BIBLIOASIA JAN - MAR 2020 VOL. 15 ISSUE 04 FEATURE

Among the spectators is a six-year- Recruited and drilled by their colonial sub-continent. These lesser subjects of old boy named Chan Chon Hoe.1 From masters, guards and prisoners alike His Majesty the King deride the darker his home in Pagoda Street, he had fol- belong to the so-called martial races of South Indians as kling, derived from lowed the military band of Volunteers . Both sets trace their origins to the Kalinga, an ancient Indian kingdom, that marched up New Bridge Road to widest reaches of Punjab, Rajputana and but was derogatorily said to be from In 1915, sepoys in Singapore revolted against their Outram Road. Now Chon Hoe peeks out the North-west Frontier, well before its the sound of the chains that hobbled British officers in a bloody rebellion. Umej Bhatia from between the legs and shoulders of violent partitioning between Muslim and them as convict labour. And they label recreates the final moments of the mutineers as the gathered crowd to catch a glimpse non-Muslim in 1947. Hardy specimens Sikhs, Rajputs and Pathans collectively they pay the ultimate price for their actions. of the prisoners. The prisoners are all hand-picked to perform a lifetime of as Bengalis, because they sailed from the Trial by former sepoys, soldiers of the 5th Native military labour. Trained to ensure that Calcutta port in Bengal to Malaya. Some Light Infantry of the British Indian army. religion comes a distant second after are confused, having once seen the Shipped in to defend Singapore, they loyalty to the British Raj. The Sikhs Ranghars, now bare-headed, wearing have now been charged with mutiny in hail from the fertile west of Punjab, , with some even full-whiskered the middle of the First World War. The while the mutineers are mainly Muslim like their Sikh guard. prisoners’ armed escort are an imposing Rajputs known as Ranghars from small While some spectators may strug- Firing Squad squad from the Sikh Police Contingent dusty towns in the more backward gle to discern between the regimented policemen. The tall and burly Sikhs carry eastern reaches of Punjab known today as Indians and those in rags, the Sikh police Lee Enfield .303 bolt-action rifles that Haryana. These were towns and villages know all the difference between faith resemble toys in their massive hands. where camels roamed, and home of and faithlessness. And there is no love Heads bowed, the 16 mutineers the sturdy black Murrah buffalo, with lost for the mutineers who had tried to are ordered to stand to attention by the nearest Sikh and Punjabi speakers kill some of them in the Central Police British Army Major E.H. Hawkins of further up north. Station and even wounded fellow con- the 4th Shropshire Light Infantry. They British orientalists and linguists stables. Outram Prison had also come obey instinctively, surrounded by two understood these differences. They under attack. Now the only remaining companies of the 4th Shropshires and know that unlike the Ranghars, Sikhs link of values between the Sikh police other British soldiers from the Singa- did not wear a cone-shaped kulla and the sepoy mutineers was a devotion pore garrison. Like surplus caddies, under their tall pagri. The colonial social to the code of izzat, or reputation and British non-commissioned officers and engineers of efficient power mainte- respect. A question of manly pride, of enlisted men hurriedly form three sides nance shaped and created the martial honour and of shame. Izzat made good of a square with the prison wall. It has races and used the age-old caste and soldiers. But if offended it made them become a full- show. Colonial class system to their full advantage. vendetta-hunters seeking revenge at officials are sensitive to the spectacle Singapore’s Chinese and Malays are any cost. And izzat required them to of British power and its salutary effect largely ignorant of the shades of the die like men. on the natives. The difference between loyalty and treachery to King and Emperor (Facing page) The public must be made clear. Imperial officialdom execution of convicted uses the civilising veneer of ceremony sepoy mutineers at the and procedure to demonstrate that Singapore Criminal Prison the Empire’s rule of law trumped the on Outram Road, March 1915. Image reproduced barbaric whims of a debauched Eastern from James, L. (1987). potentate. Never mind the hasty court Mutiny in the British and martial or the macabre theatre that is Commonwealth Forces, about to be staged. This Empire had 1797–1956. London: Buchan offered the world the Magna Carta. Its & Enright, Publishers. (Call no.: RSING 355.1334 JAM). ruddy-faced representatives will now On 15 February 1915, a mutiny broke portrayed as a minor event confined to ram Road. A crowd of about 6,000 have serve up an object lesson on the fate of (Left) An illustration of the out among sepoys (Indian soldiers) of the Singapore, Umej Bhatia’s recently published gathered on Golf Hill, opposite Pearl’s those who ate their salt and then spat it assassination attempt on Lord Charles Hardinge, 5th Light Infantry Regiment based in Sin- book Our Name is Mutiny argues that the Hill, to the unfolding spectacle. back in their faces. Viceroy of India, on 23 gapore. The mutiny lasted almost a week event was part of a larger movement rebel- Men, women and children representing The prisoners and their escort of Sikh December 1912 on the and claimed the lives of 44 people – British ling against the British Raj. This abridged all the races and faiths of Singapore constables are a study in stark contrast. occasion of the transfer of