work was made on a contract basis for an

elite local clientele. Aristocratic men, ordering caps and angarkhas

(long, embroidered coats) were important consumers of fine chikan”

Sharar (1975).

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Chapter -IV

Oral accounts and scattered written sources suggest that a critical

shift in chikan production took place in the 1920s. Workshops closed

and embroidery production withdrew into the household, where the

labour of male non-relatives was replaced by the cheaper labour of

female relatives. It is difficult to determine what caused this labour

restructuring; however, that it coincided with a period of global

economic depression is suggestive. There is little question that elite

consumption declined.

Cross-cultural studies collected in volumes written over the past

15 years reveal commonalities in home-based work and household

subcontracting that apply with equal force to chikan. Since women are

home-based workers, their embroidery is regarded by men and

officialdom as one of a range of subsistence practices. In contrast, male

workers in the chikan industry are typically found in publicly accessible

workplaces and the status of their work—as work—is unchallenged.

Female workers execute the stage of production that makes the final

product distinct, but they are rendered invisible because their efforts are

not acknowledged in socially sanctioned ways.

Their invisibility is compounded by cultural rules governing male-

female interaction that limit the latter's public participation in the work

process. Female embroiderers arc constrained to some degree or another

by the demands of purdah (seclusion from, or veiling in front of non-

related men). Most women depend upon agents, the majority of whom

are men. to bring work to them (a service for which a substantial portion

of the wage may be extracted).

Publicly, debasement of the work and the worker can be framed in

two ways: embroiderers are either naive or ignorant, or they lack taste

and discernment. In the first instance, portraying chikan as a domestic

pastime rooted in the glorious days when Lucknow was ruled by Nawabs

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{king, ruler; title of rulers of the province of Awadh) but that is now

ripe for revival by non-govemmental organisations (NGOs). Government

institutions and private designers, depends upon the public construction

of a sequestered and simple embroiderer who needs to be told what to

do. She consciously practices a domestic art inherited without break

from a remote, courtly ancestor, but now corrupted by commercialism.

Even the highly skilled must be brought under the wings of

sophisticated designers and development agents. Attempting to oppose

this received wisdom docs the highly skilled embroiderer little good.

Officially, they are positioned as mere technicians who execute the

designer or developer's vision.

Significantly, when embroiderers appear in advertising or

marketing media, they are depicted as overtly Muslim women (see

Figures ). Chikan work has been described as 'a hereditary craft

practiced by the most backward Muslim classes in Lucknow ... [that has

today] passed into the hands of the women folk of the backward Muslim

communities, an additional labour in ill-lit rooms behind the purdah".'"

The photograph reproduced in Figure I is evidently staged, since the

embroiderer is shown working on an embroidery that has already been

finished. Moreover, portraits of women embroidering while wearing

burqas {enveloping garments that conceal the body) are inherently odd

since embroiderers wear the garment to go outside their homes, and

embroidery, as home-based work, is rarely done out of doors.

In these depictions, chikan is portrayed not just as the archetypal

artefact of Lucknow, but one produced by a marked and, to middle-class

Indian and foreign consumers, exotic group; that is, women in purdah.

Such portrayals essentially position embroiderers in impossible

situations, staged to communicate about women and their work in ways

that emphasize their profound connection to tradition. Portrayals of this

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kind directly sustain middle-class, urban and, ultimately, global

stereotypes of heritage. The embroiderer's difference from the viewer is

presented here as primarily religious and cultural in nature, rather than

sociocconomic and class-based. These depictions entrench notions of

embroiderer backwardness, of the guileless and ignorant embroiderer

thoughtlessly acquiescent in the debasement of chikan work who must

be educated in the authentic production of her craft. The result of a

century's development of a manufacturing industry in which women

have been deployed as the primary labour source for the advantages that

their home-based labour provides to capital is reconceived as the retreat

into backward homes of an art form once practiced at the highest levels

of society.

Unpredictability and Low Incomes

When occupations are intermittent, part-time, casual, or multiple,

and where children may also work, it is not easy to measure total

household income. There I focused on financial transactions and income

and expenditure flows, I have estimates of income based on periodic

enquiries.

To give some meaning to these statistics, I include an extensive

table in the chapter ahead that shows daily per capita income data for a

selection of households chosen to illustrate their varying sizes, locations

and occupational patterns, with notes about ways in which the value and

nature of the income intersects with their financial behaviour as noted in

the diaries.

The first element of the triple whammy that poor households face,

then, is low incomes. The second element, the uncertain timing of cash

flows, is Ill brought out by the diary methodology.

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Seasonal variations in income affected many households. Based

on diary sample, shows the income of Nawabs who are involved in

Zardozi (embroidery) as an occupation. I am highlighting Zardozi

(embroidery) here for a simple fact that almost all the households had

atleast one member who was involved in Zardozi (embroidery).

Therefore it was important to discuss and reveal the soci economic

problems faced by these people on a day to day basis. In the following

paragraphs an attempt has also been made to unravel the process of

Zardozi (embroidery) along with the problems related to it.

Zardozi and the Nawabs

Zardozi is not merely a needlecraft but a vestige of an opulent

bygone era. An embroidered extravaganza in gold and silver threads

embellished with precious stones and crystals patterned on velvet,

chiffon, crepe, silk, evoking the nostalgia of an exotic past – of Shia

‘Nawabs’ (used honorifically as a title by the rulers of Avadh after the

disintegration of the Mughal Empire) and nobility, court life and

courtesans as described by Sharar (1975) in a “collection of essays

which originally appeared under the title of Hindustan men Mashriqi

Tamaddun ka Akhri Namuna (literally, ‘The Last Phase of Oriental

Culture in India’) in the Lucknow journal ‘Dil Gudaz’ over a period

from 1913 onwards” (in Harcourt and Husain, 1994, p.25). Not

surprisingly even today every Zardoz (artisan) proudly claims to be the

practitioner of this heritage. The pride of the craftsmen is incidentally

not just confined to the craft’s true-blue status, but applies to its origin

as well. The Zardoz claim the genesis of this art to prophet

Yosuf/Joseph, when he decorated his aba (robe) in a similar fashion.

With the end of the feudal era the demand for this embroidery

came down, but remained a part of the Shia culture of Lucknow. During

the last three decades one has witnessed a resurgence in the production

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of Zardozi embroidered clothes after their induction as ethnic couture in

the bridal wear, fashion and glamour industry of India and abroad. This

has created a huge local demand and a boom in exports to the Middle

East and Europe, along with creating an extraordinary inclination within

the Muslim community towards learning this art from their predecessors.

The migration of Zardoz from Lucknow to Saudi Arabia and Dubai has

also been a common phenomenon since then.

Today, the scenario is that approximately more than 80,000

artisans from the Shia community are associated with this work, but are

reeling under intense poverty and suffering as a result of living on a

pittance. What is interesting to note here is that most of the Nawab

families have attached themselves to this art and are now practising it on

a full time basis. What attaches them to Zardozi (embroidery) is their

need for money and their inability to perform any other skilled labour.

This can be attributed to the cultural notions of dignity whereby the Shia

community distances itself from any other skilled occupations like

butchery, confectionery or cooking, thus avoiding a stigma associated

with lower caste occupational groups.

So both small regular monthly incomes and modest seasonal

incomes produce a need for intermediation, explaining why poor

households that experience these patterns in income tend to hold

portfolios of transactions and relationships.

But there is no doubt that irregularity, and above all

unpredictability, of income causes even more serious challenges in cash-

flow management, resulting in ever more innovation in trying to address

them.

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Fig.6: Karigar (labourer) making powdered chalk

Fig.7: Chalk is being mixed with kerosene oil

Fig.8: The solution of chalk and kerosene is rubbed on to the Khaka (design) which has minute holes.

Fig 9: A group of Nawab Karigars working on a piece of cloth.

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The family needs for food, shelter, education of their children and

health concerns are all taken care of from whatever is earned on a

weekly basis. Either the Zardoz are self employed or they are Karigar at

a certain Karkhana. Being self employed, the Zardoz brings work from

local boutiques or Offices (who bag orders from exporters and

showrooms in metros). These Offices are sometimes run by a

Karkhandar (person who employs wage labourers in his Karkhana for

Zardozi, at a certain Nafri. As the orders are huge, they in turn distribute

the work to their Branches (group of Zardoz working for a particular

Karkhandar). But these days, in local Zardozi parlance, the term Office

refers to a place for getting the work, and the person distributing the

work to the Zardoz, might not be a Karkhandar himself.

The distribution of work is based on the work skills of the Zardoz

concerned and their interpersonal understandings. The Office makes sure

that the self employed Zardoz embroidering a piece of cloth does it at

the lowest possible rate. It is at the time of negotiations that the cloth

and design in the form of a printed picture or a Khaka (Fig.1 handmade

design on a butter paper) is given to the Zardoz, who then tries to

quantify the number of Nafri which will be needed in order to prepare

the piece of cloth. The rates are then decided at that moment, but the

dilemma remains that the Nafri might exceed the amount negotiated with

the Office, which happens quite often. Many a times the Office rejects

the completed piece of cloth in case housefly excreta or decolouration of

threads is spotted at the time of delivery. The Zardoz is helpless as he

has to keep the completed Nag (rejected embroidered piece) with

himself and has to pay the Nafri from his own purse to all those Zardozi

Karigars employed during the completion of the embroidered piece. The

Office in turn cuts the cost of the cloth from the payment amount kept

as dues. These dues guard the Office against losses which could incur

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due to the decolouration or any other patches which reduces the quality

of the completed fabric.

