In an article in Time magazine recently, William Dalrymple author of the book The Last Mughal:The Fall of a Dynasty, Delhi 1857 draws a parallel between what is happening today in Iraq and the uprising that shook India with the sepoy revolt in 1857. The lesson to be derived at is that people with long embedded traditions and values dislike being dominated by another foreign race or faith. When their religious sensibilities are hurt or there is threat to their religion, people?s reaction might as well be violent. In India, the ruthlessness of the East India Company in the harsh expropriation of the wealth of the natives ?with a sword in the hand? and attempts of European missionaries to absorb the Indians, both Hindus and Muslims, into the Christian faith led, as it is said, to the outbreak of one of the largest rebellions in the history of British colonialism.

But as Dalrymple has pointed out, 1857 also saw in a forceful way the manifestation of what is described as ?Islamic fundamentalism? when jihad militants flung in action. Delhi wore an Islamic flavour as 60 000 ?jihadis? descended from all parts of northern India and swarmed the Mughal city. Yet, despite their numerical strength, the jihadis had to beat a retreat when the British army struck Delhi. The jihadis could not save Bahadur Shah Zafar, the king of Delhi, whom the predominantly Hindu sepoys on 11 May proclaimed Emperor of India. With the fall of Delhi, there ended the era of the Mughal imperial family after almost 350 years of existence.

The British and Muslims had been at daggers? drawn since 1830 when Muslim extremists called for a crusade against British imperialism. The uprising of the sepoys in 1857 was squarely placed on the back of the Muslims and the 82 year old Zafar had to bear the brunt of wild British reaction. The British prosecutor argued in January 1858 during Zafar?s trial that the dreadful events in May 1857 broke out because of ?Mussalman intrigues and Mohammedan conspiracy?. That could be regarded as a far-fetched argument. The web of complexity surrounding the uprising has not yet been cleared.

But was Zafar the brain behind the sepoy revolt? For one thing, he had a strained relationship with the British. At the height of the revolt, he stated: ?the mighty British who boast of having vanquished Russia and Persia, have been overthrown in Hindustan by a single cartridge.?

If the king of Delhi had an axe to grind with the British, what could explain that disenchantment? Reasons are varied. The East India Company had curtailed his royal power so that the king?s authority never extended beyond the walls of his residence, the Red Fort. His lands and wealth were seized and in return was offered a monthly pension. Next, the British decided to abolish his title as king and refused to recognise as heir apparent the king?s youngest son, Mirza Jawan Bakht.

Zafar?s life was not that easy for he had in his harem 16 wives, 16 sons and 31 daughters. So the war of succession and intrigues raged within the family at the Red Fort. But of all Zafar?s wives, it was Zinat Mahal, the king?s favourite and youngest wife and mother of Mirza Jawan Bakht, who exerted a crushing influence and made the king dance to her tune. She had caused her serious rival, Begum Mahal, to be thrown behind the bars. The second son of Zafar with another wife, Fakir-ul-din, died after having consumed poisoned food.

Saul David points out in his book The Indian Mutiny, that Zafar influenced by Zinat Mahal started plotting against the British as early as 1855 when he sent his nephew to the Shah of Persia requesting money and troops to fight the British and drive them out of India. Sources from the Red Fort also put it that Zafar believed very hard in an imam who told him of a divine revelation in his dream that ?the splendour of the sovereignty of Mughal Delhi will again revive and the British will pack up and go?. That dream revelation and posters placed on the walls of the Jama Masjid showing a sword and a shield announcing the arrival of Persian troops ?to relieve Hindustan from Christianity? gave hope and excited not only Zafar and Zinat Mahal but also the Muslims of Delhi.

Prevent subversion of Islamic culture

What further strengthened the British suspicion against Zafar was that the Red Fort became the focal point of Hindu and Muslim sepoys when Delhi fell in May 1857. Hindus had no qualms about proclaiming Zafar, a Muslim, Emperor of India. Two days after the uprising erupted, Zafar on 12 May 1857, issued a proclamation addressed ?To all the Hindus and Mussalmans? warning them of the strategy of the ?cunning English? and their tactics of ?raising Hindus against Mussulmans?. Assuring them that ?at this hour, I have decided to stand by my people,? he reminded them that ?it is the imperative duty of the Hindus and Mussulmans to join the revolt against the English.? For the British, that was a sign of open rebellion and Zafar could not but find himself a marked man on the hit list...

At this juncture, the situation in Delhi spiraled out of Zafar?s control and that was going to be the beginning of the end of the Mughal era. A climate of terror and anarchy reigned throughout. Despite the warning of Zafar, butchery did not stop. Even the leader of the Shia community in Delhi was about to be ?blown away? when his house was set on fire on the pretext that he was in league with the British.

To the bloody nightmare of the Delhi residents came surging another thorny problem. That was the influx of large numbers of Muslim in the garb of jihadis. The jihadis included also Muslim women who were determined to put a brave front. Led by one of the mullahs of Delhi, Maulvi Muhammud Sayyid, they set up a standard of jihad in Delhi?s famous Jama Masjid in an apparent effort according to Dalrymple to turn the revolt ?into an exclusively Muslim holy war?. Another Maulvi who fueled the jihad move was Sarfaraz Ali, known as the ?imam of the Mujahedin.? In a fiery speech, he told his audience as quoted by Dalrymple that ?our religion is now in danger. Having lost the sovereignty of the land, having bowed in subjection to the impure kafir (British), shall we surrender the inalienable privileges which we received from the Prophet, upon whom be peace??

