Empire of the Sikhs (31 page)

Chand Kaur was at the centre of the struggle that now began in the Lahore Durbar. Although she ascended to power by assuming ‘the functions of regent or ruler',
⁷
she held the reins for all too brief a time, but during this period she conducted herself with extraordinary self-assurance. As she put it, if ‘England is ruled by a queen, why should it be a disgrace to the Punjab to be governed by a Rani?'
Which was more easily said than done, considering the nature of those who surrounded her.

It was accepted that Sher Singh, Ranjit Singh's second son, born of Ranjit Singh's first wife Mehtab Kaur, was illegitimate, and even the Maharaja, who had given him the title of prince, had not been entirely comfortable with him, although honouring him in various ways. The young man had an impressive presence, but his dissipated ways and lack of serious convictions earned him no respect, and, as usual, time-servers and others crowded around him for their own ends. Despite coming close to the throne after Ranjit Singh's death, he lost out because of his lack of leaderly qualities, legitimacy and political wisdom.

Sher Singh was out of the capital when his half-brother Kharak Singh and Nau Nihal Singh died, although this news was deliberately sent late to him. He returned to Lahore as soon as he heard it, but by this time Chand Kaur – despite Dhian Singh's attempted moves to delay him – had managed to get herself installed as ruler of the Punjab. The main card she played was that her daughter-in-law, Nau Nihal Singh's widow, was pregnant and she would hold power as Regent until the child was born. If the new-born was a girl instead of a boy, she would be perfectly agreeable to adopting Dhian Singh's son Hira Singh as the heir to the empire – which is what Dhian Singh's plan had been all along. Even the devious Dhian Singh seemed satisfied with Chand Kaur's offer, which Sher Singh was not, wanting to remove her by force of arms. Dissuaded by Dhian Singh from doing anything rash at this stage, Sher Singh was advised to wait for the appropriate moment, which he was assured would not take long. Sher Singh, the ‘good-natured voluptuary', was happy to go back to his dissipated ways.

Chand Kaur was doubtless aware that her pacification of Dhian Singh was a lull in the storm he was bound to create. He was much too involved in devious ways to be wholly convinced that Chand Kaur's assurance regarding Hira Singh was etched in stone. Nor
was he unmindful of the many other influences that might prevail on her, or of her own intelligence and ambitions. She could also draw on some powerful figures for help. To begin with, she was the daughter of Jaimal Singh, Sardar of the Kanhayia
misl.
She was also close to Attar Singh, the Sandhanwalia chief, as well as to Sardar Lehna Singh Majithia, an influential nobleman although not a
misl
chief. There were several other Sardars she could call upon, too. To consolidate her position further she appointed Attar Singh Sandhanwalia as her prime minister.

A man of Dhian Singh's acuity was wholly aware of the support Chand Kaur was mobilizing to consolidate her position. Aside from his other subterranean moves, the two main cards he chose to play, in order to defend his own interest and that of his Maharaja-in-waiting son Hira Singh, was to edge his brother Gulab Singh into Chand Kaur's circle of close advisers, while at the same time placing his bets on Sher Singh. It was a shrewd move of Dhian Singh's. While his brother could subvert the state from within the Durbar, Sher Singh could be made to mount a frontal attack on it, given his own claim to the throne. This would place both the Dogra brothers in a win-win situation; if things worked out in their favour, they would be rid of both Chand Kaur and Sher Singh.

With the time considered ripe for a march on Lahore, as a late-nineteenth-century historian describes, ‘Sher Singh, according to previous arrangements with Dhian Singh, marched from Mukerian, at the head of about 300 followers, and posted himself at the Shalimar gardens. To his great disappointment, however, he was informed that Dhian Singh, instead of joining him at the gardens as previously arranged, had not, up to that moment, even left his hill territory in Jammu. This afforded an opportunity to Jawala Singh, an ambitious Sardar, and one of Sher Singh's principal councillors, who aspired to the wazirship, to instil into the mind of the credulous prince the idea that Dhian Singh cared little for
his interests, and that his real sympathies were with his brother, Gulab Singh, who had openly espoused the cause of the Maharani.'
⁸
Inexorably, the stage was now being set for a showdown, with subversion of the two camps by the Dogra brothers assured.