Syed Sajid Husain (50 ) a self employed Zardoz works in his

own Karkhana, along with his two sons- Shahzade, (21) and Raja (10).

Sajid tries to give insights into the intricacies and work principles

involved in Zardozi and reasons as to why the Zardoz are not able to

get the work directly from the metro cities and shops, and have to

depend upon the Offices for work. Sajid states that-

We (Zardoz) cannot bring the work directly from metro cities like

Delhi and Mumbai for a simple reason- it requires a lot of capital

investment, which we can’t afford to do. The Offices bag orders from

Delhi, Punjab, Mumbai and local shops. Apart from this, businessmen

from different cities across India come directly to these Offices to get

their pieces embroidered. Offices get bulk orders i.e. 500-1000 pieces in

a Season... They (Offices) get their payment only after all the pieces are

cleared and checked by the shops or business houses. It takes time for

their dues to get cleared; on an average, an Office gets back its dues

after a minimum of 90 days. Only Offices can afford to invest such huge

sums of money with risk. Offices themselves do the sampling (get the

designs embroidered at their own Karkhanas) and in this way they know

the cost of the material and Nafri being put into a particular design.

When they distribute this design to their Branches or Karkhandars, they

negotiate at rates which are much below than the actual. For example, if

the Office has done a sample for Rs.1000 ($ 20.83), then the negotiated

amount with the Branch will be Rs.900 ($ 18.75). We all know that the

design could not be prepared at those rates, but our problem is poverty,

lack of capital and cut throat competition and we cannot keep our

children without food. We need work and money at the end of the

week...and moreover, if we don’t pick up that piece on the wishes of the

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Office, then there is always someone ready to do it at a much lower rate.

Many a times our Nafri along with the material used exceeds the amount

negotiated with the Office. In that case even if I plead with the Office

about my losses incurred, the Office will pay no heed to my pains and

suffering. They usually tell us that the same piece is being prepared at a

much lower rate by some other Zardoz …We get our payments on a

weekly basis after there is a deduction of 3% per piece. This is the

courier charge deducted by the Office from our payment. Late payments

also traumatise the life of a Zardoz. Offices hold on to some portion of

the payments and pay back on Chand Raat or before Moharram (First

month of Islamic Calendar). Sometimes to minimise the loss on a piece

of cloth, we transfer that piece to our Branch, who does it for on even a

lesser amount i.e. Rs 800- Rs 850($ 16.66- $ 17.70). But, I try to avoid

this practice, because at times the Branches have ruined some of my

pieces and on account of that I had to bear the brunt of the loss... All the

Offices which are raking profits and getting wealthier are drenched in

malpractices and malice. They have a sole objective of utilising the

helpless poor Zardoz for their own benefits....

Tahir (51) is canny while dealing with the Office, he manipulates

designs in such a way that it is impossible for the Office to notice any

visible alteration in design and stitches. He reveals-

If the Karkhandar is bent on decreasing the prices, then we,

Zardoz also decrease some patterns which are not noticeable and also

decrease the quality of material used, for instance if there are six

stitches, we decrease it to four stitches and sometimes reduces the

design by giving in only two stitches...We also make compromises on

the material being used in Zardozi. Material comes in three qualities-

one packet is of Rs 1800 ($ 37.5), the other is Rs 400 ($ 8.33) and Rs

200 ($ 4.16) respectively.

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The apathy remains in its place, where a poor Zardoz remains at

whelm of affairs, and can’t do much about what’s happening around

them. These shocks and losses create a market where the Zardoz from

Lucknow, in order to bag contracts from the Offices, bring down the

market rates per embroidered cloth and hence there is also a fall in the

Nafri.

A few voices have been raised during the last couple of years to

increase the Nafri, but to no avail. The government has turned a blind

eye to the demands of this poor artisan class. The Zardoz leadership is

confronted by many constraints such as disunity amongst this artisan

community, where they are unable to take a stand and share a common

platform for their rights. Secondly, because the leaders are self

proclaimed with no support from the majority Zardoz community, they

remain voiceless. The issue of sectarian violence in Lucknow between-

Shia and Sunnis, has also created a rift which acts as a limiting factor

when leadership issues are brought forth. To unite the Zardoz,

‘Anjumane-e- Zardozaan’ (Zardoz Association having both Shia and

Sunni members) has been organising Presidents and Vice Presidents on a

rotation basis, i.e. a Shia President and a Sunni Vice President and vice

versa the next year. But this association remains paralysed due to a lack

of commitment and an inability to come forward and protest.

I quote Bahar Alam (45), a Zardoz by profession and a candid

person of Ghazi Mandi research area. He says –

Our Union was very strong and once a year, there used to be a

General Body Meeting of the Anjuman which dealt with the various

grievances of the Zardoz community, along with issuing orders to

increase the Nafri. The Karkhandars/Offices were asked to increase the

rates they got from the shop keepers, so as to give an increased Nafri to

the Zardozi Karigar. No response from the shopkeepers regarding the

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Nafri led to strikes. During strikes the shopkeepers tried to get their

work done through some Zardoz by giving them extra money. But, as the

Union was strong, the Union members were informed about such ill

practices, and the Union then raided the Karkhanas to take into custody

all the embroidered pieces of that shopkeeper. Such raids were very

common throughout the city and all the seized cloth was returned back

when demands were met. The Union also gave full rights to the Zardoz

to tear one’s cloth, if it was found that a design had been copied or

cheated. Thus, it protected the interests of the Zardoz to the maximum.

Whilst the Union was strong the Zardoz were very happy. To run the

Union, Rs10 ($ 0.20) per week was collected. But now no one

contributes even a single penny to the Union. No one cares about the

Union and with the lack of funds it went on getting weaker and weaker.

Now the scenario is that when the Union calls a meeting, no one bothers

to attend it.

There has been an inability on the part of the leadership to act,

and this has now generated a spurt in area wise local groups of Zardoz

trying to voice their demands to the government. Here, I am quoting in

verbatim, some striking lines from a joint petition of Shia and Sunni

Zardoz leaders, submitted to the government of the State – In 1977, a

construction wage labourer used to get Rs 4 ($ .083) and a Zardoz got a

Nafri of Rs 10 ($ .20), whereas in 1988 the wages increased and a

construction wage labourer got Rs 25 ($ .52) and the Nafri of a Zardoz

was Rs 35 ($ .72). Similarly in 1992 both a construction labourer as well

as a Zardoz were getting a wage of Rs 80 ($ 1.66), but now in 2009, the

wages of a construction labourer have shot up to Rs250 ($5.20), whereas

the Nafri of a Zardoz is stagnant at Rs 80 ($ 1.66) for 8 hours of work.

There has been no increase in the Nafri since then. Where should we go?

When we ask the shopkeepers/boutiques and Offices/ Karkhandars to

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increase their returns on the prepared cloth, they simply argue that when

they are not getting higher returns from their clients, then how could

they increase the amount on a prepared material. If these conditions

prevail then the Zardoz will have no option but to leave this art of

embroidery to do some other work. Therefore, it’s a humble request that

the government should find a solution to our problems, so that our

minimum Nafri is Rs 250 ($5.20) for 8 hours of work..... Our work goes

to foreign destinations and our country men also wear our embroidered

cloth. In all fashion shows only our embroidered clothes are worn by the

models on the ramp. The government should levy tax from the

shopkeepers and then should give help us from the money generated as

tax.

Seasonal Earnings of Nawab Households attached to Zardozi

The average income for a household in Raees Manzil (Fig.5)

during the Madda and Season this year was Rs 2582.98 ($53.79) and Rs

6150.73 ($128.13) respectively, while that of Ghazi Mandi (Fig. 6) area

during the Madda was Rs 3762.40 ($78.39) while Rs7567.77 ($157.66)

in the Season.

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Graph 1.1: Seasonal household variations in US Dollar -Raes Manzil

Graph 1.2: Seasonal household variations in earnings-Ghazi Mandi

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Chapter -IV

These averages don’t show the true picture of earnings because

these are not individual earnings per month, but an average of a

composite aggregate of all the household members working on Zardozi.

The wage for a Zardoz depends upon the depth of their skill and

the movement of the ‘Muthiya’ while making a design. A skilled Zardoz

while hiring a Karigar gives a piece of cloth with a design and comes

to know about his Zardozi skills by assessing the speed of the ‘Muthiya’

for making that particular design. The agility, craft and ability to

embroider intricate designs are the main determinants of the wage. A

child learning the art gets around Rs 10 to Rs 20 ($ 0.21 to $0.42) a

week, while a more skilled Zardozi Karigar ekes out Rs 80 to Rs 90

($1.67 to $1.88) for complete 8 hours of work. I f he continues with the

work for another 4 hours then the wage is doubled i.e., he will be paid

Rs Rs.160 – Rs.180 ($ 3.33 to $ 3.75). But certain inhibiting factors

curtail these working hours on a daily basis. Electricity cuts and

household liabilities are the two main reasons which hamper a Zardoz in

getting his full Nafri.

