India under Ripon: A Private Diary

by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt

“Last came Schomberg Kerr, Lord Ripon’s chaplain, who knew my brother and sister so well years ago. He is a very nice fellow, and not unlike his cousin, the other Schomberg Kerr.[6] But he was wary of talking politics, as befits a Jesuit and a private chaplain. I fancy he makes it a rule to confine himself strictly to spiritual advice, but I don’t know.

“19th Dec.—Seyd Amir Ali called, and we talked about Arabi. I taxed him at once with having written that letter to the ‘Times’ just before the war saying that all the Indian Mohammedans supported the action of the English Government, and he said he was sorry for it now, but the Mohammedans had been deceived as to the true state of the case. They now recognized Arabi as an honest man, fighting in defence of his religion. I noticed, however, that he looked rather confused when I charged him with this, but I think we shall get on well together in spite of the pot hat he wears. I told him that Gladstone wanted to restore Arabi, and urged him to protest against any further wars against Mohammedans, whatever the pretext might be. I told him that the only way to get attention paid to the wishes of the Mohammedan community was to inspire a certain amount of fear. By holding their tongues in a crisis like the Egyptian War, or pretending to sympathize with the Government, they threw away their advantages. I trusted that if there should be any serious talk of sending Indian troops to suppress the Mahdi he would call a general meeting of his party to protest against it. Amir Ali is a young man not much over thirty, and evidently very clever, and if he has the courage to take an independent line, may play a great part. But they say his ambition is to be made Chief Justice.

“While we were talking, arrived a dignified old man, Manockji Rustemji, the Parsi Consul-General for Persia, with his son. We talked about the Bengal Rent Bill, to which, like everybody else I have talked with, they are opposed. Sir Jamsetji Jijibhoy is staying with him, and he promises to send him to see us. I like this old man very much. He is a friend of Ragunath Rao’s, and spoke very warmly of him, saying that he was a far cleverer man than his cousin, Sir Madhava Rao, who has more celebrity but less courage. We are to call on his wife next week.

“At a quarter to three I paid my visit to Lord Ripon, feeling rather nervous about it beforehand, but I have every reason to be satisfied with the result. I had a good hour’s conversation, first about the state of the agricultural districts which I described, and afterwards about the really important business of Hyderabad. I set the whole state of the case before him, the reversal by the Peishkar and Kurshid Jah of all Sir Salar Jung’s policy; the dismissal of the skilled administrators; the consequent breakdown of the administration; the return to old practices of corruption and the rest of it; and, lastly, ‘what would seem incredible but for which I could nevertheless vouch’ that the Peishkar’s misgovernment was strongly supported at the Residency. I made no charge against Mr. Cordery, who I considered was merely the responsible person representing the several interests of the official class. But I could only explain the matter to myself by supposing that these officials feared a retrocession of Berar, and so purposely abetted the misgovernment of the State. This had been done without doubt in former years for similar reasons, and I had had sufficient experience of official ways in Egypt to make me very distrustful. Lord Ripon smiled at this and said that official ways were always a little the same everywhere, but he did not commit himself to any opinion as to whether I was correct or not. He said, however, that I must know well how great a difficulty there was in Hyderabad in finding any one competent to carry on Sir Salar Jung’s administration. He had considered Sir Salar’s death a great misfortune, though others, and he believed Lord Lytton, had thought otherwise. It was the more deplorable to himself because he had just had the satisfaction of restoring the good relations which had so long existed between Sir Salar and the Indian Government, but which had latterly been interrupted, and he had personally a high opinion of Sir Salar’s integrity and good faith. But who was there to fill his place?

“I then told him my high opinion of young Salar Jung, both as a good young man, and one with statesmanlike qualities, which only wanted practice to develop into a capacity equal, perhaps, to his father’s. He said that he was glad to hear me say this, for such had also been Sir Stewart Bailey’s opinion. But Laik Ali was very young for so responsible a position. I said that he was twenty-one, and he asked me whether that meant twenty-one according to the Mohammedan or the English reckoning. I said: ‘According to the English, as he was born in August, 1862,’ and so was very nearly as old as his father had been when he first became Prime Minister, for Sir Salar had been only twenty-four according to the Mohammedan reckoning, and, if one considered how troubled and disorganized a State Hyderabad then was and compared it with what it is now, it would be seen that Laik Ali’s position, if he were made Minister to-morrow, would be a more favourable one by a great deal than his father’s had been. Now all the machinery of government was there, and it only required to be kept going, instead of having to be created. I also begged him to see the young man himself privately when he came to Calcutta, and he said he would certainly do so, and as Laik Ali could speak English, they would not want an interpreter, and he would give him every encouragement to explain his position and ideas thoroughly. All Lord Ripon’s manner showed a thorough good will towards young Salar Jung, and I have little doubt that he will give him his support. He then asked me about the character of the Nizam, and I told him I could say nothing for certain, because he had been so silent in our interviews that I had not been able to judge, but it was my opinion that he was far from being without ideas of his own, and very likely a will of his own too. He asked me whether the people of Hyderabad wished him to be proclaimed of age this year or not till two years later, and I said it was not a case of their wishing. They all expected it to be at once, and would be grievously disappointed if it was deferred. There was a strong feeling of loyalty and affection towards the Nizam among the people, and they would resent his being kept out of his right. He also asked about Bushir-ed-Dowlah and to which faction he belonged. I said I could not answer certainly, but I believed Laik Ali considered him to be among his friends. Bushir-ed-Dowlah seemed to be without strong political colour. Lord Ripon remarked, however, that he, Bushir-ed-Dowlah, had been on bad terms with Laik Ali’s father. Of this I knew nothing.