‘For about thirty days,' in the words of an earlier British historian, ‘Dhian Singh remained at Jammu, during which time the emissaries he had left at Lahore secretly to ply the Sikh soldiery, had so well played their part as to have received promises from the different corps that as soon as the minister and Sher Singh should present themselves at Lahore, they would place the latter upon the throne. These promises were given on consideration that the army should receive an increase of pay, together with large presents – terms which only were afterwards partially fulfilled.'
⁹

All this would soon prove fatal for Sher Singh, who lacked the intelligence to foresee that by making the Sikh army take sides in palace intrigues he was undermining the basic structure on which the supposedly indestructible power of the Lahore Durbar rested. By foolishly drawing the army into the political decision-making process, he gave it the right to assert itself in decisions affecting the state – which was a right invested by the Gurus in the entire Khalsa community and not just the army. What aggravated conditions within the army still further were the feelers Sher Singh sent to the British, seeking their help in capturing Lahore. This angered the army – already ill-disposed towards the British – still further.

Dhian Singh with his men arrived at Shahdara, not far from Lahore, to join Sher Singh on the fifth of the week-long siege of Lahore. Before his arrival the Sikh soldiery had rallied around Sher Singh in numbers that are said to have been close to 70,000 infantrymen. The detachments stationed in the Lahore Fort were also mobilized to the fullest. The battle between the besiegers and the besieged was bloody. As for the Dogra brothers, while Gulab Singh oversaw operations within the fort, according to plan Dhian Singh arrived outside it as an ally of Sher Singh. Sher Singh, on
learning of Dhian Singh's arrival, offered to end hostilities and negotiate with Gulab Singh – who refused to accept any overtures except through the mediation of his brother Dhian.
¹⁰
What better outcome could the Dogras ask for?

The siege ended on the evening of 17 January 1841 with the capitulation of Chand Kaur's forces. The terms of the peace agreed between Chand Kaur and Sher Singh were as follows: ‘The Maharani Chand Kaur to surrender the fort of Lahore to Sher Singh, and to give up all her claims to the throne of Lahore. In return for this Sher Singh was to give the ex-queen a
jagir
of nine lakhs [900,000] of rupees, adjoining the Jammu hills, which should be managed by Gulab Singh, as her regent or
mukhtar.
Secondly, that Sher Singh was to refrain from his wish to marry the Maharani by the ceremony
chadar-dalna.
Thirdly, that the Dogra troops should be permitted to leave the fort and capital unmolested. And fourthly, that security should be furnished for the due fulfilment of the treaty.'
¹¹

It is time now to take a closer look at Gulab Singh. What distinguished him from his brother was not the degree of his capacity for treachery, since here there was very little to choose between the two. It was Gulab Singh's cupidity that set him apart. He regularly helped himself without compunction to what belonged to others. He not only surreptitiously removed an enormous amount of the Lahore Durbar's wealth after Chand Kaur's surrender but had been periodically helping himself to state property even before that and during the time of Maharaja Kharak Singh.

Here is what the newsletters published by the court at this time under the title of
Punjab Akhbar
had to say about this: ‘It was reported … that “Raja Gulab Singh is removing from the fort of Minawar and from other forts in the Minawar district, lakhs of property and money to Jammu.” This amounted to theft of the
State property, and the Maharaja [Kharak Singh] was naturally enraged to hear this and exclaimed: “Who are these Rajas that they should carry away property and coin from the fort of Minawar?” On hearing these remarks Dhian Singh sent word to the Maharaja saying, “It is at the Maharaja's option to sequester all his property, but why abuse and degrade him?”‘
¹²

