Prince Duleep Singh, the youngest son of Maharaj Ranjit Singh became the Maharaja of the Punjab, by a quirt of fortune. But the throne ascended had already been infected by while ants and the structure had been damaged beyond repair. His celebrated mother, a wide awake woman, made a determined bid to repair the damage. For a while she seemed to have succeeded, as she was able to tame the belligerent Sikh soldiery, who hailed her as Mother of the Khalsa But the self-secking courtiers encouraged by perfidious British neighbours made things too hot for her. When she strongly opposed the proposal to give unlimited authority in the internal and external administration to the British resident, she had to face an intense campaign of calumny and even imprisonment. But she did not give in and fought till her end.
Maharaja Duleep Singh had the traits of both his father and mother. He had the discerning eye of his father that could peep through the coming events and judge the limits of power. But he became the worst afflicted victim of British machinations when he was only a lad. He was acknowledged by the British officers to be "more intelligent than most of the English children of his age" Living under the shadow of threats to life and deceit, he conducted himself with grace that was required of a royal descendants.
After signing of the Treaty of Lahore (1549) leading to the annexation of Punjab and his own deportation from the Punjab, he saw too much of the British and their high Christian values. The woes of his mother, Maharani Jindan and his own experiences, aroused within him the pride of a Sikh and after taking Puhul he emerged as a relentless crusader for the cause of freedom of the entire Indian people from the British oppression. He knew that the might of British imperialism could be fought only with external help, mention of British high-handedness in the print-media and diplomatic maneuvers. Thus, Duleep Singh comes out as forerunner of the makers of modern India.
Hitherto Maharaja Duleep Singh had been projected as an extravagant and a forsaken Prince. This kind of projection put forward by the British, needed to be deconstructed in the light of vast material now having become available to us in the Indian, British, French and Russian archives.
The present volume is primarily a collection of papers presented in a seminar held on the occasion of the first Death Centenary of Maharaja Duleep Singh wherein the stands out as a pioneer for the cause of Swarajya in the post mutiny era who pointed towards the vast areas of a multipronged struggle that required to be launched and pursued assiduously to free the Indian subcontinent from the British bondage. As a result, Duleep Singh has emerged as a patriot who struggled hard and upheld his Pride, befitting the Khalsa tradition.
A peep through the events that over-took the Punjab soon after the death of Sher-4-Punjab Maharaja Ranjit Singh, is not only heart rending but agonising also. Maharanı Jind Kaur and Maharaja Duleep Singh were unfortunate witnesses to what happened and also became victims of the machinations of the courtiers, collaterals and the perfidious British neighbours. The mother and the son had also to stand the vilification campaigns launched against them in order to malign them in the eyes of the Khaba Panth. Still, the soldiers of the Khalsa army looked unto them as the sovereigns of the Punjab.
It has been our earnest desire since long to persuade the scholars of history to have a fresh look at the events that led to the British occupation of the Punjab. We are glad that such an occasion was provided by the first Death Centenary celebrations of Maharaja Duleep Singh. A seminar on this theme was organised by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, Amritsar at the Gujranwala Guru Nanak Khalsa College, Ludhiana in December 1993. A galaxy of eminent scholars made it to the seminar and their valuable contributions comprise of this collection of Seminar Papers.
Professor Prithipal Singh Kapur (formerly Pro-Vice Chancellor, Guru Nanak Dev University) deserves our thanks for having painstakingly edited the papers and the inspiring keynote address.
We are satisfied that this seminar inspired many a scholar to join the endeavour to reconstruct Sikh history of this period.
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