How, led by Mughals, Hindus and Muslims together fought the war of 1857

By Rana Safvi   @iamrana |

2018-06-01 21:07:29

They battled as a united force against the might of the British Raj.

On May 11, 1857, Bahadur Shah Zafar, the nominal emperor of Hindustan, was approached by the Indian sepoys of the Bengal army who came to see him from Meerut after rebelling against the British dictat that required them to use Enfield rifles whose cartridges were greased with the fat of pig and cow.

They appealed to him saying that every proclamation that they had heard so far was in his name: “Khilqat Khuda ki, Mulk Badshah ka, Hukm Company ka (The Lord’s creation, the emperor’s country, the company’s command).”

“But now, the British have been empowered to rule us on your orders. So we have come to you as petitioners, hopeful of justice.” (Dastan e Ghadar by Zahir Dehlvi, translated by Rana Safvi).

Liaquat Ali was holding the fort in Khusrau Bagh, Allahabad, while 80-year-old Kanwar Singh (above) raised the banner of revolt in Bihar. Photo: Screengrab

The emperor, though initially reluctant, agreed to lead them in their war against the foreign rulers and on May 12, 1857, he was crowned the Emperor of Hindustan. On May 18, 1857, Munshi Jeevan Lal, a spy of the British, wrote that the Rani of Ujjain, Laxmibai, had asked for permission to come to court; she was told that it was entirely upto to her and not required.

Implicit in this report is her support for the Indian sepoys fighting under the Mughal emperor.

He was indeed accepted by all as the emperor of Hindustan and when the uprising spread, even Rani Laxmibai of Jhansi and Nana Saheb “sought legtimacy from the Mughal sovereign Bahadur Shah II rather than appealing to the notion of Hindu Padpadshahi or seeking legtimacy from the Maratha chiefs of Satara or Peshwa,” writes Prof SZH Jafri, in a special volume on Delhi in 1857.

In another article, ”The issue of religion in 1857: Three documents”, Prof Jafri writes:

“One comes across numerous printed proclamations, appeals and pamphlets issued by the rebel leaders in the various centres of the Uprising, always making a plea for a united struggle to expel the foreign rulers from the Indian subcontinent. Apart from making a very strong case for Hindu-Muslim unity they often also sought to revive the notion of Mughal sovereignty and invoked the concept of ‘People (khalq) of God, country (mulk) of king (that is, the Mughal emperor), authority (hukm) of the local leaders or chiefs’ to imply loyalty to a common cause.”

A fierce battle against the Empire. Photo: Screengrab

On August 25, 1857, Bahadur Shah Zafar issued a proclamation. S Mahdi Hasan, in his seminal book Bahadur Shah Zafar and the War of 1857 in Delhi, writes that the original proclamation was lost, but in 1858, after Zafar’s sentence but before he was actually sent to Rangoon, Burma, his descendant Prince Firoz Shah, who was still at war with the British, issued its replica and thus it became famous as the Azamgarh Proclamation.

It was translated by JD Forsythe, the secretary to the chief commissioner of Oude as the “Proclamation issued by the Rebels”. It declares that “as both Hindoos and Mohammadens have been ruined by the oppression of the infidel and treacherous English, therefore it is the bounden duty of all the wealthy people of India to stake their lives for the well-being of the people of India”.

It talks of Muslims rallying under the flag of Muhammad and the Hindus under the flag of Mahavira (used for Hanuman).

It goes on to say that the sacred books of Hindus and Muslims have prophesied the end of British rule after this year (1857) and thus, people should remove fear of its continuance from their minds and join in “our cause”.

(There was a prophesy that 100 years after the Battle of Plassey (1757), the British rule would come to an end.)

The proclamation addresses zamindars, merchants, men of service, artisans and scholars of both creeds, “Hindoos and Musalmans (Maulvis and Pandits)”. This last part is very interesting as it says: “You are aware that the British are opposedto your religion and as the present is a religious war you should join s and gain the good will of the creator, otherwise you will be considered sinners. If you will join us you will receive mafees and land from the emperor.” (From Bahadur Shah Zafar and the War of 1857 in Delhi).