soldiers and civilians, as well as Chinese extract is from the first chapter of Bhatia’s – Euro­peans, Eurasians, Malays, Indi- The handcuffed sepoy mutineers wear the capital of British India and Malay civilians. More than 200 sepoys book, which deliberately uses a novel- ans, Chinese and Christians, Buddhists, ill-fitting long , Indian from Calcutta to New Delhi. A bomb was thrown by Indian were tried by court martial and received like narrative to recount the events. Muslims and freethinkers – are about or Malay . The Sikh lawmen, with nationalists at the viceroy’s varying sentences, while more than 47 were to participate in an ancient ritual of their headquarters situated next door in ceremonial procession in publicly executed at Outram Prison. Initially public justice. Gently sloping heights Pearl’s Hill, represent the force of order Delhi. Hardinge escaped that had served as the sixth hole of the in these parts. The police sport striped with injuries but his mahout The end is always a good place to start. Sepoy Lines golf links now double up as blue and white pagri (turbans) and wear was killed. The act of terror Umej Bhatia is the author of Our Name is Mutiny: The galvanised the movement Even in the face of its own extinction the a viewing gallery. The onlookers have an impassive faces behind groomed, raven- to gain independence for Global Revolt Against the Raj and the Hidden History mind believes it will go on. unobstructed view from a space looking dark beards. Their perfectly pressed khaki of the Singapore Mutiny, 1907–1915 (2019). He is a India. Illustration by E. Abbo career diplomat from Singapore and is currently t Under the light of Singapore’s early out towards Outram Park, to be levelled are secured by shiny buckles for La Tribuna Illustrata, based there. His first book is on Muslim memories evening sun, 16 men are being led out and occupied in the near future by the while mirror-polished under neat 5–12 January 1913. © Look of the Crusades. of His Majesty’s Criminal Prison on Out- Singapore General Hospital. puttees reflect glints of the dying sunlight. and Learn. 38 39 BIBLIOASIA JAN - MAR 2020 VOL. 15 ISSUE 04 FEATURE

dar Dunde Khan and ex-Jemadar Chiste battalion, looked sullen and unhappy. A that day, Lance-Naik (Lance-Corporal) of his Ranghar identity in a moment of Khan struggle to retain some soldierly hard core was ready to explode, itching Najaf Khan wrote a letter to his brother great stress, Sepoy Shaikh Mohammed bearing and dignity. to do the unthinkable. The Pathans from in India lamenting: wrote to his family, reflecting Hindu ideas A few weeks earlier, the pair of the other half were in a better state, with of resurrection: Khans had been in a very different posi- several of their own up for the coming “As this war is such that no one has tion. Both were native officers of the 5th promotion test. returned out of those who have “It is with sighing, crying, grief Light Infantry garrisoned in Singapore. Physically, the pudgy-looking Rid- gone to the war. All died. And those and sorrow to tell you that the Dunde commanded B Company of No out with his bristly toothbrush mous- who have enlisted will not live alive. transfer of the regiment on the 20th 1 Double Company and Chiste led D of tache did not inspire fear or respect. Believe this. World has died. No one February is now a settled fact. It will No 2 Double Company. They had turned But looks are deceiving. Short and stout, has escaped who has gone to the go to Hong Kong. But don’t know out with their battalion for a Monday Ridout’s benign and inoffensive appear- war. All have perished. And there is this, whether it is going to the war. morning inspection parade by Acting ance was sharpened by cold, piercing recruiting open, don’t let any men Brigadier-General Dudley Ridout, the blue eyes. He had tried to rally the men enlist. As all are being taken to the “God knows what kinds of trouble General Officer Commanding the Troops with a rousing speech. The Khans and war. All will be caused to be killed.”3 we will have to confront. What in the Straits Settlements. Ridout was their sepoys listened to his words. Or is this war? It is resurrection. conducting his farewell inspection of the rather half-heard its translation into With a battalion and their own That who goes there, there is no regiment just before its redeployment Hindustani by their regimental com- minds in disarray, some of the sepoys hope of his returning. It is God’s Sepoys in the British Indian Army in Singapore, 1915. This photograph is from the album of Sergeant B.W. Turner of the 1st/4th Battalion, King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. Turner served in one of the battalion’s to Hong Kong. The inspection coincided mander, Lieutenant-Colonel Edward developed their own conspiracy theories, punishment. If God released us companies sent to Singapore in February 1915 to quash the mutiny. Courtesy of the National Museum with the Chinese New Year holidays. The Victor Martin. The perennially sleepy- with help perhaps from passing agents of from this calamity we will take to of Singapore, National Heritage Board. festivities had begun the day before. At looking Martin was an isolated figure, influence. Their once-disciplined heads have reborn. We are very much the stroke of midnight, the settlement’s unpopular with his fellow British officers held many confusing ideas. Some noble, confused and shocked. All the Major Hawkins reads out the court- Unlike the 16, the five are handcuffed. Chinese population exploded in riotous and judged by some as too sympathetic others dangerous and mixed with trivial regiment