Legendary tale of breach of Faith–Kulhuns tribe of Rajpoots–Murder of the Banker, Ramdut Pandee, by the Nazim of Bahraetch–Recrossing the Ghagra river–Sultanpoor district, State of Commandants of troops become sureties for the payment of land revenue–Estate of Muneearpoor and the Lady Sogura–Murder of Hurpaul Sing, Gurgbunsee, of Kupragow–Family of Rajahs Bukhtawar and Dursun Sing–Their bynama Lands–Law of Primogeniture–Its object and effect–Rajah Ghalib Jung–Good effects of protection to Tenantry–Disputes about Boundaries–Our army a safety-valve for Oude–Rapid decay of Landed Aristocracy in our Territories–Local ties in groves, wells, &c.
December 15, 1849.-Wuzeergunge. On the way this morning, we passed Koorassa, which is said once to have been the capital of a formidable Rajah, the head of the Kulhuns tribe of Rajpoots. The villages which we see along the road seem better, and better peopled and provided with cattle. The soil not naturally very fertile, but yields fine returns under good culture, manure, and irrigation. Water everywhere very near the surface. The place is called after the then Nawab Wuzeer, Asuf-od Dowlah, who built a country-seat here with all appurtenances of mosque, courts, dwelling-houses, &c., on the verge of a fine lake, formed in the old bed of the Ghagra river, with tillage and verdure extending down to the water’s edge. The garden- wall, which surrounds a large space of ground, well provided with fruit and ornamental trees, is built of burnt bricks, and still entire. The late minister, Ameen-od Dowlah, persuaded his master, Amjad Allee Shah, to give this garden and the lands around, with which it had been endowed, to his moonshee, Baker Allee Khan, who now resides at Fyzabad, and subsists upon the rents which he derives from them, and which are said to be about twelve hundred rupees a-year.
The Bulrampoor Rajah, Ramdut Pandee, the banker, and Rajah Bukhtawar Sing, rode with me this morning. The Rajah of Bulrampoor is an intelligent and pleasing young man. He was a child when Mr. Ravenscroft was killed, but said he had heard, that the Bhinga chief had suffered for the share which he had had in the murder; his body swelled, and he died within a month or two. “If men’s bodies swelled for murder, my friend,” I said, “we should have no end of swelled bodies in Oude, and among the rest, that of Prethee Put’s, of Paska.” “Their bodies all swell, sooner, or later,” said old Bukhtawar Sing, “when they commit such atrocious crimes, and Prethee Puts will begin to swell when he finds that you are inquiring into his.” “I am afraid, my friends, that the propensity to commit them has become inveterate. One man hears that another has obtained lands or wealth by the murder of his father or brother, and does not rest till he has attempted to get the same by the murder of his, for he sees no man punished for such crimes.” “It is not all nor many of our clan” (Rajpoots), said the Rajah of Bulrampoor, “that can or will do this: we never unite our sons or daughters in marriage with the family of one who is so stained with crimes. Prethee Put and all who do as he has done, must seek an union with families of inferior caste.” I asked him whether the people, in the Tarae forest, were still afraid to point out tigers to sportsmen. “I was lately out with a party after a tiger,” he said, “which had killed a cowherd, but his companions refused to point out any trace of him, saying, that their relatives’ spirit must be now riding upon his head, to guide him from all danger, and we should have no chance of shooting him. We did shoot him, however,” said the Rajah, exultingly, “and they were all, afterwards, very glad of it. The tigers in the Tarae do not often kill men, sir, for they find plenty of deer and cattle to eat.”–“Can you tell me, Rajah Sahib,” said I, “why it is that among the Arabs, the lion is called ’the father of cultivation,’ ‘abol hurs, or abo haris.’” “No,” replied the Rajah; “it is an odd name for a beast that feeds on nothing but the flesh of deer, cattle, and men.” “It is, I suppose, Rajah Sahib,” I remarked, “because he feeds upon the deer, which are the greatest enemies of their young crops.”
The Rajahs of Toolseepoor and Bulrampoor, and all the merchants and respectable landholders in these parts assure me, that all the large colonies of Bhuduks, or gang robbers by hereditary profession, who had, for so many generations, up to A.D. 1840, been located in the Oude Terae forest, have entirely disappeared under the operation of the “Special Police,” of the Thuggee and Dacoitee Department, aided and supported by the Oude Government; and that not one family of them can now be found anywhere in Oude. They have not been driven out as formerly, to return as soon as the temporary pressure ceased, but hunted down and punished, or made to blend with the rest of society in service or at honest labour.
December 16, 1849.–Nawabgunge, eight miles, over a plain of the same good soil, but not much better cultivated. The people tell me, that garden tillage is now almost unknown in these districts; first, because kachies or gardeners (here called moraes) having been robbed, ruined, and driven into exile by Rughbur Sing, cannot be induced to return to and reside in places, where they would have so little chance of reaping the fruits of their labour; and, secondly, because there are no people left who can afford to purchase their garden produce. They tell me also, that the best classes of ordinary cultivators, the Koormies and Lodhees, have been almost all driven out of the district from the same cause. The facts are manifest– there are no gardeners, and but few Koormies and Lodhees left; and there is, in consequence, little good tillage of any kind, and still less of garden cultivation.
The Rajah of Bulrampoor and Ramdut Pandee, the banker, rode with me, and related the popular tradition regarding the head of the Kulhuns family of Rajpoots, Achul Sing, who, about a century and a quarter ago, reigned over the district intervening between Gonda and Wuzeer Gunge, and resided at his capital of Koorassa. The Rajah had a dispute with one of his landholders, whom he could not get into his power. He requested Rutun Pandee, the banker, to mediate a reconciliation, and invite the landholder to an amicable adjustment of accounts, on a pledge of personal security. The banker consented, but made the Rajah swear by the River Sarjoo, which flowed near the town, that he should be received with courtesy, and escorted back safely. The landholder relied on the banker’s pledge and came; but the Rajah no sooner got him into his power, than he caused him to be put to death. The banker could not consent to live under the dishonour of a violated pledge; and, abstaining from food, died in twenty-one days, invoking the vengeance of the River Sarjoo, on the head of the perfidious Prince. In his last hours the banker was visited by one of the Rajah’s wives, who was then pregnant, and implored him to desist from his purpose in mercy to the child in her womb; but she was told by the dying man, that he could not consent to survive the dishonour brought upon him by her perjured husband; and that she had better quit the place and save herself and child, since the incensed river Sarjoo would certainly not spare any one who remained with the Rajah. She did so. The banker died, and his death was followed by a sudden rise of the river and tempest. The town was submerged, and the Rajah with all who remained with him perished. The ruins of the old town are said to be occasionally still visible, though at a great depth under the water in the old bed of the Sarjoo, which forms a fine lake, near the present village of Koorassa, midway between Gonda and Wuzeer Gunge.
The pregnant wife fled, and gave birth to a son, whose descendant is now the head of the Kulhuns Rajpoots, and the Rajah of Bahmanee Paer, a district on the eastern border of Oude towards Goruckpoor. But, it is a remarkable fact, that the male descendants have been all blind from their birth, or, at least, the reigning portion of them, and the present Rajah is said to have two blind sons. This is popularly considered to be one of the effects of the Rajah’s violated pledge to the banker. A handmaid of the Rajah, Achul Sing, is said to have fled at the same time, and given birth to a son, from whom are descended the Kulhuns tallookdars of the Chehdwara, or Gowaris district, already noticed. The descendants of Rutun Pandee are said still to hold rent-free lands, under Achul Sing’s descendant, in Bahmanee Paer; and the Pandee is worshipped throughout the districts as a saint or martyr. He has a shrine in every village, at which offerings are made on all occasions of marriage, and blessings invoked for the bride and bridegroom, from the spirit of one who set so much value on his plighted faith while on earth. The two branches of the Kulhuns family above mentioned, propitiate the spirit of the deceased Pandee by offerings; but there is a branch of the same family at Mohlee, in the Goruckpoor district, who do not. Though Hindoos, they adopt some Mussulman customs, and make offerings to the old Mussulman saint, at Bahraetch, in order to counteract the influence of the Pandee’s spirit.
Such popular traditions, arising from singular coincidences of circumstances, have often a salutary effect on society, and seem to be created by its wants and wishes; but rivers have, of late years, become so much less prompt in the vindication of their honour, that little reliance is placed, upon the oaths taken in their names by the Prince, his officers or his landowners in Oude.
Nawabgunge, Munkapoor, and Bahmanee transferred to the British Government, with the other lands, under the treaty of 1801; and retransferred to Oude, by the treaty of the 11th of May 1816, in exchange for Handeea, alias Kewae, a slip of land extending along the left bank of the Ganges, between Allahabad and Benares.