More outrageous still was the brazenness with which Gulab Singh helped himself to Chand Kaur's wealth, which she had rightfully inherited from her husband Maharaja Kharak Singh. After her surrender at Lahore Fort, Gulab Singh ‘carried off the accumulated treasures of Ranjit Singh … sixteen carts were filled with rupees and other silver coins, while 500 horsemen were each entrusted with a bag of gold mohurs, and his orderlies were also entrusted with jewellery and other valuable articles. The costly pashminas, and rich wardrobes, and the best horses in Ranjit Singh's stables, were all purloined by Gulab Singh on the occasion of his evacuating Lahore, an event which took place on the night following the cessation of hostilities.'
¹³

But this was not all. Adept as he was at the game of stealing on the grand scale, he had over time misappropriated the revenues of twenty-two districts which had been put for just administration under his charge. He had also regularly diverted to his coffers some of the tribute sent to the Lahore Durbar by the hill rajas. Aside from all that the generous Ranjit Singh had gifted him, he owned large tracts of land in Jammu and from 1830 onwards had a monopoly of the salt mines in the Pind Dadan Khan Salt Range which were also a gift from the Maharaja. In addition to all this, the latter had made him Raja as well and granted him Jammu as a
jagir
in 1820.

When Sher Singh arrived outside Lahore in January 1841 in preparation for his assault on the fort, Gulab Singh, who was then Chand Kaur's confidant and factotum, went to see him. After professing his unswerving loyalty to Sher Singh, he pulled the Kohi-i-noor diamond out of his bag and offered it to him as a
humble gift. Sher Singh had no problem in accepting it. Having thus put him in a mellow mood, the wily Dogra then proceeded to pledge his abiding loyalty to Sher Singh just as he had, he said, been loyal to his lord and master Ranjit Singh. He explained that it was because of his profound regard for the old Lion that he had stayed by the side of Chand Kaur in these difficult times, so that he could protect and help her in every possible way. Having built his bridges with Sher Singh, he returned to work against him from within the fort. Theoretically Chand Kaur's trusted adviser, he had no qualms about walking off with her wealth the day the Lahore Fort fell.

And what of Chand Kaur? For a spirited lady who had tried to stand up to the menacing intrigues that swirled all around her, her end was particularly tragic. After the capitulation of Lahore Fort she was confined to an apartment there for more than a year. She tried to rally some of the Sikh chiefs around her from there, as also many of the Khalsa regiments. She made overtures to the British as well. But the odds were stacked against her. Both Sher Singh and Dhian Singh sensed danger from her intrigues and the staunch support being given to the Rani by the Sandhanwalias. Gulab Singh feared the disclosure of his looting of the Lahore treasury. All three seem to have agreed to get rid of her, and the execution of their plan was entrusted to Dhian Singh. The Rani's trusted maidservants were won over, and on 9 June 1842 she was administered arsenic poison in a drink. After she had remained in a coma for three days her skull was smashed with a grindstone.
¹⁴

Chand Kaur was the only woman who ruled the Sikh empire. Had she had even a little more time on the throne, without so many malignant presences around her, she might have handled her responsibilities with much greater confidence and success and thereby honoured the injunction of the Sikh Gurus, who had clearly given a call for equal rights to all women in every walk of life.

The spotlight now shifted on to Sher Singh, who had ascended the throne on 18 January 1841 after the removal of Chand Kaur from the throne. In what was surely the most naïve and senseless act of his life, he appointed Dhian Singh as his prime minister. But he had learnt no lessons from the sinister role of Dhian Singh in the Lahore Durbar's affairs after Ranjit Singh's death. As was to be expected, Dhian Singh soon brought back to court his brother Gulab Singh and his own son Hira Singh. Sher Singh compounded his error by being persuaded to make Hira Singh commander-inchief of the Punjab forces. An indolent profligate, he was only too glad to shift the responsibilities of government on to the shoulders of the willing Dhian, who lost no time in filling all the most important posts in the state service with ‘friends of the family'. The Jammu brothers were now at the height of their power.
¹⁵