AMAZING UNTOLD
STORIES OF INDIA’S FIRST WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 1857
[The first fact
we must remember about this great liberation war is that though known as 1857
war of independence but it continued till the end 1859 steadily. This commemorative
piece based on the contemporary documents appeared on of the 150th
anniversary (2007) of India’s first great war of liberation, in English, Hindi and
Urdu. The following revised version is being released on the 164th
commemoration [2021] of this great liberation War. The primary sources quoted
in this essay are available with the author which were collected from different
parts of the world in over a period of more than a decade. Another aspect
author wants to highlight is that in this narrative mainly those incidents/individuals
have been covered in which revolutionaries laid down their lives. I would make
a humble request that researchers having interest in this theme, if possible,
should make copies of it and put in the libraries.]
(1) Participation of common people in
India’s First War of Independence.
(2) Hindu-Muslim-Sikh joint martyrdoms in
India’s First War of Independence.
(3) Women in the forefront of India’s
First War of Independence.
(4) Conclusion: Shameless betrayal of
the sacrifices and joint heritage of India’s First War of Independence by our
independent India.
(2) Participation
of common people in India’s First War of Independence
There is no
denying the fact that the first sparks of India's First War of Independence were
ignited on 15th February 1857, when the soldiers of the 19th Native Regiment of
East India Company rose in revolt at the Barrakpore cantonment in Bengal. The
immediate reason for this revolt was the use of newly introduced cartridges
which the soldiers had to bite before using. These were very smooth due to use
of a greasy material and the soldiers had strong apprehension that this was due
to the use of the fat of cows and pigs. British army officers failed in giving
any convincing explanation that it was not the case.
Thus the
religious feelings of Hindu and Muslim soldiers were equally hurt by the
introduction of these new cartridges and outcome was mutinies in many
cantonments. To suppress mutiny at Barrakpore
the British rulers held Mangal Pandey responsible for it and presented him in
front of a military court which finally ended in his being hanged to death on
8th April 1857. Mangal Pandey's execution helped spreading the revolt in other parts
of the country and most of the cantonments of the Company sepoys [Indian
soldiers] started protesting.
It did not happen
in isolation. Parallel to this were thousands of native rulers and taluqdaars [big
landholders] who announced their independence in various parts of the country.
This collective revolt came to a critical point when on 10th May 1857, Indian
soldiers of the British army devastated the biggest cantonment of the East
Indian army at Meerut army in North India. This rebellion did not remain
confined to the Meerut cantonment. It seems that they had a plan and marched on
to Delhi in order to have an audience with the captive Mughal King, Bahadur
Shah Zafar. They were joined by thousands of peasants on the way. Similar to
this, rebel soldiers from the North India's various cantonments and the common
people continued marching towards Delhi, the capital of the independent Mughal
Empire.
Under the
leadership of Bahadur Shah Zafar, an independent government was formed in Delhi, which issued an
announcement in the name of countrymen and called upon for eradication of British
rule and put all the energy in this holy work because "if the British
continue ruling India, they will leave no one
alive".[i]
The myths which have
continually been propagated about this war of liberation are that it was a
mutiny which occurred due to the indiscipline of the soldiers which was supported
by the repressive, degenerated and corrupt feudal elements like kings and
nawabs who backed the undisciplined soldiers and it was short lived and had no
pan-Indian character.
Many of these
insinuations appeared in the contemporary writings of many Indians who were in
the service of the East India Company or the British stooges. The two such
important works, both in Urdu were, Tareekh-e-Bhaghawat-e-Hind:Moharba-e-Azeem
[History of Indian Mutiny: A Great War by Pandit Kanhaya Lal which appeared at
the end of 1857 and the other by Syed Ahmad Khan (also known as Sir Syed)
titled, Asbab-e-Bhaghawat-e-Hind [The Causes of the Indian Revolt] which
was published in 1859.[ii]
The historians
who thought on these lines believed that this struggle did neither enjoy the
support of the country's masses nor had pan-India character. On the 150th
anniversary of this struggle, it is important to let the nation and the world
be aware of the facts and demolish the myths constructed by the British
stooges.
The first
myth about India’s First War of Independence 1857 which we must confront is that
it was short-lived rebellion which was suppressed in the year 1857 itself. The
contemporary official documents (specially, The British government gazetteers)
tell a different story. It continued in one form or the other till 1959. The
last big battle was fought on 21st Jan 1859 near Sikar in Rajasthan. In this
battle, due to the treachery of native rulers of the region, a huge army of the
revolutionaries led by Tatya Tope, Rao Sahib and Shahzada Ferozshah's had to
face defeat. Smaller battles continued through 1960.
The second
myth that it had no national character is not borne by the contemporary
narratives. This First War of Independence of India true to its name was a
national liberation war. It raged from Jammu in the North to Hyderabad in the
South and from West in Afghanistan to East in Tripura, everywhere the British
rule was challenged and in many cases overthrown. The liberation war which
started from Meerut spread in the whole country like a wild fire.
CONTEMPORARY BRITISH NARRATIVES CONFESSING
MASS CHARACTER OF THE REBELLION
In this liberation war, army men, zamindars,
Rajas, Nawabs, peasants, common people, women, intellectuals, literary figures
and journalists fought together. This truth is engraved on every page of the contemporary
documents and memoirs. The official British military historiographer of the
mutiny, Sir John William Kaye[iii]
while underling the character of the rebellion stated that it was impossible to
deny “the universal fact that the Black man had risen against the White.”.[iv]
Another contemporary British historian Charles Ball confessed that 1857
revolution was a "national revolution".[v]
WSR Hodson was a leading commander of
the British army which put Delhi under siege after
“From hence to Allahabad, the fort of
Agra and the Residency of Lucknow are the only spots where the British flag
still flies. We are more to be considered now as an isolated band, fighting for
our very name and existence in the midst of an enemy’s country, than as an
avenging army about to punish a rebel force.”[vii]
William Howard Russell, a veteran war
correspondent of the British newspaper, The
Times, who came, specially, to cover the mutiny, in one of the despatches candidly
stated:
"Here we had not only a servile
war and a sort of Jacquerie combined [an insurrection of peasants against
the nobility in northeastern France in 1358 which was ruthlessly
suppressed] but we had a war of
religion, a war of race, and a war of revenge, of hope, of some national
promptings to shake off the yoke of a stranger, and to re-establish the full
power of native chiefs, and the full sway of native religions."[viii]
Thomas Lowe being a physician, his
clinical mind led him even to deliberate on the causes of the national
rebellion. According to him,
“It is quite evident that the
resources of this country, instead of being developed and improved, have been
permitted to lie as they did a thousand years ago, and decay; that such of the
native arts and manufacturers as used to raise for India a name and wonder all
over the western world are nearly extinguished in the present day; once great
and renowned cities are mere heaps of ruins…ruin, ruin poverty and natural
wealth everywhere, as though a leper had touched the land, it were hastening to
decay. A question constantly asked of oneself is—‘whence arise all this?’ and
the conclusion one arrives at is, that something
must have caused such terrible result, and that something equally bad continues
to perpetuate! [italics as in the original] Whether this ruin has been
natural result of a vicious feudalism, or misgovernment on our parts of
territories and their cities, absorbed by British power, is for others to
decide.
“No one who has eyes and ears to use,
can doubt for a moment that we have almost totally neglected the resources of
such a mighty country, while we have introduced the trash of our manufacturing
towns into every cranny of the land. It appears as though we had endeavoured to
destroy every inherent useful production of an eastern nation for the
introduction of western merchandise. And what must be the end of such
short–sightedness if such an erroneous line of policy be pursued?”[ix]
Thomas Lowe shared an anecdote to convey
the point that it was a state of helplessness for common people having no
choice but rise in revolt.
“I remember asking on old man about the
country and its owners, when he significantly said to me, ‘The jungles, sahib,
the trees, the rivers, the wells, all the villages and all holy cities belong
to the Sircar [British government]; they have taken all—everything (bahut achcha)—very good, what can we
do?”[x]
For him,
“To live in India now was like
standing on the verge of a volcanic crater, the sides of which were fast
crumbling away from our feet, while the boiling lava was ready to erupt and
consume us!”[xi]
Lowe underlining the participation in
the rebellion of servant class which stood at the lowest rung of the social
hierarchy wrote:
“All had disappeared to a man; even
the native servants had leagued with the murderers of their masters, and
hurried away with the destroying stream.”[xii]
The perusal of
the contemporary documents and narratives of the First War of Independence which
this author has collected make one fact crystal clear. It is impossible to neglect
that whether the initiators of this rebellion were army personnel but it didn't
take long to become a national independence struggle. The most important reason
of this was that all the revolutionary soldiers came from peasant families and
the plight of farmers naturally affected their thoughts and actions. The common
people who were trapped in misery, they all became the part and parcel of this
revolution and joined hands to throw the British rule lock, stock and barrel.
It was not
only Lowe who found that the servants of the British officers had suddenly
disappeared. Hodson in a letter to his wife on 5th June 1857 wrote:
“I have tried everywhere to get a
bearer, but the natives will not serve us now, and I could get no one even on
double pay. Only two days ago I succeeded in getting a Bheestie [Bhishti or water-carrier].”[xiii]
John Kaye
stated that even before the start of the rebellion the domestic servants had
disappeared. It was no ordinary disappearance; before parting they had damaged or
carried the weapons. Kaye while narrating the events of Sialkot (now in
Pakistan) uprising on
“took an active
part against their old masters. That they knew what was coming seems to be
proved by the fact that the Brigadier’s sirdar-bearer, or chief body servant,
an ‘old and favourite’ domestic, took caps off his master’s pistols in the
night, as they lay beside him while he slept. And how thoroughly they cast in
their lot with the soldiery is demonstrated with equal distinctness by the fact
that they afterwards fought against us, the Brigadier’s khansaman [cook], or
butler, taking an active part in operations…”[xiv]
Kaye observed
that servants were acting in league with other sections of the populace.