Rent Roll. Kankur. Govt. demand
Nawabgunge, Wuzeergunge,.} l,08,000 32,000 76,000 Mahadewa . . . . .}
Munkapoor . . . . . 40,000 12,000 28,000 Bahmanee Paer . . . . 12,000 3,000 9,000
The landholders and cultivators complain sadly of the change of sovereigns; and the tillage and population have greatly diminished under the Oude Government since 1816, but more especially, since the monster, Rughbur Sing got the government. Here Ramdut Pandee, the Rajah of Bulrampoor, and the Nazim of the district, have taken leave of me, this being my last stage in their district. Ramdut Pandee holds two estates in this district, for which he pays an annual revenue to Government of 1,66,744 13 3.* He holds, at the same time, a small estate in our district of Goruckpoor, where he resides and keeps his family, till he obtains solemn written pledges, confirmed on oath, for their security, not only from the local authority of the day, but from all the commandants of corps and establishments, comprising the military force employed under him. These pledges include all his clients, who may have occasion to visit or travel with him, as the Rajah of Bulrampoor is now doing. These pledges require to be renewed on every change in the local authorities and in the military officers employed under them. He is one of the most substantial and respectable of the agricultural capitalists of Oude, and the highest of his rank and class in this district. He every year stands security for the punctual payment of the revenues due, according to existing engagements, by the principal landholders of the district, to the extent of from six to eight lacs of rupees; and for this he gets a certain per centage, varying with the character and capability of the landholders. Some are of doubtful ability, others of doubtful character, and he rates his risks and per centage accordingly. He does much good, and is more generally esteemed than any other man in the district; but he has, no doubt, enlarged his own landed possessions occasionally, by taking advantage of the necessities of his clients, and his influence over the local authorities of government The lands he does get, however, he improves by protecting and aiding his tenants, and inviting and fostering a better class of cultivators, He is looked up to with respect and confidence by almost all the large landholders of the district, for his pledge for the punctual payment of the revenues saves their estates from the terrible effects of a visit from the Nazim and his disorderly and licentious troops; and this pledge they can always obtain, when necessary, by a fair assurance of adherence to their engagements.
[* The estate of Ramdut Pandee, for this year, 1849, comprises– Sirgha, Chunda, &c. . . . 1,20,729 11 0 Akberpoor, &c. . . . . . 46,015 2 3 Total . . 1,66,744 13 3 ]
On the 8th of November 1850, Ramdut Pandee lent the Nazim eighty thousand rupees on his bond, after paying all that was due to the State for the season, by him and all his clients, and on the 16th of that month he went to Gonda, where the Nazim, Mahommed Hussan, was encamped with his force, to take leave preparatory to his going to bathe at Ajoodheea, on the last day of the month of Kartick, as was his invariable custom. He was accompanied by the Rajah of Bulrampoor, and they encamped separately in two mango-groves near to each other, and about a mile and a half from the Nazim’s camp. About nine at night the Nazim sent two messengers, with silver sticks, to invite and escort them to his tent. They set out immediately, leaving all their armed followers in their camps, and taking only a few personal attendants and palankeen bearers. No person is permitted to take arms into the Nazim’s tent; nor does any landholder or merchant of Oude enter his tent without the pledges for personal security above mentioned. Ramdut Pandee and the Rajah entered with only a few personal servants, leaving all their other attendants outside the outer curtain. This curtain surrounded the tent at a distance of only a few yards from it, and the tent was pitched in the centre. They were received with all due ceremony, and in the same friendly manner as usual. The Rajah had no business to talk about, while the Nazim and banker had; and, after a short conversation, he took leave to return to his tents and break his fast, which he had kept that day for some religious purpose. He left in the tent the Nazim, his deputy, Jafir Allee, and his nephew and son-in-law, Allee Hoseyn, sitting together on the carpet, on the right, all armed, and Ramdut sitting unarmed, on the left, with a Brahmin lad, Jowahir, standing at the door, with the banker’s paundan and a handkerchief. Kurunjoo, a second person, with the banker’s shoes, and a third attendant of his standing outside the tent door.
The Nazim and Ramdut talked for some time together, seemingly on the most friendly and cordial terms; but the Nazim, at last, asked him for a further loan of money, and further securities for landholders of doubtful character, before he went to bathe. The banker told him, that he could lend him no more money till he came back from bathing, as he had lent him eighty thousand rupees only eight days before; and, that he could not increase his pledges of security without further consultation with the landholders, as he had not yet recovered more than four out of the seven lacs of rupees which he had been obliged to advance to the Treasury, on the securities given for them during the last year. He then took leave and rose to depart. The Nazim turned and made some sign to his deputy, Jafir Allee, who rose, presented his gun and shot Ramdut through the right side close under the arm-pit. Exclaiming “Ram! Ram!”–God! God!–the banker fell; and the Nazim, seizing and drawing the sword which lay on the carpet before him, cut the falling banker across the forehead. His nephew and deputy drew theirs; and together they inflicted no less than twenty-two cuts upon the body of Ramdut.
The banker’s three attendants, seeing their master thus shot down and hacked to pieces, called out for help; but one of the three ruffians cut Jowahir, the Brahmin lad, across the shoulder, with his sword, and all ran off and sought shelter across the border in the British territory. The Nazim and his attendants then buried the body hastily near the tent, and ordered the troops and artillery to advance towards and fire into the two camps. They did so, and the Bulrampoor Rajah had only just reached his tents when the shot came pouring in upon them from the Nazim’s guns. He galloped off as fast as he could towards the British border, about twenty miles distant, attended only by a few mounted followers, some of whom he sent off to Bulrampoor, to bring his family as fast as possible across the border to him. The rest he ordered to follow him. His followers and those of the murdered banker fled before the Nazim’s forces, which had been concentrated for this atrocious purpose, and both their camps were plundered. Before the Rajah fled, however, the murdered banker’s son- in-law, who had been left in the camp, ran to him with a small casket, containing Ramdut’s seals, the bond for the eighty thousand rupees, and the written pledges given by the Nazim and commanding officers of corps, for the banker’s and the Rajah’s personal security. He mounted him upon one of his horses, and took both him and the casket off to the British territory.
It was now about midnight, and the Nazim took his forces to the towns and villages upon the banker’s estate, in which his family and relatives resided, and in which he kept the greater part of his moveable property. He sacked and plundered them all without regard to the connection or relationship of the inhabitants with the murdered banker. The property taken from the inhabitants of these towns and villages is estimated at from ten to twelve lacs of rupees. As many as could escape fled for shelter across the border, into the British territory. The banker’s brother, Kishen Dutt, who resided in the British territory, came over, collected all he could of his brother’s followers, attacked the Amil’s forces, killed and wounded some forty or fifty of his men, and captured two of his guns. The body of the banker was discovered two days after, and disinterred by his family and friends, who counted the twenty-two wounds that had been inflicted upon it by the three assassins, and had it burned with due ceremonies.
The Nazim’s agent at Court, on the 18th of November, submitted to the minister his master’s report of this affair, in which it was stated, that the banker was a defaulter on account of his own estate, and those of the other landholders for whom he had given security–that he, the Nazim, had earnestly urged him to some adjustment of his accounts, but all in vain–that the banker had disregarded all his demands and remonstrances, and had with him five hundred armed followers, one of whom had fired his pistol at him, the Nazim, and killed one of his men–that they had all then joined in an attack upon the Nazim and his men, and that, in defending themselves, they had killed the banker. On the 19th, another report, dated the 16th, reached the minister from the Nazim’s camp, stating, that the banker had come to his tent at ten at night, with his armed followers, and had an interview [with] him–that as the banker rose to depart, the Nazim told him that he must not go without some settlement of his accounts; and a dispute followed, in which the banker was killed, and two of the Nazim’s followers were severely wounded-that so great was the confusion that the Durbar news-reporters could not approach to get information.
On the 20th, a third report reached the minister, stating, that the Rajah of Bulrampoor had come with the banker to visit the Nazim, but had taken leave and departed before the collision took place–that the Nazim urged the necessity of an immediate settlement of accounts, but the banker refused to make any, grossly abused the Nazim, and, at last, presented his pistol and fired at him; and thereby wounded two of his people–that he was, in consequence, killed by the Nazim’s people, who joined the banker’s own people in the plunder of his camp.
On receiving this last report, the minister, by order of his Majesty, presented to the agent of the Nazim a dress of honour of fourteen pieces, such as is given to the highest officers for the most important services; and ordered him to send it to his master, to mark the sense his sovereign entertained of his gallant conduct and valuable services, in crushing so great a rebel and oppressor, and to assure him of a long-continued tenure of office.
By the interposition of the British Resident and the aid of the magistrate of Goruckpoor, Mr. Chester, the real truth was elicited, the Nazim was dismissed from office, and committed for trial, before the highest judicial Court at Lucknow. He at first ran off to Goruckpoor, taking with him, besides his own, two elephants belonging to the Rajah of Gonda, with property on them to the value of fifty thousand rupees, which he overtook in his flight. The Rajah had sent off these elephants with his valuables, on hearing of the assassination of the banker, thinking that the Nazim would secure impunity for this murder, as Hakeem Mehndee had for that of Amur Sing, and be tempted to extend his operations. Finding the district of Goruckpoor unsafe, the Nazim came back and surrendered himself at Lucknow. Jafir Allee was afterwards seized in Lucknow. There is, however, no chance of either being punished, since many influential persons about the Court have shared in the booty, and become accessaries interested in their escape. Moreover, the Nazim is a Mahommedan, a Syud, and a Sheeah. No Sheeah could be sentenced to death, for the murder, even of a Soonnee, at Lucknow, much less for that of a Hindoo. If a Hindoo murders a Hindoo, and consents to become a Mussulman, he cannot be so sentenced; and if he consents to become so after sentence has been passed, it cannot be carried into execution. Such is the law, and such the every-day practice.
The elephants were recovered and restored through the interposition of the Resident, but none of the property of the Rajah or the banker has been recovered. May 18, 1851.–The family of the banker has obtained a renewal of the lease of their, two estates, on agreeing to pay an increase of forty thousand rupees a-year.