So, this was a religious war where Hindus and Muslims, of “high” and “low” castes, all fought against the foreign power of the British East India company, under the banner of the Emperor of Hindustan, Bahadur Shah II (more popularly known as Bahadur Shah Zafar), and fought a common enemy: the firangi or foreigner.

However, it is important to note that Bahadur Shah Zafar was not fighting Christians or Englishmen but the British East India company. “He (Zafar) opposed the company’s paramountcy and the Englishmen as a class enjoying the highest and most lucrative offices in the state,” writes S Mahdi Hasan.

In fact, the European Francis Godlieu Quins, who wrote Urdu-Persian poetry under the penname Frasoo, chronicles that “Zafar called all the three classes of poeople (Musalman, Hindus and Mujahideen) to a personal interview, and having taken an oath explained his object. He asked that the Hindus should swear by Ram and the Ganges and that the musalman should swear, each placing a copy of the Quran on his head.” (Bahadur Shah Zafar and the War of 1857 in Delhi.)

A war that Faizabad’s Ahamadullah Shah, Jhansi’s Rani Laxmibai and Haryana’s Rao Tula Ram fought together.

While Ghulam Ghaus manned the cannons in the Fort of Jhansi under Rani Laxmibai, Raja Jai Singh of Azamgarh fought under the banner of Begum Hazrat Mahal (he was a key member of her military counsel and also the main spokesperson for the troops in their dealings with the court of the young Birjis Qadr, after the regent declared him the Nawab in 1857). Jai Singh, too, was martyred in the cause of Independence.

Ghaus, the gunner, died defending Jhansi; Rani Laxmibai had famously declared, “Main apni Jhansi nahin dungi (I will never give up my Jhansi)” to the British.

Azizan Bai, the famous courtesan of Kanpur, joined the battle against the British in 1857, under the banner of Nana Saheb.

There are innumerable examples of Hindu-Muslim unity and, in fact, that was seen as one of the main reasons for the “revolt” by the British.

If there was Ahmadullah Shah, the Maulvi of Faizabad, fighting the British in Awadh, there was also Rao Tula Ram of Haryana, who was helping Bahadur Shah Zafar.

Bahadur Shah Zafar: Poet extraordinaire, exiled emperor. Photo: IP-Black/Indiapicture

Liaquat Ali was holding the fort in Allahabad’s Khusrau Bagh, while 80-year-old Kanwar Singh raised the banner of revolt in Bihar. A forgotten aspect of the 1857 uprising is the role of the tribals who had also participated. A popular Bhojpuri song from 1857 goes thus:

Ab chod re firangiyal hamar deswa

Lutpat kaile tuhun majwa udaile

Kailas des par julum Jor.

Sahar gaon luuti, phunki dihiat firangiya

Suni Suni kunwar ke hridaya mein lagal aagiya

Ab chod re firangiyal Hamar deswa

(Oh British, leave our country, for you loot us,

you enjoy the luxury of our country,

and, in return, you loot and burn our hamlets, cities and villages,

Kunwar’s heart burns to know this,

Oh British, leave our country…)

(Translated by Badri Narayan in Facets of the Great Revolt, edited by Shireen Moosvi).

“Among the many lessons the Indian mutiny conveys to the historian, none is of greater importance than the warning that it is possible to have a Revolution in which Brahmins and Sudras, Hindus and Mahomedans, could be united against us…,” British historian George William Forrest mentioned in the introduction of the State Papers soon after the end of the First War of Independence.

According to historian Irfan Habib, it was the largest anticolonial uprising anywhere in the world. Out of 1,35,000 Bengal army native soldiers, only 7,000 remained loyal to their British masters.

It was the sheer scale that rattled the might of the British Empire and they struck back with unparalleled cruelty — killing, executing and looting all those whom the slightest shred of evidence linked to the revolt. The brunt was borne by Muslims as they shared the faith of the man declared as Emperor of Hindustan. It was seen as a “Mohammedan conspiracy making capital out of Hindu grievances”.