According to him:
“There seems to
have been perfect cohesion between all classes of our enemies—the mutineers,
the criminals from the gaols, the ‘goojurs’ [Gujars] from the neighbouring
villages, and the servants from the houses and bunglows of the English. From
sunrise to sunset the work went on bravely. Everything that could be carried
off by our enemies was seized and appropriated…And nearly everything belonging
to us, that could not be carried off, was destroyed and defaced, except—a strange
and unaccountable exception—the Church and Chapel, which the Christians had
reared for the worshipping of the Christian’s god.”[xv]
Fred Roberts who
played a vital role in suppressing the mutiny of 1857 and later became the
chief of the British army in India, in a letter to his mother on 7th September
1857 admitted:
"All Natives
are the same, and I believe we are as thoroughly hated in the Punjab as elsewhere…Without
being severe, I have always kept my servants well in order, once they trip, I
give it them well. Yet, all this time, when whole sets have gone off and many
officers are without one."[xvi]
Whatever, may be claimed
by the pro-British historians about 1857; it being a mutiny of the army, what
Roberts as a British military commander faced was a mass revolt. In a letter to
his mother from Camp Bulandshahar [approximately 60 kilo-meters from Delhi] on
30th September 1857, Roberts stated:
“With scarcely an
exception, all the Police and Native Civil Authorities joined at the very
commencement [of the rebellion], and the many independent Rajahs raised their
Standards against us. Every villager tore down European and robbed their
property.”[xvii]
George Otto
Trevelyan [Lord Macaulay was his maternal uncle] was
part of the British ruling elite. In the beginning of his career he served as a
civil servant in India. In his book Cawnpore
(published in 1866) he narrated how different subaltern sections, specially,
performers prepared ground for the nation-wide rebellion.
“Sometimes it was
a couple of fakeers perched on an
elephant; sometimes a party of country-people on their way to the Ganges for
their annual dip in the sacred stream; a gang of gipsies [sic]; a string of camel-drivers; or a troop of musicians escorting
a celebrated nautch-dancer to her home in Cashmere [sic], after a successful season in Bengal. However, it might be,
it invariably happened that, a few hours after the strangers had entered the
station, the bazaar and the cantonments
were in a ferment of gossip and conjure; the sepoys at once grew sulky and
idle; the Mahomedans [sic] of the
town became insolvent, and the Hindus pert.”[xviii]
The
insubordination had spread even to the domestic servants of the British
officials, Trevelyan stated:
The very domestic
servants appeared to share the contagion; the cooks got drunk and the grooms
stupid; the water-carrier omitted to fill the bath, and the butler to ice the
Moselle [white wine]; the peon spent twice his usual numbers of hours in
conveying a note to the next compound; while the bearers delighted to insult
their mistress by smoking under her window, and coming bare-headed into her
presence…”[xix]
William Kaye while
highlighting the causes of the mutiny held the puppetry artist responsible for spreading
the disinfection amongst common people specially the Company soldiers. Describing
the themes of the puppet-shows in ‘Bazaars and the Lines [the cantonments], he
stated:
“There were two
subjects which the Kootpoolee-Wallahs
[sic] extremely delighted to illustrate-the degradation of the Mogul [sic], and the victories of the French over the English, one
intended to excite hatred, the other contempt, in the minds of the spectators”.[xx]
By June 1857
the British had mobilized a force outside Delhi which in strength and resources
was never witnessed in the colonial history claiming that they will turn the
city into wreckage. Their spies and compradors with strong presence in the city
were continuously involved in the destructive activities to facilitate the
British to enter Delhi. However, the British could enter Delhi only at the end
of September and that too after a series of conspiracies. The common people of
Delhi stayed united against the British siege and relentless artillery
bombardments which was underlined by Hodson in a letter to a senior officer in
a letter dated July 27 [1857],
"The
news-letters [most of which were brought by the spies] from the city mention
meetings in the marketplace and talkings at the corner of the streets, with big
words of what they intend to do…”[xxi]
We can know more
about the sacrifices of the common people of Delhi against the British
fortification by getting acquainted with the names of those who laid their
lives on different battle fronts and this has been documented officially which
is a proof of the marginalized sections’ participation in the revolt. The
available list includes martyrs like Abdul (rubber-stamp maker), Chosa Bhishti
(water-carrier), Eman Kahar (palanquin lifter),
Gannoo Halwai (sweet-meat seller), Heera Dom (scavenger),
Laloo Teli (oilman) etc.[xxii]
Such martyrdoms were witnessed
throughout the country.
The large scale participation
of common people in the countryside can be gauged by the fact that according to
the contemporary British gazetteers hundreds of villages in the districts of Gurgaon,
Delhi, Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, Aligarh, Faruqabad, and Bulandshahar were burnt to
ashes with villagers confined inside. This kind of savagery was perpetrated in
order to punish the peasants for participating and supporting the rebellion.
How bravely and daringly Delhi
commoners defended Delhi when the British, after almost 5 months long preparations
and Indian stooges in tow, went for all-out assault on the city from the Kashmiri
Gate side on September 14, has been chronicled by none else but Kaye who had
access to all the contemporary military memos in the following words:
“So furious was the fire of the
enemy, and so heavy the shower of stones and bricks from the crumbling walls,
which the maddened insurgents poured upon us, that it was difficult, for a
little time, to plant the ladders in the ditch so as to ascend the scrap on the
other side….So fearful, indeed, was the carnage that when Baynes [British
commander] found himself opposite the Water Bastion, the seventy-five men who
had started with him on their perilous mission were reduced to only
twenty-five.”[xxiii]
The revolutionaries were always
denigrated by the British as a bunch of budmash
[those who are in evil professions], looters, Pandies and what not. They
were described as cowards but Kaye while narrating the details of the defence
of Delhi by the ‘insurgents’ referred to the comments of a prominent British
commander, Chamberlain who,
“could not but admire the dashing
manner in which the Native officers rode in among the ranks of the mutineers,
urging them and leading them on to battle against the British and Jummoo troops
nor was his admiration, in this conjuncture, without some feeling of anxiety.
For it seemed at one time that the enemy might break through our Subzee-mundee [even
presently known by this name only] defences, carry the undefended battery below
Hindoo Rao’s house, and take possession of the post itself, with its hospital
and its magazine.”[xxiv]
Hodson who had been using the
filthiest language against the rebels wrote on
“Our Artillery officers themselves
say that they are outmatched by these rascals in accuracy and rapidity of fire,
and so they have unlimited supply of guns and ammunition from our own greatest
arsenal, they are quite beyond us in many respects.”[xxvi]
On June 27, 1857 he wrote to his
wife:
“The cannonade was very heavy, and I
have seldom been under a hotter fire than for about three quarters of an hour
at our most advanced battery, covered every moment with showers or rather
clouds of dust, stones and splinters…The only formidable part of the enemy is
their artillery, which is amazingly well served, and in prodigious abundance,
as my experience this morning abundantly proved.”[xxvii]
Another prominent British military
commander Griffiths narrating the status on the day [September 14] his troops
stormed Delhi from Kashmiri Gate side wrote:
“Advancing from our first place at
the main guard, No. 5 Column pushed forward to the College Gardens, Marching
through narrow streets and lanes, with high houses on each side. But how can I
describe that terrible street-fighting, which lasted without intermission the
whole day? From every window and door, from loopholes in the buildings, and
from the tops of the houses, a storm of musketry saluted us on every side,
while every now and then, when passing the corner of a street, field-guns,
loaded with grape, discharged their contents into the column. Officers and men
fell fast…”[xxviii]
The resolute resistance by the rebel
forces and commoners against the British attack at the Delhi front was not
isolated happening. The contemporary British military documents are full of
thousands of such stories.
The
establishment of an independent India under the kingship of Bahadur Shah Zafar
after rebels had declared freedom from the British slavery was in no way
restoration of the degenerated and dehumanized rule of the feudal elements as was
alleged by the British rulers and their Indian stooges. This was clear from
almost all the proclamations of independence issued by rebellion leaders in
different parts of the country. These proclamations made solemn promise to the
commoners that their rights would be safeguarded. For instance in in Oudh[xxix],
British had deprived the Pasis [Sudras] of their ancestral profession of
guarding (chowkidaari) the
countryside and cities. The independent rule of Birjis Qadar under the regent
ship of her mother Begum Hazrat Mahal through a proclamation assured that
"Pasis should
know that gate-keeping is their ancestral profession but the British appointed Berkandaaz [police with guns] in place
of them and so they were deprived of their livelihood. It will not be repeated.”[xxx]
The tribal
areas of India too became centres of armed uprisings. The contemporary records
are full of tribal uprisings against the British rule. Bheem Naik, a prominent
Bheel tribal leader of Nimar (Barwani State) in the then Central India
organized a valiant armed resistance against the British rule in the area. He
was able to unite other tribes like Bhilalas, Mandlois and Naiks for a joint
military campaign to oust the British from the area. He also joined forces with
Tatya Tope and made daring attacks on the British positions on Bombay-Agra road
between Sindhawa and Khull. Revolutionary army under his command continued the
War till 1859. But due to the treachery of many non-tribal princes of the
region they were defeated. They shifted their base into the forest and
continued with the guerilla warfare. He could be captured in 1861, sentenced
for life imprisonment, sent to Andaman Islands where he died (date not known).[xxxi]
It is not
only sad but shameful that we forgot these startling facts of the First War of
Independence. If we had remembered this glorious heritage, the rise of communal
polarization as well as gradual take-over of the independent India by the
pro-feudal-capitalists-imperialist ruling class would have been scuttled.
(2) Hindu-Muslim-Sikh joint martyrdoms in
India’s First War of Independence
The people of
India, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs[xxxii],
unitedly challenged the might of world’s greatest imperialist power, Britain,
during India’s First War of Independence [hereafter referred as War] which
began in May 1857. This unprecedented unity, naturally, unnerved the British
rulers or Firangees and made them
conscious of the fact that if their rule was to continue in India, it could
happen only when Hindus and Muslims, specially, were divided on communal lines
and no opportunity was missed to create enmity between these two largest
religious communities of India. This was the reason, that immediately after
crushing militarily, this First War of Independence with the help of spies and
stooges, the then minister of Indian Affairs Lord Wood, sitting in London, in a
letter to the chief of British rule in India, Lord Elgin, admitted, "we
have maintained our power in India by playing off one part against the other
and we must continue to do so. Do all we can, therefore, to prevent all having
a common feeling."[xxxiii]
The
most prominent administrator of the East India Company in India and chief
strategist of the British plan of suppressing the mutiny (India’s First War of
Independence 1857) shamelessly declared:
"If the Mohameduns [sic] and Hindoos [sic]
have quarreled so much the better for us, let them slaughter each other, and on
the fall of Delhee[sic], we shall not
find it difficult matter to reconquer the whole of Rohilcund [sic] ."[xxxiv]
In order to
put this strategy in operation effectively, the White rulers and their Indian
stooges, the Brown Sahebs came out with the two-nation theory implying that
Hindus and Muslims belonged to two separate antagonistic nations, as they
belonged to different religions. The birth of the two-nations theory was no
accident, in fact, it was specifically designed and created to help the British
rulers in creating communal divide and fragmentize the Indian society on the
basis of religions as a religiously united India could prove to be the death
knell of their rule here. The memories of the War, which the British rulers
called ‘Mutiny’, in which Hindus and Muslims fought tooth and nail with great
determination and spirit of sacrifice against the rule of the East India
Company, was too fresh in the memories of the White rulers who saw their
repressive rule almost on the brink of collapse. They could succeed only with
the use of treachery and deceit, hallmarks of the British imperialism (or any
other) the world-over.