Sirgha Chunda . . . . 1,20,729 11 0 Increase . . . . 30,000 0 0 _______________ 1,50,729 11 0
Akberpoor . . . . . 46,015 2 3 Increase. . . . . 10,000 0 0 _______________ 56,015 2 3 _______________ Total annual demand . . . . . . . 2,06,744 13 3 _______________
They bold the Nazim’s bond for the eighty thousand rupees, borrowed only eight days before his murder.
December 17, 1849.–Five miles to the left bank of the Ghagra, whence crossed over to Fyzabad, on platformed boats, prepared for the purpose by the Oude authorities. Our tents are in one of the large mango-groves, which are numerous on the right bank of the river, but scanty on the opposite bank. From the time we crossed this river at Byram-ghaut on the 5th, till we recrossed it this morning, we were moving in the jurisdiction of the Nazim of the Gonda and Bahraetch district. After recrossing the Ghagra we came within that of the Nazim of Sultanpoor, Aga Allee, who was appointed to it this year, not as a contractor, but manager, under the Durbar. The districts under contractors are called ijara, or farmed districts; those under the management of non-contracting servants of Government are called amanee, or districts under the amanut, or trust of Government officers. The morning was fine, the sky clear, and the ground covered with hoar frost. It was, pleasing to see so large a camp, passing without noise, inconvenience, or disorder of any kind in so large a river.
The platformed boats were numerous, and so were the pier-heads prepared on both sides, for the convenience of embarking and landing. Carriages, horses, palankeens, camels and troops, all passed without the slightest difficulty. The elephants were preparing to cross, some in boats and some by swimming, as might seem to them best. Some refuse to swim, and others to enter boats, and some refuse to do either; but the fault is generally with their drivers. On the present occasion, two or three remained behind, one plunged into the stream from his boat, in the middle of the river, with his driver on his back, and both disappeared for a time, but neither was hurt. Those that remained on the left bank, got tired of their solitude, and were at last coaxed over, either in boats or in the water.
The Sarjoo rejoins the Ghagra a little above Fyzabad, and the united stream takes the old name of the Sarjoo. This is the name the river bears, till it emerges from the Tarae forest, when the large body takes that of the Ghagra, and the small stream, which it throws off, or which perhaps flows in the old bed, retains that of the Sarjoo. The large branch absorbs the Kooreeala, Chouka, and other small streams, on its way to rejoin the smaller. Some distance below Fyzabad, the river takes the name of Dewa; and uniting, afterwards, with the Gunduck, flows into the Ganges. Fyzabad is three miles above Ajoodheea, on the same bank of the river. It was founded by the first rulers of the reigning family, and called for some time Bungalow, from a bungalow which they built on the verge of the stream. Asuf-od Dowlah disliked living near his mother, after he came to the throne, and he settled at Lucknow, then a small village on the right bank of the Goomtee river. This village, in the course of eighty years, grown into a city, containing nearly a million of souls. Fyzabad has declined almost in the same proportion.
The Nazim has six regiments, and part of a seventh, on duty under him, making, nominally, six thousand fighting men, but that he cannot, he tells me, muster two thousand; and out of the two thousand, not five hundred would, he says be ready to fight on emergency. All the commandants of corps reside at Court, knowing nothing whatever of their duties, and never seeing their regiments. They are mere children, or Court favourites, worse than children. He has, nominally, forty-two guns, of various calibre; but he, with great difficulty, collected bullocks enough to draw the three small guns he brought with him from Sultanpoor, to salute the Resident, on his entering his district. I looked at them in the evening. They were seventy-four in number, but none of them were in a serviceable condition, and the greater part were small, merely skin and bone. He was obliged to purchase powder in the bazaar for the salutes; and said, that when he entered his charge two months ago, the usual salute of seven guns, for himself, could not be fired for want of powder, and he was obliged to send to the bazaar to purchase what was required. The bazaar-powder used by the Oude troops is about one- third of the strength of the powder used by our troops. His authority is despised by all the tallookdars of the district, many of whom refuse to pay any rent, defy the Government, and plunder the country, as all their rents are insufficient to pay the armed bands which they keep up. All his numerous applications to Court, for more and better troops and establishments, are disregarded, and he is helpless. He cannot collect the revenue, or coerce the refractory landholders and robbers, who prey upon the country.*
[* The Nazim for 1850-51, got both Captain Magness’s and Captain Banbury’s regiments.]
He says that the two companies and two guns, which were sent out at the Resident’s urgent recommendation, to take possession of Shahgunge, and prevent the two brothers, Maun Sing and Rughbur Sing, from disturbing the peace of the country, in their contests with each other, joined Maun Sing, as partisan; to oppose his brother; and that Maun Sing has taken for himself all the bynamah lands, from which his brother, Rughbur Sing, has been ousted, under the favour of the minister. He tells me also, that Beebee Sogura, the lady who holds the estate of Muneearpoor, and pays fifty thousand rupees a-year to the Government, was seized by Wajid Allee, his predecessor, before he made over charge of the district to him, and made over to a body of troops, on condition, that she should enter into engagement to pay to them the ten months’ arrears of pay due to them, out of the rents of the ensuing year; and that they should give him receipts for the full amount of these arrears of pay at once, to be forwarded to the Durbar, that he might get credit for the amount in his accounts for last year–that she has paid them fifteen thousand rupees, but can collect no more from her tenants, as the crops are all being cut or destroyed by the troops, and she is in close confinement, and treated with cruel indignity. The rent-roll of her estate is, it is said, equal to one hundred thousand rupees a year.
This was a common practice among governors of districts at the close of last year; and thus they got credit, on account, for large sums, pretended to have been paid out of the revenues of last year; but, in reality, to be paid out of the revenues of the ensuing year. But the collections are left to be made by the troops, for whose arrears of pay the revenue has been assigned, and they generally destroy or extort double what they are entitled to from their unhappy debtors. This practice of assigning revenues due, or to be due, by landholders, for the arrears of pay due to the troops, is the source of much evil; and is had recourse to only when contractors and other collectors of revenue are unable to enforce payment in any other way; or require to make it appear that they have collected more than they really have; and to saddle the revenue of the ensuing year with the burthens properly incident upon those of the past. The commandant of the troops commonly takes possession of the lands, upon the rents, or revenues, of which the payments have been assigned, and appropriates the whole produce to himself and his soldiers, without regard to the rights of landholders, farmers, cultivators, capitalists, or any other class of persons, who may have invested their capital and labour in the lands, or depend upon the crops for their subsistence. The troops, too, are rendered unfit for service by such arrangements, since all their time is taken up in the more congenial duty of looking after the estate, till they have desolated it. The officers and soldiers are converted into manorial under-stewards of the worst possible description. They are available for no other duty till they have paid themselves all that may have been due or may become due to them during the time of their stay, and credit to Government but a small portion of what they exact from the landholders and cultivators, or consume or destroy as food, fodder, and fuel.
This system, injurious alike to the sovereign, the troops, and the people, is becoming every season more and more common in Oude; and must, in a few years, embrace nearly the whole of the land-revenue of the country. It is denominated kubz, or contract, and is of two kinds, the “lakulame kubz,” or pledge to collect and pay a certain sum, for which the estate is held to be liable; and “wuslee kubz,” or pledge to pay to the collector or troops the precise sum which the commandant may be able to collect from the estate put under him. In the first, the commandant who takes the kubz must pay to the Government collector or the troops the full sum for which the estate is held to be liable, whether he be able to collect it or not, and his kubz is valid at the Treasury, as so much money paid to the troops. In the second, it is valid only as a pledge, to collect as much as he can, and to pay what he collects to the Government collector, or the troops he commands. The collector, however, commonly understands that he has shifted off the burthen of payment to the troops–to the extent of the sum named–from his own shoulders to those of the commandant of the troops; and the troops understand, that unless they collect this sum they will never get it, or be obliged to screw it out of their commandant; and they go to the work con amore. If they can’t collect it from the sale of all the crops of the season, they seize and sell all the stock and property of all kinds to be found on the estate; and if this will not suffice, they will not scruple to seize and sell the women and children. The collector, whose tenure of office seldom extends beyond the season, cares little as to the mode as long as he gets the money, and feels quite sure that the sovereign and his Court will care just as little, and ask no questions, should the troops sell every living thing to be found on the estate.
The history, for the last few years, of the estate of Muneearpoor, involves that of the estate of Kupragow and Seheepoor, held by the family of the late Hurpaul Sing, and may be interesting as illustrative of the state of society in Oude. Hurpaul Sing’s family is shown in the accompanying note.*
[* Purotee Sing had two sons, Gunga Persaud and Nihal Sing. Gunga Persaud had one son, Seosewak, who had three sons, Seoumber Sing, Hobdar Sing, and Hurpaul Sing. Seoumber Sing had one son, Ramsurroop Sing, the present head of the family, who holds the fort and estate of Kupradehee. Hobdar Sing had one son, who died young. Hurpaul Sing died young, Nihal Sing had no son, but left a widow, who holds his share of one-half of the estate, and resides at Seheepoor.]