“Then, with some apologies, I mentioned the report about the draft treaty. At this Lord Ripon laughed, and said it was the first he had heard of it. He certainly would never consent to taking any such treaty from the young Nizam. It would be a fraud, and I might dismiss it from my mind; all that might possibly be asked of him would be some limitation of his absolute power for a couple of years or so until they saw how he got on with his Government. As to a treaty concerning the Berar claim, he, Lord Ripon, was incapable of proposing it.[7] I said I was sure it was so, and would dismiss it from my mind. Lord Ripon’s manner, though reserved at first, was very cordial to me in the latter part of this conversation, and he shook hands warmly with me and said he was glad I had spoken to him on these matters, and hoped to see me again. Since my famous interview with Mr. Gladstone in March, 1882, I have not been so favourably impressed by any statesman that I have conversed with. Absit omen.

“20th Dec.—Looked in on Knight, Editor of the ‘Statesman,’ who gave me his views on the decadence of English morality, which he dates from the first Afghan war. He has been useful as exposing many of the official iniquities here, and takes, as it seems to me, generally just views. He would not, however, admit that the finances were in any danger, but looks rather to a revolution to end the present system.

“From him I went to Sir Stewart Bailey, and, as the conversation led up to it, told him something of the state of things at Hyderabad. He seemed surprised that Cordery was actually supporting the Peishkar and Kurshid Jah; said he thought he had been weak in letting things go on so far unchecked; repudiated all idea of its being done on policy; did not think that Trevor really influenced Cordery; Trevor was not nearly as clever a man, but very likely he had been too long at Hyderabad. Sir Stewart, however, spoke with great sympathy of Laik Ali, and said his was a waiting game, and it was only a matter of time his becoming Minister. We discussed his age, and he asked me, as Lord Ripon had done, whether I thought him capable of being now at the head of affairs. I said of course it was a very responsible position for a youth of twenty-one, but I believed him capable of it if really supported and rightly advised at the Residency. He was very popular in Hyderabad on his father’s account and his own, and would find no opposition except from the old Mogul nobles.

“We then discussed the north-west men. Sir Stewart does not like Seyd Huseyn Bilgrami, says his letters are flippant, but agreed with me that Salar Jung’s system, to be carried out at all, must be so through people who had received a modern education. Of Gough he spoke highly, but not of Clerk. On the whole I am satisfied with our conversation. It is evident Sir Stewart meant to have Laik Ali supported when he made the arrangement which left him co-administrator, and will do what he can for him now. At leaving he said it was a question whether it might not be better to let things go on a little longer and then interfere, or to interfere now on the Nizam’s coming of age. I said I considered they had gone quite far enough. In any case he promised to talk the whole matter over with Laik Ali, and I shall be surprised if Trevor is not removed and a change of attitude insisted on with Cordery. Talking of past affairs at Hyderabad, Bailey said that Sir Richard Meade’s alliance with the late Emir el Kebir against Sir Salar Jung had been most unfortunate, and had ‘dragged the Indian Government through a deal of mud.’ He did not wish to be quoted in this opinion, but such was the fact.

“21st Dec.—Mulvi Seyd Amir Huseyn, deputy collector and magistrate at court, a friend of Amir Ali’s, came. We discussed the Bengal Rent Bill, and he told me he had been one of the original supporters of a scheme to relieve the ryots, and had sent in a memorandum on the subject to the Government, but now the Bill had been drafted he had changed his mind about it. He considered that it would not really relieve the ryots, and would most certainly be made a precedent for further spoliation of landlords by the Government, and eventually for increased assessments. The breach of faith with the Zemindars was glaring, and it was not proposed to compensate them in any way. [I remember Lytton complaining to me at Simla in 1879 of the Bengal Land Settlement as an injustice to Indian Finance, and saying that it would be necessary to break it.] With regard to the condition of the Bengali Mohammedans, the Mulvi explained that they were an oppressed community, the Hindus having it all their own way, and there was very little courage among them, though the antiquated Mohammedans and Hindus lived on excellent terms. They dared not take any prominent part against the Government. He himself was a magistrate and deputy collector, but he had five English superiors, one above the other over him from the Collector to the Lieutenant-Governor, who, on the complaint of any one of them, would be down on him if he expressed his opinions. I told him India needed martyrs, and until they learned to have the courage of their convictions nothing would be done for them; reforms were only granted to the importunate, and on compulsion.