JOINT COMMAND FOR THE WAR
One truth, which should never be missed about this War, is that it was
jointly led by leaders like Nana Sahib, Bahadur Shah Zafar, Maulvi Ahmed Shah,
Tatya Tope, Khan Bahadur Khan, Rani Laxmibai, Hazrat Mahal, Azimullah Khan and
Ferozshah, a galaxy of revolutionaries who belonged to different religions. It
was a liberation struggle in which Maulvis, Pandits, zamindars, peasants,
traders, lawyers, servants, women, students and people from different creeds, castes and regions rose in revolt
against the dehumanized rule of the East India Company and laid down their
lives.
On the eve of
164th anniversary of First War of Independence we need to tell the
present flag-bearers of the Hindu-Muslim brands of communal politics that the
revolutionary army which declared the Mughal King Bahadur Shah Zafar, a Muslim,
India’s Independent ruler on 11th May 1857 comprised of more than
seventy percent Hindu soldiers. These were Nana Sahib, Tantya Tope and
Laxmibai, all Hindus, who played vital role in making Zafar, Badshah; the real
King of Hindustan once again.
The
contemporary documents of the period which are available even today are replete
with instances, not confined to one particular area, in which Hindus and
Muslims could be seen joining the War, making supreme sacrifices together,
least bothered about who was in the lead and who would bear what cost for
opposing the British rule. The details of this War contained in the
contemporary documents present one fundamental truth that Hindu-Muslim
separatism or hatred between these two communities was not at all a problem to
be worried about.
We present in
the following some of the instances of how Hindus-Muslims-Sikhs rose in revolt
together, making joint sacrifices for a common cause underlying the fact that
this united effort could bring the foreign rule to its doom. These are but few
of the examples from thousands and thousands of unparalleled deeds of bravery
and sacrifices which remain unsung even today.
MEERUT
The First War of Independence started on May
11, 1857 when revolutionaries declared India free of the British rule. However, the process started on May 9 at the
Meerut cantonment when the British military brass attempted to Court Martial
the 85 sepoys of the 3rd Light Cavalry Regiment who [out of 90] for
the crime of refusing the new cartridges which were to be mouth-bitten before
firing. All of them were to be killed; to be blown by the artillery guns. This
news spread like a wildfire with other sepoys, commoners including many women
and the convicted sepoys were freed. Later they with thousands others left for
Delhi. The most notable fact about the identity of the 85 rebel sepoys was that
48 of them were Muslims.
AYODHYA
After
independence, the town of Ayodhya has emerged as a place which caused the
growth of immense hatred between sections of Hindus and Muslims. Babri
Masjid-Ram Janmbhoomi [birth-place] dispute at Ayodhya has played significant
role in creating an environment of violence and mistrust between the two
largest religious communities of India. But in 1857, it was the same Ayodhya
where Maulvis and Mahants and common Hindu-Muslims stood united in rebelling
against the British rule and kissed the hangman’s noose together. Maulana Ameer
Ali[xxxv]
was a famous Maulvi of Ayodhya and when Ayodhya’s well-known Hanuman Garhi’s
(Hanuman Temple) priest Baba Ramcharan Das[xxxvi]
took lead in organizing the armed resistance to the British rule, Maulana also
joined the revolutionary army. In one battle with the British and their
stooges, both of them were captured and hanged together on a tamarind tree at
the Kuber Teela in Ayodhya.
Baba Ramcharan
Das and Maulana Ameer Ali were no exception in Ayodhya. This region also
produced two more great friends, belonging to different religions who made life
hell for the British sponsored armies. Acchhan Khan[xxxvii]
and Shambhu Prasad Shukla[xxxviii]
were two such friends who lead the army of Raja Devibaksh Singh[xxxix]
in the district of Faizabad. Both of them were able to defeat the Firangee army in many battles,
inflicting heavy losses on them. It was due to the treachery again that they
were captured. In order to desist anyone from such companionships between
Hindus and Muslims both these friends were publicly inflicted prolonged torture
and their heads were cruelly filed off.
It is not
difficult to understand that why the same Ayodhya where blood of both Hindus
and Muslims flowed for liberating the motherland in 1857 later became a
permanent source of friction between the two communities. The joint heritage of
Ayodhya needed to be erased and only then the British Indian Empire could
survive. It was meticulously done by the British rulers and the heritage of
communal unity at Ayodhya was turned upside down.
RAJASTHAN
Kota state
(now in Rajasthan) was ruled by a Maharao subservient to the British. The
leading courtier of this state was, Lala Jaidayal Bhatnagar[xl],
a great literary figure who was equally conversant with Persian, Urdu and
English. When it was found that Maharao was collaborating with the British he
joined hands with the army chief, Mehrab Khan[xli]
and established a revolutionary government in the state. When Kota was captured
by the British forces with the help of stooge neighbouring princes, they
together continued fighting in the region till 1859. Betrayed by an informer
both were hanged at Kota on September 17, 1860.
HARYANA
Hansi town
(now in Haryana) presents another heart-warming example of how Muslims and
Jains fearlessly challenged the foreign rule and did not hesitate in
sacrificing their lives together. In this town lived two close friends, Hukumchand
Jain[xlii]
and Muneer Beg[xliii].
They were known for literary works and love for mathematics and joined the
revolt in the earlier phase itself. The revolutionary government of Bahadur
Shah Zafar chose them as advisors and appointed them as commanders in the region
of west of Delhi which is known as Haryana today. They led many successful
military campaigns in the area but due to the treachery of rulers of Patiala,
Nabha, Kapurthala, Kashmir and Pataudi were defeated in a crucial battle and
captured. The British were extremely worried and horrified with this kind of
unity of the people of two religions that they decided to kill them in a most
horrendous and sickening manner. After hanging them on the same tree in Hansi
on January 19, 1858, Hukumchand Jain was buried and Mirza Muneer Beg was
cremated against the custom of their respective religions. It was done with the
obvious purpose of making fun of the unity of these two revolutionaries
belonging to different religions and show hatred towards their comradeship. Another
unspeakable crime committed by the British was that when Fakir Chand Jain[xliv],
13 year old nephew of Hukamchand Jain protested to this treatment he too was
hanged, although there was no sentence passed against him.
CENTRAL
INDIA
JHANSI: We all are familiar with Rani
Laxmi Bai's[xlv]
sheroic resistance to the British rule and her death fighting the British
forces at Gwalior. She was able to put up such a great resistance with her
Muslim commanders; Ghulam Ghouse Khan (chief of artillery, martyred on June 4,
1858 in hand-to-hand fight with the British troops inside Jhansi fort)[xlvi],
Khuda Bakhsh (chief of infantry, martyred defending the Jhansi fort on June 4,
1858)[xlvii]
both of whom were martyred defending Jhansi fort on June 4, 1858. Even her
personal bodyguard was a young Muslim lady, Mundar who laid down her life with
Rani on June 18, 1858 at Kotah-ki-Sarai battle in Gwalior.[xlviii]
MALWA: Malwa
region in the then Central Province (now Madhya Pradesh) was another war
theatre where big and crucial battles were fought against the British. The
joint command of Tatya Tope,[xlix]
Rao Saheb (alias Pandurang Sadashiv and a nephew of Nana Saheb[l],
Laxmi Bai, Ferozshah and Moulvi Fazal-ul- Haq[li],
was able to mobilize a huge rebel army of 70-80 thousand fighters. This army
won innumerable battles against the British. However, in a crucial battle at
Ranod when due to the treachery of stooge princes the revolutionary army led by
Tatya Tope, Ferozeshah and Moulvi was encircled, Moulvi Fazal-ul- Haq stood as
a rock in the way of advancing British troops. He and his 480 companions laid
down their lives on December 17, 1858, but were able to save the main force
which included Tatya Tope, Rao Saheb and Ferozshah.[lii]
Thus saved by the supreme sacrifice by Moulvi Fazl Haq and his comrades, Tatia
Tope continued to wage war till the beginning of 1859.
Tatia Tope
continued to wage war till the beginning of 1859 and it was due to the
treachery of Man Singh, ruler of Narwar, that the British were able to capture
him and subsequently hang him on April 18, 1859. Rao Saheb (Pandurang Sadashiv,
nephew of Nana Saheb) too continued to wage the struggle and could be captured
only in 1862 betrayed by a Maratha chief in the Jammu region. He was later
hanged in Kanpur on August 20, 1862. Ferozeshah, fought the longest, was never
captured and travelled to the West Asia in search of help from the Muslim
rulers for India’s freedom. Disheartened by their apathy went to Mecca where he
died in 1887.
ROHILKHAND
Rohilkhand
(present day Bareilly, Shahjahanpur, Badaun and Bijnor etc.) was the area which
was a strong hold of revolutionaries from the beginning of the revolution.
Immediately after the announcement of an independent Indian government at Delhi
on May 11, 1857, Khan Bahadur Khan[liii]
was appointed as the viceroy of Mughal emperor there. Khan soon after assuming
charge appointed a committee of eight members consisting both Hindus and
Muslims to conduct the affairs of the state. His deputy was Khushi Ram.[liv]
This government forbade cow-killing
in deference to the sentiments of local Hindus as was done in Delhi by the
orders of General Bakht, chief commander of the revolutionary army. Khan and
Khushi Ram led troops defeated the British and their stooges in many battles
but were defeated in a crucial battle at Bareilly after remaining in office for
almost a year. They continued with the struggle and withdrew towards Nepal but
were captured. Both of them were brought to Bareilly and hanged with hundreds
of their followers outside old Kotwali on March 20, 1860. Their bodies were left
hanging in order to terrorize the populace.
