‘The Lion and the Lily’: Ira Mukhoty’s new book on Awadh history resurrects Nawab Begum, Bahu Begum

The 18th century was a tumultuous period in Indian history, marked by wars and battles which would change its fate forever. But it did not happen in isolation. Certain events happening in faraway Europe would lead to a significant transformation for both India and Europe deeply influencing their respective histories and interactions with each other.

The British East India Company (EIC) and the French East India Company competed for dominance in India during the Carnatic Wars (1746-1763). The British emerged victorious, securing their supremacy. Concurrently, the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) in Europe, which began over North American territories, concluded with the Treaty of Paris. This treaty significantly curtailed French trading interests in India and established the EIC's dominance, including political and military involvement in Indian territories.

The Battle of Buxar in 1764 was crucial, where the British, led by Hector Munro, defeated the combined forces of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II, Nawab Shuja-ud-Daulah of Awadh, and Mir Qasim, the deposed Nawab of Bengal. The Treaty of Allahabad (1765) followed, with Shah Alam II ceding diwani rights over Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa, and Shuja-ud-Daulah ceding territory and paying a large indemnity.

This led to the decline of the Mughal Empire and the eventual establishment of British colonial rule in 1858.

Shah Alam II lived in Allahabad under British protection before being reinstated on the throne of Delhi in 1771 with Maratha support, and with very limited powers.

Diving into French sources

However, Nawab Shuja-ud-Daulah refused to be cowed down and after Buxar, threw himself into rebuilding his authority and the infrastructure of Awadh. Faizabad was established as his capital. Despite British disapproval, he employed several Frenchmen in his army and administration. His army consisting of French and Indian officers also employed warrior ascetics known as the Gosains.

While most of the above information is in the public domain, it is the establishment of sovereignty by Shuja-ud-Daulah and the magnificent court of Faizabad as seen through hitherto unstudied French sources, which is the triumph of Ira Mukhoty’s new book, The Lion and the Lily.

Indo-French Mukhoty utilises her knowledge of French to read and reference from the archives of the de Boigne family, Jean Baptiste Gentil’s Memoires sur l’indoustan and atlas and other works are Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris and the Persian letters of Claude Martin in the British Library to name a few. She also makes extensive use of artworks from that period, especially the Polier album that she travelled to the Museum of Islamic Art, Berlin to study and the Claude Martin album of plants and animal drawings now in Kew Gardens, London.

Mukhoty makes extensive use of the memoirs of the Comte de Modave, who travelled to India. This has been translated into English only in 2023.

These along with primary and secondary sources in English enable her to present a very vibrant portrait of the Nawabs and their court in Faizabad and Lucknow.

Thus, we are introduced to a dazzling court in Faizabad, where Nawab Shuja-ud-Daulah, instead of allowing “himself to slump into a paralysing stupor of despair” after his defeat in Faizabad “turned his insatiable energy and ambition into strengthening his city and province”.

The city which is the “residence of one of the greatest officers of the Mughal empire” as described by Modave was once second only to Calcutta as a commercial hub, with a bazaar, bustling with traders, fragrant aromas of food being cooked, “goldsmiths with furnace and crucible, muslin weavers at their looms, hookah makers, tobacco mixers, sellers of toys made of clay or wood, medicine men with their bags of herbs, milk and cream sellers” making the Chowk bazaar seem mundane yet magical.

Today, Faizabad is a sleepy town in Uttar Pradesh. Ruins scattered about the city do hint at a past, but one that has been mostly forgotten. The eight palaces built by Shuja for himself and his family along the Ghaghara River, between 1765-75 can now only be seen in paintings or in ruins.

As an ardent Awadhi – what people hailing from this region are called – I owe a debt to Mukhoty for lifting the veil of one of the most fascinating periods of history.

Awadh, which takes its name from the holy town of Ayodhya, is synonymous with tehzeeb and tameez or culture and etiquette. It is also famous for its nawabs and kababs, but most accounts of its past concentrate on Lucknow and its Nawabi architecture or the British takeover of Lucknow.

Having done my schooling in Lucknow, I knew all about Nawab Asaf-ud-Daula, whose legacy the Bara Imambara and Rumi Darwaza dominate the skyline. A larger-than-life figure for the Lucknow wallahs, for he is responsible for making Lucknow not just his capital city but also making it a cultural centre of great aesthetics.

And who doesn't know of Wajid Ali Shah?

Meanwhile, Shuja-ud-Daulah, the son of Nawab Safdar Jung and the third Nawab of Awadh is mostly forgotten. If he is remembered it is in connection with his participation and defeat in the Battle of Buxar.

Decolonial studies are fast becoming very popular, to examine, challenge and dismantle the legacies of colonialism and knowledge systems and The Lion and the Lily unravels layers of colonial history to give us a glimpse of powerful sovereign rulers and equally powerful women.

One gets the sense in the introduction itself when we read of a “pall of smoke” spreading over Delhi. The year is 1947 and the British are leaving India, and countless documents are being burnt by the civil servants of the British empire.

While concentrating on Awadh in view of the Anglo-French struggle The Lion and the Lily gives an overview of the court of Delhi as well as the battle for supremacy in Mysore and the fall of Seringapatam.