Most of the princes and princesses were either killed or died trying to escape, or spent their lives in ignominy and poverty. Many innocents from every site associated with the centres of the uprising were killed, and Hindustan, as we knew it till 1857, changed forever.

The emperor was tried for sedition (against his own empire!) and exiled to Rangoon in 1858; he died there, away from his homeland, in 1864.

Thus, the Mughal empire was replaced by the British Empire under Empress Victoria.

This article appeared in The Wire on 7th April 2016

April 7 marks the 137th death anniversary of Begum Hazrat Mahal, a woman who has gone down in history for her valour and courage in standing up to the might of the British forces in India’s first war of independence in 1857.

This is as good a time as any to remember not the begum but also all the other women who sacrificed their lives in 1857 – many of whom are unknown and unheralded.

When we talk about women’s roles in 1857 we immediately think of Rani Lakshmibai and Begum Hazrat Mahal. But were these the only women who contributed to the struggle?  There were women from the depressed classes (called dalit veeranganas by scholars), there were numerous bhatiyarins, or innkeepers, in whose inns plots were hatched by the rebels, aided by performers and courtesans who passed on news and information and even financed them.

But why is it that we hardly ever talk about these women? Is it because they were from the margins of society and so their sacrifices weren’t taken into account, or because no one propagated their stories of courage? Or is the reason for their “absence” that, in traditional patriarchal society, women were not seen as warriors?

The victors rewrote post-1857 history to suit their own interests. Eulogising or glorifying those who participated in the uprising against them wasn’t on their agenda, of course. The reason Jhansi ki Rani is so popular is because of the oral tradition and the dozens of folk songs that are still sung about her. The elite of Awadh kept Begum Hazrat’s legacy alive, though their ways didn’t prove to be as powerful as the folk songs. Nowadays comic books, especially the Amar Chitra Katha series, keep the legends of a select few alive.

But, apart for having their names registered in British records, most women remain unknown.

On May 10, 1857, the “sepoys” of Meerut rebelled against the British East India Company. Very soon, others joined them under the banner of Bahadur Shah II, the Mughal emperor, to whom the rebels gave the title Shahenshah-e-Hind. The rebellion became a full-fledged uprising against the British, with kings, nobles, landlords, peasants, tribals, and ordinary people fighting together. Yet historians tend to ignore, and to completely forget, the role of the women who came out of their homes and joined the men in fighting the Company Bahadur.

Begum Hazrat Mahal

n Awadh, Begum Hazrat, wife of the deposed Nawab Wajid Ali Shah, took on the might of the East India Company and almost succeeded. The longest resistance to the British was offered by the begum and her trusted band of followers, Sarafad-daulah, Maharaj Bal Krishna, Raja Jai Lal and, above all, Mammu Khan. Her associates included Rana Beni Madho Baksh of Baiswara, Raja Drig Bijai Singh of Mahona, Maulvi Ahmad Ullah Shah of Faizabad, Raja Man Singh and Raja Jailal Singh.

She crowned her 11-year-old son Birjis Qadar the ruler of Awadh, under Mughal suzerainty, on June 5, 1857, after a spectacular victory by the rebel forces in the Battle of Chinhat. The British were forced to take refuge in the Lucknow Residency, a series of events that became famous as the Siege of Lucknow, while her diktat ran in Awadh as regent of Birjis Qadar.

William Howard Russell writes in his memoir My Indian Mutiny Diary: “This Begam exhibits great energy and ability. She has excited all Oudh to take up the interests of her son, and the chiefs have sworn to be faithful to him. The Begum declares undying war against us.”

The British made three offers of truce, even offering to return her husband’s dominions under British suzerainty. But for the begum, it was all or nothing. The longest and fiercest battles of the First War of Independence were fought in Lucknow. The begum ruled for 10 months as regent and had the biggest army of any of the rebel leaders that fought the British in 1857. The zamindars and peasants who had been reluctant to pay taxes to the British gave them to her voluntarily.