13 Hindu-Muslim-Sikh women jointly laid
down lives at Thana Bhavan, Western Uttar Pradesh
Hindu-Muslim
unity during the First Indian War of Independence was not confined to one area
or one section of the population. This unity pervaded the whole country at all
stratum. It was a ground reality and fact of life with which, naturally, women
also did not remain untouched. In a small town, Thana Bhawan, situated in
Muzaffar Nagar district (now in western Uttar Pradesh) 13 brave women belonging
to different religions and Castes were hanged together or burnt alive for
taking up arms against the repressive British rule.
The names of these
sheroes [according to the dictionary word ‘hero’ means a “man who exhibits great
bravery” which is not gender neutral and conveys the faulty wisdom that only
man can be brave. Author is using the term ‘shero/sheroes for
female participants in the liberation War] and sheroic deeds of them are as follows.
Asghari Begum, 45
years old, belonged to a well-to-do family and was burnt alive for organizing
rebellion in the area in 1858.[lv]
Another revolutionary woman was, 28 years old, Asha Devi[lvi],
who belonged to a Hindu Gujar family and was hanged in 1858. Another martyred
woman was 23 year old young Bhagwati Devi[lvii],
born into a Tyagi family of farmers who fought in many battles against the Firangee rule and was hanged in 1858. 24
year old, Habeeba[lviii],
belonging to a Muslim Gujar family, fearlessly fought in many battles to
liberate neighbouring areas from the British
tyranny. She was a great organizer and mobilized her neighbourhood for the
liberation struggle. She was captured while resisting a British attack and was
executed on gallows in 1858.
Another brave woman
from this area named Mam Kaur[lix]
belonged to a family of the shepherds and was hanged at the young age of 25
years in 1858. 26 years old, Umda[lx]
was another gallant woman from this area, born into a Jat Muslim family who
sacrificed her life resisting the British invasion. Raj Kaur[lxi]born
in 1833, hailed from a Rajput family and made the supreme sacrifice fighting
against the British in Thana Bhawan area only. Another brave woman hailing also
from a Jat family who laid down her life fighting against the British was Inder
Kaur[lxii].
Bkhtawari[lxiii] born
in 1819 was another brave woman from the region who laid down her life fighting
against the British rulers.
Jamila[lxiv]
born into a Pathan family of the area took up arms against the foreign rulers
and was martyred in 1858. Three other revolutionary women from Thana Bhavan who
sacrificed their lives for liberation of India from the Company rule were,
Rahimi[lxv],
belonging to a Muslim Rajput family born in 1829, Bhagwani[lxvi]
born in 1831 hailing from a Brahmin family and Beebee who were hanged in 1858.
It is to be noted that most of these revolutionary women were hanged in 1858
which shows that the British that this area remained liberated till 1858.
DELHI
British made
it a prestige issue to recapture Delhi (which the revolutionaries got liberated
from the British rule on May 11, 1857 and declared it to be the Capital of an
Independent India). They rightly thought that if once they were able to
re-capture Delhi, the centre of anti-British activities, then it would not be
difficult to suppress the rising tide of rebellions in other parts of the
country. During June-September 1857, the British army encircled Delhi with all their might but could not break into Delhi which was valiantly
being defended by the revolutionary army, which was mocked by the
British as poorabia sena (army of
people from eastern India).
The majority
of this revolutionary army consisted of Hindu soldiers and was led by a joint
command consisting of Mohammed Bakht Khan,[lxvii]
Azimullah Khan[lxviii],
Sham Singh Dooga, Sirdhara Singh, Ghouse Mohammad, Hira Singh and a 'Doabi
Brahmin'.[lxix] The
contemporary British documents show that despite all their attempts to create
communal divide in the ranks of revolutionary army and residents of Delhi, the
Indians stood as one. In order not to let the British spies succeed in creating
communal conflict amongst Delhites, General Bakht Khan, C-in-C of the
revolutionary army prohibited cow slaughter.[lxx]
What kind of
communal amity existed in Delhi under siege can be further known by the fact
that when a huge canon of Shahjahan’s times which was lying unused was taken
out, repaired and made useable, before firing the first canon, in the presence
of Bahadur Shah Zafar and other army officials, Hindu priests performed Aarti,
garlanded it and blessed it with Vedic hymns.[lxxi]
ANTHEM OF THE WAR
The high degree of communal unity
among the rebels can further be known by going through the Rebel Anthem [Aazaadee kaa Tarana] of 1857, penned by Azimullah Khan. It was in Urdu and read:
Hum haen iss ke malik, Hindoostan
hamaaraa/Paak watan hae qaum kaa Jannat se bhee piyaaraa.
[We are its owners, it belongs to us.
It is our holy land, lovelier than paradise.]
Yeh hamaari milkiat Hindoostan
hamaaraa/iss kee roohaniyat se Roshan hae jug saaraa.
[It is our Hindustan, our owned. The
whole world sparkles with its spiritualism.]
Kitnaa qadeem kitnaa naeem, sab
duniyaa se niyaraa/kartee hae zarkhez jisse Gang-o-Juman kee dhaaraa.
[It is old as well as pleasure
giving, unique in the world. Ganga and Jamuna irrigates its lands.]
Ooper barfeela parvat pehre-daar
hamaaraa/Neeche sahil per bajta sagar kaa naqqaaraa.
[On top snow-clad mountain guards us.
On the lower end you can hear roaring of sea.]
Iss kee khanen ugal raheensona,
heera, paaraa/iss kee shaan shaukat kaa duniyaa maen jaikaaraa.
[Its mines produce gold, diamond and
lead. Its greatness is renowned throughout the world.]
Aayaa Firangee door se, essaa mantar
maaraa/loota donon hathoon se piyaaraa watan hamaaraa.
[The British came from far away,
played trick. Our dear land was looted with both hands.]
Aaj shahidon ne tumko, ahl-e-watan
lal-kaaraa/Todo ghulamee kee zanjeeren barsao angaaraa.
[Martyrs are calling you, countrymen.
Break shackles of slavery, spit fire.]
Hindoo-Mussalmaan-Sikh hamaaraa bhai
piyaaraa-piyaaraa/yeh hae azaadi kaa jhanda isse salaam hamaaraa.
[Hindu-Muslim-Sikh are our dear
brothers. This is the flag of independence, salute to it.][lxxii]
Contemporary British narratives
underscoring Hindu-Muslim-Sikh unity
William
Russell, a renowned war correspondent was sent by The Times, a leading British newspaper published from London to
cover the ‘Mutiny.’ In one of his reports from Oudh, dated, March 2, 1858,
while describing the strength of the revolutionary army he wrote:
“There are, it is
said, at least 60,000 regulars of all sorts, and about 70,000 nujeebs
[irregulars], militia, and matchlock-men. All the great chiefs of Oudh,
Mussalman and Hindu, are there, and have sworn to fight for their young king,
Birjeis Kuddr [Birjis Qadr], to the last. Their cavalry is numerous, the city
is filled with people, the works are continually strengthened. All Oudh is in
the hands of the enemy, and we only hold the ground we cover with our
bayonets.”[lxxiii]
Thomas Lowe was
part of the British army's campaign against the rebels in Central India as
commander of the medical corps. He was one of the leading British officers who
participated in the most long running military campaign against the
revolutionaries which included killing of Rani of Jhansi. In his war memoirs
[published in 1860 from London] despite his deep hatred for the rebels, he was
quite frank in sharing the fact that in this rebellion all the following
sections of Indians came together for waging war against the British:
“the infanticide
Rajput, the bigoted Brahmin, the fanatic Mussalman, and the luxury loving,
fat-paunched ambitious Maharattah [sic],
they all joined together in the cause; the cow-killer and the cow-worshipper,
the pig-hater and the pig-eater, the crier of Allah is God and Mohommed [sic] his prophet and the mumbler of the
mysteries of Brahma…”[lxxiv]
Fred Roberts
was one of the leading British military commanders who led the British army to
re-capture Lucknow, the Capital of the Oudh kingdom. He later on became the
Commander- in-Chief of the British armed forces in India. In one of his letters,
from the Lucknow front dated November
25, 1857, while rejoicing victory on that day at Sikander Bagh, Lucknow
war front could not miss out the fact that even in the face of death the rebel
army consisting of both Hindus and Muslims did not lose heart and stayed glued
to each other. When Fred entered the Sikander Bagh he found nearly 2000 rebels
on the ground dead or dying. According to him:
“I never saw
such a sight. They were literally in heaps, and when I went in were a heaving
mass, some dead, but most wounded and unable to get up from the crush. How so
many got crowded together I can’t understand. You had to walk over them to
cross the court. They showed their hatred even while dying, cursed us and said:
‘if we could only stand, we would kill you.”[lxxv]
Throughout the
First War of Independence 1857 every nook and corner of the country was replete
with such instances of fearless fighters, supreme sacrifices and strong bond of
unity amongst people belonging to different religions. Such glorious instances of
unbreakable Hindu-Muslim unity did really happen not more than 165 years back. These can be verified even today by a
simple perusal of the contemporary British archives, autobiographies, personal
collections, diaries and narrations.
Given these
realities of history, it is not difficult to understand why a divide between
Hindus and Muslims was necessitated, who were instrumental in accomplishing it
and who benefited out of this divide. This natural unity between the followers
of the two largest religions in 1857 had greatly alarmed and perturbed the
British rulers and they could foresee the end of their colonial project in
India, in fact, Asia.
This danger
could only be averted if Hindus and Muslims were hoodwinked to separate, follow
opposite directions and behave as two antagonistic ‘nations’. The survival of
the British Empire in India depended on the successful execution of this
strategy. The flag-bearers of the politics of two-nations in the past and
communal politics, presently, are the ones who helped the British to
successfully execute this evil design. We should never ignore the fact that
communalism was a ploy of the British who feared the end of their Empire in
India if Hindus and Muslims continually stood united. Not only on at every
anniversary of the great rebellion but every day we must take pledge of never
betraying the shared heritage and shared martyrdoms of the First Indian War of Independence.
(3) Women in the forefront of India’s First
War of Independence
The apologists of
the British rule in India, past and present, argued that the incidents of 1857 were
not more than a sepoy mutiny. According to them, in May 1857 it occurred due to
the anarchist and disobedient soldiers and they were responsible for violence
and destruction. However, the contemporary narratives and records which we
perused in details above make it clear that such conclusion about the War was
and is a patent lie.
The truth is that
the great liberation war which began in May in 1857 will be always remembered for
the glorious reality that not only a particular group or people of a particular
Caste, gender, religion or region participated but the people of almost all
strata joined it and jointly laid down their lives for the liberation of India.