Electricity usage on an illegal basis is quite rampant in both the

field areas. Out of the 60 researched households, 39 households were

using a ‘Katiya’ (see Fig.7,8,9) a hook connected to the main line on the

street to draw illegal electricity). Some of these illegal connections were

of previous defaulters who had outstanding bills ranging between

Rs.6000 ($ 125) to Rs.6 lakhs ($ 12500). Amongst the rest, 19

households were supplied electricity using a connection that was on

rent. People hire connections from households paying their bills on time.

These households mostly belong to friends in the neighbourhood. For a

hired connection each household was paying on an average of Rs 350 ($

7.29) per month. Only two households were paying their bills on time

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Fig.10: Use of Katiya to draw illegal electricity from the main electric line

Fig.11: Katiya is being used by a NawabZardoz and a house

Fig 12: Electricity theft at Ghazi Mandi by Katiya connection.

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and had electricity meters to their names.

The vigilant squad of the Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation

Limited (UPPCL) conducts raids, but the people of the neighbourhood

alert all the other households in the vicinity, to pull off/terminate their

connections from the main electricity terminal. The neighbourhood is

quite sensitive to the needs of their friends and relatives, especially as

they know this would directly hamper the economic prospects of the

households -Zardozi gets affected by the lack of proper lighting.

Moreover, power theft is a crime and if anyone gets caught they would

not only get charged for their crime, but also fall into the police net.

There have been numerous cases where the households are informed of

such raids. Tahir Bhai says –

Katiya connections are common everywhere in the old city. It is

not only the poor who are stealing electricity for their benefit, but also

the rich who can easily pay up their instalments but are thriving on such

illegal connections. If the rich get caught they can get away by giving a

bribe, but when we get trapped, then there is no one to help us. The

children of our area and young adolescents remain alert and they easily

spread the word for any danger regarding the Departmental

checkups....Many of us use Katiya connections for making Zardozi

designs which have intricate details and require a lot of concentration.

Electricity failure on a day to day basis hurts the Nafri of a Zardozi

Karigar as well as the Karkhandar. The Zardozi Karigar will not get a

full Nafri as he can’t work without electricity and the Karkhandar will

suffers for his payments from the Office, as his work will finish late...

The Offices tend to hold on the payments of the Karkhandar for a week;

if their pieces are not submitted on time i.e. the Office wants completed

embroidered pieces on Saturday. Power crises loom every year in the

summers, there is a huge electricity deficit due to power pilferage. For

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those of our neighbours, friends and relatives who have been caught, I

really feel pity for them. They could have done nothing, as they have to

survive and for survival electricity is a must...But who cares for the poor

and who can understand what goes behind such acts of desperation to

survive.

Migration to cities like Chandigarh, Delhi, Mumbai and

Hyderabad and in the Middle East to Saudi Arabia and Dubai, remains

an alternative to dipping incomes. Being experts in Zardozi they easily

get work with a Nafri that is triple the amount of their present income in

Lucknow. But family liabilities and loneliness abroad limits the Zardoz

propensity to settle abroad permanently to earn a better living. There

have been numerous instances where the Zardoz Karigars in spite of

earning much more than their current incomes have returned back to

their native land. Babbu (27) has a different story to tell. He never

wanted to come back from Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) where he had earned

in lakhs after just staying for four years as an illegal immigrant. But his

luck ran out and he was deported back along with many Zardozi

Karigars from different parts of the city.

He narrates that-

Living in Saudi for me was a dream come true. Since my

childhood I had seen people going to Saudi in search of greener pastures

and earn handsome money in quick time. If you work in Saudi for just a

year then you can easily build a full house from the earned income?

Working conditions and Nafri is totally different from Lucknow. Here,

the Office can cheat, lose your bills and give you just pennies for your

hard work, but in Saudi, the stringent rules and regulations and harsh

penalties help you reap benefits from your tireless attitude and hard

work....We can go to Saudi either by Umrah visa giving just Rs 40000 ($

833.33) or through a company visa where we paid Rs1.5 lakhs ($ 3125).

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Babbu is now back to Jeddah again after getting a work visa for

Rs 1.5lakhs ($ 3125). This time he can work freely and can send

remittances which will benefit his family and brother who still works as

a Karkhandar at a small Karkhana in Ghazi Mandi.

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Graph 1.3: Average Weekly Expenditure and Earning –Raees Manzi

Note: USD 1 = Rs 48

Graph 1.4: Average Weekly Expenditure and Earning- Ghazi Mandi

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In fact out of all the commonalities, the most fundamental one is

that the households are coping with incomes that are not just low, but

also irregular and unpredictable and that too few financial instruments

are available to effectively manage these uneven flows. But there is no

doubt that this irregularity, and above all unpredictability of income

causes even more serious challenges to cash-flow management, resulting

in ever more innovative measures to try and address them.

SPENDINGS ON RITUALS AND FESTIVALS BY THE POOR

NAWABS

Although not a devout Shia, Baqar also attends the Anjuman-e-

Nasrul Aza (a religious group), formed by the people of the Nakhas

locality where he was born and lived for years, before moving to

Thakurgunj locality. Anjuman-e- Nasrul Aza usually performs matam

(self flagellation) and recites to the rhythm of a special chant known as

nawha (elegy) after the Majlis (mourning session) to remember the

martyrdom of Imam Husain, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, at

the Battle of Karbala. A young man takes the microphone and begins to

chant one of the special nawha (elegies) that are a trademark of each

group in the city. As he does so, the members of the group including

Baqar Khan, fling their arms in the air and begin to beat their breasts

with a heavy rhythmical thud.

Every Shia locality has its own Anjuman (religious group) which

specifically consists of people from that area. Baqar also moves with

Anjuman-e- Raunaqe Deene Islam (Group of Glittering Islam) which

operates from Ghazi Mandi research area and is composed of mainly

Zardoz. Similarly Anjuman- e -Ghunchai Mahdia (Group of flowers

from the garden of the Mahdi- who before the Day of Resurrection,

alongside Jesus, will rid the world of wrongdoing, injustice and tyranny)

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consists of the people from the Raees Manzil research area, including

Zardoz and various other occupational groups.

Baqar remains reluctant when moving with the Anjumans, for it is

only after the Karkhanas get closed, that the Zardoz come out to move to

houses from where they have got a Wada, (invitation) for the Nauha

Khwani (elegy recitation). But because, there are almost all the Zardoz

in the Anjuman, he makes sure that he doesn’t miss many outings with

the Anjuman.

Baqar works with full dedication on Zardozi and makes sure to

repay all borrowed moneys to the grocers and his friends. To meet

pressing short-term needs, his main objective is cash-flow management.

Being able to manage immediate needs is a precondition for considering

long-term ambitions, and hence his emphasis is on the flexibility and

convenience of the financial tools, even if those tools were not always

reliable – reminding us that money is fungible.

The Zardoz is never short of spending money in annual religious

festivals like Moharram where they commemorate the martyrdom of

Imam Husain- grandson of Prophet Mohammed for over two months,

Eid

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Graph 1.5: Household Spendings in Moharram Raees Manzil

Graph 1.6:Shia Nawab Zardoz families spend most of their Savings in Moharram

on Rituals.

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Chapter -IV

ul Fit r (Festivity after the conclusion of the fast), Eid ul Adha (Festival

of Sacrifice), along with Nazr (Nyaz) - "an offering" every Thursday and

on special Islamic calendar dates. In each case they require large sums

of money and require huge savings to accomplish these rituals.

SMALL SCALE LENDING AND BORROWING

To manage day to day, the diary households patched and stretched

their savings and their loans, a strategy that was called into play

whenever an employer failed to pay on time, a spell of unemployment

hit, or a visitor suddenly arrived, to name just a handful of reasons.

Perhaps because saving is something that an individual or a household

can do without involving others, virtually every household saved. For

example, not a single one of the 60 households, even the very poorest,

was without some form of do it yourself saving. And yet for none of

these households was saving-at-home a sufficient strategy: all of them

had to turn to others in their community to bolster their capacity to

manage their money. So while saving was the most ubiquitous

instrument, much more cash food through loans, when I looked at all

withdrawals from saving and loans taken by the households, including

the very smallest transactions of each type, loans outnumbered savings

withdrawals by four to one.

Overwhelmingly, the loans were taken locally, in the "informal

market". 88 percent of all borrowing deals were informal, a figure that

climbs to 92 percent for the poorest part of the sample.

While moneylenders loom large as lenders of last resort, charging

fees that can stretch the capacities of borrowers, informal-sector

borrowing usually means paying zero interest, and in general the smaller

the sum the more likely is to be the case.

