Extension of British Paramountly over Rajputana and Central India
The Governor-Generalship of Lord Hastings also witnessed the establishment of British influence over the Rajput States and some minor states of Central India. Rajputana had indeed a tragic history in the eighteenth century. The lords of Rajasthan had generally speaking lost the heroism and chivalry of their ancestors; and their land, detracted by dynastic quarrels (particularly between Jaipur and Jodhpur) and pseudo-chivalry, became a prey to external aggressions of the Marathas, the Pindaris and the Pathans. These inroads resulted in anarchy, plunder, economic ruin and moral degradation and “ended only with the total ruin and humiliation of this noble race (the Rajputs) “. Utterly bankrupt, the historic land of Rajasthan readily acknowledged British supremacy at a time when the English had vanquished the leading Indian powers.
Rajput alliance had been a potential factor in the consolidation of Mughul rule in India; the Marathas under the third Peshwa failed to utilize it for their Hindu-Pad-Padshahi; and its value was realized by Lord Hastings even when the Rajputs had become “a played-out race”. The Covernor-General was satisfied that ‘an alliance with the Rajput States would give “immense strategic advantages for the Company’s military and political positions in Central India.”, and would place at the disposal of the Company “the resources of the Rajput country, for defensive and offensive purposes, against the internal as well u external enemies of the Company”. So with the sanction of the home Authorities he opened negotiations with the following Rajput States, which, one by one, entered into treaties of “defensive alliance, perpetual friendship, protection and subordinate cooperation” with the Company: the State of Kotah, then under the able guidance of Zalim Singh, on the 26th December, 1817; Udaipur on the 16th January, 1818, Bundi on the 10th February, 1818; Kishangarh, near Ajmer, and Bikaner, in March, 1818; Jaipur on the 2nd April, 1818; the three kingdoms of Pratapgarh, Banswara and Dungarpur, branches of the Udaipur house and situated on the border of Gujarat, on the 5th October, 5th December, and 11th December, 1818, respectively; Jaisalmer on the 12th December, 1818;’and Sirohi in 1823.
Thus the Rajput States, who were, as Lord Hastings himself said, “natural allies” of the Company, sacrificed their independence for protection and accepted British paramountly. It is difficult to agree with Prinsep that the “good government and tranquillity” of Rajputana were “the exclusive aims” of the Company in interfering in its affairs. In fact, the guiding considerations of Lord Hastings in his relations with the Rajput States were political expediency and convenience” and strategic advantages.
The Nawab of Bhopal entered into a treaty of “defensive and subordinate alliance” with the Company, and Jaora being created an independent entity by the Treaty of Mandasor with the Holkar was given to Ghafur Khan, a relation (their wives were sisters) of Amir Khan, Nawab of Tonk, in return for the help he rendered to Sir John Malcolm. The minor States of Malwa and Bundelkhand acknowledged British supremacy. A band of able British officers effected the work of reconstruction and administrative consolidation in these States: Elphinstone in the Western Deccan, Munro in Madras, Malcolm in Central India, and Metcalfe, Tod and Ochterlony in Rajputana. Students of Indian history have special reason to be grateful to most of them for the valuable works they have left behind, particularly Tod’s Rajasthan and Malcolm’s Memoir of Central India.
Thus the close of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century saw the fall of those Indian powers which arose or revived on the decline of the Mughul Empire and contended for political supremacy; and as a result of a number of political and military transactions, the British Government became the paramount power over a dominion extending from the Himalayas to Cape Comorin and from the Sutlej to the Brahmaputra. Clive sowed the seed of the British Empire in India; Warren Hastings preserved it against hostile forces; Wellesley reared it; and Lord Hastings reaped the harvest. Delhi, Oudh, Mysore, Hyderabad, the Carnatic, Surat and Tanjore passed under British control, for all practical purposes, in the time of Wellesley. Lord Hastings pushed further the bounds of British imperialism. He shattered the Maratha power beyond any hope of recovery and extinguished the Peshwaship, established British control over Central India, and persuaded the weak and harassed Rajput States to barter away their independence for British protection. Another significant step taken by him was the formal abolition of the fiction of the Mughul Government. Mughul supremacy had ceased to exist in fact more than half a century earlier. All the attempts of the Emperor Shah ‘Alam II to restore it proved futile; and he had to spend his days in pitiable circumstances, sometimes as a wanderer seeking help hither and thither and sometimes at Delhi amidst the ruins of its ancient greatness. His name and personality were ut for their own purposes by the Marathas, the English, and probably also by the French. Warren Hastings stopped the payment of the Bengal tribute to the Emperor on the ground that he had placed himself under the protection of the Marathas; and his successors gradually declared the Company’s freedom from obligations to the descendant of the Great Mughuls. After Delhi had come under British control in 1803, Shah ‘Alam 11 lived virtually as a pensioner of the Company till he closed his eyes for ever in 1806. His successor, Akbar II, was asked by Lord Hastings to give up all ceremonial “implying supremacy over the Company’s dominions ” and it was not long before the titular dignity of the Mughul Raj finally disappeared.