One great characteristic, almost forgotten, was that women not only
participated in this great War with male rebels but they led the military
campaigns against the British at many places.
Generally
speaking, we believe that women are weaker and unintelligent in comparison to males.
In fact, despite this male-chauvinistic omnipresent belief about women, the
First War of Independence of India once again proved the denigrators of women patently
wrong. The contemporary documents are a huge repository of great sheroic deeds
and sacrifices by the women rich and poor hailing from both countryside and the
towns. The War proved umpteen times that given chance women were capable of
shaking the foundations of the colonial rule in India of the greatest
imperialist power on the earth.
Born in 1835 in
Kashi, the queen/Rani of Jhansi Laxmibai's (real name Manikarnika) was one of
the first native rulers who challenged the repressive rule of the East India
Company.[lxxvi]
The contemporary documents make it amply clear that she did not dream of
freeing her own State Jhansi only but the whole of India from the British
hegemony. She waged one of the most sheroic military challenges against the
British army and kept it going till her last breath. Her correspondence with
other rebel chiefs is the living testimony of how she led from the front. In a
letter to a rebel chief, Mardan Singh. She wrote,
"Shri Maharani Lakshmibai
conveys good wishes for the well-being of Maharaja Shri Raja Mardan Singh Ju
Dev. We are well here. We are delighted to read the letter brought by Devan [Dewan,
an office equivalent to primeinister] Ghaus…After consultation among ourselves
including yourself and Shahgarh and Tatya Tope we came to the conclusion that
there should be suraj, our own
rule…"[lxxvii]
Laxmibai used to
lead the her army’s contingents wearing normal
military attire. She was a great military strategist and rebel leaders in the
area used to follow her military plans as would be clear from her another
letter to Mardan Singh, which read:
"Shri Maharani Lakshmibai Ju
Devi conveys good wishes for the well-being of Maharaja Shri Raja Mardan Singh
Bahadur Ju Dev…It is further stated that you please set-out towards Sagar.
There are two companies of Sahebs enroute. After crushing them, go ahead along
with Raja of Shahgarh. Tatya Tope, Nana Saheb, and I are engaged in making
arrangements for the army. Drive Hue [Hugh] Rose at Notghat and proceed towards
Kalpi. There we all will meet to jointly attack the British at Gwalior. Now there
should not be any delay."[lxxviii]
As a
great military strategist she realized that without defeating the prominent
British stooge in the Central India, the Scindhias who ruled Gwalior State, the
foreign rulers could not be defeated. With this aim she attacked Gwalior Fort.
One of the battles continued for more than 15 days. It was here that at the
battle front of Kotah-Ki-Sarai on June 18, 1858 she was martyred fighting
riding a horse was wounded seriously on the front of Kotha-Ki-Sarai on June 18,
1858 and laid her life there only. She was barely 22 at the time of her
martyrdom. Even the British used to praise her bravery. The chief commander of
the British Army, Sir Hugh Rose wrote in his report:
"Although
a lady she was the bravest and the best military leader of the rebels. A man
among the mutineers."[lxxix]
The British
official historiographers of the mutiny, Kaye and Malleson confessed that,
“She gained a
great influence over the hearts of her people. It was this influence, this
force of character, added to a splendid and inspiring courage, that enabled
her…to offer to the English troops under Sir Hugh Rose, a resistance which made
to a less able commander, might have been successful.”[lxxx]
Thomas
Lowe who was present in all the battles with the Rani though described her as
‘the Jezebel of India’; the wicked woman did confess that she was “the young,
energetic, proud, unbending un-compromising Ranee”.[lxxxi]
Sir Robert Hamilton who was asked to file a report on the killing of Rani by
the British military headquarters submitted the following report:
“The Ranee [sic] was on a horseback, and close to
her was the female (a Mohammedan long in the family) who seems never to have
left her side on any occasion, these two were struck by bullets and fell, the
Ranee survived about 20 minutes.”[lxxxii]
The Muslim lady
who never left Rani alone was a young brave fighter woman named Mundar [Munzar?]
who was Rani's personal security in charge. She had shown her courage in the
battles of Jhansi, Koonch, Kalpi and Gwalior, finally, laid down her life
trying to save Rani at the same Kotah-Ki-Sarai. Her sacrifice based on the
contemporary police and military archives has been recorded in the following
words:
“Resident of
Jhansi [now in Uttar Pradesh]; Muslim woman who was a close associate of the
Rani of Jhansi; took active part in the Great Revolt against the British rule
in 1857.Fought by the side of Maharani Laxmi Bai during the battles against the
British at Jhansi, Koonch, Kalpi and Gwalior. Killed in the battle at
Kotah-ki-Sarai [June 17, 1858] in Gwalior, where the Rani attained martyrdom.”[lxxxiii]
Another lieutenant of Rani in the War who sacrificed her life was Moti
Bai, a canon-operator. Her sacrifice has
been recorded in the following words:
“She took part in throwing the
British out from Jhansi and surrounding areas; later the British struck back
and reached Jhansi in 1858; while fighting against the British offensive at the
Jhansi Fort on June 4, 1858, she was knocked down by the enemy fire and died on
the spot.”[lxxxiv]
In this War the sheroic
deeds and sacrifices of another woman warrior Rani Avantibai Lodhi of Ramgarh
State, situated in the tribal region of the Satpura jungles remain under
wrap. According to the contemporary
records the British had confiscated Ramgarh after the demise of her husband,
Raja Lakshman Singh. With the beginning of the liberation War she also declared
war against the British,
“and advanced
towards Suhagpur in July 1857. They opposing British force was defeated and
Sohagpur was captured by her. Another British force under Captain HF Waddington
tried to stop her and a bloody battle was fought near Shahpura. Riding on
horse-back, the Rani personally led her army…Fighting with remarkable valour,
she defeated the enemy…Captain Waddington retreated in such haste that his infant
child was left behind, but the Rani sent he child to him through her special
emissary.”[lxxxv]
The
contemporary records also tell us that repeated British attacks were repulsed
by the Rani’s army in a crucial battle in April 1858 when her army was fighting
the British army,
“the army of the
treacherous pro-British ruler of Rewa assaulted her from behind. She herself
and her army fought with extreme bravery, but were hopelessly outnumbered”.[lxxxvi]
She was asked to surrender but
refused to submit and instead of accepting defeat or surrendering, according to
the British gazetteer, “she killed herself by inflicting herself with a double-edged
sword so that could not be arrested”.[lxxxvii]
One more
queen who led the War after joining hands with Tantya Tope, Nana Sahib and Azimullah
Khan was Begum Hazrat Mahal [not to be confused with Zeenat Mahal, wife of Mughal
king Bahadur Shah Zafar who helped the British to capture Delhi in September
1857] of Lucknow. [lxxxviii]The
East India Company had deposed her husband, Wajid Ali Shah as ruler of Oudh. On
the advice of chieftains she installed her minor son, Brijis Qadr as ruler [she
becoming a regent] and formed a united front against the British and challenged
them vigorously in the Oudh region. She brought out a Proclamation in 1858
declaring objectives of the independent rule.
When the
British army attacked Lucknow, her army fought bravely with her associates. The
bravery shown by revolutionaries under her joint command are now part of the folk
stories and folklore. The revolutionary forces were defeated due to the
treachery of some local chieftains allied with the British and arrival of
thousands of the Gurkha soldiers who were sent by the Nepal Rana in support of
the British.
Her forces
withdrew to Shahjahanpur where in a crucial battle lost due to the treachery of
Raja Jagannath Singh of Pawayan. This
brave queen instead of discarding the armed struggle continued fighting in the
Tarai areas of Nepal with Nana Sahib and Azimullah Khan. She died there and is
buried in the vicinity of Jama Masjid, Kathmandu, Nepal.[lxxxix]
War
correspondence Howard Russell who was present in all the battles fought with
the army of Hazrat Mahal confessed:
“The Begum exhibits great energy and ability.
She has excited all Oudh to take up the interest of her son, and the chiefs
have sworn to be faithful to him. We effect to disbelieve his legitimacy, but
the zamindars, who ought to be better judges of facts, accept Birjeis Kuddr [Brijis
Qadr] without hesitation. Will Government treat these men as rebels or as
honourable enemies? The Begum declares undying war against us; and in the
circumstances of the annexation of the kingdom, the concealment of the
suppression of the treaty, the apparent ingratitude to the family for money
lent, and aid given at most critical times, has many grounds for her indignant
rhetoric…”
The male chauvinist
specially in India who continue to denigrate women as inferior to males must
read what a diehard defender of the British colonialism in India wrote about Indian
women who mainly stayed in zenanas [female apartment]. According to Russell:
“It appears, from the energetic
character of these Ranees and Begums, that they acquire in their zenanas and
harems, a considerable amount of actual mental power, and, at all events,
became able intriguantes. Their
contests for ascendancy over the minds of the men give vigour and acuteness to
their intellects.”[xc]
The Lucknow war front witnessed one
of the most sheroic deeds of not only 1857 War but any other battle by an alone
revolutionary woman which even the British army commanders shared with others.
Uda Devi’s husband Makka Pasi of Hazrat Mahal’s revolutionary army was killed
in a battle at Chinhat (near Lucknow) on June 10, 1857. In order to avenge his death what she did was
corroborated by the British commander, William Forbes-Mitchel who was leading
the attack at the Secundrabad battle front. He wrote in his memoirs:
“In the centre of the inner court of
the Secundrabâgh there was a large peepul [Ficus Indica] tree with a very bushy top, round the foot of
which were set a number of jars full of cool water. When the slaughter was
almost over, many of our men went under the tree for the sake of its shade, and
to quench their burning thirst with a draught of the cool water from the jars.
A number however lay dead under this tree, both of the Fifty-Third and
Ninety-Third, and the many bodies lying in that particular spot attracted the
notice of Captain Dawson. After having carefully examined the wounds, he
noticed that in every case the men had evidently been shot from above.
