Why various regions remained loyal to english east india company myths and misconceptions-part 5

1. Sepoy Rebellion of 1857-59 Reinterpreted
Available on Amazon Books in hard copy form
Quoted recently by Prof Rajmohan Gandhi in his book on Punjab History
https://www.amazon.com/Sepoy-Rebellion-1857-59-Reinterpreted-
Agha/dp/1480085707/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1497192736&sr=1-
1&keywords=agha+h+amin+sepoy+rebellion

2. Major Agha H Amin (retired)
About the Author
About the Author Agha H. Amin , Retired Tank corps major who served in five
tank regiments and commanded an independent tank squadron and served in
various staff , instructional and research assignments. In his Pakistan Army
tenure he wrote three original tactical papers on Reconnaissance Troops
Tactical handling, Reconnaissance support group , and RFS Concept. His
writings were published in Pakistan Armys prime journals , Pakistan Army
Journal and Citadel Journal of Command and Staff College Quetta. His
recommendations regarding bifurcation of officer corps into command and
staff cadre advanced in 1998 were later accepted. In addition his
recommendation of grouping various corps into army commands advanced in
an article published in Citadel Journal in 1998 were accepted in 2005 or so.
Wrote The Essential Clausewitz in 1993, Sepoy Rebellion of 1857-59 in 1998 ,

3. Pakistan Army till 1965 in 1999 ,Development of Taliban Factions in
Afghanistan and Pakistan (2010) ,Taliban War in Afghanistan (2009). Served
as Assistant Editor of Defence Journal ,Executive Editor of globe and Founder
Editor of Journal of Afghanistan Studies . An associate of the think tanks
ORBAT and Alexandrian Defense group. Carried out various oil and gas and
power transmission line surveys in West Asia. Editor in Chief of monthly
Intelligence Review and monthly Military and Security Review. Heads the
think tank Centre for study of Intelligence Operations established in early
2010.

4. Muslims as Major Leaders
The period before 1857 was that of EEIC supremacy starting from its capture
of Delhi in 1803. Before 1803 the Mahrattas were masters of Delhi. But in 1857 we
find that the Mahrattas main leader Nana Sahib did not get any support from the
main Mahratta area of Bombay presidency.

5. He was supported by the Hindustani Bengal Army sepoy who had little connection
with Mahrattas by race.

6. Actually some of the sepoy regiments which rebelled at Cawnpore marched
to Lucknow. We see in 1857 the predominantly Hindu Regiments of Bengal Army
marching to predominantly Muslim centres of rebellion i.e. Delhi and Lucknow.
Bahadur Shah Zafar has to be given credit for at least preserving Hindu Muslim unity
in Delhi in 1857. He undertook various measures to do so like banning cow
slaughter in Delhi.
As per Percival Spear who is considered to be a very reliable authority on Indo-Pak
history:—
"On 19 May, Maulvi Muhammad Sayyid set up the standard of Jehad or holy war in
the Jamia Masjid; he was immediately ordered to remove it by the King. The Maulvi
explained that it was intended against the Hindus, where upon the king declared that

7. Hindus and Muslims were alike to him. Hindu army officers also complained and
were tactfully told that it had been intended against the English 542".
It seems that Hindu opinion just like Muslim opinion was divided. But this appears
odd only to those who take Hindus or Muslims as two nations in Indo-Pak sub-
continent.
If you analyse the Hindu as the UP Hindu or the Mahrashtra Hindu and the Muslim
as Hindustani Muslim or Punjabi Muslim their differences do not appear odd.
Thus we find the Hindustani Hindu acknowledging the Mughal Muslim as king
of India in 1857 because culturally they could identify with him more than the
Mahrashtra Hindu to whom the Mughal king was the descendant of a dynasty of
Muslim tyrants.
We find the Oudh Talukdars most of whom were Hindu Rajputs acknowledging the
Nawab of Lucknow Birjis Kadar a Muslim as their Nawab and ruler. The rebels were