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After home savings, interest free borrowings was by far the most

frequently used financial instrument in all three countries. It

complements rather than contrasts with the households' attempts to save

at home, because interest free borrowing and lending is in essence a way

of harnessing the savings power of a neighbourhood or family network

to address the cash-flow problems of its individual members. To tap into

this network the diary households needed to be part of it: the portfolios

of the poor are thus portfolios of transactions and relationships. Better-

off people might manage money on an everyday basis with a credit card.

For the poor households in our study, the main strategy was to turn to

each other, using one-on-one lending and borrowing between friends,

family, and neighbours.

These interest free borrowings and lendings were ubiquitous

among all the households. Interest free borrowing and interest free

lending relate to each other in interesting ways. Often there is an

understanding that the borrower will return the favor and lend when the

need arises: I call this "reciprocal" lending and borrowing. In other

cases, the borrowing flows one way and the creditor in one deal is

unlikely to become the debtor in the next: this might be called

"obligatory" lending since it depends on the lender's sense that he or she

is obliged to help out the borrower with a loan. "Obligatory" lending

appears to be common in where there are many fewer reports of interest-

free lending by the diary households themselves than of interest-free

borrowing. This suggests that many poor people go to wealthier people

(people outside the range of our enquiry) for such loans – better off

family members or employers, for example, who feel some sense of

responsibility to help out.

To smooth their consumption, then, poor people often lean on

those around them with marginally more resources, and this is true not

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only in purely cash transactions, but also in groceries taken on credit, in

rent payments delayed, and in advances taken against wages. All these

transactions have in common that the advance (whether in goods,

services, or payment for labor) is given within an existing relationship

that reduces the risk to both borrower and lender.

[ 241 ]

Chapter VNAWAB HOUSEHOLD PARTICIPATION IN THE

INFORMAL SAVING MECHANISMS

The global recession might end soon, but there are no signs of the

woes of the poor in third world countries settling down. The impact of

the recession is huge- there are definite signs of job losses, loss of

income, high expenditures and an unusual increase in food prices. It then

becomes just unimaginable when we take into account the poor from the

third world countries, whose lives depend upon earnings which are

vulnerable to economic fluctuations and seasonality. This dilemma of

poverty becomes more pathetic when these earnings are just less than

$2, working for more than eight hours a day. How can one survive in

such conditions of haplessness and misery? Do they compromise on the

education of their children or do they make compromises on the health

front? To an extent yes - families reeling under extreme poverty make

compromises on all fronts- education, health and the quantity of food

stuff they eat daily. Every day of their lives is spent struggling to earn a

living, so that the children at home don’t sleep hungry and hence the big

question remains, what keeps them afloat?

The answer lies somewhere in their social structure, which helps

in maintaining strong social networks and ties among the members of

the neighbourhood and sometimes even employing financial tools, many

linked to informal networks and family ties, which according to

Coleman (1990) is the social capital of the society - a ‘glue’ that binds

people together (Putnam, 1993; Putnam, 1995; Portes, 1998; Shuksmith,

2000). Social capital consists of norms, networks and horizontal

associations (Putnam, Leonardi and Nanetti, 1993), that have important

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economic consequences for development outcomes including growth,

poverty and poverty alleviation (Gootaert, 1996).

Local social capital

Within a local community there are people, organizations and

companies from all three economic systems operating alongside each

other. Small businesses and corner shops (of the private sector) provide

local services to the communities and employ local people; community

councils and local authority offices (of the public sector) do the same.

And voluntary and community organizations, (of the third sector)

provide a web of social networks and also create paid and unpaid jobs.

All this activity by the sectors and between the sectors adds to the

overall development of the community and a better quality of life for

residents. Together they generate and maintain local social capital. At a

neighbourhood level the three sectors tend to be close and operate in a

closely integrated way.

At this local level, social capital plays a significant role in the

development of the local economy across the sectors. For example, it

can reduce transaction costs such that there can be unwritten agreements

and mutual understanding instead of the need for formal contracts. The

role of social enterprises running managed workspaces and offering

training and advice to the self-employed on behalf of a local authority is

a good example of the three sectors working together and building local

social capital for the benefit of the community. Similarly it is noticeable

how much of the work in which social enterprises are engaged is work

based on trust: childcare, domiciliary care, estate security, etc. The

quality of this work is enhanced also by local knowledge and a sense of

belonging to the community: local people doing local work.

This is not to suggest that social capital is not apparent at

regional/district, national or global levels. It manifests itself wherever

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there are networks and relationships between individuals and

organizations. Social capital currently thrives within the apparently

close relationships between multinational companies and government

ministers and officials just as much as it can enthusiastically be used by

the manager of a social enterprise and the local shopkeeper and the local

librarian. The importance is in the relationship and how that is used to

develop trust, which may lead on to reciprocal assistance.

Social Networks

These networks are structures of relationships linking social

actors-and are ubiquitous in contemporary society, especially among the

poor in third world countries. They regulate the flow of information, the

formation of social norms, the establishment of authority and the

administration of sanctions against anti normative behaviour, and trust

plays a fundamental role in these processes (Coleman, 1988; Burt, 1993;

Lin, 1999; Putnam, 2000).

Networks not only provide emotional support in times of crisis,

but are also, an instrumental aid for individuals whose social and

economic disadvantages place them “beyond the frontier” of formal

finance (Von Pischke, 1991), successful financial intermediation is often

accompanied by social intermediation. Social intermediation prepares

marginalised groups or individuals to enter into informal networks often

known as Rotating Services and Credit Associations (ROSCA’s) which

are groups developed by their members at the grass root level. They

bear different names in different countries, for example, in West Africa

they are tontines, paris, or susus; in South Africa they are stokvels; in

Egypt they are gam’iyas; in Guatemala they are cuchubales; in Mexico

they are tandas (Krahnen and Schmidt, 1994), hui in Taipei (Armendariz

de Aghion and Murdoch, 2005) and in Lucknow, India they are Beesi.

As Geertz (1962) points out, these associations serve as efficient

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institutions for amassing savings for small capital expenditures- an

important aid to economic development.

Social intermediation also creates a sense of trust and solidarity

among individuals in informal networks and hence borrowing and

lending on a day to day basis also marks an important component used

for settling small money crunches. Neighbours, friends and relatives are

the ones who come forward for support and in this way each ‘‘favour’’

is expected to be repaid, and those who can provide ‘‘favours’’ are

expected to do so when requested. It is only in the worst scenario when

credit needs are unavoidable that the poor are forced to borrow from

money lenders at usurious interest rates or sell their assets. This social

intrermediation leads to the formation of saving mechanisms among the

poor and leading to the formation of social capital.

Savings Mechanisms

Savings are an important determinant of wellbeing at both the

individual and national levels. For individuals, savings may be

motivated by life-cycle considerations, investment opportunities, the

desire to smooth consumption in the face of volatile incomes,or the need

to accumulate resources for large purchases. From an aggregate

perspective, savings help determine the supply of funds for investment.

And while the precise relationship between savings and growth is still a

subject of debate, for low-income countries financial development and

“deepening” are likely to have important implications for economic

growth and the effectiveness of monetary policy.

Households in low-income countries have a variety of

mechanisms available for saving. These mechanisms range from formal

institutions such as banks and credit unions to less formal mechanisms

such as holding cash, asset accumulation, and participation in rotating-

savings-and-credit-associations (ROSCAs). These mechanisms differ in

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important ways that have significant micro- and macroeconomic

implications. Yet very little is known about the micro-level determinants

of household participation in the various instruments. In this paper, I

discuss a simple framework for thinking about this choice, and provide

empirical evidence from Luckow. I focus on the choice between formal

market savings, specifically banks and postal savings, and informal

savings committees (beesi, a Indian ROSCA). Though somewhat

restrictive, I focus on these mechanisms because they represent

intermediated funds, are the most prevalent forms of savings in

Lucknow among the Nawabs, and because other savings are notoriously

difficult to measure.

Focusing on the distinction between formal and informal

institutions is important for several reasons. Informal finance

mechanisms are quite prevalent in low-income countries, and are

successful in meeting some specific financial needs. The advantage of

informal mechanisms such as ROSCAs (Rotating Services and Credit

Associations) is the ability to overcome some of the information and

enforcement problems that often lead to the absence of formal markets.

Because savings groups tend to be localized, agents on both sides of

transactions often know each other personally. Therefore, informational

problems such as adverse selection, moral hazard, monitoring, and

verification are less serious. Further, because participants in informal

savings committees typically share a common social bond (for example,

they tend to form among friends, family, neighbors, and coworkers), the

desire to maintain the capital embodied in those bonds provides

incentives against voluntary default.

HoIver, the fact that such institutions tend to be localized means

they are less able to exploit scale economies and are more vulnerable to

local economic shocks affecting all group members. The formal sector is

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superior on these grounds, and provides some additional advantages

over the informal sector, both for the individual and the economy. For

depositors, government insurance reduces the default risk of banking. In

the aggregate, funds intermediated through the banking sector can be

lent over a greater geographical area, equalizing the marginal product of

investment and enhancing efficiency. A further distinction between the

formal and informal sectors is that effective monetary policy typically

relies on central bank or government control over the banking system. A

large informal financial sector may compromise this ability.