It describes a century of the rule of the Nawabs of Awadh: the smoke and fire of the battles are captured in all their urgency, the fragrance of food in the bazaar and in dastarkhwan of the rich come alive in telling fragrance, as do the elegies of Muharram and songs and music of the entertainers, singers and courtesan.

Nawab Begum and Bahu Begum

However, for me, the standouts are the portraiture and description of two women, the Nawab Begum, wife of Safdar Jung and her daughter-in-law, Bahu Begum, and in particular Bahu Begum (1727-1815), the most powerful woman of her time in India. A woman who lived a life of piety in purdah, who spoke to men from behind a screen or through the agency of her trusted khwajasaras or eunuchs yet managed to shake the gentlemen of the British EIC with her omniscient presence. A “mere woman” in Governor General Warren Hastings’s estimation who ruled her people and had her own army and along with her mother-in-law Nawab Begum was capable of espousing the cause of the Raja of Benares, Chait Singh against the British and much to their horror. Her lands remained mostly with her, and it was Hastings who suffered the consequences. One of the major charges against Warren Hastings in his impeachment trial was the “despoilation” of the Begums when he retaliated by seizing their lands.

Though such a powerful woman lived within easy distance from Lucknow, her memory has been all but erased from public memory. Chances are that most people of my generation would think of Bahu Begum as the 1967 film, starring Meena Kumari. Today’s generation would perhaps connect it to a successful TV series made in 2019. One can’t really blame them, for a Google search result also shows either the film or the serial.

Even though I was brought up in a culturally conscious family and with a great interest in history, I became actually acquainted with the real Bahu Begum, thanks to Mukhoty. It was during a visit to Faizabad with Mukhoty, for research for the book The Lion and the Lily that I got a chance to visit Bahu Begum’s once majestic mausoleum. Like Bahu Begum’s legacy, it too is in a neglected condition.

Bahu Begum whose name was Ummat-ul-Zohra, was one of the most significant players in the history of Awadh. Mukhoty, known for her work on historical Indian women, does more than ample justice to the character of Bahu Begum. As the adopted daughter of the Mughal emperor, Mohammed Shah, her wedding was lavish and at that time cost a whopping 46 lakh rupees! It was her dower that saved her husband many times. It was from her dowry that Shuja-ud-Daulah paid the 20 lakh rupees indemnity, imposed on him by the British after the defeat at Buxar. “She even removed her nose-ring with its bunch of pearls”, telling her horrified entourage that the jewellery and wealth were of use to her only as long as Shuja was safe. In return, he made her his khas mahal or chief consort and the keeper of the treasury.

The nawab was always conscious of and distressed by his forced alliance with the British and confessed to Modave that an ally which was “so greedy, so powerful and so paranoid”, was difficult to control.

After her husband’s death, she wielded considerable influence over the administration and political affairs of the state. Her authority was recognised and respected by the British East India Company as well, but her enormous personal wealth (2 million pounds) at the time of Shuja’s death was irresistible to the EIC.

Her dominance over the affairs of Faizabad continued and may have been the reason why her son shifted his capital to Lucknow in 1775. “Most commentators blame this on Bahu Begum’s overbearing personality, her unfeminine greed for power, and her meddlesome interference in the nawab’s affairs”.

Not one to let circumstances cow her down she maintained and “presided over her independent court at Faizabad” after Asaf shifted to Lucknow.

She maintained a correspondence with the British, realising that they were a “duplicitous friend”.

When Warren Hastings decided to make up for the EIC’s financial losses by resumption of the jagirs of the two Begums, there was such an uproar with the residents of Faizabad, zamindars and landholders joining in that Hastings wrote in a letter to his friend in 1782, that “the old women had very nigh effected our destruction.:

Later, Bahu Begum did bail out her son by paying 60 lakh rupees from her wealth to the British.

Bahu Begum outlived her son, who died in 1797, “much as his father had done, a proudly independent sovereign of a rich and powerful state”.

The Begum seized the moveable properties of her son, after his death and set up her own durbar in Lucknow with the help of Almas Ali Khan, a powerful and rich khwajasara, who had accompanied her after her wedding and became the manager of all her lands. The two became a powerful combination influencing the succession to the seat of Awadh. Finding that her grandson, Wazir Ali Khan who had succeeded Asaf-ud-Daulah was not as malleable as withdrew her support to him, which in turn helped the British officials to replace him with Sadat Ali Khan and also get rid of the Begum from Lucknow.

She returned to Faizabad in 1798, “where she lived for many years in contented if reduced splendour” and died in 1815 ending the era of co-sharing between the nawabs and their khas mahals or chief consorts.

The Lion and the Lily not only captures her role and character very effectively, but it is also a commentary on the social and economic fabric of Awadh and its restructuring due to colonial expansion.

It should go a long way in highlighting not just the romanticised view of the nawabs of Awadh as just effete patrons of culture, architecture and culinary traditions but also as powerful sovereign powers with equally powerful women who shaped the history of that region.

The Lion and The Lily: The Rise and Fall of Awadh, Ira Mukhoty, Aleph Book Company.