8. thus not organised on communal lines. Hindu acknowledged Muslim political
supremacy by and large.
Nana Sahib had a more limited following and his own people i.e. Mahrattas never
rebelled in his favour. The Bombay Army and Maharashtra as a region stayed loyal
to the EEIC.
It appears that the Hindustani and Bombay or Punjab people had little in common.
This behaviour further reinforces the theory that India or even Pakistan are not; or
cannot be strictly defined as countries but rather a marriage of convenience of a
multiple member of nationalities.
The foundation of both the states is on mutual fear; and continuance of this
confrontation alone can guarantee survival of both; off course at the expense of the
smaller minority ethnic groups in both the states.
But the positive side of the rebellion was that at least it was the first major outbreak
in which Indians combined against the British sinking their differences based on
religious considerations.
Communal hatred in Indo-Pak sub-continent was definitely a post-1857 development
and had a deep connection with the deliberate but unwritten "divide and rule" policy
of the British which finally led to the increase in communal tension in post-
1857 India.
Why the Rebellion was confined to only certain regions of Indo-Pak
The primary and the first reason for this is very simple. Indo-Pak subcontinent is not
one country but a number of countries which have been ruled for most part of their
history by one dynasty or race from Delhi till 1947 and now

9. from Islamabad and Delhi.
The states of Pakistan and India came into existence in their present form not
because the Hindu rulers at Delhi conquered Bengal or Madras or Bombay but
because these areas were conquered a long time ago by the EEIC and then
subsequently transferred to the British crown in 1858 and to government
of India and Pakistan in 1947.
The two countries came into existence primarily not because all the regions of Indo-
Pak wanted this to happen but because the British simply confined their freedom of
choice to two options either to join "India" or "Pakistan". The fragility of this
arrangement was successfully challenged for the first time by the Muslim Bengalis
who gave us a new version of "two nation theory" by proving that among the
Muslims of India and Pakistan also there were two Muslim nations i.e. "West
Pakistan Muslims" and "East Pakistan Muslims"!
The success of regional parties in Sindh, Balochistan Madras etc. is a clear proof
that both the countries consist of different and distinct nationalities. In symbolic
terms this arrangement may be compared to "Sigheh or Muttaa" i.e. a marriage
limited to a certain period as practiced in Iran!!

10. The sub-continent had been conquered by the EEIC at different periods spread over
a century and different regions viewed the British in a different line. We will study
some of the regions and bring out the differences.
Bengal.
This was a very populous region of India. It was ruled by a Nawab before 1757 who
had no connection with the Bengalis by race.
His departure from the scene in 1757 hardly made any difference to the common
Bengali. Bengal in terms of population was the largest province in India in 1857.
The North West provinces (Modern UP) had also been part of the Bengal province

11. till 1836 when it was separated. The Bengali common man was a much exploited
and oppressed man.
But this exploitation and oppression was done by his own Bengali landlords and
revenue collector class both Muslim and Hindu.
The British did not change the system in this regard. They, however, brought one
major change which made post-1857 Bengal one of the most politically conscious
regions of India.
This was in terms of educating the people. Bengal was too big a province to worry
about what was happening in the rest of India.
For example the Santhal uprising had little to do with the EEIC. It was an uprising of
the Santhal people against oppression by money lenders and railway contractors
543.
This rebellion broke out in 1855 and was suppressed by 1857 and the Bengal Army
sepoys played a decisive role in suppressing it. The Hindustani sepoy of the EEIC
was almost as much of a foreigner for the Bengali as the European.
The Bengalis had nothing in common with the Hindustani Brahman, Rajput or
Mussulman sepoy of the Bengal Army. These sepoys were actually viewed

12. in Bengal as mercenary watchdogs of the EEIC.
Thus although there were only 2,400 European soldiers in Bengal in 1857 as
compared to more than 29,000 Hindustani sepoys 544 the rebellion did not succeed.
Many sepoy regiments which rebelled were hunted down by common people led by
landlords who supported the European troops in destroying them.
There were hardly any Bengali in the Bengal Army and during 1857 the British did
not recruit any soldiers here. Later on in early twentieth century Bengal became one
of the most anti-British area, where probably the maximum number of British officials
were assassinated apart from the tribal area of NWFP.
But in 1857 the Bengalis were not aware enough to participate in the rebellion. They
had no representation in the army so they could not have taken any part in the
rebellion. They had little to share with the northwest provinces and EEIC rule had
been established here exactly 100 years ago.
In all probability the Bengalis were satisfied with the status quo. The Mughal
emperor had no relevance to their problems and the only exposure which they had
of the Mahrattas was as dacoits and plunderers who raided West Bengal in the pre-
1857 era.
The pre-1857 Muslim Persian/Turk Nawabs of Bengal had hardly any sympathy
with the ethnic Bengali Muslim and mostly relied on Hindu officials for revenue
collection.
Madras.
The rebellion found no adherents in Madras also. The Madras Army was employed
in Central India and at Cawnpore and Lucknow. This does not imply that the people
of the south were docile but simply because they did not identify themselves with the
Hindustanis of the Gangetic plains who were far different from the Madras people.
Administration of Madras presidency by the EEIC since 1760s had produced peace
and security and the people were enjoying about 58 years of uninterrupted peace