Beesi Savings Committees Among the Poor

Beesi are informal savings committees structured like ROSCAs, as

discussed and analyzedby Besley et al. (1993, 1994). Individuals

voluntarily form groups and meet at regular intervals. At each meeting,

members contribute a fixed amount to a central pot, and take turns

receiving the pot. The order of receipt is determined either by lottery or

through agreement of the members. One motivation for such committees

is as as hort-term accumulation instrument to facilitate the purchase of

durables. Besley and Levenson (1996) discuss the role of the hui in

Taiwan in the accumulation of durable goods. With repeated

participation, or very large groups, these committees can also function

as a longer-term savings instrument. For instance, in Lucknow, the mean

group size is around 20 (bees is the Urdu word meaning twenty) and

most groups meet monthly. Thus, some members wait nearly two years

before they “withdraw” their deposits from the committee. Late

recipients are typically compensated for their delay, and thus many

individuals purposefully view these committees as savings instruments

that may yield high returns. While the order of receipt is typically

determined in advance, exceptions to the ordering may be made when a

member has a specific need, enhancing the liquidity of what is otherwise

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Chapter -V

a fairly rigid instrument. However, covariant shocks among group

members make it likely that a time of need for one member will also be

a time of need for other members. Thus, security is more of a concern

for depositors to Beesi savings committees.

One additional important characteristic of Beesi is that they tend

to form around social groupings, with members of a given group

typically residing or working near each other. These connections allow

the groups to overcome problems of information and enforcement.

However, it is precisely this “closeness” that renders these committees

vulnerable to group-wide income shocks that cause members to default

and threaten the solvency of the committee.

Banks vs Beesi, Accessibility

Aside from the primary differences regarding return on deposits,

security, and liquidity, these two financial organizations differ in terms

of accessibility. For banks, access depends first on physical access

(having a branch nearby). This typically means that rural households are

at a disadvantage, as the distance to a bank branch can be great, and can

involve substantial transportation costs. And while there are no explicit

restrictions on participation for any groups, physical distance and travel

can provide barriers to participation by women in particular, since the

observance of purdah restricts movement outside of the household. And

quite aside from physical access, participation in the banking sector also

depends on education; in order to open and operate an account, basic

skills such as reading, writing, and keeping track of the account are

necessary.

The literacy rate is just 30%, which will limit participation of a

substantial number of men and women. Access to Beesi savings

committees entails other factors; first, a group must exist, and second an

individual must be selected for participation in a group.A number of

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Chapter -V

factors determine whether a savings group exits. First, there must be a

sufficiently large number of people, living in close physical proximity,

who want to participate. Thus, areas with low population densities will

be less likely to sustain groups. Income sources and variability are

additional critical factors in group formation. In places with variable

income, or where most people are employed in seasonal activities such

as agriculture, it is unlikely that there will be enough individuals able to

make the regular contributions required for the group.

An additional factor regarding access is that, even if a group

exists, individuals must be selected for or admitted into the group. Beesi

are private groups, and membership of specific individuals is determined

by the group, either at the time of formation or when an individual asks

to join the group. In either case, there is likely to be a substantial

amount of screening by group members. Individuals who may pose

problems for the functioning of the group are unlikely to be admitted;

for example, individuals with very low or extremely variable incomes

are likely to have difficulty making regular payments.

However, unlike banks, Beesi are typically located locally and do

not involve substantial travel. And while groups form along social,

ethnic or religious lines, there tend to be multiple groups in any given

area. Further, some groups consist exclusively of women; combined with

reduced travel, this means that women have greater access to Beesi. And

finally, unlike banks, the functioning of the group does not require

literacy or numeracy of all the members. Typically a leader is chosen to

keep track of payments and records, and this is the only person within

the group who must be literate.

Case Study of two Women who Belong to the Nawab Families

This study reveals two such operating Beesi networks run by

women, each one from Ghazi Mandi organised by Shafia (female, 38)

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and at Raees Manzil by Sultana (female, 48). The Zardoz find saving in

Beesi to be uncomplicated, localized and efficient, in the absence of any

other saving mechanism. The risk levels are low and agents on both

sides of transactions mostly know each other personally. Therefore,

informational problems such as adverse selection, monitoring and

verification are less serious. Furthermore, because the participants in

Beesi network share a common social bond being neighbours, friends,

family members and co-workers, the desire to maintain the capital

embodied in those bonds provides incentives against voluntary default.

Moreover, if defaults occur, then the responsibility to pay the dues of

the participant falls upon the Organiser of these Beesi. The Organiser of

the Beesi pays all the dues, which have been defaulted by the member. It

is also noticed that the members also take into consideration the

genuineness of the Organiser and how he/she has managed the members’

money during his/her stint as a Beesi Organiser. I have noticed that the

trust levels of people in Raees Manzil is quite low and that they look at

each other with suspicion and doubt, especially when money is at stake.

Hence, running a Beesi is a big task for the Organiser, and what I

conclude is that although the people don’t trust each other, they back the

Organiser hoping that if someone defaults then the money will be paid

by the Organiser. The Organisers remain on their toes when receiving

the weekly or monthly instalments from the members. One can see

ferocious altercations with participants in case the instalments are not on

time. No one is spared, even blood relatives when payments are at stake.

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Chapter -V

Fig.13: Shafia receiving her Beesi instalment from his husband, who is also a member

of the network

Fig 14: Shafia paying out the ‘pot’ of Rs 23000 ($479.16) to a member on her turn.

The word Beesi comes from the word Urdu word ‘Bees’ meaning

twenty participants who have agreed to pay a certain sum in instalments

[ 251 ]

Chapter -V

to an Organiser, who himself/herself is one of the participants in the

network. But these days these Beesi networks need not have twenty

participants. There can be many more participants according to the

amount of money being invested and the duration of the Beesi. The mean

group size of the Beesi network is 23 Nawab families in Ghazi Mandi

while it is 60 in Raees Manzil. Out of these 60 members only 37

members belonging to the Nawab families were involved in Zardozi

were researched upon. The Ghazi Mandi groups meets at an interval of

one month and the instalment for each participant of the network is Rs

1000 ($20.83) receiving Rs 23000 ($ 479.166), (see fig.20&21) while

the Raees Manzil Beesi network has 60 members who meet every week

for a draw and saves Rs100 $ (2.08) per week, each member getting Rs

6000 ($ 125). This weekly draw, according to the participants, creates a

sort of interest among all the participants who are interested in the pot.

In both cases the draw of the recipients is done in front of all the

members present through a lottery.

The Organisers (Shafia and Sultana) in both these Beesi networks

take away the first Beesi (pot). In case of a financial emergency, the

participants negotiate and switch their numbers. Hence based on mutual

understanding the Beesi money is transferred to the needier person.

Surprisingly over time a large proportion of income gets managed this

way by a poor household.

Surprisingly both the Beesi networks were established for the sake of

self interest and a need for money for their own household businesses,

but they have different stories to tell on what led them to organise a

Beesi in their respective areas.

Shafia started organising the Beesi in Ghazi Mandi soon after her

marriage. Before her marriage she had never organised anything like

that, and it was the need for money which led her to venture into the

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formation of a network, which since 17 years has not shown any default.

Starting a Bessi was a joint effort of Shafia and her sister Nikhat Bano

who wanted some money for the construction of her house. It was by

virtue of her novel idea that Shiafia’s first Beesi network was

established in 1993, which had 70 members each contributing Rs100 per

week to the pot. The group drew predominantly Ghareelu (household)

women of Ghazi Mandi, and that created her reputation as an Organiser

in this area. Shafia tells-

I enjoy a very healthy reputation among the members of the Beesi

and people come from far flung localities in Lucknow to join my Beesi

now. Earlier this was not the case, it was tough as I was also new to this

area and knew very few people, but luckily as the women were very

responsible and were in dire need for money they trusted me and this led

to the formation of a strong network....The first pot is mine and this is

the advantage of being the Organiser and this makes me a de facto

borrower from the other members of the Beesi and thus I take up full

responsibilities as an Organiser to turn up at subsequent meetings to

repay their debt obligations..... People put money in Beesi because they

need someone to save money for them and here they are under

obligation to save money as instalments, which otherwise they are not

bound to do so. Participants use their money for their daily use, buying

jewellery, education, building a house and most importantly for repaying

debts etc. Many women who participate in my Beesi seek to get money

out of their household without letting their husband know about it and

they find putting money into Beesi more profitable rather than saving in

the bank. Moreover as their autonomy is restricted due to the notion of

modesty they prefer coming and dealing with a woman...” Selecting the

members is a bit of a tough process and requires a careful knowledge of

your neighbourhood- who is doing what? I usually approach those

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people who are from my neighbourhood and are working hard to earn a

living. The prerequisite is that they should be running a Zardozi

Karkhana and earning well...Those people who don’t do any work and

loiter around are usually the only ones who will never be included in my

Beesi, even if they come on their own. There are people who in my

network sometimes complain about other members, but I don’t go by

what they say to me. I remain confident of my choice and I believe in

my eyes and don’t go by what other members are telling me. In a very

recent incident, my friend was complaining about her own brother and

argued that he should not be included in the Beesi network or else he

will default and the rest of the members will suffer. Her concern was

that her brother plays Ludoo (board game) and gambles with his earned

money... I told her it’s up to me to get the instalments from him. Now he

is submitting the Beesi on time, before the 5th of every month... I

include only those relatives who live very close to my house for it is

easy to pursue them. I am liable to all the members too for ensuring all

the payments get in on time and if the members do not send their

instalments on time, then I feel responsible for this. I don’t want such a

behaviour to creep in, then it will be impossible for me to run this Beesi,

and it will destabilise the whole set up...The message is clear, loud and

simple- the instalments should reach me by the 5 th of every month as the

payments are to be made on 10 th. Those who resist my orders are

omitted. For instance I have not spared even my blood relatives – my

father’s brother’s wife (chachi), my mother’s brother (mamu) because

they never paid the instalments on time... Most of the people come and

give their money at my home on their own, but at times I also have to go

to their houses to get the money. Even if the instalments are late, they

are not later than 8 th of every month...My husband is a bit lousy in

money matters, but I remain alert and every month I go and give the

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payment on time to the respective client’s house. I don’t depend on my

husband..