In the year A.D. 1821, after the death of Purotee Sing, his second son, Nihal Sing, held one-half of the estate, and resided in Seheepoor, and the family of his eldest son, Gunga Persaud, held the other half, and resided in Kupragow. The whole paid a revenue to Government of between six and seven hundred rupees a-year, and yielded a rent-roll of something more than double that sum. The neighbouring estate of Muneearpoor, yielding a rent-roll of about three hundred and fifty thousand rupees a-year, was held by Roshun Zuman Khan, in whose family it had been for many generations. He had an only brother, Busawan Khan, who died, leaving a widow, Bussoo, and a daughter, the Beebee, or Lady, Sogura. Roshun Zuman Khan also died, leaving a widow Rahamanee, who succeeded to the estate, but soon died, and left it to the Lady Sogura and her mother. They made Nihal Sing, Gurgbunsee, of Seheepoor, manager of their affairs. From the time that he entered upon the management, Nihil Sing began to increase the number of his followers from his own clan, the Gurgbunsies; and, having now become powerful enough, he turned out his mistress, and took possession of her estate, in collusion with the local authorities.
Rajah Dursun Sing, who then, 1836, held the contract for the district, wished to take advantage of the occasion, to seize upon the estate for himself, and a quarrel, in consequence, took place between him and Nihal Sing. Unable, as a public servant of the State, to lead his own troops against him, Dursun Sing instigated Baboo Bureear Sing, of Bhetee, a powerful tallookdar, to attack Nihal Sing at night, with all the armed followers he could muster, and, in the fight, Nihal Sing was killed. Hurpaul Sing, his nephew, applied for aid to the Durbar, and Seodeen Sing was sent, with a considerable force, to aid him against Bureear Sing. When they were ready for the attack, Dursun Sing sent a reinforcement of troops, secretly, to Bureear Sing, which so frightened Seodeen Sing, that he retired from the conflict.
The Gurgbunsee family had, however, by this time added a great part of the Muneearpoor estate to their own, and many other estates belonging to their weaker neighbours; and, by the plunder of villages, and robbery on the highways, become very powerful. Dursun Sing was superseded in the contract, in 1837, by the widow of Hadee Allee Khan; and Hurpaul recovered possession of the Muneearpoor estate, which he still held in the name of the Lady Sogura. In 1843, she managed to get the estate transferred from the jurisdiction of the contractor for Sultanpoor, to that of the Hozoor Tehseel, and held it till 1845, when Maun Sing, who had succeeded to the contract for the district, on the death of his father, Dursun Sing, in 1844, managed through his uncle, Bukhtawar Sing, to get the estate restored to his jurisdiction. Knowing that his object was to absorb her estate, as he and his father had done so many others, she went off to Lucknow to seek protection; but Maun Sing seized upon all her nankar and seer lands, and put the estate under the management of his own officers. The Lady Sogura, unable to get any one to plead her cause at Court, in opposition to the powerful influence, of Bukhtawur Sing, returned to Muneearpoor. Maun Sing, after he had collected the greater part of the revenue for 1846, made over the estate to Hurpaul and Seoumber Sing, who put the lady into confinement, and plundered her of all she had left.
Feeling now secure in the possession of the Muneearpoor estate, Hurpaul and Seoumber Sing left a small guard to secure the lady, and went off, with the rest of their forces, to seize upon the estate of Birsingpoor, in the purgunnah of Dehra, belonging to the widow of Mahdoo Sing, the tallookdar. She summoned to her aid Roostum Sa and other Rajkomar landholders, friends of her late husband. A fight ensued, in which Seoumber Sing and his brother, Hobdar Sing were killed. Hurpaul Sing fled and returned to his fort of Kupragow. The Lady Sogura escaped, and presented herself again to the Court of Lucknow, under better auspices; and orders were sent to Maun Sing, and all the military authorities, to restore her to the possession of her estate, and seize or destroy Hurpaul Sing. In alarm Hurpaul Sing then released the mother of the Lady Sogura, and prepared to fly.
Maun Sing sent confidential persons to him to say, that he had been ordered by the Court of Lucknow to confer upon him a dress of honour or condolence, on the death of his two lamented brothers, and should do so in person the next day. Hurpaul Sing was considered one of the bravest men in Oude, but he was then sick on his bed, and unable to move. He received the message without suspicion, being anxious for some small interval of repose; and willing to believe that common interests and pursuits had united him and Maun Sing in something like bonds of friendship.
Maun Sing came in the afternoon, and rested under a banyan-tree, which stood opposite the gateway of the fort. He apologized for not entering the fort, on the ground, that it might lead to some collision between their followers, or that his friend might not wish any of the King’s servants, who attended with the dress of honour, to enter his fortress. Hurpaul Sing left all his followers inside the gate, and was brought out to Maun Sing in a litter, unable to sit up without support. The two friends embraced and conversed together with seeming cordiality till long after sunset, when Maun Sing, after investing his friend with the dress of honour, took leave and mounted his horse. This was the concerted signal for his followers to despatch his sick friend, Hurpaul. As he cantered off, at the sound of his kettle-drum and the other instruments of music, used by the Nazims of districts, his armed followers, who had by degrees gathered round the tree, without awakening any suspicion, seized the sick man, dragged him on the ground, a distance of about thirty paces, and then put him to death. He was first shot through the chest, and then stabbed with spears, cut to pieces with swords, and left on the ground. They were fired upon from the fort, while engaged in this foul murder, but all escaped unhurt. Maun Sing had sworn by the holy Ganges, and still more holy head of Mahadeo, that his friend should suffer no personal hurt in this interview; and the credulous and no less cruel and rapacious Gurgbunsies were lulled into security. The three persons who murdered Hurpaul, were Nujeeb Khan, who has left Mann Sing’s service, Benee Sing, who still serves him, and Jeskurun Sing, who has since died. Sadik Hoseyn and many others aided them in dragging their victim to the place where he was murdered, but the wounds which killed him were inflicted by the above-named persons.
The family fled, the fort was seized and plundered of all that could be found, and the estate seized and put under the management of Government officers. Maun Sing had collected half the revenues of 1847, when he was superseded in the contract by Wajid Allee Khan, who re-established the Lady Sogura in the possession of all that remained of her estate. He, at the same time, reinstated the family of Hurpaul Sing, in the possession of their now large estate–that is, the widow of Nihal Sing, to Seheepoor, comprising one-half; and Ramsurroop Sing, the son of Seoumber Sing, to Kupragow, comprising the other half.* The rent-roll of the whole is now estimated at 1,29,000 a- year; and the nankar, or recognized allowance for the holders, is 73,000, leaving the Government demand at 56,000, of which they hardly ever pay one-half, or one-quarter, being inveterate robbers and rebels. Wajid Allee Khan had been commissioned, by the Durbar, to restore the Lady Sogura to her patrimonial estate, and he brought her with him from Lucknow for the purpose; but he soon after made over a part of the estate to his friend, Bakir Allee, of Esoulee, and another part to Ramsurroop, the son of Seoumber Sing, for a suitable consideration, and left only one-half to the Lady Sogura. This she at first refused to take, but he promised to restore the whole the next year, when he saw she was resolved to return again to her friends at Lucknow, and she consented to take the offered half on condition of a large remission of the Government demand upon it. When the season of collections came, however, he would make no remission for the half he had permitted her to retain, or give her any share in the perquisites of the half he had made over to others; nor would he give her credit for any portion of the collections, which had been anticipated by Maun Sing. He made her pledge the whole rents of her estate to Hoseyn Allee Khan, the commandant of a squadron of cavalry, on detached duty, under him. Unable to conduct the management under all these outrages and exactions, she begged to have the estate put under Government officers. Her friends at Court got an order issued for her being restored to the possession of the whole estate, having credit for the whole amount collected by Maun Sing, and a remission in the revenue equal to all that Government allowed to the proprietors of such estates.
[* In May 1851, the Nazim besieged Ramsurroop, in Kupragow, with a very large force, including Bunbury’s and Magness’s Regiments and Artillery. After the loss of many lives from fighting, and more from cholera, on both sides, Ramsurroop marched out with all his garrison and guns at night, and passed, unmolested, through that part of the line where the non-fighting corps were posted.]
Wajid Allee Khan disregarded the order, and made over or sold Naraenpoor and other villages belonging to the estate, to Rughbur Sing, the atrocious brother of Maun Sing, who sent his myrmidons to take possession. They killed the Lady Sogura’s two agents in the management, plundered her of all she had of property, and all the rents which she had up to that time collected, for payment to Government; and took possession of Naraenpoor and the other villages, sold to their master by Wajid Allee. Wajid Allee soon after came with a large force, seized the lady and carried her off to his camp, put all her officers and attendants into confinement, and refused all access to her. When she became ill, and appeared likely to sink under the treatment she received, he made her enter into written engagements to pay to the troops, in liquidation of their arrears of pay, all that he pretended that she owed to the State. He prevailed upon Ghuffoor Beg, who commanded the artillery, to take these her pledges, and give him, Wajid Allee, corresponding receipts for the amount, for transmission to the Treasury; and then made her over a prisoner to him. Ghuffoor Beg took possession of the lady and the estate, kept her in close confinement, and employed his artillery-men in making the collections in their own way, by appropriating all the harvests to themselves.
