The Dogras (1846-1947)

Gulab Singh (1846-57) and the treaty of Amritsar

In 1842 an armed contingent arrived in Kashmir to restore Sikh authority after Col. Mehan was murdered by his own troops. In theory Prince pratab, the ten-year-old grandson of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, led the contingent. However, Raja Gulab Singh of Jammu was its real commander.

In January 1846, Maharani Jindan appointed Raja Gulab the prime Minister of the Punjab. After the first Sikh war of 1845-46, the British imposed an indemnity on the Sikh government. The Sikh rulers were not in a position to pay the sums demanded. Instead, they promised to give to te British control of Kashmir, Jammu, Ladakh and Baltistan. Raja Gulab Singh stepped in and agreed to pay the indemnity.

Since Gulab Singh did not have all the money that was needed, he is said to have borrowed some of it from Sheikh Saudagar, whose father Maula Bakhsh had held high office under the Sikhs. There is no reason to believe that several Kashmiri Muslim nobles helped the Raja out by contributing a few thousand horses each.

On the 16th March 1846, the Treaty Amritsar was signed between the British and the Raja. The Raja was asked to pay Rs 75 lakh, which he did. In return he was given Kashmir, such parts of Jammu as were not already under him, Ladakh and Baltistan. The British also recognised him as a Maharaja, placing him, in terms of protocol and gun-salutes, among the top five Princes of India.

The new Maharaja took steps to ensure that shawl weavers got a better price for their shawls than in the past, by reducing the importance of intermediaries called Karkhandars. He also started a system of providing cheap rations to the landless. He tried to minimise the harshness of begar (unpaid, corvee labour)

Gulab expanded his kingdom rapidly. He died in 1857. British surveyors carried out the Trignometrical Survey of J&K with aid given by Gulab & his successor, Maharaja Ranbir.

Maharaja Ranbir Singh (1857-1885) added Gilgit to the State. He was quite popular with the people. Despite the general poverty of kashmir, food was cheap and abundant. A rupee could buy 90 lb (pounds) of rice or 12 lb of meat or 60 lb of milk. Fruit and fish were available almost free : it certainly was uneconomical to sell them. Crime was low because punishment was harsh and responsibility was fixed on officials. Drunkenness was unknown.

A History Of Kashmir:

Maharaja Pratap’s (1885-1925) father and grandfather, Gulab & Ranbir respectively, had resisted the posting of a British Resident in the State. The British accused Pratap of secretly being in touch with Russia with a view to destabilizing British rule in India. So, in 1889, they temporarily forced him to issue an irshad (voluntary resignation). In the process, a British Resident was imposed on the State.

In 1907, Urdu replaced Persian as the language of the Dogri court. Many Muslims and Persian-knowing Kashmiri Pandits opposed this. A major agitation began against the imposition of Urdu and against the influx of Punjabis. This led to the enactment of the so-called ‘state subject’ legislation. Thenceforth, only state subjects could purchase land or get a government job in the state.

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