Shafia’s daughters help their mother in her tasks of making chits

and jotting down the names of the members who will be participating in

the Beesi. Her eldest daughter Noor Jahan (19) prepares the chits with

numbers written on them. These numbers represent the months on which

the participant who has picked up the chit will be getting the ‘pot’.

Participants are invited for the random lottery at the start of the cycle

and then allowed one by one to pick up the chits. As they pick, the

numbers which denote their months are jotted down on a diary. This is

done in the presence of all the members to avoid any conflict regarding

their allotted months or numbers. The problem of enforcements like

penalties never seems to happen in Shafia’s Beesi. Members pay their

Beesi on time for they also seem responsible for the instalments on time.

There arises a question of whether in Shafia’s Beesi a problem of

enforcement could evolve once the order of the pot is determined as

those participants who are very last in the line will be at a disadvantage,

as that participant is better off saving up on his own? According to

Shafia this is an inherent problem but participating members do tend to

shuffle their order if someone has an intense need for money. Mutual

consultations are very common, but this happens only between members

who are close friends or relatives. There is a possibility that if a member

shuffles and gives his number to the needy member and later on that

needy member could default, although this has not happened in her

Beesi, but the possibilities are numerous and anything can happen. She

has passed specific instructions to the members that each one of them is

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Chapter -V

Fig. 14: Simple book keeping procedure showing the names of the

members who have given their Beesi Instalment.

[ 256 ]

Chapter -V

responsible for himself or herself when interchanging their numbers

with any other existing members. But as the people are well acquainted

with each other, with most of them belonging to the same

neighbourhood, such a possibility is next to nil.

Shafia has included a Sunni member to her Beesi who resides just

next to her house. She knows him well and argues that she never

discriminates between people when money is at stake. Even when

tensions were high some years ago between the two sects Shafia was

least bothered about any Sunni member in her Beesi. She says that she

would love to have more Sunni members participating in her Beesi-that

will eventually help in her cause to save more for her household. It can

easily be said that people tend to trust Shafia (Organizer) and even trust

each other, and give way to form a wider network of relationships,

where everyone is for himself and is also for others.

Similarly, Sultana (48) Organiser of Raees Manzil Beesi, also

belonging to a Nawab family has 5 children- three daughters and two

sons. Two of her daughters are married and the boys help their father

Raees in his business of making pillows. Some 23 years ago, Sultana

used to work on Kamdani and stitched clothes to eke out her living, but

saving and organising a Beesi has changed her life. She narrates her

story that one day her 6 year old daughter Daisy brought home Rs1

which she and some other friends of her class had collected in

denominations of Rs .25 each. Daisy’s class mates had told her that

every day we all will contribute Rs 0.25 ($ .0052) and one of us turn by

turn will get this collected money. When Daisy brought that collected

money home, Sultana enquired from where she had brought that money.

Sultana had never known what it was, but some of her family members

told her that this was similar to Beesi and suggested she also start a

network in her neighbourhood where one of the members will receive

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the pot on a weekly basis. Thus, Sultana’s first Beesi was started with

Rs 5 ($0.10).

Sultana says –

I don’t keep members who live far away from Raees Manzil.

Almost all the members are from Raes Manzil and neighbouring

localities. If any of the members are unable to give their instalments on

time then a fine of Rs 5 ($ 0.10) is imposed per day and that money is

transferred to the member who gets the pot that month. Fines are given

by the members and in case the instalment comes and the fine doesn’t

then in that case I put in some Rs.5-Rs.10 ($0.10-$ 0.20) if I know that

the household paying out the fine is poor and doesn’t have much

monetary resources in hand then sometimes I payout the fine by letting

them know about it. Most of the members here in Raees Manzil are poor

Zardoz who earn very little on a weekly basis. Hence, keeping in mind

the weekly payment system of the Zardozi occupational group, I have

started organising the Beesi where the payments of the pot are

distributed on weekends and this suits their lifestyle. We have to use the

Beesi money for paying out the debts of the members as many have

defaulted and left the network.. From the money which I saved for Beesi

I have arranged for the dowry of my two elder daughters for their

marriage. I have also fixed some money in ‘Marriage Endowment

Policy’ for my younger daughter Daisy (17) and also have kept

additional money for her education....”

Sultana knows the behaviour of the people in her neighbourhood

for they are poor and can default. Many people from her neighbourhood

have defaulted after getting the Beesi payments, due to which debts of

Rs.1.5 lakhs ($3125) have accumulated on her shoulders to be paid to

the members. She is paying her debts through the Beesi, but remains

silent on the names of these people for she follows strict principles, and

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never leaks any information of her members to anyone. She refuses the

absconders and defaulters from access to future cycles of Beesi.

People turn up in anticipation of the pot which according to

Anderson, Baland and Moene (2003) is the “early pot motive” for

ROSCA (Rotating Services and Credit Association). According to

Beatriz Armendariz de Aghion and Morduch (2005), the assumption of

impatience also matters to the early pot story; otherwise households

would be content to save up on their own.

Sultana remains non indulgent which creates a situation in which

members say ‘they don’t eat themselves but pay the instalment for

Sultana’s Beesi’. She was not like this, but when members defaulted she

had no option but to enforce payments. She relates an incident of a

young man who had started a barber’s shop adjacent to Raees Manzil.

As he had been there in the neighbourhood Sultana and his husband

Raees developed a sense trust with him. He became a member and the

mistake they did was not to scrutinize his credentials. The barber kept

on paying up his instalments regularly on time but one day he came to

them and asked that he wanted someone’s pot as he was in need of

money. He promised to take only Rs. 40,000 ($833.33) on a pot that was

of 50,000 ($ 1041.66) – which would profit the member a whopping

Rs10, 000($208.33). Sultana had already told everyone that it will not be

her responsibility if there is any exchange of pots between members. He

somehow pursued Babba Jani, a member, and was able to dupe him. He

took the money from Babba Jani on the condition that when he gets the

pot he will pay up 50,000 ($1041.66). Since the day he took that money

he never returned and because of which Sultana had to pay Babba Jani

his dues in instalments.

The beauty of saving through Beesi is that it empowers people

with a mechanism which is simple and does not require any collateral.

[ 259 ]

Chapter -V

Women particularly feel empowered as it can help them save sums of

money in secret which are not possible to obtain from their husbands. It

is a boon for the poor who need lump sum amounts for making large

purchases, by translating small bits and pieces of their hard earned

money into a large chunk that can be used to fund a major purchase.

The narratives presented through this research paper are evocative

and tend to present before us real life experiences and situations which

have been a part of one’s life. The hard realities are mind boggling and

are a representation of how people fight with poverty and forge ways to

survive in even the harshest of conditions.

[ 260 ]

Chapter VICONCLUSION

Stark realities emerge from this research and that has always

bewildered me for several reasons- the foremost being how people are

able to survive with such low incomes. One of the biggest challenges of

living on two dollar a day is that it doesn’t always come, which makes it

impossible to plan out future expenditure and calculate one’s own

capacity to save or repay. My concern remains with how these Nawabs

will be able to meet the challenges which the world will be posing for

them in the near future? Expenses are mounting, inflation in India is

unstoppable and showing an upward trend, education and health remains

unattended due to a poor household economy.

We have seen through out the research that a sense of a strong

social capital is found among the members of the Nawab community and

other poor living in the same neighbourhood. Beesi is such an example

where people come forward and manage their financial resources with

outmost responsibility. Social capital gains its important throughout the

discussion in previous chapters. One can think of social capital

particularly social networls as an asset that people accumulate largely by

spending time building relationships with helping others. Some returns

on this asset-such affection for some relationships-are certain ,while

other returns depend on the state of the world.

The existence of seemingly archaic forms of production does not

mean they resist capitalism, or have not already been assimilated by it. It

is vitally important to acknowledge that scarcely any handicraft

production in South Asia has been unaffected by commoditization.