Wajid Ali Shah, when he left for Calcutta in 1856, had foreseen the begum’s fighting spirit and valour:

Gharo’n par tabahi padi saher mein, khude mere bazaar, Hazrat Mahal
Tu hi baais e aisho araam hai garibo’n ki gamkhwaar, Hazrat Mahal

[Calamity fell on the houses in the morn, my bazaars were looted, Hazrat Mahal
You alone are a source of comfort, O comforter of the poor, Hazrat Mahal]

She fought as long as she could and finally found asylum in Nepal, where she died in 1879. These lines are attributed to her:

Likha hoga Hazrat Mahal ki lahad par
Naseebo’n ki jali thi, Falak ki satayi

[It will be written on Hazrat Mahal’s grave
Starcrossed was she, oppressed even by the skies]

Jhansi ki Rani

The bravery of Lakshmibai is the mainstay of many folk stories and songs of Bundelkhand. In the words of Rahi Masoon Raza:

Nagaha chup huye sab, a gayi bahar Rani
Fauj thi ek sadaf, us mein gauhar Rani
Matla-e-jahad pe hai gairat-e-Akhtar, Rani
Azm-e-paikar mein mardo’n ke barabar Rani

[Suddenly there was silence, here comes the Rani
The army was the oyster, the pearl was the Rani
In the battlefield, you could shame the stars, Rani
In bravery and courage, equal to men is the Rani]

Lakshmibai was born Manikarnika in the house of a brahmin priest in Varanasi. She was renamed Lakshmibai after marriage to Maharaja Gangadhar Rao of Jhansi in May 1842. After her husband’s death in 1853, Jhansi was annexed by the British under Lord Dalhousie’s infamous Doctrine of Lapse, as the British refused to recognise the right to rule of Laxmibai’s adopted son Damodar Rao.

Lakshmibai was forced out of the Jhansi fort and relegated to the Rani Mahal on a pension. But she was adamant that ‘mera Jhansi nahin dungi’ (‘I will not give up my Jhansi’) and sent several appeals to England against the annexation. All her appeals were rejected. In 1857, faced with attacks by neighbouring principalities and a distant claimant to the throne of Jhansi, Lakshmibai recruited an army and strengthened the city’s defences.

In the words of Makhmoor Jallundhari:

Laxmibai tere hathon mein tegh o sipar
Husn ki sari riwayat ki thi silk-e-gauhar

[Laxmibai the sword and shield in your hands
Is your jewelry, your string of pearls]

In March 1858, the British forces attacked Jhansi and were fiercely opposed. When they finally gained the upper hand, Laxmibai escaped from the fort with her son. She fled to Kalpi, where she joined Tatya Tope. Together, they captured Gwalior. But the British gained the upper hand yet again. The fighting shifted to the outskirts of Gwalior.

On June 17, 1858, during the fighting a Kotah-ki-Serai, five miles south east of Gwalior, the Rani, dressed in male attire, was shot at and fell from her horse.

Not much has been written about the other brave freedom fighters of 1857 and so resources on them are scarce. I hope we can at least spare a thought for these ladies.

Jhalkari Devi’s statue in Gwalior

Jhalkari Bai and the Durga Dal of Jhansi

Jhalkari Bai was part of the Durga Dal, or women’s brigade, of Jhansi. Her husband was a soldier in the Jhansi army, and Jhalkari too was trained in archery and swordplay. Her striking similarity to Lakshmibai helped the Jhansi army evolve a military strategy to deceive the British. 
To elude the British, Jhalkari dressed up like her queen and took command of the Jhansi army, allowing Lakshmibai to escape unnoticed.
 Jhalkari gave the British quite a shock when she was caught and imprisoned. According to legend, when the British discovered the impersonation, they released her and she went on to live a long life till 1890.

Jhansi, with its Durga Dal, saw the participation of many women who fought alongside their queen and sacrificed their lives for their kingdom. Some of the women we’ve found references to include Mandar, Sundari Bai, Mundari Bai and Moti Bai.

These women were not content to wait on the sidelines and embrace widowhood.

Churi forwai ke nevta
Sindoor pochwai ke nevta

[You are invited to break your bangles
You are invited to wipe off the vermillion from your forehead]

Uda Devi, a crack shot and a warrior

Uda Devi

One of the fiercest battles in Lucknow was the Battle in Sikandar Bagh in November 1857. Sikandar Bagh was manned by the rebels and fell along commander Colin Campbell’s route as he marched to rescue the Europeans besieged in the Residency. A bloody battle ensued and thousands of Indian soldiers were killed.