13. since the last Mysore war of 1799.
But we must not forget that many parts of Madras presidency were formerly part of
the Mysore State which from 1769 to 1799 had been one of the EEIC’s toughest
opponent. In Madras one is inclined to believe the old theory that nations and races
are like a living organism.
They struggle, get tired and then sink into inactivity for some time in order to
recuperate. The region had seen many wars from 1740 to 1799 and now was war
weary at least in 1857. The higher proportion of Muslims in the Madras Army,
however, illustrates that the Punjabi Muslims and the Pathans were not the only
loyal Muslims. There were certain cases of individual mutiny in the Madras Cavalry
since this had a proportion of Hindustani Muslims. However, these were isolated
incidents and as a regiment no unit of Madras Army was disbanded or disarmed.
Bombay.
The Bombay Presidency comprising the western Ghats and modern
day Maharashtra had seen more anarchy and bloodshed than any other part
of India. This started from Sivaji's phenomenal war against the Mughals in 1660.
The Mahrattas must not be underestimated, since it was the Mahratta insurgency
which destroyed the Mughal empire more than any martial race of the area north
of Jhelum or north of Khyber or Oxus!
Since 1660 the Mahrattas had almost constantly been fighting adversaries ranging
from the Nizam of Hyderabad to the Afghans and the EEK with whom they fought
some three long wars, these three wars taking place during 1775-1782, 1803-5 and
the last one from 1817-18.
The Mahrattas did not like the Purbiya or Hindustani and the Hindustanis also
disliked this race since the Mahrattas were plunderers and looters like the Afghans
(although a little more well mannered) and they were equally disliked by both Hindus
and Muslims of the Gangetic plain.
The word "Delhi" above all was a hateful word for a Mahratta since it was the capital

14. of the hated Mughal who had ravaged the Mahratta home country so ruthlessly
during the great Mahratta insurgency lasting from 1660 to 1707.
The Mahrattas were a brave and courageous people and they shattered the myth of
Muslim and Mughal invincibility which had for so long kept the non-Muslim
inhabitants of the sub-continent victim of an irrational inferiority complex; that they
could never win against any Muslim invaders.

15. The Mahrattas in this regard are a unique people in sub- continental history. We are
discussing the history of Mahrattas because it is felt that it was not a question of
bravery or martial prowess in 1857 but that of political awareness and unfortunately
this awareness was overall lacking in the majority of regions of Indo-Pak sub-
continent in 1857.
Thus, 1857 was a period when the people of sub-continent did not really feel that the
EEIC was a foreign power which was exploiting them.
Perhaps in the short term the much needed stability and order which the EEIC
restored in many regions of Indo-Pak sub-continent was preferred by the people
rather than a freedom struggle which may have pushed them into the pre- 1917
medieval disorders and anarchic situation of Maharashtra and Central India.

16. The greatest credit in making the people of Bombay presidency believe that the
EEIC rule was best for them rests with Mountstuart Elphinstone was Resident at the
Mahrattas Peshwa's court from 1810 to 1819.
Mountstuart was a great scholar, historian and administrator. He loved and
respected India as a country and believed that the British were not in India forever.
He was a very just man and believed in
delegating some power and authority to the Indians. He was a firm believer of use of
local languages in the courts and routine administrative affairs.
He instituted reforms, greatly improved the system of public education and in
general followed extremely liberal and humanitarian policies. He loved India so