While the pace of capitalist intervention in crafts has increased in the

[ 261 ]

Chapter -VI

past 20-25 years or so,'' there is growing evidence that transformations

were taking place in 'traditional industries’ by the end of the nineteenth

century. The possibility that changes were also going on in other crafts

is very strong. For example, from its inception Chikan and Zardozi

embroidery production has resembled what Marx termed 'industrial

manufacture’ since all finished pieces of chikan and Zardozi embroidery

are made in a multi-stage process where laborers at each stage rely upon

workers in other stages to complete their own tasks. In other words,

there are virtually no independent labourers in the industry. Manufacture

entails the break-up of a production process into stages, a division of

labour with interdependent workers, a decline in skilled labour and the

systematic extraction of surplus labour. A single workplace is

unnecessary for manufacture to take place. Indeed, dispersed workplaces

afford many advantages to capital, including tbe need to comply with

labour laws and workplace safeguards, likelihood of labour organisation

and bypassing of fixed capital commitments.- The idealised form of

handicrafts production—home or workshop-based, low technology,

seemingly self-reliant artisans—coincides neatly with the very form

contemporary capitalism dictates.

While home-working women are at a disadvantage all over the

world, and in many different industries, handicrafts have the potential to

work especially pernicious effects because of the ideological dimensions

of the commodities themselves. The depiction of women's labour as

part-time or use-value production, or women as mere helpers of men,

permits an air of tradition and authenticity to attach itself to their work.

The preservation of handicrafts in an idealised form cannot be done in

any other way than by making them commercially successful.

Constructing a gendered domain of production obscures this

paradox, because commodities are seen to be made in ways that are

[ 262 ]

Chapter -VI

conceived as morally and culturally traditional. Such a construction also

serves as the means by which any commercial success achieved can be

kept from the very women who ensure it, by denying their status both as

workers and intelligent creators. It is, in summary, impossible to efface

the contradiction between crafts as symbols of tradition and their status

as commodities produced by alienated workers. This contradiction lies at

the very core of what contemporary craftwork is, and deserves more

serious attention from South Asia social scientist

From my conversations with the Nawabs they have an urge to

move forward and free themselves from the clutches of the

Offices/Boutiques/Shops who, with their corrupt practices, are pushing

them over the edge. They believe there is nothing wrong with the

profession, but traditionally, the way the Nawabs are victimized by a

handful of middle men who have controlled their access to markets,

dictated business terms, and siphoned off profits, creates images in their

minds which are full of misery filled with an intense feeling to shun this

occupation. There have been instances where the Nawabs have requested

me to look for alternative jobs, so that at least the younger generation

can move out and earn without being crushed on a daily basis for a few

bucks.

They are fighting a lone battle for their families but they need

help in order to educate their children in inexpensive computing and

some basic education about the internet. From the data collected the

Nawabs remains insensitive to the changing paradigm of the world

which is led by IT (Information Technology). The curriculum at Schools

remains unpractical towards the needs of the present economy and what

puts the household under severe stress is the extra charges which

government and private institutions charge from the children when they

opt for computers, which sometimes forces them to leave the subject.

[ 263 ]

Chapter -VI

Initiatives have to be taken to inculcate the poor with ideas, that they

can also move forward and defeat poverty by taking bold initiatives for

their lives. There might be skeptics who think the poor economies are

incapable of using IT as a fulcrum for growth -only small initiatives

will lead to positive results. Recently India unveiled a Rs 1,500 (around

$30) computer designed specifically for students which would be made

available to students in 2011- a ray of hope for poor students. This can

surely open up new vistas for poor Zardoz who can upload their designs

onto their self designed web pages or websites and book orders directly

after full payments into their business accounts. I feel really optimistic

that change can happen if the right initiatives are taken with willingness

and determination.

We see that this Informal finance, once the preserve of

anthropologists and sociologists, is progressively capturing the attention

of a growing number of economists see EBOUE [1988],). There are

probably two reasons for this growing interest. First, the findings from

field research in several developing countries suggest that the role of

informal finance in resource mobilization and resource allocation is

quantitatively significant: in many cases, there are indications that

informal financeintermediates amounts comparable to these raised by

formal institutions(SCHRIEDER and CUEVAS [1989] for Cameroon,

IZUMIDA [1989] for Japan in early XXth

century, SANDERATNE [1989] for Sri Lanka, ONCHAN [1989]

for Thailand). Second, and perhaps more importantly, there is a growing

awareness that 'informal finance persists and often flourishes because it

resolves important problems that are handled poorly or not at all by most

formal financial systems' in developing countries (ADAMS, 1989,p. 11)

Disappointment with the effectiveness of 'formal' financial systems in

fostering economic growth has led to a reevaluation of the role of

[ 264 ]

Chapter -VI

informal finance. One of the most ubiquous 'informal' institutions is the

so-called Rotating Saving and Credit Association (Roscas),here in this

case is Beesi.

The Zardoz Nawabs households face challenges of poverty that

impact not only their livelihoods but make them suffer on many fronts –

literacy, health, income. Having been left with little choice on their

economic front, they remain unaware of how to save money and which

financial instruments to use for their small savings. Without access to

proper savings instruments and financial literacy, they remain at risks.

For instance, when health crises strike which leads to broader economic

problems, they have rely on friends, neighbours and relatives for small

sums of money. The results also show that the poor have room in their

budget for savings and understand the need to save and its prime

example is the use of Beesi, which gives them the opportunity to save

over a long span of time. The lump sum amounts received through Beesi

are well planned for spending on various needs ranging from small day

to day needs to life cycle needs, emergencies and investment

opportunities and of course in their religious life. Beesi tend to blur the

distinction between saving and borrowing. Members are transformed ,

one by one from net savers into net borrowers. This happens because the

basic mechanism is the intermediation of a series of small pay-ins into a

single large payout, and this mechanism is true for savers and

borrowers.

Although the Zardoz households are under intense pressure to

earn night and day, each member does his bit which keeps them far from

hand to mouth. They remain close to their neighbours helping them

when emergencies strike, but when bringing designs and orders from the

Office they tend to hide it even from their closest friend- for now it is

their livelihood at stake.

[ 265 ]

Chapter -VI

The role of the government is crucial for it needs to curb inflation

which is rising and fuelling the poverty in third world countries. Food

prices have reached their peak in the last one year, and never seem to

bottom out. The data collected from the households was in the summer

of 2009, and since then there has been a substantial increase in the

prices of essential commodities.

Reducing the plight of these poor Nawabs will require access to

alternative jobs and they need to learn skills which they can apply when

they have no work. A steady economic foundation is the need of the

hour, along with helping them save money through instruments that are

safe and easy to use. The lack of financial literacy remains a concern for

them. The informal instruments they use are effective but unreliable.

Moreover, if we look at Beesi then neither the size of the pot nor the size

of the contributions is flexible within the life of the Beesi, thus creating

many problems for those who want to quit. Lump sum amounts can be

achieved from a Beesi, but a larger pot needs to recruit more members,

which can lead to defaults and management problems. The lifespan of a

Beesi also tends to increase and can be a problem for those with

insufficient flow of capital on a regular basis. It is for this reason that

not many Zardoz participate in Beesi and shy away from it.

It is now for the financial houses and development agencies to

step in and address poverty issues by directly working with the poor and

exploring new possibilities of banking services for the poor. All that we

need is a shift in emphasis from ‘concern’ with general services to a

‘sharper focus’ on improving the financial lives of the poor, so that they

may enjoy the freedom of life without being financially insecure.

There is a need to provide some additional financial tools so that

they can get ‘better save their bits and pieces properly on a day to day

basis’. They spend heavily on rituals and in festivals and follow an

[ 266 ]

Chapter -VI

urban lifestyle which is full of show. People need to curb their spending

on festivities and small invisible expenses which remain unaccounted

for- tobacco, tea with friends, recreation, cell phone etc. Reduction of

poverty will take more than the financial sector development for there is

a need for jobs and the development of alternative skills which can

produce a household that can switch to some other work for their day to

day earnings.

A better understanding of how the poor wish to manage their

money, and a shift in emphasis from a concern with general

development objectives to a sharper focus on improving the financial

services might mean that many more poor people could get improved

help to manage their money.

Creating better financial services for the poor starts with

having a clear idea of just what constitutes good services.

The message of this essay is that financial services for the poor

help them swap their savings for lump sums of cash. It follows that good

financial services for the poor are those that perform this swap well.

This requires above all:

1. Products that suit the poor’s capacity to save and their needs for

lump sums:

So that they can save (or repay) in small sums, of varied value, as

frequently as possible so that they can access the lump sums (through

withdrawals or through loans) when they need them: short term for some

consumption and emergency needs, medium term for investment

opportunities and some recurrent life-cycle needs, longer term for other

life-cycle needs like marriage, health-care, education and old age.

