In the foreword to her book Bahawalpur: The Kingdom That Vanished, Anabel Loyd mentions a mnemonic by which a British viceroy used to remember the names of the Indian princely states entitled to a 21 gun salute: “Hot kippers make a good breakfast”. Hyderabad, Kashmir, Mysore, Gwalior and Baroda. Not among the 21 gun states, but not too far from them when it came to stature and wealth was Bahawalpur, with a 17 gun salute to its name. Bahawalpur is now situated in one of the most arid zones of Pakistan, abutting Rajasthan in India but with a primarily Muslim population, and a ruling family which traces its ancestry back over more than 60 generations, through the Abbasid caliphs to none other than the uncle of the Prophet Mohammad. Not that that is an indisputable fact.
Like much of the rest of the pre-colonial history of Bahawalpur, this lineage too is a matter of some debate. Bahawalpur itself, as emerges from Loyd’s history of the state and its line of nawabs, has been all too often torn in different directions, caught between opposing interests. From its unique culture (part of the larger Saraiki tradition), which struggles to survive against the overwhelming presence of the adjacent Punjab, to the constant war the nawab must wage against corruption in Pakistan’s political scenario in order to keep Bahawalpur’s interests alive, this fascinating area appears to have a long history of conflict of various types.
Loyd delves into the history of Bahawalpur using sources as varied as historical accounts by British officials across the centuries to written histories by modern Pakistani writers. This is embellished by folklore, legend and the memories of Salahuddin Abbasi, the current Amir of Bahawalpur. Beginning from the somewhat sketchy origins of the Abbasi family, Loyd’s history of Bahawalpur weaves its way through the glamorous-bizarre times of the Anglicized Bahawalpur nawabs of the 1800s, with their European wives and their eccentric, expensive tastes.
Through the turbulent years of the Partition (when the region was largely free of the violence that tore apart much of the India-Pakistan border), to Bahawalpur’s absorption into Pakistan and the subsequent leaching away of Bahawalpur’s substantial wealth, Loyd traces the postcolonial history of this kingdom, once wealthy and powerful, now almost unknown. The history of Bahawalpur and its ruling family is written in chronological order with the focus initially on the early rulers.
This narration, since it draws from limited sources (and a mix of lore and conjecture), is at times dry and even confusing, with one name after the other blending into a blur. It is with the later nawabs— specifically, Sadiq Mohammad Khan IV—that Loyd seems to hit her stride, or perhaps it is just that the wealth of information available from this period on makes it easier to write more impactfully. The way she does it is to combine state with individual, politics with persona. On the one hand, she shows how the Bahawalpur nawabs’ equations with the ‘paramount power’ changed over time—whether the power was the Mughal ruler, the British East India Company, the British Raj, or the government of Pakistan. On the other hand, she allows us a peek into the (somewhat) private lives of the nawabs: the love for philately of one man, the obsession with Rolls Royces of another.
The accompanying photographs of its rulers, from the very earliest days of photography to the present day, are invaluable. The book, in the final analysis, is an eye-opener, and also a poignant tale of a once powerful, beautiful and wealthy state that now, thanks to dirty politics, corruption and greed, is possibly on the brink of losing what little remains of its heritage. Bahawalpur: The Kingdom That Vanished is a sad riches-to-rags story, as well as an insight into the mess that Pakistan’s politics and the radical Islamisation of the country have made of what was once the wealthiest of the princely states in the country.
Bahawalpur: The Kingdom That Vanished
By: Anabel Loyd
Publisher: Penguin Random House
Pages: 285
Price: Rs 599