Wajid Allee was superseded in October 1849, by Aga Allee, who, on entering on his charge, directed that martial-law should cease in Muneearpoor; but Ghuffoor Beg and his artillery-men were too strong for the governor, and refused to give up the possession of so nice an estate. When I approached the estate in my tour, Ghuffoor Beg took the lady off to Chundoly, where she was treated with all manner of indignity and cruelty by the artillery. The estate was going to utter ruin under their ignorant and reckless management, and the Nazim, Aga Allee, prayed me to interpose and save it, and protect the poor Lady Sogura. I represented the hardship of the case to the Durbar, but with little hope of any success, under the present government, who say, that if the troops are not allowed to pay themselves in this way, they shall have to pay them all the arrears for which the estate is pledged, not one rupee of which is reduced by the collections they make. If they were to hold the estate for twenty years, they would not allow it to appear that any portion of the arrears had been paid off. The estate is a noble one, and, in spite of all the usurpations and disorders from which it has lately suffered, was capable last year of yielding to Government a revenue of fifty thousand rupees a- year, after providing liberally for all the requirements of the poor Lady Sogura and her family, or a rent-roll of one hundred thousand rupees a-year.
December 19, 1849.–Shahgunge, distance twelve miles. This town is surrounded by a mud wall, forty feet thick, and a ditch three miles round, built thirty years ago, and now much out of repair. It belongs to the family of Rajah Bukhtawar Sing. The wall, thirty feet high, was built of the mud taken from the ditch, in which there is now some six or seven feet of water. The wall has twenty-four bastions for guns, but there is no platform, or road for guns, round it on the inside. A number of respectable merchants and tradesmen reside in this town, where they are better protected than in any other town in Oude. It contains a population of between twenty and thirty thousand persons. They put thatch over the mud walls during the rains to preserve them. The fortifications and dwelling-houses together are said to have cost the family above ten lacs of rupees. There are some fourteen old guns in the fort. Though it would be difficult to shell a garrison out of a fort of this extent, it would not be difficult to take it. No garrison, sufficient to defend all parts of so extended a wall, could be maintained by the holder; and it would be easy to fill the ditch and scale the walls. Besides, the family is so very unpopular among the military classes around, whose lands they have seized upon, that thousands would come to the aid of any government force brought to crush them, and overwhelm the garrison. They keep their position only by the purchase of Court favour, and have the respect and attachment of only the better sort of cultivators, who are not of the military classes, and could be of little use to them in a collision with their sovereign. The family by which it is held has long been very influential at Court, where it has been represented by Bukhtawar Sing, whose brother, Dursun Sing, was the most powerful subject that Oude has had since the time of Almas Allee Khan. They live, however, in the midst of hundreds of sturdy Rajpoots, whom they have deprived of their lands, and who would, as I have said, rise against them were they to be at any time opposed to the Government The country over which we have passed this morning is well studded with groves, and well cultivated; and the peasantry seemed contented and prosperous. The greater part of the road lay through the lands acquired, as already described, by this family. Though they have acquired the property in the land by abuse of authority, collusion and violence, from its rightful owners, they keep their faith with the cultivators, effectually protect them from thieves, robbers, the violence of their neighbours, and, above all, from the ravages of the King’s troops; and they encourage the settlement of the better or more skilful and industrious classes of cultivators in their villages, such as Kachies, Koormies, and Lodhies. They came out from numerous villages, and in considerable bodies, to salute me, and expressed themselves well satisfied with their condition, and the security they enjoyed under their present landholders. We came through the village of Puleea, and Rajah Bukhtawar Sing seemed to have great pleasure in showing me the house in which he was born, seventy-five years ago, under a fine tamarind- tree that is still in vigour. The history of this family is that of many others in the Oude territory.
The father of Bukhtawar Sing, Porunder, was the son of Mungul, a Brahmin, who resided in Bhojpoor, on the right bank of the Ganges, a little below Buxar. The son, Porunder, was united in marriage to the daughter of Sudhae Misser, a respectable Brahmin, who resided in Puleea, and held a share of the lands. He persuaded his son-in-law to take up his residence in the same village. Prouder had five sons born to him in this village:– 1. Rajah Bukhtawar Sing, my Quartermaster- General. 2. Pursun Sing, died without issue. 3. Rajah Dursun Sing, died 1844, leaving three sons. 4. Incha Sing lives, and has two sons. 5. Davey Sing died, leaving two sons.
The eldest son was a trooper in the Honourable Company’s 8th Regiment of Light Cavalry; and while still a very young man, and home on furlough, he attracted the attention of Saadnt Allee Khan, the sovereign of Oude, whom he attended on a sporting excursion. He was very tall, and exceedingly handsome; and, on one occasion, saved his sovereign’s life from the sword of an assassin. He became one of Saadut Alee’s favourite orderlies, and rose to the command of a squadron. In a fine picture of Saadut Allee and his Court on the occasion of a Durbar, at which the Resident, Colonel Scott, and his suite were present, Bukhtawar Sing is represented in the dress he wore as an orderly cavalry officer. This picture is still preserved at Lucknow. His brothers, Dursun, Incha, and Davey Sing became, one after the other, orderlies in the same manner, under the influence of Bukhtawar Sing, during the reign of Saadnt Allee, and his son, Ghazee-od Deen. Dursan Sing got the command of a regiment of Nujeebs in 1814, and Incha Sing and Davey Sing rose in favour and rank, both civil and military.
Bhudursa and five other villages were held in proprietary right by the members of a family of Syuds. They enjoyed Bhudursa rent free, and still hold it; but the other five villages (Kyl, Mahdono, Tindooa, Teroo, and Pursun) were bestowed, in jagheer, upon another Syud, a Court favourite, Khoda Buksh, in 1814. He fell into disfavour in 1816, and all these and other villages were let, in 1817, to Dursun Sing, in farm, at 60,000 rupees a-year. The bestowal of an estate in jagheer, or farm, ought not to interfere with the rights of the proprietors of the lands comprised in it, as the sovereign transfers merely his own territorial rights, not theirs; but Dursun Sing, before the year 1820, had, by rack-renting, lending on mortgage, and other fraudulent or violent means, deprived all the Syud proprietors of their lands in the other five villages. They were, however, still left in possession of Bhudursa. He pursued the same system, as far as possible, in the other districts, which were, from time to time, placed under him, as contractor for the revenue. He held the contract for Sultanpoor and other districts, altogether yielding fifty-nine lacs of rupees a-year, in 1827; and it was then that he first bethought himself of securing his family permanently in the possession of the lands he had seized, or might seize upon, by bynamahs, or deeds of sale, from the old proprietors.
He imposed upon the lands he coveted, rates which he knew they could never pay; took all the property of the proprietors for rent, or for the wages of the mounted and foot soldiers, whom he placed over them, or quartered upon their villages, to enforce his demands; seized any neighbouring banker or capitalist whom he could lay hold of, and by confinement and harsh treatment, made him stand security for the suffering proprietors, for sums they never owed; and when these proprietors were made to appear to be irretrievably involved in debt to the State and to individuals, and had no hope of release from prison by any other means, they consented to sign the bynamahs, or sale deeds for lands, which their families had possessed for centuries. Those of the capitalists who had no friends at Court were made to pay the money, for which they had been forced to pledge themselves; and those who had such friends, got the sums which they had engaged to pay, represented as irrecoverable balances due by proprietors, and struck off. The proprietors themselves, plundered of all they had in the world, and without any hope of redress, left the country, or took service under our Government, or that of Oude, or descended to the rank of day-labourers or cultivators in other estates.*
[* Estates held by the family under bynamahs or sale deeds:
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Puchumrath . . . . . . . . . 1,13,000
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Howelee . . . . . . . . . . 45,000
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Mogulsee, including Hindoo Sing’s estate of Shapoor, obtained by fraud and violence . . . . . . 28,000
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Bhurteepoor and Laltapoor . . . . 30,000
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Rudowlee . . . . . . . . . 12,000 Turolee in Huldeemow. . . . . . 17,000
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Bahraetch in Sagonputtee . . . . 4,000
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Gosaengunge . . . . . . . . 3,000 ________
Total Company's Rupees . . . 2,52,000 ________
Dursun Sing’s contracts, for the land revenue, of districts, amounted from 1827 to 1830, to 59,00,000 rupees a year. From 1830 to 1836, to 58,00,000. In 1836 to 46,100,000. In 1837 to 47,00,000. He continued to hold the whole or greater part of these districts up to September 1843.]
There were four brothers, the sons of a Canoongo, of Fyzabad; first, Birj Lal; second, Lala; third, Humeer Sing, a corporal in one of our Regiments of Native Infantry; fourth, Hunooman Persaud; fifth, Gunga Persaud. The family held-eight villages, in hereditary right, with a rent-roll of 6,000, of which they paid 3,000 to Government, and took 3,000 for themselves. While Dursun Sing was dying, in 1844, his eldest son, Ramadeen, tried to get possession of this estate. He seized and confined, in the usual way, Gunga Persaud, the Canoongo, and kept him with harsh treatment, for 1844; and when his brother the corporal complained, in the usual way, through the Resident, Gunga Persaud was released, and he attended the Residents Court, as his brother’s attorney, till 1847, when the family recovered possession of the estate. But in 1846, when Dursun Sing’s son saw that the case was going against him, he made their local agent, Davey Persaud, plunder all the eight villages of all the stock in cattle, grain, &c., that they contained, and all the people, of whatever property they possessed.