The manifestation of jihad militancy in 1857 was not the first of its kind. Back in 1830, a group of radical Muslims led by one Sayyid Ahmad Barelvi of the Madrasa i-Rahimiyya in Delhi launched a jihad action against the Sikhs and British. His aim was to prevent the ?subversion of Islamic culture and the disruption of Islamic lifestyle by the Christians?. His action having been foiled, he tried to secure the support of other Asian rulers in order to ?liberate India? from the clutches of the British. Killed in 1831, Barelvi left, nevertheless, a legacy ? the mujahedin network ? which continued to operate underground at Peshawar, Delhi and Patna. In one of the raids in 1852 on the Madrasa i-Rahimiyya, the British found out pamphlets preaching crusades against the British in what was said to be a ?Wahhabi conspiracy.? So, it was no surprise that the mujahedin network kept alive underground surfaced in 1857 when it found a fertile ground with the sepoy revolt.

But the biggest blunder the radical Muslims made was to go to the extent of accusing the Hindus of supporting the British and calling for jihad against Hindus as well. That was to spell the doom of the Mughal reign and Bahdur Shah Zafar knew that without the sepoys and Hindus? support, his hope was dashed.

That accusation was followed by a stern reaction. A delegate of Hindus lost no time in turning up at the Red Fort and angrily denying the charge. The mullahs in a way created an irreparable rift between Hindus and Muslims. The sepoys largely constituted of Hindus began keeping out of the fray in Delhi, dissociating themselves from the actions of the jihadis and laying down arms so much so that in a conciliatory move, one of the influential Urdu newspapers appealed to ?our Hindu brothers? to pull together against the ?common Brtish enemy? and to rise up by drawing inspiration from the Hindu epic Ramayana when ? Ravana and his army of demons were beaten by Lord Ram?.

?Jihad: an act of an extreme folly?

Zafar was known to embrace the promotion of Hindu-Muslim unity. His mother was a Hindu princess. When visiting Hindus temples, he made it a point to wear the brahmanical thread and a caste mark on his forehead. Brahmin priests recited prayers over sacred flames at the Red Fort. Zafar did not eat beef and forbade the slaughter of cows. Hindu festivals like Divali and Holi were celebrated at Zafar?s court by Hindus and Muslims alike. The king made it plain that he did not support a jihad movement and ordered the standard planted on the Jama Masjid to be taken down ?because such a display of fanaticism would only tend to exasperate the Hindus.? For him, the Hindus and Muslims were equal in his eyes. ?Jihad is impossible,? said Zafar, ?for such an idea is an act of extreme folly and would create a civil war.? Zafar stressed that ?the Holy War is against the English. I have forbidden it against the Hindus...?

But the prevailing anarchy in Delhi and the untrained, disorganised band of jihadis who operated with no cohesive action and no well defined strategy hardly impressed any one, not even Zafar. Sensing that the cause was lost with the withdrawal of the sepoys, a group of ?suicide jihadis? from Gwalior vowed never to eat again and to fight until they met death at the hands of the kafirs. To a petition signed by 6 000 jihadis from Nasirabad saying that they were ready to march on Delhi, Zafar replied : ?There are 60 000 jihadis in Delhi and they have not driven the British army out. What can your 60 00 men do??

Could the king trust the jihadis for his survival when the dispirited sepoys had given up? A depressed Zafar whose fate was hanging in balance declared: ?I have no hopes of becoming victorious?. As there was a feeling that the days of the Mughal era were numbered, Zinat Mahal with the connivance of the British spies Rajab Ali, Muhammad Baqar and Ilahe Baksh, all operating in Zafar?s household began to negotiate secretly with the British army chief of Delhi, William Hodson, for getting the king to surrender and also to ensure the succession of Jawan Bakht. The continuation of the Mughal dynasty was not, however, on the British agenda.

In all the confusion, the British army was to strike forcefully. The response to the jihadis demonstration was met effectively by the recruitment in the British army of locals namely, Pathans and Punjabi Muslims and reinforced by the Gurkhas regiment.

On 20 September 1857, the British recaptured Delhi. As cited by Saul David, the British celebrated the taking of Delhi by riding their horses up the steps of the Jama Masjid, dancing jigs and drinking toasts of beer and brandy. Fires were lighted in the sacred mosque. The king left the Red Fort to take refuge in Humayun?s mausoleum where he was picked up by Hodson and then placed under house arrest at Zinat Mahal?s residence at Chandni Chowk. The British soldiers in utter disrespect placed the ex-king ?like a beast in a cage? and poked fun at him. His sons, Mirza Mughal and Mirza Kizr Sultan and grandson Abu Bakr were stripped naked and shot at point blank range by Hodson and their decapitated heads shown to the old ex King of Delhi on a platter. Later Hodson wrote saying that he did ?enjoy the opportunity of ridding the earth of these wretches?.

Spared of his life, Zafar was tried by a court-martial on a charge of ? treason, murder and rebellion?. The sentence inflicted by the court was banishment of the ex king from his own country India which he would not see again and which he would lament very much in one of his lyrics. He was exiled to Rangoon where he died in 1862. The news of his death was kept within the prison?s walls. His burial was attended by Zinat Mahal, Jawan Bakht, a British official and the grave digger. With no memorial raised, his grave could not be identified after some years. It was only in 1991 that workers digging a drain hit the bricks of the grave 3 feet under the ground and only then was his exact burial place was located.

Bahadur Shah Zafar whose ancestor gave India the Taj Mahal, one of the wonders of the world, was the last Mughal king of Delhi. He was a great promoter of Indian culture, a writer of poetry and patron of noted Urdu poets like Mirza Ghalib, Zauq and Dagh. His fate was sealed when the Jihadis failed in 1857 in an exclusive Muslim holy war to drive the British out of India.

By Anand MOHEEPUTH