2. Product delivery systems that are convenient for the poor:

[ 267 ]

Chapter -VI

that are local, frequent and quick

that are not burdened with paperwork and other transaction costs

that are transparent in a way that is easy for illiterate people to

grasp

Although this conclusion is not, essentially, about institutions, our

recapitulation of what constitutes good financial services for poor

people would not be complete without some further reference to the

‘promoters’ and ‘providers’

We need-

3. Institutions adapted to delivering good products:

that are committed to serving the poor

that are cost-effective

and

4. A healthy environment for financial services for the poor:

stable macro-economic and financial management by government

the rule of law

helpful rather than restrictive legislation governing promoters and

providers of financial services for the poor.

Moreover there are also clear implications for governments and

local authorities who wish to create policies to strengthen the social

economy.

At a local level, policies could be developed that encourage local

people to get together and form social networks. The formation of

voluntary organizations along with trading schemes, mentoring,

volunteering, and so on will contribute directly to the building of local

social capital. Institutions and programmes that foster a sense of

[ 268 ]

Chapter -VI

community and help articulate shared values can be encouraged.

Strengthening the community ownership of public assets such as village

halls and community centres is a practical way of promoting growth in

local social capital (Performance and Innovation Unit, 2002).

At regional there should perhaps be further research into new

structures that support the development of social capital. This research

has to be closely followed by support for national organizations that put

organizations in touch with each other and encourage networking and

exchange internationally as well as nationally.

These values can connect and thus link the smallest

neighbourhood enterprise to the largest mutual organization. Second,

providing support to networking organizations will improve networking

and help build trust such that organizations, which at present emphasize

their differences, can start to see the common ground that unites them.

Social capital, the social economy and community development

once trust develops, then mutual help and working together will follow.

Further research is required to look at ways in which social capital may

be measured, perhaps through an extension of social accounting and

audit. Finally, the levels of social capital within society generally need

to be monitored. If it begins to reduce or if it is used to exclude, steps

must to be taken to counter this, to ensure that social capital is used to

create a healthy, balanced and equitable society. A high level of social

capital will of itself achieve nothing. It has to be used, by people

working through their organizations and structures, in short through

civil society.

Undoubtedly, social capital is – and always has been – an

important concept. As our understanding of how things work and do not

work within communities becomes clearer, we recognize that society is

[ 269 ]

Chapter -VI

made up of connections just as much as it is made up of money,

materials resources and human resources.

The above suggestions can be a part of the discussion on how to

eradicate poverty and misery of the Nawabs of Lucknow who remain

depressed and are living in complete misery and problems. After the

partition they have not yet been able to find a right place for themselves.

They have gone down in education and economic resources. Living on

pittance and low wages around the year has shattered their will power

and health. A lot need to be done to enhance their lifestyle which

includes providing better jobs and taking care of the education of the

children. Children should be the focus of developmental agencies for if

they remain uneducated and trapped in Zardozi, this vicious cycle of

poverty will never break up. We need to be more proactive as

researchers and indeed this research is a medium through which I have

tried to instill vigor in the minds of the reader to look around and see

how much apathy is surrounding the people, who once used to rule the

province of Avadh.

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[ 279 ]

SOCIO-ECONOMIC BACKGROUND OF THE DESCENDENTS OF THE

NAWABS OF AVADH

Thesis submitted to the University of Lucknow

for the award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

ByBy

Syed Aasim RizviSyed Aasim Rizvi

DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGYDEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGYUNIVERSITY OF LUCKNOWUNIVERSITY OF LUCKNOW

LUCKNOW - 226007LUCKNOW - 226007

References 2014

[ cclxxxi ]

DeclarationDeclarationThis thesis is an original investigation whilst a research scholar in the Department of Sociology, University of Lucknow and has been carried out under the supervision of Prof.Ram Gadesh Yadav. It has not been submitted in part or full to this or any other University, for any other Degree or Diploma.

____________________________

SYED AASIM RIZVISYED AASIM RIZVIResearch Scholar

__________________________________

PROF. RAPROF. RAM GADESH YADAVM GADESH YADAVResearch SupervisorHead of the Department

Department of SociologyUniversity of Lucknow

Lucknow- 226007

AcknowledgementsAcknowledgements

I sincerely extend my profound gratitude and indebtedness to my

supervisor Prof. Ram Gadesh Yadav, Head, Department of Sociology,

Lucknow University, Lucknow for his esteemed supervision and keen

interest in my research. It was entirely his patient and insightful

guidance, invaluable advises and constructive criticism that has enabled

me to complete the present study. The faith he showed in me by giving

me flexibility and independence to work is also highly appreciated.

I am grateful to Dr.Syed Aiman Raza, (Assistant Professor,

Department of Anthropology, Shia PG College) Dr.Mirza Mohd Abu

Tayyab Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Shia PG College

and Dr. Pradeep Sharma Department of Sociology, Shia PG College,

Dr.Sanobar Haider, (Assistant Professor, Department of History,Govt

Degree College Kalan Kheeri, Palai & Mohd Haider, Advocate for their

kind co-operation, help and encouragement. I have benefited from all of

them, but while I am willing to share with them the credit for any virtues

the research may have, I jealously guard my sole ownership of its faults.

While regretting my inability to thank everyone individually, his

or her contributions and wishes towards accomplishing the presently

undertaken task, are genuinely acknowledged with gratitude.

Syed Aasim RizviSyed Aasim Rizvi

ToTo

MummyMummy

This fulfils your long awaited dream….

CONTENTSCONTENTS

List of Photographs

List of Graph and Tables

Chapter I INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION 1-10

Methodology 5

Chapter II HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF LUCKNOW AND NAWABS OF AWADH

11-186

Present Lucknow 180

Demographic and Social Profile 182

Gender Ratio 183

Literacy 183

Key Demographic Issues 184

Economic Base 184

Heritage 185

Chapter III THEORY OF SOCIO-ECONOMICS IN THEORY OF SOCIO-ECONOMICS IN SOCIOLOGYSOCIOLOGY

187-206

Historical Attempts at Economic Sociology 189

New Economic Sociology 194

Network Analyses 197

The Influence of Culture and Values 199

Organization Theory 200

Possible Future Directions 205

Chapter IV THE DAILY GRIND:DAY TO DAYTHE DAILY GRIND:DAY TO DAY PROBLEMS OF THE NAWABS PROBLEMS OF THE NAWABS

207-241

Small Balances and Large Cash Flows 210

Multiple and Uncertain Occupations 212

Unpredictability and Low Incomes 219

Zardozi and the Nawabs 220

Contents

Seasonal Earnings of Nawab Households attached to Zardozi

228

Spendings On Rituals and Festivals By The Poor Nawabs

236

Small Scale Lending and Borrowing 239

Chapter V NAWAB HOUSEHOLD PARTICIPATION IN THE INFORMAL SAVING MECHANISMS

242-260

Savings Mechanisms 245

Beesi Savings Committees Among the Poor 247

Banks vs Beesi, Accessibility 248

Case Study of two Women who Belong to the Nawab Families

249

Chapter VI CONCLUSIONCONCLUSION 261-270

REFERENCESREFERENCES 271-279

LIST OF FIGURES

Map: 1.0 Research Area Ghazi Mandi and Raees Manzil in Lucknow, India

4

Map: 2.0 Research Areas Raees Manzil and Ghazi Mandi in Old Lucknow

4

Map: 3.0 Awadh in 1857 10

Map 4.0 Present Lucknow 181

Plate: I Fig.No.1 A child of a Nawab family working on a piece of cloth for Rs 30 a week.

206

Fig No. 2 A Nawab explaining his day to day life problems

206

Plate: II Fig.No.3 A woman working on chikan embroidery 213

Fig No.4 Women from Nawab households help their male counterparts in the household finances.

213

Plate: III Fig.6 A Karigar (labourer) making powdered chalk

222

Fig.7 Chalk is being mixed with kerosene oil 222

Fig.8 The solution of chalk and kerosene is rubbed on to the Khaka (design) which has minute holes.

222

Fig No.9 A group of Nawab Karigars working on a piece of cloth

222

Plate: IV Fig.10 Use of Katiya to draw illegal electricity 231

Fig.11 Katiya is being used by a NawabZardoz and a house from the main electric line

231

Fig 12. Electricity theft at Ghazi Mandi by Katiya connection.

231

Plate: V Fig.13 Shafia receiving her Beesi instalment from his husband, who is also a member of the network

251

Fig 14 Shafia paying out the ‘pot’ of Rs 23000 ($479.16) to a member on her turn.

251

Fig.14 Simple book keeping procedure showing the names of the members who have given their Beesi Instalment.

256

List of Graphs and Tables

Table No. 1.0 Portfolio Summary for Subir and Mumtaz over the Research Year

211

Graph No. 1.1 Seasonal household variations in US Dollar -Raes Manzil

229

Graph No. 1.2 Seasonal household variations in earnings-Ghazi Mandi

229

Graph No.1.3 Average Weekly Expenditure and Earning –Raees Manzi

235

Graph No. 1.4 Average Weekly Expenditure and Earning- Ghazi Mandi

235

Graph No. 1.5 Household Spendings in Moharram Raees Manzil.

238

Graph No.1.6 Shia Nawab Zardoz families spend most of their Savings in Moharram on Rituals

238