Dursun Sing’s family now pay to the Oude Government, a revenue of 1,88,000 rupees a-year, for their bynamah estates, which were acquired by them in the manner described. The rent-roll, recognized in the Exchequer, is 2,56,000; and the nankar 68,000; but the real rent-roll is much greater-perhaps double. The village of Tendooa, in Mehdona, belonged, in hereditary right, to Soorujbulee Sing and Rugonauth Sing, Rajpoots, whom the family of Dursun Sing wished to coerce, in the usual mode, into signing a bynamah, or deed of sale. They refused, and some of the family are said to have been in confinement in consequence, since the year A.D. 1844. When Gunga Persaud, the Canoongo, was confined by Dursun Sing’s family, on account of his own estate, they extorted from him, on the pretence of his being security for the punctual payment of what might be demanded from these two men, Soorujbulee’ and Rugonauth, the sum of 4,000 rupees. One of the eight villages, held by the Canoongoes, named Aboo Surae, Ghalib Jung, alias Dursun Sing, another Court favourite, is now trying to take by violence, for himself, following the practice of his namesake. He has possessed himself of many by the same means, keeping the troops he commands upon them at exercise and target- practice, till he drives both cultivators and proprietors out, or shoots them.
This Rajah, Ghalib Jung, is now a great favourite with the minister, and no man manifests a stronger disposition to make his influence subservient to his own interest and that of his family. By fraud and violence, and collusion with the officers who have charge of districts and require his aid at Court, he seizes upon the best lands of his weaker neighbours, in the same manner as his namesake, Rajah Dursun Sing, used to do; and of the money which he receives for contracts of various kinds, he appropriates by far the greater part to himself. He is often sent out, with a considerable force, to adjust disputes between landholders and local authorities, and he decides in favour of the party most able and willing to pay, under the assurance that, if called to account, he will be able to clear himself, by giving a share of what he gets to those who send and support him. He commands a large body of mounted and foot police, and he is often ordered to go and send detachments in pursuit of daring offenders, particularly those who have given offence to the British authorities. In such cases he generally succeeds in arresting and bringing in some of the offenders; but he as often seizes the landholders and others who may have given them shelter, intentionally or otherwise; and, after extorting from them as much as they can be made to pay, lets them go. He is not, of course, very particular as to the quantity or quality of the evidence forthcoming to prove that a person able to pay has intentionally screened the offenders from justice.
Rajah Ghalib Jung was the superintendent of the City Police, and commandant of a Brigade of Infantry, and a prime favourite of the King, Nuseer-od Deen Hyder, for two years, up to November 1835. He had many other employments, was always in attendance upon the King, and was much liked by him, because he saw his orders carried into immediate effect, without any regard to the rank or sufferings of the persons whom they were to affect. For these two years he was one of the most intimate companions of his sovereign, in his festivities and most private debaucheries. He became cordially detested throughout the city for his reckless severity, and still more throughout the Court, for the fearless manner in which he spoke to the King of the malversation and peculations of the minister and all the Court favourites who were not in his interest. He thwarted the imbecile old minister, Roshun-od Dowlah, in everything; and never lost an opportunity of turning him into ridicule, and showing his contempt for him.
The King had become very fond of a smart young lad, by name Duljeet, who had been brought up from his infancy by the minister, but now served the King as his most confidential personal attendant. He was paid handsomely by the minister for all the services he rendered him, and deeply interested in keeping him in power and unfettered, and he watched eagerly for an opportunity to remove the man who thwarted him. Mucka, the King’s head tailor, was equally anxious, for his own interests, to get rid of the favourite, and so was Gunga Khowas, a boatman, another personal servant and favourite of the King. These three men soon interested in their cause some of the most influential ladies of the palace, and all sought with avidity the opportunity to effect their object. Ghalib Jung was the person, or one of the persons, through whom the King invited females, noted for either their beauty or their accomplishments, and he was told to bring a celebrated dancing-girl, named Mogaree. She did not appear, and the King became impatient, and at last asked Dhuneea Mehree the reason. She had often been employed in a similar office, and was jealous of Ghalib Jung’s rivalry. She told his Majesty, that he had obstructed his pleasures on this as on many other occasions, and taken the lady into his own keeping. All the other favourites told him the same thing, and it is generally believed that the charge was true; indeed the girl herself afterwards confessed it. The King, however, “bided his time,” in the hope of finding some other ground of revenging himself upon the favourite, without the necessity of making him appear in public as his rival.
On the 7th of October, 1835, the King was conversing with Ghalib Jung, in one of his private apartments, on affairs of state. Several crowns stood on the table for the King’s inspection. They had been prepared under Mucka, the tailor’s, inspection, from materials purchased by him. He always charged the King ten times the price of the articles which he was ordered to provide, and Ghalib Jung thought the occasion favourable to expose his misconduct to his master. He took up one of the crowns, put his left hand into it, and, turning it round on his finger, pointed out the flimsy nature of the materials with which it had been made. His left finger slipped through the silk on the crown, whether accidentally, or designedly, to prove the flimsy nature of the silk and exasperate the King, is not known; but on seeing the finger pass through the crown, his Majesty left the room without saying a word. Soon after several attendants came in, surrounded Ghalib Jung, and commanded him to remain till further orders. In this state they remained for about two hours, when other attendants came in, struck off his turban on the floor, and had it kicked out of the room by sweepers.
They then dragged out Ghalib Jung, and thrust him into prison. The next day heavy iron fetters were put upon his legs, and upon those of three of his principal followers, who were imprisoned along with him; and his mother, father, wife, and daughters were made prisoners in their own houses; and all the property of the family that could be found was confiscated. On the third day, while still in irons, Ghalib Jung and his three followers were tied up and flogged severely, to make them point out any hidden treasure that they might have. That night the King got drunk, and, before many persons, ordered the minister to have Ghalib Jung’s right hand and nose cut off forthwith. The minister, who prayed forgiveness and forbearance, was abused and again commanded, but again entreated his Majesty to pause, and prayed for a private audience. It was granted, and the minister told his Majesty that the British Government would probably interpose if the order were carried into effect.
The King then retired to rest, but the next morning had Ghalib Jung and his three followers again tied up and flogged. Six or seven days after, all Ghalib Jung’s attendants were taken from him, and no person was permitted to enter the room where he lay in irons, and he could in consequence get neither food nor drink of any kind. On the 19th of October, the King ordered all the females of Ghalib Jung’s family to be brought on foot from their houses to the palace by force, and publicly declared that they should all on the next day have their hair shaved off, be stripped naked, and in that state turned out into the street. After giving these orders, the King went to bed, and the females were all brought, as ordered, to the palace; but the sympathies of the King’s own servants were excited by the sufferings of these unoffending females, and they disobeyed the order for their being made to walk on foot through the streets, and brought them in covered litters.
The Resident, apprehending that these poor females might be further disgraced, and Ghalib Jung starved to death, determined to interpose, and demanded an interview, while the King was still in bed. The King was sorely vexed, and sent the minister to the Resident to request that he would not give himself the trouble to come, if his object was to relieve Ghalib Jung’s family, as he would forthwith order the females to be taken to their homes. The minister had not been to the Resident for ten or twelve days, or from the first or second day after the fall of the favourite. He prayed that the Resident would not speak harshly to the King on the subject of the treatment Ghalib Jung and his family had received, lest he, the minister, should himself suffer. The Resident insisted upon an audience. He found the King sullen and doggedly silent. The minister was present, and spoke for his master. He denied, what was known to be true, that the prisoner had been kept for two days and two nights’ without food or drink; but admitted that he had been tied up and flogged severely, and that the females of his family were still there, but he promised to send them back. He said that it was necessary to confiscate the property of the prisoner, since he owed large sums to the State. The females were all sent back to their homes, and Ghalib Jung was permitted, to have four of his own servants in attendance upon him.
The Resident reported all these things to Government, who entirely approved of his proceedings; and desired that he would tell his Majesty that such savage and atrocious proceedings would ruin his reputation, and, if persisted in, bring on consequences most injurious to himself. When the Resident, at the audience above described, remonstrated with the King for not calling upon his officers periodically to render their accounts, instead of letting them run on for indefinite periods, and then confining them and confiscating their property, he replied–“What you state is most true, and you may be assured that I will in future make every one account to me every three months for the money he has received, and never again show favour to any one.”
Rajah Dursun Sing, the great revenue contractor, and at that time the most powerful of the King’s subjects beyond the precincts of the Court, had, like the minister himself, been often thwarted by Ghalib Jung when in power; and, after the interposition of the Resident, he applied to have him put into his power. The King and minister were pleased at the thought of making their victim suffer beyond the immediate supervision of a vigilant Resident, and the minister made him over to the Rajah for a consideration, it is said, of three lacs of rupees; and at the same time assured the Resident that this was the only safe way to rescue him from the further vengeance of an exasperated King; that Rajah Dursun Sing was a friend of his, and would provide him and his family and attendants with ample accommodation and comfort. The Rajah had him put into an iron cage, and sent to his fort at Shahgunge, where, report says, he had snakes and scorpions put into the cage to torment and destroy him, but that Ghalib Jung had “a charmed life,” and escaped their poison. The object is said to have been to torment and destroy him without leaving upon his body any marks of violence.
On the death of Nuseer-od Deen Hyder, Ghalib Jung was released from confinement, on the payment, it is said, of four lacs of rupees, in Government securities, and a promise of three lacs more if restored to office. He went to reside at Cawnpore, in British territory; but, on the dismissal of the minister, Roshun-od Dowlah, three months after, and the appointment of Hakeem Mehndee to his place, Ghalib Jung was restored to his place. The promise of the three lacs was communicated to the new King, Mahommed Allee Shah, by Roshun-od Dowlah himself, while in confinement; and it is said that Ghalib Jung paid one-half, or one hundred and fifty thousand.