17. much that he refused the post of Governor General of Canada545!
It would not be an over exaggeration to say that it was Elphinstone who secured the
Bombay Presidency for the EEIC by creating a system in which the Indians were
made to feel as part of the system by justice and fairplay institutionalised by creation
of laws, procedures and systems. Just compare the conduct of Elphinstone with
racist behaviour of West Pakistani civil servants who served in East Pakistan during
the first two decades after 1947!
Rajputana.
The Rajputs are a very brave and hardy race but they remained neutral during 1857.
The answer for this inaction lies in the policy of neutrality followed by the Rajputs
since 1707.
The Rajputs somehow like Switzerland managed to stay neutral during the long

18. period of anarchy which devastated most of India during the period from 1707 to
1849. The Mahrattas did not raid Rajputana as frequently as other areas because
most of it was arid desert.
The northern Mahrattas the Afghans had also for this purpose left Rajputana alone.
The EEIC also because of the arid terrain avoided bothering the Rajputana states
except having a small enclave at Ajmer. The Rajputana states were large in area
and few in number and had a very small population.
Thus the EEIC only held Ajmer territory while the remaining Rajputana was under
local rulers who remained loyal throughout 1857. Many of their state troops rebelled
but these were mostly Hindustani and marched towards Delhi or Central India after
rebelling. The Rajputs thus remained neutral in 1857.
They had no reason to rebel since they were not under the EEIC. Arid terrain more
than martial fervour had saved Rajputana from EEIC colonialism and subjugation.
Another major reason for Rajput neutrality was the simple fact that the entire area
except Ajmer was ruled by local dynasties of long standing. The EEIC had never
hurt Rajput pride thanks to their barren terrain!
Punjab Loyalty
This is a much debated affair. The debate has degenerated in a very ugly manner
into an irrational defence of Punjab loyalty by ardent modern Punjabi nationalists
and misinterpreted in a very adverse manner by historians and thinkers with an anti
Punjabi attitude. The job of the historian is not to defend or to condemn an action
which was beyond the control of a nation or a leader at a particular time in history.
The Punjabis were as much the prisoners of circumstances as the Madrasi or the
Bengali or the Mahratta or the Rajput.
The history of Punjab in the period 1707 to 1857 was actually more complex than
the history of other parts of India. Leadership as far as the Muslims are concerned
did not develop in Punjab because the Punjabi Muslim did not fit anywhere in the

19. political expediency considerations of the Mughals. The Mughals preferred to recruit
Muslims of Persian, Turk or Afghan descent. Among the non Muslims their first
choice was the Hindu Rajput, particularly those from Rajputana proper since the
Rajputs were the most dominant class in Hindu society.
Later on, after 1689 546 the emphasis shifted to the Mahrattas who were ennobled
in large numbers by Aurangzeb as a political bribe to defeat Sivaji’s phenomenal
rebellion.
Mughal historical record illustrate that the Punjabis by and large were very peaceful
people. The region was prosperous and the weather and climate and fertility of soil
contributed in making the inhabitants peace loving and easy to administer like most
plain areas of India including the Gangetic plains etc.
But the Mughals went wrong at one place and underestimated the resilience and
moral force of a new religion which originated from Punjab in sixteenth century.
Jahangir imprisoned the fifth Sikh Guru Arjun who died while being tortured under
detention in 1606 547.
Aurangzeb the mild Stalin of India had the ninth Guru Tegh Bahdur executed in
1675548. Symbolically speaking this excess proved to be a major reason for the
burning Sikh desire to destroy Delhi in 1857.
But then it is an irony of history that Delhi has been burnt destroyed and looted by
Muslims from Afghanistan, Iran and Rohailkhand much more by any non Muslim
army except in 1857. Keeping in view the Mughal policy; the Sikh excesses
at Delhi were a normal reaction of an aggrieved community.
Till 1605 the Sikhs remained a peaceful religious group. But Arjun’s death while in
prison turned a basically peaceful religious group into more serious dissidents.
Thus Guru Har Govind adopted a more active policy unlike the previous Sikh Gurus.
Thus the Sikhs brought into Punjab’s history a healthy tradition of manly and

