Jammu and Kashmir: In the Shadow of Imperialism Home
Maharaj K. Kaul
[Taken from Essays in Inequality and Social Justice (Essays in honor of Ved Prakash Vatuk), Edited by Kira Hall, Archana Publications, Meerut, India, 2009]
FORMATION OF THE STATE AND BRITISH INTRIGUES
The state of Jammu and Kashmir, as it was called on the eve of India’s freedom, came into existence with the Treaty of Amritsar on March 16, 1846. The Treaty was signed by Gulab Singh, Raja of Jammu, and Lord Hardinge (the Viceroy of India), at the conclusion of the first British-initiated Anglo-Sikh war.
Gulab Singh, a Dogra from Jammu, had risen to the position of an important general of Maharaja Ranjit Singh at Lahore. He had distinguished himself in various successful military campaigns for the Sikhs, the last of which resulted in the annexation of Kashmir in 1819, which until then had been ruled by the Afghans. (Jammu had been annexed by the Sikhs in 1808.) In recognition of his service to the Sikhs, Gulab Singh was rewarded by being made the hereditary ruler of Jammu in 1820 and allowed to have an army of his own. By 1842, Gulab Singh had led successful military expeditions in Ladakh and Baltistan in the north and brought these regions and other smaller principalities near Jammu under his rule. In the meantime, the Sikhs had also extended their control over Gilgit.
But after Ranjit Singh’s death in 1839, the Sikh empire was riven by factionalism and civil war, giving the British an opportunity to intervene. The First Anglo-Sikh war was started in 1845. Sensing the course of events, Gulab Singh sided with the British. The British weakened the Sikhs and forced them to sign a treaty that included a heavy war indemnity of about 1,500,000 Nanakshahi rupees. When the Sikhs were subsequently unable to pay all of this amount, the British took away the possessions of Kashmir and Gilgit from the Sikhs and transferred these to Gulab Singh for 750,000 Nanakshahi rupees. This was the 1846 Treaty of Amritsar that added Kashmir and Gilgit to Gulab Singh’s possessions and gave shape to today’s undivided state of Jammu and Kashmir.
The Treaty of Amritsar curtailed Sikh power in northern India. The transfer of Kashmir and Gilgit to Gulab Singh was politically expedient. Indeed, Lord Hardinge, the then British Viceroy, justifies the transfer as “the only alternative” given the great distance between Kashmir and other British outposts:
But once they occupied Punjab after the Second Anglo-Sikh war, the British set their eyes on the Gilgit region. They had succeeded in extending their control over Punjab; now they began the process of severing Gilgit from Gulab Singh’s Kashmir. Because of its proximity to the Czarist Empire to the north, Gilgit was strategically important to the British. The importance of Gilgit is described by E. F. Knight in his book Where Three Empires Meet:
The British thus attempted to intervene in Kashmir in 1848, only two years after the signing of the Treaty of Amritsar. Citing complaints of “mal-administration” against Gulab Singh’s rule, they tried to place a British Resident in the state. Although Gulab Singh successfully resisted this British maneuver, the British raised the question again three years later, this time citing security concerns from English visitors to the state. The Maharaja once again successfully resisted the appointment of a British resident, but he yielded under pressure to the appointment of a British Officer on Special Duty—to be under the control of the British Punjab Government—who would look after the interests of Europeans in the state. This unfortunately opened up the possibility of British encroachment. The British made another attempt at intervention in 1872, but Maharaja Ranbir Singh, who had taken the throne in 1858 after the death of his father Gulab Singh, was also able to resist the attempt.
When the Second Anglo-Afghan War broke out in 1878, the possession of Gilgit assumed increasing importance for the British in view of the advance of Russian power into Central Asia. Ranbir Singh died in 1885, and the rule passed on to his son Maharaja Pratap Singh. With the help of Pratap Singh’s brother, Amar Singh, the British wove an elaborate scheme to reduce Pratap Singh to a mere figurehead, replacing his authority by a Council of Ministers selected by the Government of India. The British then converted the position of British Officer on Special Duty to British Resident, to be under the direct control of the British Government of India. While Pratap Singh remained virtually deposed, the British created a Political Agency in Gilgit in 1889 under the control of the Political Agent appointed by the British Government of India; Col. A. G. Durand was the first Political Agent. The Gilgit Agency controlled the area to the west of Gilgit town, including all the areas from Chilas in the south to Yasin and Ishkuman in the north. Indeed, Col. Durand had at his disposal 2,000 men of the Imperial Service Troops, made up of Dogra and Gurkha soldiers, most of whose expenses were paid by the state government! Only the Gilgit Wazarat, the settled areas around and south of Gilgit town, continued to be administered by the Maharaja.
The conspiracy against Pratap Singh, however, was later exposed by Amrit Bazar Patrika in meticulous detail. The newspaper presented secret documents, some of them forged, which had been obtained through an Indian employee of the British Resident in Kashmir. The British were forced to step back, and by 1922 Maharaja Pratap Singh’s earlier powers had been restored. Yet the Political Agency in Gilgit continued to exist, and its control remained with the Political Department of the Government of India.
It was necessary last March to weaken the Sikhs by depriving them of Kashmir. The distance from Kashmir to Sutlej is 300 miles of very difficult mountainous country, quite intractable for six months. To keep a British force 300 miles away from any possibility of support would be an undertaking that merited a strait-waistcoat and not a peerage. The arrangement was the only alternative. (Hardinge, cited in Raina 1988:4)
The value of Gilgit to the Kashmir State, commanding as it does the Indus Valley and the mouth of the Hunza river, and so holding in check the unruly tribes on either side, is obvious enough, but it is only recently that the great strategical importance to the Empire of this position has been fully realized. … Our influence should at least extend to that great mountain-range [Hindu Kush] which forms the natural frontier of India. It is necessary for the safeguarding of our Empire that we should at any rate hold our side of the mountain-gates; but unless we looked to it, Russia would soon have both sides under her control. …
Gilgit, the northernmost post of the British Empire, covers all the passes over Hindoo Koosh, from the easternmost one, the Shimshal, to those at the head of Yasin River in the west. It will be seen, on referring to a good map, that all these passes descend to the valleys of the Gilgit River and its tributaries. But the possession of Gilgit Valley does more than this; it affords us a direct communication through Kashmir territory to the protected state of Chitral, which would be otherwise removed from our influence by the interposition of countries at present practically closed to us. We now guarantee the independence of Chitral against Afghanistan, as we do that of Afghanistan against Russian aggression. (Knight 1893, 288-291)