Ghalib Jung had, in many other ways, abused the privileges of intimate companionship which he enjoyed with his master, as better servants under better and more guarded masters will do; and the King, having discovered this, had for some time resolved to take advantage of the first fair occasion to discharge him. The people of Lucknow liked their King, with all his faults–and they were many–and hated the favourite as much for the injury which he did to his master’s reputation, as for the insults and injuries inflicted by him on themselves. But when the unoffending females of the favourite were dragged from their privacy to the palace, to be disgraced, the feelings of the whole city were shocked, and expressed in tones which alarmed the minister as much as the Resident’s interposition alarmed the King. They had no sympathy for the fallen favourite, but a very deep one for the ladies and children of his family, who could have no share in his guilt, whatever it might be.
Ghalib Jung was raised, from a very humble grade, by Ghazee-od Deen Hyder, and about the year 1825 he had become as great a favourite with him as he afterwards became with his son, Nuseer-od Deen Hyder, and he abused his master’s favour in the same manner. The minister, Aga Meer, finding his interference and vulgar insolence intolerable, took advantage one day of the King’s anger against him, had him degraded, seized, and sent off forthwith to one of his creatures, Taj-od Deen Hoseyn, then in charge of the Sultanpoor district, where he was soon reduced almost to death’s door by harsh treatment and want of food, and made to disgorge all the wealth he had accumulated. Four years after the death of Ghazee-od Deen and the accession of his son, Nuseer-od Deen, Ghalib Jung was, in the year 1831, again appointed to a place of trust at Court by the minister, Hakeem Mehndee, who managed to keep him in order during the two years that he held the reins of government.*
[* Ghalib Jung died on the 1st of May 1851, at Lucknow, aged about 80 years.]
December 20, 1849.–Saleepoor, ten miles. The country, on both sides of the road, well studded with trees, hamlets, and villages, and well cultivated and peopled. The landholders and peasantry seem all happy and secure under their present masters, the brother and son of the late Dursun Sing. They are protected by them from thieves and robbers, the attacks of refractory barons, and, above all, from the ravages of the King’s troops; and the whole face of the country, at this season, is like that of a rich garden. The whole is under cultivation, and covered with the greatest possible variety of crops. The people showed us, as we passed, six kinds of sugar-cane, and told us that they had many more, one soil agreeing best with one kind, another with another. The main fault in the cultivation of sugar-cane is here, as in every other part of India that I have seen, the want of room and the disregard of cleanliness. They crowd the cane too much, and never remove the decayed leaves, and sufficient air is never admitted.
Bukhtawar Sing has always been considered as the head of the family to whom Shahgunge belongs, but he has always remained at Court, and left the local management of the estate and the government of the districts, placed under their charge in contract or in trust, to his brothers and nephews. Bukhtawar Sing has no child of his own, but he has adopted Maun Sing, the youngest son of his brother, Dursun Sing, and he leaves all local duties and responsibilities to him. He is a small, slight man, but shrewd, active, and energetic, and as unscrupulous as a man can be. Indeed old Bukhtawar Sing himself is the only member of the family that was ever troubled with scruples of any kind whatever; for he is the only one whose boyhood was not passed in the society of men in the every-day habit of committing with impunity all kinds of cruelties, atrocities, and outrages. There is, perhaps, no school in the world better adapted for training thoroughbred ruffians (men without any scruple of conscience, sense of honour, or feeling of humanity) than the camp of a revenue- contractor in Oude. It has been the same for the last thirty years that I have known it, and must continue to be the same as long as we maintain, in absolute sway over the people, a sovereign who never bestows a thought upon them, has no feeling in common with them, and can never be persuaded that his high office imposes upon him the obligation to labour to promote their good, or even to protect them against the outrage and oppression of his own soldiers and civil officers. All Rajah Bukhtawar Sing’s brothers and nephews were bred up in such camps, and are thorough-bred ruffians.
They have got the lands which they hold by much fraud and violence no doubt, but they have done much good to them. They have invited and established in comfort great numbers of the best classes of cultivators from other districts, in which they had ceased to feel secure, and they have protected and encouraged those whom they found on the land. To establish a new cultivator of the better class, they require to give him about twenty-five rupees for a pair of bullocks; for subsistence for himself and family till his crops ripen, thirty- six more, for a house, wells, &c., thirty more, or about ninety rupees, which he pays back with or without interest by degrees. Every village and hamlet is now surrounded by fine garden cultivation, conducted by the cultivators of the gardener caste, whom the family has thus established.
The greatest benefit conferred upon the lands which they hold has been in the suppression of the fearful contests which used to be perpetual between the small proprietors of the military classes, among whom the lands had become minutely subdivided by the law of inheritance, about boundaries and rights to water for irrigation. Many persons used to be killed every year in these contests, and their widows and orphans had to be maintained by the survivors. Now no such dispute leads to any serious conflict. They are all settled at once by arbitrators, who are guided in their decisions by the accounts of the Putwaries of villages and Canoongoes of districts. These men have the detailed accounts of every tenement for the last hundred years; and, with their assistance, village traditions, and the advice of their elders, all such boundary disputes and misunderstandings about rights to water are quickly and amicably adjusted; and the landlords are strong, and able to enforce whatever decision is pronounced. They are wealthy, and pay the Government demand punctually, and have influence at Court to prevent any attempt at oppression on the part of Government officers on themselves or their tenants. Not a thief or a robber can live or depredate among their tenants. The hamlets are, in consequence, numerous and peopled by peasantry, who seem to live without fear. They adhere strictly to the terms of their engagements with their tenants of all grades; and their tenants all pay their rents punctually, unless calamities of season deprive them of the means, when due consideration is made by landlords, who live among them, and know what they suffer and require.
The climate must be good, for the people are strong and well-made, and without any appearance of disease. Hardly a beggar of any kind is to be seen along the road. The residence of religious mendicants seems to be especially discouraged, and we see no others. It is very pleasing to pass over such lands after going through such districts as Bahraetch and Gonda, where the signs of the effects of bad air and water upon men, women, and children are so sad and numerous; and those of the abuse of power and the neglect of duty on the part of the Government and its officers are still more so.
Last evening I sent for the two men above named, who had been confined for six or seven years, and were said to have been so because they would not sign the bynamahs required from them by Mann Sing: their names are Soorujbulee Sing and Rugonath Sing. They came with the King’s wakeel, accompanied by their cousin, Hunooman Sing, on whose charge they were declared to have been confined. I found that the village of Tendooa had been held by their family, in proprietary right, for many generations, and that they were Chouhan Rajpoots by caste. When Dursun Sing was securing to himself the lands of the district, those of Tendooa were held in three equal shares by Soorujbulee and his brothers, Narind and Rugonath; Hunooman Sing, their cousin; and Seoruttun, their cousin.
Maun Sing took advantage of a desperate quarrel between them, and secured Soorujbulee and Rugonath. Narind escaped and joined a refractory tallookdar, and Seoruttun and Hunooman did the same. Hunooman Sing was, however, invited back, and intrusted, by Maun Sing, with the management of the whole estate, on favourable terms. In revenge for his giving in to the terms of Maun Sing, and serving him, the absconded co-sharers attacked his house several times, killed three of his brothers, and many other persons of his family, and robbed him of almost all he had. This was four years ago. He complained, and the two brothers were kept more strictly confined than ever, to save him and the village. Hunooman Sing looked upon the two prisoners as the murderers of his brothers, though they were in confinement when they were killed, and had been so for more than two years, and was very violent against them in my presence. They were no less violent against him, as the cause of their continued confinement They protested to me, that they had no communication whatever with Seoruttun or Narind Sing, but thought it very likely, that they really did lead the gangs in the attacks upon the village, to recover their rights. They offered to give security for their future good behaviour if released; but declared, that they would rather die than consent to sign a bynamah, or deed of sale, or any relinquishment whatever of their hereditary rights as landholders.
Bukhtawar and Maun Sing said,–“That the people of the village would not be safe, for a moment, if these two brothers were released, which they would be, on the first occasion of thanksgiving, if sent to Lucknow; that people who ventured to seize a thief or robber in Oude must keep him, if they wished to save themselves from his future depredations, as the Government authorities would have nothing to do with them.”
I ordered the King’s wakeel to take these two brothers to the Chuckladar, and request him to see them released on their furnishing sufficient security for their future good behaviour, which they promised to produce.* They were all fine-looking men, with limbs that would do honour to any climate in the world. These are the families from which our native regiments are recruited; and hardly a young recruit offers himself for enlistment, on whose body marks will not be found of wounds received in these contests, between landlords themselves, and between them and the officers and troops of the sovereign. I have never seen enmity more strong and deadly than that exhibited by contending co-sharers and landholders of all kinds in Oude. The Rajah of Bulrampoor mentioned a curious instance of this spirit in a village, now called the Kolowar village, in the Gonda district, held in copartnership by a family of the Buchulgotee tribe of Rajpoots. One of them said he should plant sugar-cane in one of his fields. All consented to this. But when he pointed out the place where he should have his mill, the community became divided. A contest ensued, in which all the able-bodied men were killed, though not single cane had been planted. The widows and children survived, and still hold the village, but have been so subdued by poverty that they are the quietest village community in the district. The village from that time has gone by the name of Kolowar village, from Koloo, the sugar-mill, though no sugar-mill was ever worked in the village, he believed. He says, the villagers cherish the recollection of this fight; and get very angry when their neighbours twit them with the folly of it.