20. righteous resistance which had been missing in the region since Porus last opposed
Alexander on the Hydaspes!
Har Govind correctly assessed that without recourse to the option of militant
resistance the Sikhs would be destroyed by the Mughals.
Har Govind militarised the Sikhs and started a series of military actions which
subsequently assumed the shape of a low intensity conflict or a guerrilla war against
the Mughals.
This low intensity war continued till Har Govind’s death in 1645. The Sikh resistance
assumed more serious proportions once their Guru (Religions head) Tegh Bahadur
was executed by Aurangzeb at Delhi in 1675. This execution proved to be a
watershed in Sikh-Muslim relations and Sikhs from 1675 became vehemently anti
Mughal and anti Muslim since they identified Mughals with Islam. The Mughals on
the other hand were doing little more than manipulating religion for rationalising
oppression as all kings of the world of that time did.
There is no human passion as powerful as revenge in driving a man! Guru Govind
Singh the son of Tegh Bahadur rightly decided to avenge his father’s death. Thus
the Sikhs became a truly militarised sect under Govind. It is not our intention to
discuss much more of Sikh history.
But some background of this remarkable religious group is necessary for the
layman.
The Sikhs were the toughest opponents of the British in battles fought on abs the
population of the area they ruled in Ranjit Singh’s time.
But being a totally militarised religious group largely composed of the Jat caste
of Punjab they were more integrated than the majority Muslims and Pathans of their
empire. The Muslims were firstly divided into two distinct races the “Pathans and the
Punjabis”. The Pathans although of a better fibre were further sub divided into a
watertight tribal society of various tribes. The Punjabi Muslims till 1849 had a

21. negligible role in the elite power groups which controlled Punjab. The Mughals who
were ruling Punjab from 1526 to 1748 kept their own hand-picked governors, mostly
of Turkish, Persian or Pathan descent.
Merely being Muslim did not qualify the Punjabi for a respectable place in the
Mughal hierarchy. There was no religious oppression since the Punjabis were
Muslims by majority, but consequently the Mughals saw no need to cultivate the
Punjabis by ennobling them. This was a strange paradox which is common in world
history. Without oppression there is little resistance and since there was no
“challenge” which the Punjabi Muslim faced unlike his Punjabi Sikh counterpart,
there was no “response”.
Thus we see two simultaneous trends. Racially the “Punjabi Muslim” and the
“Punjabi Sikh” were the same people. The Sikhs belonging to one of the farming
caste the “Jats” to which many “Punjabi Muslims” belonged. But their faith united
them more closely than the “Punjabi Muslim” since the “Punjabi Muslim” suffered
from no religious oppression.
Thus the Sikhs who were as plainly Punjabi as the Punjabi Muslims became
remarkably militant, while the Punjabi Muslim remained placidly submerged in his
Lassi and routine life, without any religious cohesion or fervour that the vacuum
which was left following the decline of the Mughal Empire in the Punjab was filled
not by the majority Punjabi Muslim or the Pathan Muslim or the Martial Afghan but
by the smaller but more effective Sikh, who was a Punjabi Jat by chance and a Sikh
by choice.
Thus by 1799 the Sikhs were masters of Punjab and by 1823 they had driven the
Afghans to where they belonged i.e. out of Peshawar. It may be noted that racially
the Afghans and East of Khyber Pathans are one race but there are certain subtle
but marked differences in the two as far as culture and history are concerned.

22. The Sikhs were doing exactly what Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan were doing
in Mysore. Mysore was a Hindu majority area ruled by Hyder Ali and his son Tipu
Sultan.
They challenged the EEIC for more than thirty years and effectively led a Hindu
majority area from 1769 to 1799 defying all theories and notions about Hindu Muslim
differences and rivalry.
These two rulers were able to inspire a Hindu majority area into a willing
participation in a series of wars which constituted a succession of most serious
challenges to the existence of the EEIC in South India. It is an irony of Indo Muslim
history that the toughest Muslim challenge to the EEIC came not from any Muslim
majority region but from Mysore a predominantly Hindu area!
Even the regions between Delhi and Benares which were the heartland of various
Muslim Empires in India played no part in resisting the British after the militarily
small battle of Buxar in 1764!
The Sikhs could not annihilate the Muslims since it was physically impossible but
they did suppress them. This does not mean that there was absolutely no Muslim
participation in the government or administration of the country.
There were many Muslim governors and subsidiary Chiefs but mostly in barren
unproductive areas of Khushab Kalabagh etc. There was the Muslim Fakir family
of Lahore who provided many ministers to Ranjit Singhs government.
But the Multani Pathans or the Chahttas or the Bhattis who had resisted the Sikhs
were persona non grata. Many Muslim mosques were turned into powder
magazines and stables.
Today many Pakistanis do not know this and in the process of murder of history
in Pakistan in order to prove outmoded obscurantist theories about our past history
the Mughals are glorified.