A story goes that the British heard a crack shot, who was firing from atop a tree. It was only when they managed to fell the tree that they discovered that the person shooting was a woman, who was then identified as Uda Devi from the Pasi community. Her statue graces the square outside Sikandar Bagh in Lucknow today.

Forbes-Mitchell, in Reminiscences of the Great Mutiny, writes of Uda Devi: “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.”

Koi unko habsin kehta, koi kehta neech achchut.
abla koi unhein batlaye, koi kahe unhe majboot.

[Some called them Africans, some untouchable.
Some called them feeble, others strong.]

Many African women were employed in the court of the Awadh nawabs to guard the harem. They too perished in the battles in Lucknow during 1857.

A particular feature of the great uprising was the participation not just of women from royal and noble backgrounds but of women from depressed classes too. Another dalit veerangana  was Mahabiri Devi from the village of Mundbhar in the district of Muzaffarnagar. Mahabiri formed a group of 22 women, who together attacked and killed many British soldiers in 1857. The women were all caught and killed.

Azizun Bai

But perhaps one of the most fascinating stories is that of the courtesan Azizun Bai of Kanpur.

Kanpur saw fierce battles between the forces of Nana Sahib and Tatya Tope against the British.

Azizun Bai

Tere yalghar mein tameer thi takhrib na thi
Tere isar mein targheeb thi taadeeb na thi

Your war cry was one of construction, not destruction
Your sacrifice was to inspire, not admonish
– Makhmoor Jallundhar

Colonial and Indian historians have mentioned Azizun’s role during the battles of Kanpur. She had personally nothing to gain and no personal grudges, unlike many of the other women who had joined in the uprising. She was simply inspired by Nana Sahib.

Her memory is still alive among the people of Kanpur. She dressed in male attire like Lakshmibai and rode on horseback with the soldiers, armed with a brace of pistols. She was part of the procession the day the flag was raised in Kanpur to celebrate the initial victory of Nana Sahib.

Lata Singh writes in her article “Making the ‘Margin’ Visible” that Azizun was a favourite among the sepoys of the 2nd cavalry posted in Kanpur, and was particularly close to one of the soldiers, Shamsuddin. Her house was a meeting point of the sepoys. She also formed a group of women, who went around fearlessly cheering the men in arms, attended to their wounds, and distributed arms and ammunition. She made one of the gun batteries her headquarters for this work. During the entire period of the siege of Kanpur, she was with the soldiers, who she considered her friends, and she was always armed with pistols herself.

Other valiant women

Rudyard Kipling’s ‘On the City Wall’ refers to the anti-British activities of the courtesans during 1857.

In fact, many of the courtesans’ kothas were meeting points for the rebels. Post 1857, the full might of the British Empire descended on these kothas. The courtesans who had been the repositories of old culture and fine arts were relegated to the status of common prostitutes and their vast properties seized.

The Muzaffarnagar area in western UP saw the active participation of women. Some of the names of the women rebels are Asha Devi, Bakhtavari, Habiba, Bhagwati Devi Tyagi, Indra Kaur, Jamila Khan, Man Kaur, Rahimi, Raj Kaur, Shobha Devi and Umda, all of whom sacrificed their lives in active fighting.

According to the records, all these women, with the exception of one Asghari Begum, were in their 20s. They were hanged and, in some cases, burnt alive.

There were two other queens whose kingdoms were the victims of the Doctrine of Lapse and who rose against the British. They were were Avantibai Lodhi of Raigarh and Rani Draupadi of Dhar.

Sadly, not much has been written about these other brave freedom fighters of 1857 and resources on them are scarce. One such resource is Shamsul Islam’s article ‘Hindu-Muslim Unity: Participation of Common People and Women in India’s First War Of Independence,’ which mentions the names of many women who are today only relegated to the pages of the 1857 records.

It is time India remembered, and saluted, these brave women