“He thereupon stepped out from
beneath the tree, and called to Quaker Wallace to look up if he could see any
one in the top of the tree, because all the dead under it had apparently been
shot from above. Wallace had his rifle loaded, and stepping back he carefully
scanned the top of the tree. He almost immediately called out, ‘I see him,
sir’…”[xci]
He fired on the sighted person and nobody could
believe that,
“down fell a body dressed in a
tight-fitting red jacket and tight-fitting rose-coloured silk trousers; and the
breast of the jacket bursting open with the fall, showed that the wearer was a
woman, She was armed with a pair of heavy old-pattern cavalry pistols, one of
which was in her belt still loaded, and her pouch was still about half full of
ammunition, while from her perch in the tree, which had been carefully prepared
before the attack, she had killed more than half-a-dozen men."[xcii]
In the annals of the history of
India’s liberation War another woman who stands tall was Ishwori Kumari Devi,
Rani of Tulsipur. Tulsipur known as Tulsipur Pargana (located in the Terai
region between India and Nepal) was one of the principalities of the Oudh
kingdom. She took up arms when her husband Drig Narayan Singh was treacherously
arrested and put up in a jail at Lucknow. The queen of Tulsipur not only raised
a large army with the help of Raja Riasat Ali Khan of Utraula but also formed a
joint armed front with Nana Sahib, Begum Hazrat Mahal and Raja Devibaksh Singh
of Gonda. Her army was defeated due to the arrival of thousands of Gurkha
soldiers from Nepal in support of the British army and treachery of Man Singh
of Ayodhya and Raja of Balrampur. She with her army shifted her base in the
jungles of Nepal and there is almost no primary source clues how and when she
died. The British Imperial Gazetteer recorded the fact that where as many rebel
taluqdars (large estate holder)
“accepted the
amnesty; but neither the Raja of Gonda nor the Rani of Tulsipur could be
induced to surrender…and their estates were accordingly confiscated and
conferred as reward upon Maharajas Sir Drigbijai Singh of Balrampur and Sir Man
Singh of Ajodhya [Ayodhya]”[xciii]
Mainavati was
another leading revolutionary who performed amazing deeds during the War. She
was from Bithoor, Cawnpore (now Kanpur), a foster daughter Nana Saheb Peshwa.
According to contemporary primary sources she,
“joined the
anti-British rebel forces and participated in driving the British out from
Kanpur and its neighbouring areas; acted as a supplier of the basic necessities
for the rebels during the revolt; in the course of the fighting she was
captured by the enemy and mercilessly burnt alive.”[xciv]
Sursee was
mother of Bheem Naik, a prominent Bheel tribal leader of Nimar (Barwani State)
in the then Central India who organized a valiant armed resistance against the
British rule in the area. According to the contemporary records Sursee
organized her own battalion and supported
“her son’s resistance
against foreign intrusion in the tribal inhabited areas; she was captured by
the British troops near Saloda on 8 February 185, following serious encounter
with troops at her command; she was imprisoned and tortured physically as well
as mentally at Mandleshewar Fort, died in detention on 28 February 1859.”[xcv]
The saga of rebel
women taking up arms against the foreign rule and laying down their lives in
the liberation War was not confined to one area or one section. Women
sacrificed lives in every nook and corner of the country. We have discussed
above how in a small town, Thana Bhawan, situated in Muzaffar Nagar district
(now in western Uttar Pradesh) 13 brave women belonging to different religions
and Castes were hanged together or burnt alive for taking up arms against the
repressive British rule. We need to re-run that great occurrence.
The names of these
sheroes[xcvi]
and sheroic deeds of them are as
follows. Asghari Begum, 45 years old, belonged to a well-to-do family and was
burnt alive for organizing rebellion in the area in 1858.[xcvii]
Another revolutionary woman was, 28 years old, Asha Devi[xcviii],
who belonged to a Hindu Gujar family and was hanged in 1858. Another martyred
woman was 23 year old young Bhagwati Devi[xcix],
born into a Tyagi family of farmers who fought in many battles against the Firangee rule and was hanged in 1858. 24
year old, Habeeba[c],
belonging to a Muslim Gujar family, fearlessly fought in many battles to
liberate neighbouring areas from the British
tyranny. She was a great organizer and mobilized her neighbourhood for the
liberation struggle. She was captured while resisting a British attack and was
executed on gallows in 1858.
Another brave
woman from this area named Mam Kaur[ci]
belonged to a family of the shepherds and was hanged at the young age of 25
years in 1858. 26 years old, Umda[cii]
was another gallant woman from this area, born into a Jat Muslim family who
sacrificed her life resisting the British invasion. Raj Kaur[ciii]born
in 1833, hailed from a Rajput family and made the supreme sacrifice fighting
against the British in Thana Bhawan area only. Another brave woman hailing also
from a Jat family who laid down her life fighting against the British was Inder
Kaur[civ].
Bkhtawari[cv] born in
1819 was another brave woman from the region who laid down her life fighting
against the British rulers.
Jamila[cvi]
born into a Pathan family of the area took up arms against the foreign rulers
and was martyred in 1858. Three other revolutionary women from Thana Bhavan who
sacrificed their lives for liberation of India from the Company rule were,
Rahimi[cvii],
belonging to a Muslim Rajput family born in 1829, Bhagwani[cviii]
born in 1831 hailing from a Brahmin family and Beebee who were hanged in 1858.
It is to be noted that most of these revolutionary women were hanged in 1858
which shows that the British that this area remained liberated till 1858.
How serious was rebellion mainly led
by women and the degree of resistance at Thana Bhavan can be understood by
reading the description about it in a British gazetteer which shared the
information that after hearing about the rebellion,
“The troops at once proceeded to Thana
Bhawan and attacked the town, but were repulsed with the loss of 17 killed and
21 wounded, and were obliged to retire upon Muzaffarnagar, which was again
threatened by marauders. On the arrival of reinforcements from Meerut, an
expedition was again led against Thana Bhawan which was evacuated by the enemy,
and the gates and walls were razed to the ground.”[cix]
Delhi, battle
front too witnessed unbelievable sheroics of Indian women which was beyond
comprehension of the leading British commanders. Hodson in a letter to his wife
on August 8, 1857 informed her,
“I have sent one of our few prisoners
up to Forsyth [a senior British official] at Umbala [Ambala], whom we
ironically call the ‘Maid of Delhi’, though her age and character are questionable,
and her ugliness undoubted. She actually came out on horseback, and fought
against us like a fiend. The General at first released her, but knowing how
mischievous she would be among those superstitious Mahommedans, I persuaded him
to let her be recaptured, and made over for safe custody.”[cx]
Importantly, another leading
commander of the besieging British army outside Delhi, HH Greathed (who was
killed by the defending revolutionary army on September 19, 1857) in a letter
to his wife dated July 19, 1857 informed about another woman fighter being
arrested outside Delhi,
"A John of Arc [a young French
lady who played sheroic role against the besieging British army and was
martyred in 1431] was made prisoner yesterday; she is said to have shot one of
our men, and to have fought desperately. She is a 'Jehadin,' a religious
fanatic, and sports a green turban, and was probably thought to be inspired.
She is to be sent prisoner to Umballa [Ambala]."[cxi]
It is to be
noted that details of participation of women (or joint martyrdoms of
Hindus-Muslims-Sikhs and participation of common people) in the Great War of
liberation are based on whatever contemporary records have survived. Most of
the contemporary archival material has been lost due to the exigencies of
weather, personal collections not maintained or destroyed due to the political upheavals.
The official records too met the same fate in many-many cases. Moreover,
Partition of India caused bifurcation of these records and large number of
documents lost in transition.
We also lost
lots of documents due to the ‘theft’ of the documents by the departing colonial
masters. They took away all important archival material with them; the proof
being that all important documents of the period are stored at India Office Library,
London and thus remain generally inaccessible to researchers. Those Indian
researchers who can afford to visit have to buy their own documents which are
sold as per the size of the document. Unfortunately,
even after independence we did not demand return of this treasure from our
former masters. It is this paucity of documents that according to a renowned
historian Professor Nurul Hasan "prevents us from acknowledging here
thousands of other patriots whose name may remain unknown."
Those women
who did not participate in the War directly produced amazing, popular,
inspiring, great folk-songs hailing the revolutionaries and decrying the
foreign rulers [author has reservation about calling these songs as ‘folk-songs’
which as per the dictionary definitions and usage mean created by the commoners,
written in regional languages/dialects which do not represent the mainstream.
It is the outcome of our hatred towards common people, the languages/dialect
they use, specially, women who have traditionally been composers and singers of
such songs. In fact, during the War these were the mainstream songs which inspired
millions of revolutionaries and kept the whole nation engrossed in the cause of
liberation].
Women as balladeers of the War
Such songs and
ballads were composed, set to tunes and sung mainly by women in every regional
languages and dialects. Sadly, most of these have been lost as, except
connoisseurs and historian like PC Joshi, independent India did nothing to save
this great heritage of joint-struggles and joint martyrdoms. Two of such songs
are reproduced in the following.
Oh, come and look!
Oh, come and
look!
In the Bazaar
of Meerut,
The Firinghi
[the British] is waylaid and beaten!
The Whiteman
is way laid and beaten!
In the open
Bazaar of Meerut,
Look, oh look
(he is beaten).
His gun is
snatched, His horse lies dead, His revolver is battered!
In the open
Bazaar,
He is waylaid
and beaten!
In the Bazaar
of Meerut,
Look, oh look!
(Composed, sung by Gujar [a
peasant community] women in the Western Uttar Pradesh region after the victory
of revolutionaries in Meerut, Translated
from the regional dialect known as ‘desi bhasha’)[cxii]
Ah my little Devar!
The army has attacked the fort,
My Devar [husband’s younger
brother] is facing the screaming bullets,
One ‘Firangi’ [the British], my
darling has killed.
Two Firangis, my Devar has seized
and thrown,
Inside the dungeon,
I reproached him and he was
angered terribly.
There [on the otherside],
An order was given, And the
Firangi armies,
Got ready and stormed the fort.
But see my Devar,
Still unperturbed,
Is fighting them as though it is
mere play to him.
Oh, dear sister,
Much, very much did I tell him,
But he does not listen,
Now even the shells are finished.
(But) He says, ‘I will not
yield’,
And thus, he needs not,
Ah! My little Devar.
[A song sung by a sister-in-law
translated from Braj language of the Mathura-Agra region.][cxiii]
(4) Conclusion: Shameless betrayal of the sacrifices and joint heritage
of India’s First War of Independence by our independent India.
Now it is almost 170 years that
people of this country; men, women, children belonging to all religions,
regions and strata rose in revolt from Kashmir to Madras and Sylhet to the
borders of Afghanistan. Today if Indians have forgotten about this glorious
saga of commitment and sacrifices for the liberation of India can be forgiven
in absence of the contemporary narratives. But what independent India did to
obliterate the memories of this great War immediately after independence on
August 15, 1947, when only 90 years had elapsed to this great War, could only
be described as criminal.