23. But few people know that in actual fact the Mughals were not equal opportunity
employers and in this regard the Sikh attitude towards the Punjabi Muslims in
connection with distribution of power and patronage was nothing new.
The sore point about Sikh rule in Punjab was religious oppression. The Punjabi and
the Pathan Muslim for the first time suffered religious oppression during the Sikh
time from roughly 1780 to 1849. It is interesting to note that the highly pragmatic and
opportunist Muslim Tiwana and Noon Rajputs managed to win Ranjit Singh by
sophisticated sycophancy and served him loyally at a time when Muslim mosques
were used as stables and magazines!
I am convinced that had the Russians captured Pakistan following Afghanistan in
1979 these feudals would have joined the Russian Army also!
The EEIC defeated the Sikhs in two wars i.e. the First Sikh War (1845-46) and
Second Sikh War (1848-49) and annexed Punjab in 1849.
During the First and Second Sikh war both the Punjabi Muslim and the Pathan
Muslim actively helped the EEIC since they viewed the Sikhs as oppressors and the
EEIC as their liberator.
This is a crucial and decisive aspect about the EEIC annexation of Punjab. The
annexation was welcomed by the majority of the population since they viewed the
EEIC as a liberator who deposed the unjust and tyrannical Sikhs. Hence, the
Punjabi and the Pathan Muslim loyalty of 1857 to the EEIC during the near fatal
period of the siege of Delhi.
On the contrary the annexation of Oudh in 1856 was viewed by the Muslim elite and
the Hindu majority population of Oudh as an act of injustice, because in Oudh there
was no religious oppression. The Shia Muslim dynasty was benevolent and liberal
with its majority Hindu subjects. Oudh had never been invaded unlike Punjab or
Frontier or Delhi by any hostile army since 1550.

24. Thus the people of Oudh were in real terms a free people unlike most parts
of India of the period 1607-1857.
The annexation of Punjab in 1849 introduced a very stable and efficient government
in Punjab after ten years of absolute anarchy which had followed the death of Ranjit
Singh.
The EEIC administrators were very fair and effective and the province which had
witnessed tremendous anarchy and bloodshed for a continuous decade became the
most tranquil and prosperous province of India.
The Sikhs were chivalrously and benevolently rehabilitated. The disbanded soldiers
of the Sikh army were re employed, existing canals were improved and new canals
were excavated. The whole country was systematically disarmed and all
fortifications dismantled.
The various Muslim mosques used as powder magazines and stables were restored
to the Muslims. Most significant of these being the famous Badshahi Mosque
of Lahore which was restored to the Muslims of Lahore after considerable efforts by
John Lawrence the Chief Commissioner of Punjab in 1856.
The estates of many Muslims confiscated by the Sikhs were restored. The Muslims
were recruited in the army, police and civil administration which were previously
inaccessible to the Muslims.
Many Muslims who had switched to the EEIC side were elevated to the status of
feudal lords! It may be noted that Sikhs employed loyal Muslims mostly in the
artillery only.
Thus when the rebellion broke out in 1857 the populace of the Punjab by and large
felt little justification to participate in it.
They correctly viewed the EEIC as a liberator as far as the Muslims were concerned