[* They were released, and have been ever since at large on security. One of them visited me in April 1851, and said, that as a point of honour, they should abstain from joining in the fight for their rights, but felt it very hard to be bound to do so.]
In our own districts in Upper India, they often kill each other in such contests; but more frequently ruin each other in litigation in our Civil Courts, to the benefit of the native attorneys and law- officers, who fatten on the misery they create or produce. In Oude they always decide such questions by recourse to arms, and the loss of life is no doubt fearful. Still the people generally, or a great part of them, would prefer to reside in Oude, under all the risks to which these contests expose them, than in our own districts, under the evils the people are exposed to from the uncertainties of our law, the multiplicity and formality of our Courts, the pride and negligence of those who preside over them, and the corruption and insolence of those who must be employed to prosecute or defend a cause in them, and enforce the fulfilment of a decree when passed.
The members of the landed aristocracy of Oude always speak with respect of the administration in our territories, but generally end with remarking on the cost and uncertainty of the law in civil cases, and the gradual decay, under its operation, of all the ancient families. A less and less proportion of the annual produce of their lands is left to them in our periodical settlements of the land revenue, while family pride makes them expend the same sums in the marriage of their children, in religious and other festivals, personal servants, and hereditary retainers. They fall into balance, incur heavy debts, and estate after estate is put up to auction, and the proprietors are reduced to poverty. They say, that four times more of these families have gone to decay in the half of the territory made over to us in 1801, than in the half reserved by the Oude sovereign; and this is, I fear, true. They named the families–I cannot remember them.
In Oude, the law of primogeniture prevails among all the tallookdars, or principal landholders; and, to a certain extent, among the middle class of landholders, of the Rajpoot or any other military class. If one co-sharer of this class has several sons, his eldest often inherits all the share he leaves, with all the obligations incident upon it, of maintaining the rest of the family.
The brothers of Soorujbulee, above named, do not pretend to have any right of inheritance in the share of the lands he holds; but they have a prescriptive right to support from him, for themselves and families, when they require it. This rule of primogeniture is, however, often broken through during the lifetime of the father, who, having more of natural affection than family pride, divides the lands between his sons. After his death they submit to this division, and take their respective shares, to descend to their children, by the law of primogeniture, or be again subdivided as may seem to them best; or they fight it out among themselves, till the strongest gets all. Among landholders of the smallest class, whether Hindoos or Mahommedans, the lands are subdivided according to the ordinary law of inheritance.
Our army and other public establishments form a great “safety-valve” for Oude, and save it from a vast deal of fighting for shares in land, and the disorders that always attend it. Younger brothers enlist in our regiments, or find employment in our civil establishments, and leave their wives and children under the protection of the elder brother, who manages the family estate for the common good. They send the greater part of their pay to him for their subsistence, and feel assured that he will see that they are provided for, should they lose their lives in our service. From the single district of Byswara in Oude, sixteen thousand men were, it is said, found to be so serving in our army and other establishments; and from Bunoda, which adjoins it to the east, fifteen thousand, on an inquiry ordered to be made by Ghazee-od Deen Hyder some twenty- five years ago.
The family of Dursun Sing, like good landholders in all parts of Oude, assigned small patches of land to substantial cultivators, merchants, shopkeepers, and others, whom it is useful to retain in their estates, for the purpose of planting small groves of mango and other trees, as local ties. They prepare the well and plant the trees, and then make over the land to a gardener or other good cultivator, to be tilled for his own profit, on condition that he water the trees, and take care to preserve them from frost during the cold season, and from rats, white ants, and other enemies; and form terraces round them, where the water lies much on the surface during the rains, so that it may not reach and injure the bark. The land yields crops till the trees grow large and cover it with their shade, by which time they are independent of irrigation, and begin to bear fruit. The crops do not thrive under the shade of the trees, and the lands they cover cease to be of any value for tillage. The stems and foliage of the trees, no doubt, deprive the crops of the moisture, carbonic gas and ammonia, they require from the atmosphere. They are, generally, watered from six to ten years. These groves form a valuable local tie for the cultivators and other useful tenants. No man dare to molest them or their descendants, in the possession of their well and grove, without incurring, at least, the odium of society; and, according to their notion, the anger of their gods.
The cultivators always point out to them, in asserting their rights to the lands they hold; and reside and cultivate in the village, under circumstances that would drive them away, had they no such ties to retain them. They feel a-great pride in them; and all good landlords feel the same in having their villages filled with tenants who have such ties.
December 21, 1849.–Bhurteepoor, ten miles, almost all the way through the estate of Maun Sing. No lands could be better cultivated than they are all the way, or better studded with groves and beautiful single trees. The villages and hamlets along the road are numerous, and filled with cultivators of the gardener and other good classes, who seem happy and contented. The season has been favourable, and the crops are all fine, and of great variety. Sugar- cane abounds, but no mills are, as yet, at work. We passed through, and by three or four villages, that have been lately taken from Maun Sing, and made over to farmers by the local authorities, under instructions from Court; but they are not so well cultivated, as those which he retains. The cultivators and inhabitants generally do not appear to enjoy the same protection or security in the engagements they make. The soil is everywhere good, the water near the surface, and the climate excellent. The soil is here called doomuteea, and adapted to all kinds of tillage.
I should mention, with regard to the subdivision of landed property, that the Rajahs and tallookdars, among whom the law of primogeniture prevails, consider their estates as principalities, or reeasuts. When any Rajah, or tallookdar, during his lifetime, assigns portions of the land to his sons, brothers, or other members of the family, they are separated from the reeasut, or principality, and are subdivided as they descend from generation to generation, by the ordinary Hindoo or Mahommedan law of inheritance. This is the case with portions of the estate of the Rajah of Korwar, in the Sultanpoor district, one of the oldest Hindoo principalities in Oude, which are now held by his cousins, nephews, &c., near this place, Bhurteepoor.*
[* Sunkur Sing, of Korwar, had four sons: first, Dooneeaput died without issue; second, Sookraj Sing, whose grandson, Madhoo Persaud, is now the Rajah; third, Bureear Sing, who got from his brother lands yielding forty thousand rupees a-year out of the principality. They are now held by his son, Jydut; fourth, Znbar Sing, who got from his brother lands yielding nineteen thousand rupees a-year, which are now held by his son, Moheser Persaud. Sunkir Sing was the second brother, but his elder brother died without issue.]
Dooneeaput succeeded to the reeasut on the death of his uncle, the Rajah, who died without issue; and he bestowed portions of the estate on his brothers, Burear and Zubur Sing, which their descendants enjoy, but which do not go to the eldest son, by the law of primogeniture. He was succeeded by his brother, Sookraj, whose grandson, Madhoo Persaud, now reigns as Rajah, and has the undivided possession of the lands belonging to this branch. All the descendants of his grandfather, Sookraj, and their widows and orphans, have a right to protection and support from him, and to nothing more. Jydut, who now holds the lands, yielding forty thousand rupees a-year, called upon me, this morning, and gave me this history of his family. The Rajah himself is in camp, and came to visit me this afternoon.
It is interesting and pleasing to see a large, well-controlled camp, moving in a long line through a narrow road or pathway, over plains, covered with so rich a variety of crops, and studded with such magnificent evergreen trees. The solitary mango-tree, in a field of corn, seems to exult in its position-to grow taller and spread wider its branches and rich foliage, in situations where they can be seen to so much advantage. The peepul and bargut trees, which, when entire, are still more ornamental, are everywhere torn to pieces and disfigured by the camels and elephants, buffaloes and bullocks, that feed upon their foliage and tender branches. There are a great many mhowa, tamarind, and other fine trees, upon which they do not feed, to assist the mango in giving beauty to the landscape.
The Korwar Rajah, Madhoo Persaud, a young man of about twenty-two years of age, came in the evening, and confirmed what his relative, Jydut, had told me of the rule which required that his lands should remain undivided with his eldest son, while those which are held by Jydut, and his other relatives, should be subdivided among all the sons of the holder. This rule is more necessary in Oude than elsewhere, to preserve a family and its estate from the grasp of its neighbours and Government officers. When there happens to be no heir left to the portion of the estate which has been cut off, it is re- annexed to the estate; and the head of the family frequently anticipates the event, by murdering or imprisoning the heir or incumbent, and seizing upon the lands. Another Rajah, of the same name, Mahdoo Persaud, of Amethee, in Salone, has lately seized upon the estate of Shahgur, worth twenty thousand rupees a-year, which had been cut off from the Amethee estate, and enjoyed by a collateral branch of the family for several generations. He holds the proprietor, Bulwunt Sing, in prison, in irons, and would soon make away with him were the Oude Government to think it worth while to inquire after him. He has seized upon another portion, Ramgur, held by another branch of the family, worth six thousand rupees a-year, and crushed all the proprietors. This is the way in which estates, once broken up, are reconsolidated in Oude, under energetic and unscrupulous men. Of course when they think it worth while to do so, they purchase the collusion of the local authorities of the day, by promising to pay the revenues, which the old proprietors paid during their tenure of office. The other barons do not interfere, unless they happen to be connected by marriage with the ousted proprietors, or otherwise specially bound, by interest and honour, to defend them against the grasp of the head of their family. Many struggles of this kind are taking place every season in Oude.
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