It is true that we spent crores of
rupees in celebrating the 100th 150th anniversaries of
the War but did not bother to revive the common heritage of the joint martyrdoms
of this glorious struggle. Earlier, the first education minister of the
independent India, Abul Kalam Azad organized a team of renowned historians to
compile the list of pan-Indian martyrs of the War but it was abandoned. On the
eve of 150th anniversary Indian Council of Historical produced
volumes with details of martyrs which unfortunately not available now.
True, these were worthy deeds but
the issue was not only of chronicling the sacrifices but how to undo the
injustice done to the liberation warriors who not only lost their lives but all
their properties were confiscated and given to Indian stooges who helped the
foreign rulers with all kinds of human and non-human resources for suppressing
the mutiny.
We cannot overlook the fact
that Indians lost this War despite mass upsurge and support. The perusal of the
contemporary documents makes it clear that it was due to the Indian stooges
that we lost this War. reasons are not difficult to find out. Kaye was
forthright in his conclusion that these were princes who helped the British in
recapturing India after 1857 revolt. According to him,
“It was one of the most curious
characteristics of the mutiny-war, that although the English were supposed to
be fighting against the native races, they were in reality sustained and
supported by the Natives of the country, and could not have held their own for
a day without the aid of those whom we hated as our national enemies.”
William Russell, war
correspondent in one of the dispatches (May 9, 1858) wrote that
“Our siege of Delhi, would have
been quite impossible, if the rajahs [sic] of Patiala and of Jhind (now known
as Jind in Haryana) had not been our friends, and if the Sikhs had not
recruited (in) our battalions, and remained quite in Punjab. The Sikhs at
Lucknow did good service…as our armies were attended and strengthened by them
in the field”
It is to be noted here that
when Russell referred to Sikhs, it did not mean common Sikhs but the Sikh
rulers of Punjab. Moreover, these were not the only rulers who came to sub-serve the
interest of the British masters
when the latter were
on the verge of losing
India. The rulers of Kashmir,
Hyderabd, Gwalior, Nabha, Kapurthala,
Udaipur, Jaipur, Alwar, Kotah, Bhopal,
Pataudi and hundreds others joined the bandwagon
of the British imperialism in the War.
Sir Charles Aitchison, who played
a leading role in suppressing ‘Mutiny’ not only hailed the crucial contribution
of such stooge princes in winning India in the following words:
“The Native States rendered
priceless service in the day of our distress…Speaking in the fullness of his
gratitude, Lord Canning [the Governor General] described them as ‘breakwaters
to the storm, which would otherwise have swept over us in one great wave.’ ‘The
safety of our rule is increased,’ he wrote, ‘not diminished, by the maintenance
of Native Chiefs well affected to us…And should the day come when India shall
be threatened by an external enemy, or when the interests of England elsewhere
may require that her Eastern Empire shall incur more than ordinary risk, one of
our best mainstays will be found in these Native States.’”
The post-1857 era witnessed an
India in which only those princely states survived which either had worked as
the stooges of the colonial masters in this War or were pardoned by the
British. Those entire nationalists who challenged the foreign rule were
ruthlessly suppressed. Most of them died fighting
or were hanged; their families banished and their estates confiscated
and handed over to the loyal princes.
On the eve of independence the
first decision which independent India’s sovereign government should have taken
must have been to return the properties of the families of the martyrs which were
confiscated and given as rewards to the Indian stooges. The whole nation knows
how the descendants of these revolutionaries including those belonging to
princely families lived life of penury, hunger and died miserable deaths. Out of
thousands, here are few examples of gross and criminal injustice which needed
immediate redressal but we kept mum as a State and nation.
According to the contemporary British
gazetteers the estates of Raja of Gonda and Rani of Tulsipur,
“were confiscated and conferred as
rewards upon Maharaja Drigbijai Singh of Balrampur and Sir Man Singh of Ajodhya”.
Scindhia of Gwalior
who helped the British greatly in defeating Rani Laxmi Bai and Nana and their
killings, as per the contemporary British gazetteer
“For his services in the mutiny lands worth 3
lakhs a year revenue were made over to him, while he was allowed to increase
his infantry from 3,000 to 5,000 men and his artillery from 32 to 36
guns."
We come to know again through a
contemporary British gazetteer that,
"Wazir Muhammad Khan, who, during the Mutiny,
repulsed with comparatively few men an attack made on the Tonk fort by the
combined forces of Nawab of Banda and Tantia Topi [sic]. For these services, his salute was raised from 15 to 17 guns…"
Ruler of Patiala who as an
ally of the British played a prominent
role in crushing rebellion in Haryana, Delhi, Oudh received huge ‘inaam’,
"After 1857 Narendra Singh’s splendid services
were rewarded with the gift of sovereign rights in the Narnaul division of the
forfeited State of the Jhajjar Nawab, assessed at a revenue of two lakhs on
condition of political and military support in times of general danger or
disturbance. He was also permitted to purchase the Kanaud pargana of
Jhajjar and the taluka of Khamaon in perpetual sovereignty in liquidation of
loans advanced to the British Government during the Mutiny. In addition, the
Maharaja was granted administrative jurisdiction over Bhadaur, and the right of
escheats and reversion to lapsed estates therein, receiving the annual sum of
Rs. 5,265, previously paid into the Imperial treasury by the Bhadaur Sardars.
Narendra Singh was made a K.C.S.I., in 1861…”
Likewise,
Raja Randhir Singh of Kapurthala State who helped the British to crush
rebellion in Delhi and Oudh
“was rewarded with a grant of the two confiscated
estates of Bundi and Bithauli, in the Bharaich and Bara Banki districts in
Oudh, yielding a rental of Rs. 4,35,000. His brother, Kunwar Bikrama Singh, who
had accompanied the Raja to Oudh, was given a portion of the Akauna estate in
Bharaich, yielding Rs. 45,000 a year. The Raja of Kapurthala stood fifth in
order of precedence among the chiefs of the Punjab. He was entitled to a salute
of eleven guns, and to receive a return visit from the Viceroy.”
The
Pataudi family too was rewarded for services rendered during the mutiny.
"He [nawab of Pataudi] also took an
active part in the suppression of a rising in the Bahora pargana of Gurgaon,
organized by one Tula Ram, grandson of Rao Tej Singh of Rewari; and his troops
were present on the side of order at the action outside Jaurasi, which lasted
for two days… Pataudi ranks seventeenth in order of precedence amongst the
Native States of the Punjab, and the chief is entitled to be received by the
Viceroy."
The
British rulers were grateful to Jodhpur Raja when stated:
"The Maharaja [Takht Singh of Jodhpur] did good
service during the Mutiny. He was entitled for a salute of 17 guns. Takht Singh
died in 1873, when he was succeeded by eldest son, Jaswant Singh…He was created
a GCSI in 1875 and subsequently his salute was raised first to 19, and next to
21 guns."
The Pawayan [in Shahjahanpur] was ruled by a notorious
British stooge, Raja Jagannath Singh when 1857 happened. In a
gut-wrenching treachery he invited the leading commander of the rebellion
Maulvi Ahmedullah Shah posing as supporter of the War. However, when Maulvi
reached his palace in the evening he was beheaded by Jagannath’s brother Baldeo
Singh. The British had announced a prize of 50 thousand pieces of silver for
beheading the Maulvi. He presented Maulvi’s severed head same night to the
British commander of the area and received cash ‘inaam’ as reward. In his
absence the rebel forces including under the command of Nana and Hazrat Mahal
lost important battle and revolutionary rule in Rohilkhand came to an end. The
decadents of this criminal family became legislators, ministers both at the
Stat and central levels. This is how we paid homage to 1857 martyrs!
Apart
from these stooges, rulers of Dhar, Ratlam, Jaipur, Jammu, Rewa, Rampur and
hundreds other were rewarded for suppressing the mutiny. It must be noted that
in 20th century most of these pro-British native rulers became
patrons and financiers of communal-fascist organizations like Hindu Mahasabha,
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Muslim League. They provided sanctuaries to
these anti-national organizations. Many-many of these kept on ruling free India;
we saw the spectacle of the family members of the stooges enjoying power as
chief ministers, ministers, Governors in an independent India. They continued
enjoying the benefits of estates which were confiscated from the rebels and
awarded to their families by the British.
By
forgetting the heritage of the War 1857; the heritage of religious unity and
unity of all the struggling masses against loot and imperialism. The ruling
classes let the polity slip down to the present sorry state of affairs when
India is devastated by the forces of religious bigotry, intolerance, Casteism
and ruthlessness.
How heartless was independent
India that we even did not try to locate the final resting places of heroes and
sheroes of the War of 1857 like, Rani of Tulsipur, Zeenat Mahal, Azeemullah
Khan, Nana Saheb, General Bakht Khan and many of their comrades who died in
Nepal.
Shamsul Islam
May 5, 2021
Kannada, Bengali, Punjabi,
Gujarati and video interviews/debates:
http://du-in.academia.edu/ShamsulIslam
Facebook:
https://facebook.com/shamsul.islam.332
Twitter: @shamsforjustice
http://shamsforpeace.blogspot.com/
Email: notoinjustice@gmail.com
[i] For the whole text see Husain, Iqbal (ed.), Proclamations of the Rebels of 1857,
ICHR, Delhi, p. 28.
[ii] Lal, Kanhaya, Tareekh-e-Bhaghawat-e-Hind:Moharba-e-Azeem
[History of Indian Mutiny: A Great War], Munshi Nawal Kishore Press, Awadh,
1889 and Khan, Syed Ahmad (Sir Syed), The
Causes of the Indian Revolt, Khuda Baksh Oriental Public Library, Patna,
1999 reprint [first edition 1859.
[iii] Kaye, A History of the Sepoy War in India (in
three volumes).
[iv] Kaye, John William, A History of the Sepoy War in
India 1857-1858, vol. iii, London, 1870, Preface p. vi.
[v] Ball, Charles, The History of the
Indian Mutiny, vol. ii, The London Printing & Publishing Co, 1858.
[vi] Hodson, George E (ed.), Twelve Years of a Soldier's Life in India: Being Extracts from the
Letters of the Late Major WSR Hodson (BA Trinity College; First Bengal European
Fusiliers, Commandant of Hodson's Horses) Including a Personal Narrative of the Siege of Delhi
and Capture of Delhi and Capture of the King and Princes, John W. Parker,
London, 1859, p. 246.