25. and a just neutral party as far as the Sikhs were concerned.
What sympathy could the Muslims have with the Mughal eighty two year old
Emperor in Delhi whose ancestors had failed to protect the majority Muslim
population of Punjab and trans Indus frontier from the depredations and excesses
committed by plundering hordes of Persia, Afghanistan and the Sikhs from 1739 to
1849?
The Sikhs on the other hand got a golden opportunity to destroy the accursed city
of Delhi!
Every region of the Indo Pak subcontinent in 1857 was different. Leaders of one
region were viewed as oppressors in another region.
The EEIC was viewed as an oppressor in Oudh, Jhansi and in the Bengal, but as
liberator in Punjab, Frontier and Rajputana. The India of 1857 was not organised on
communal lines as much as the India of 1947 and merely being Muslim or Hindu
could not make anyone a traitor by virtue of fighting on the EEIC side.
If that was so the Bengal Sepoy was also a traitor for the hundred years before
1857. The word “traitor” does not suit the Indo Pak region because the region
consists of various nations and religious groups.
A more correct word for the natives fighting on EEIC is “subsidiary Collaborator”. A
subsidiary collaborator fought for the EEIC for economic necessity.
Speaking in nationalistic terms what “nationalism” could, the Hindustani fighting for
the EEIC in the First Sikh war feel for the Sikh. What similarity was there to make
the average Punjabi of 1857 identify with the Hindustani soldier of Bengal Army.
Nationalism or “Pan Islamism” or any other “issues” came into existence in Indo Pak
society once the people of Indo Pak subcontinent read Rosseau and Voltaire in the
British created colleges and universities in the late nineteenth century.

26. Even today what is similar between the Punjabi Rangers sepoy or policeman and
the common man in Sindh or Karachi?
We may conclude that there was nothing abnormal in Punjab loyalty of 1857. The
Punjabis were prisoners of their time and it was a twist of fate which placed the
EEIC in the role of saviour of Punjabi and Frontier Muslim; and a chivalrous and
religiously unbiased and liberal friend of the minority Punjabi Sikh.
The Hariana Hindu Jat or Hindu Rajput was more politically aware since he had
known more stability by virtue of EEIC rule since 1803.
It is but a human characteristic that when man’s basic needs are satisfied, he wants
higher things like sovereignty and independence.
The Hariana and North West Provinces had know stability and peace since the EEIC
annexed them in 1801 and 1803.
They also in 1801 and 1803 welcomed the EEIC just like the Punjabi’s welcomed
the EEIC in 1849. Because the EEIC in 1801 and 1803 had liberated the North
West provinces and the Delhi area from the oppressive and predatory Mahrattas,
Jats, Gujars, Mewatis and Rohillas. But that was 1803.
In 1857 the people of North West provinces aspired for more. The Bengal Army
sowar of 3rd Light Cavalry by resorting to the short cut of armed insurrection then
was consciously fulfilling the aspirations of the people South of Ambala.
The current of history in 1857 dictated that people of Indo Pak had to wait for nine
more decades. There was nothing abnormal in the failure of the rebellion of 1857.
The Indo Pak people failed where European subject nations like the brave Boers
and the sturdy Irish had also failed.
The commendable fact remains that a rebellion was attempted in 1857. On the other

27. side the Punjab loyalty of 1857 had also its reasons. It can be best approached by
being understood as it was rather than being despised or defended.
The Punjabis squarely speaking cannot be blamed for their attitude in 1857.
However, they also must not condemn the Hindustanis both Hindus and Muslims for
having rebelled in 1857; as many Punjabis are doing today. Both the groups had
different historical experiences and both behaved in an understandable and
predictable manner.
The reader may feel that an out proportion attention has been given to the
background of the Punjab loyalty of 1857. But this aspect of 1857 is relevant for us
even today. We have to understand and digest this fact that belonging to the same
religion cannot overcome the differences created by virtue of different perceptions
produced due to different historical experiences or because of cultural and ethnic
differences.
The Muslim leaders of post 1940 Indo Pak sub continent managed to temporarily
galvanise the Muslims in 1946 into sinking regional and cultural differences and
establish a multi ethnic state but mere rhetoric and euphoria cannot make various
ethnic groups a nation unless the political system is based on equality and mutual
respect rather than mutual distrust and political manipulation based on ulterior
designs.
The result then is nothing but “Bangladesh! And perhaps many more “Deshes”
“tans” and “lands” if the Neo Mughals of Delhi and Islamabad do not learn from
history.
End Notes
542Page-207-History of Delhi under the Later Mughals-Op Cit.
543Page-27 & 28-India's Struggle for Freedom-Op Cit. Pages-27 & 35-Cambridge
History-The Indian Empire-1858-1918-Op Cit.
544Page-35-Cambridge History-1858-1918-Op Cit.

28. 545Page-241-Dictionary of Modern Indian History-Op Cit.