[vii] Hodson. p. 240.
[viii]
Russell, William Howard, My Diary in
India:In the Year 1858-9, vol. i, Routledge, Warner & Routledge,
London, 1860, p. 164.
[ix] Lowe, pp. 357-358.
[x] Lowe, p. 327.
[xi] Lowe, p. 59.
[xii] Lowe, p. 57.
[xiii] Hodson. p. 196.
[xiv] Kaye, vol. ii, pp. 630.
[xv] Kaye, vol. ii, p. 631.
[xvi] Fred, p. 56.
[xvii] Fred, p. 75.
[xviii] Trevelyan, GO, Cawnpore,
Macmillan, London, 1866, pp. 34.
[xix] Trevelyan, GO, Cawnpore, Macmillan, London, 1866, pp. 34-35.
[xx] Kaye, A History
of the Great Revolt, vol. i, p. 246.
[xxi] Hodson, p. 243.
[xxii] Chopra, PN, pp. 1,30,39,43,55,81-82.
[xxiii] Kaye, John William, A History of the Sepoy War in
India 1857-1858, vol. iii, London, 1870, pp. 592-593.
[xxiv] Kaye, John William, A History of the Sepoy War in
India 1857-1858, vol. iii, London, 1870, pp. 610-611.
[xxv] Hodson. p. 201.
[xxvi] Hodson, p. 205.]
[xxvii] Hodson. pp. 219-220.
[xxviii] Griffiths, Charles John, A Narrative of the Siege of Delhi with an account of the Mutiny at
Ferozepore in 1857, John Murray, London, 1910, p. 159.
[xxix] For Oudh
multiple spellings have been used like Oude, Awadh as mentioned in the contemporary
narratives.
[xxx] Husain, Iqbal (ed.), Proclamations of the Rebels of 1857, ICHR, Delhi.]
[xxxi] Iqbal, Rashida (ed.), Unsung Heroes of Freedom Struggle in Andamans: Who’s Who, Andaman
& Nicobar Administration, Port Blair, 2004.
[xxxii] In this national war of independence people of other
religions also participated as we find Jains, Buddhists and even Christians too
laying down their lives but contemporary documents refer to the followers of
only these 3 religions.
[xxxiii] Cited in Pande, BN, The Hindu Muslim Problem,
Gandhi Smriti & Darshan Samiti, Delhi, p. vi.
[xxxiv] John Lawrence note dated August 18, 1857 cited in
Khan, Syed Ahmad (Sir Syed), Sarkashee-e-Zila
Bijnore, Nadwatul Mussanefeen, Delhi, 1964 [first edition published by
Mufussilite Press, Agra, 1858], p. 339.
[xxxv] Chopra, PN (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs:
1857, vol. 3, Government of India, 1973, p. 9. It is the most authentic
narrative of the 1857 martyrs as data was collected from police, administrative
records and the British gazetteers. It is to be noted as admitted in the preface
by Professor Nurul Hasan that loss and non-availability of records
"prevents us from acknowledging here thousands of other patriots whose
name may remain unknown."
I have also consulted the
contemporary British records and narratives for sharing details of martyrs.
The record of the martyrs of India’s First
War of Independence is also available in 5 volume series (2 volumes in two
parts) commissioned by Indian Council of Historical Research, Delhi titled Dictionary
of Martyrs: India’s Freedom Struggle (1857-1947), vol. ii (part 2),ICHR, Delhi, 2010. Its circulation
was stopped for unknown reasons recently.
[xxxvi] Ibid., p.120.
[xxxvii] Ibid., p.3.
[xxxviii] Ibid., p. 139.
[xxxix] Ibid., p.34.
[xl] Ibid., pp. 62-63.
[xli] Ibid., pp. 62-63.
[xlii] Ibid., p p. 56-57.
[xliii] Ibid., p. 102.
[xliv] Ibid., p. 40.
[xlv] Ibid., 81.
[xlvi] Ibid., 45.
[xlvii] Ibid., 75.
[xlviii] Chopra, PN (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs:
1857, vol. 3, Government of India, 1973, p. 102.
[xlix] Ibid., 143-144.
[l] Ibid., 125. The British were not able to arrest him
till 1862 when due to the treachery of a Maratha landlord was arrested at Jammu
(Kashmir) with his wife and a child. He was hanged at Kanpur on August 20,
1862.
[li] Ibid., 41.
[lii] Ibid., 41-42.
[liii] Ibid., 73-74.
[liv] Ibid., 76.
[lv] Chopra, PN (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs:
1857, vol. 3, Government of India, 1973, p. 11.
[lvi] Ibid., p. 11.
[lvii] Ibid., p. 21.
[lviii] Ibid., p. 49.
[lix] Ibid., p. 87..
[lx] Ibid., p. 149
[lxi] Ibid., p. 118.
[lxii] Ibid., p. 60.
[lxiii] Ibid., p. 16.
[lxiv] Ibid., pp. 64-65.
[lxv] Ibid., p. 118.
[lxvi] Ibid., pp. 20-21.
[lxvii] Ibid., 17. According to the British military reports
he was martyred while leading a revolutionary army contingent on Nepal borders
on May 13, 1859.
[lxviii] Ibid., 13. Escaped from India into Nepal forests with
Nana Saheb, died at Bhutwal (Nepal) in October 1859.
[lxix] The names of these commanders keep on recurring in
the letters of spies who were sending day-to-day reports to the British
commanders at the Ridge where Hindu Rao Hospital stands presently. According to
these spies there was 'fauji kote' or war council consisting of the above
commanders. For these letters see, Islam, Shamsul (ed.) Letters of Spies:
How Delhi was Lost, Pharos, Delhi, 2019.
[lxx] From the letter of spy Ramji Das Alipur, Ibid., p.
63.
[lxxi] Metcalf, Charles Theophilus, Two Narratives of the
Mutiny of Delhi, A Constable & Company, London, 1898, pp. 125-126.
[lxxii] Appeared in Urdu newspaper Pyam-e-Azadi
[Message of Independence], Delhi, May 13, 1857.
[lxxiii] Russell, William Howard, My Diary in India, in the
Year 1858-9, vol. i, Routledge, London, 1860, p. 244.
[lxxiv] Lowe, Thomas, Central
India: During the Rebellion of 1857 and 1858: A Narrative of Operations of the
British Forces from the Suppression of Mutiny in Aurangabad to the Capture of
Gwalior Under Major General Sir Hugh Rose, GCB,
and Brigadier Sir C. Stuart, KCB, Longman, London, 1860, p. 324.
[lxxv] Roberts, Fred, Letters Written During the Mutiny,
Macmillan, London, 1924, pp. 103-104.
[lxxvi] Chopra, PC (ed.), Who
is Who of Indian Martyrs: 1857, p. 81.
[lxxvii] [Chaturvedi, DN, (tr. & ed.), Remember Us Once in a While, Publication
Division (GOI), Delhi, 1998, p. 2.]
[lxxviii] Ibid., p. 3.]
[lxxix] cited in Joshi, PC, 1857 in Folk Songs, PPH, Delhi, 1994, p.
46.
[lxxx] cited in Joshi, PC, 1857 in Folk Songs, PPH, Delhi, 1994, p.
50.
[lxxxi] Lowe, p. 236.
[lxxxii] [Foreign
Political Consultations, No. 4293, December 31, 1858. Cited in Surendranath
Sen, 1857, Government of India,
Delhi, 1957, p. 293.
[lxxxiii] [Chopra, p. 102.
[lxxxiv] DICTIONARY OF
MARTYRS: INDIA’S FREEDOM STRUGGLE (1857-1947), vol. 2 (part ii), Delhi, 2010, p. 97.
[lxxxv] Chopra, PC (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs: 1857, pp.
11.
[lxxxvi] Chopra, PC (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs: 1857, pp.
11.
[lxxxvii] District Mandla Gazetteer (1912)
cited in Mishr, Suresh, Mandla ke
Dastavez, Swaraj Sansthan, Bhopal, 2004, p. 15.
[lxxxviii] Chopra, PC (ed.), Who
is Who of Indian Martyrs: 1857, pp. 54-55.
[lxxxix] [https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/lucknow/nepal-sun-shines-on-begum-hazrat-mahals-grave/articleshow/58074241.cms
[xc] [Russell, William Howard, My Diary in India, vol. 1, Routledge,
Warner & Routledge, London, 1860, pp. 274-75.]
[xci] Forbes-Mitchell, William, Reminiscences
of the Great Mutiny 18576-59 Including the Relief, Siege & Capture of
Lucknow& the Campaign in Rohilcund & Oude, Macmillan, London, 1897, p. 57.
[xcii] Forbes-Mitchell, William, p. 58.
[xciii] Imperial
Gazetteer of India, vol. xii, Oxford, London, 1908, p. 313.
[xciv] Mutiny Records, Kanpur Division,
Mutiny Basta, UPRRA; WWIM, III, p. 86.
[xcv] Mutiny Papers, vol. ii, NAIB; WWIM,
iii, pp. 141-142 cited in Dictionary of
Martyrs: India’s Freedom Struggle (1857-1947), vol. ii (part 2), ICHR, Delhi, 2010, p. 345.
[xcvi] according to the dictionary word ‘hero’ means a “man
who exhibits great bravery” which is not gender neutral and conveys the faulty
wisdom that only man can be brave. The author is using the term ‘shero/sheroes
for female participants in the liberation War]
[xcvii] Chopra, PN (ed.), Who is Who of Indian Martyrs:
1857, vol. 3, Government of India, 1973, p. 11.
[xcviii] Ibid., p. 11.
[xcix] Ibid., p. 21.
[c] Ibid., p. 49.
[ci] Ibid., p. 87..
[cii] Ibid., p. 149
[ciii] Ibid., p. 118.
[civ] Ibid., p. 60.
[cv] Ibid., p. 16.
[cvi] Ibid., pp. 64-65.
[cvii] Ibid., p. 118.
[cviii] Ibid., pp. 20-21.
[cix] Imperial Gazetteer of India,
v. 18, p. 86.
[cx] Hodson. p. 259.]
[cxi] Greathed, HH, Letters Written During the Siege of Delhi (edited by his widow),
Longman, London, 1858, p. 130.
[cxii] Joshi, P. C. (compiled), 1857 in Folk Songs, People’s Publishing
House, Delhi, 1994, p. 9.
[cxiii] Ibid., p. 13.
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