is in sorrow together.”4 martial sentences of the prisoners. The And their escorts this time are not the celebration. Official hours for firing small to the sepoys. feuds and simmering frustrations. They 16 prisoners receive sentences with straight-backed Sikh police but white- bombs and crackers were midnight until In the rising heat and humidity of were being sent away from Singapore to On their part, the pair of ex-officer varying lengths of imprisonment. As suited British prison wardens who form 1 am and from 5 to 6 am. The large Chi- the morning, Ridout’s speech rehearsed fight and kill Turks – their fellow Muslims. Khans, now standing with their backs each verdict is announced, a mutineer is a close guard. Affirming British prestige, nese community in carnival mood could a tired formula: “The empire is vast and This contradicted the one true faith. Even against the walls of Outram Prison, had ordered to step forward. Four ex-sepoys only the superior race may dispense hardly be expected to obey the rules. the duties of guarding it are great”2 – worse, they speculated that their ship done their own listening, thinking, and of the Taiping-raised Malay States Guides ultimate justice. The wardens are in no In the fast evaporating cool of a words meant for the British Tommy, was to be sunk en route to their next whispering. Quiet intriguing was soon fol- receive the lightest punishment possible mood to give any quarter, after one of humid tropical morning, the paraded not Jack Sepoy. Describing his burden of post. Reflecting the Rajput Hindu origins lowed by bold declarations and preaching. – below two years without hard labour. their own was killed outside Outram sepoys were in no mood to celebrate. command as General Officer Command- The remaining dozen from the 5th Light Prison by the mutineers. And they were eager to break a differ- ing the Straits Settlements was the last The European officer in the photograph is Captain Moira Francis Allan (7th from the right), seen Infantry of the British Indian Army are The execution will be carried out in ent set of rules. Many, especially those thing the already troubled, confused and here with men of the Mountain Battery of the Malay States Guides who had stoked the 5th Light slapped with far harsher penalties. Some full public view – a spectacle revived after from the Ranghar half of the dual-race demoralised sepoys needed to hear. Later Infantry Regiment to mutiny on 15 February 1915. He was one of the commanders of the battery face “transportation for 15 years”, or hard almost 20 years of its prohibition in Sin- and was killed in the mutiny. Courtesy of National Archives of Singapore. labour in a penal colony. Eight of them gapore. The natives must be taught their Acting Brigadier-General Dudley H. Ridout, General stare at “transportation for life” in the manners, including little Chon Hoe. The Officer Commanding the Troops in the Straits dreaded Andaman Islands. The Andaman condemned men are marched to their Settlements. At his farewell inspection of the 5th Islands’ Cellular Jail is the Indian Alcatraz. execution spots with military precision. Light Infantry Regiment on 15 February 1915, just The Indians know it as Kala Pani (Black The weathered and peeling execution before its redeployment to Hong Kong, he had Water), for it lay across the forbidding wall faces a flat piece of ground on the tried to rally the men with a rousing speech but failed. Image reproduced from The Royal Engineers waters of the Indian Ocean. Only the western side of Outram Road, rising gen- Journal, vol. LV, September 1941, p. 354. fit and those under 40 were sent to the tly to become Golf Hill. An eerie silence Kala Pani, overseen then by a vicious Irish holds as the five prisoners are marched warden familiar with all the dark secrets in. Quite unusual for a large crowd who of living purgatory. This could mean being is responsible for Singapore’s constant shackled like a donkey to a mill, circling market hubbub. All are captivated now in endless loops to grind oil. Or to sit in by the sight before them. pitch dark for years with no face or voice Two of the five ragged prisoners apart from your own. had worn officer’s uniforms in the British Fates confirmed, the bedraggled Indian Army. Dunde Khan is the senior group of 16 are marched off back behind of the pair of cashiered officers. Fat and the grey prison walls by their police fair-skinned with a beard and moustache escort. The huge crowd massed behind once neatly trimmed, the ex-Viceroy the cordon of British soldiers has not Commissioned Officer had once flashed come all the way just for this. This scene the two-star epaulette of asubedar (- has merely whetted their appetite for the tain) on his shoulder straps. Now ordered main show that is about to begin. to march forward, his muscle memory Spread on and below Golf Hill, completes a familiar drill. In step by his 6,000 pairs of eyes follow the final steps side is Chiste Khan, a lean, sharp-faced of a smaller group of men emerging former jemadar (lieutenant) sporting a from the prison gates. A new scene in long, flowing beard. Garbed in rumpled the theatre of public instruction unfolds. and soiled civilian clothes, former Sube- 40 41 BIBLIOASIA JAN - MAR 2020 VOL. 15 ISSUE 04 FEATURE

Secret agents in their midst. The prison- With little fanfare, the doomed men Promulgation of sentences on 21 sepoys found THE LOST TREASURE OF number of planned uprisings under the guilty of participating in the mutiny of the 5th Light ers they had sprung who went their own are strapped to the five-foot timber stakes SINGAPORE’S HISTORY banner of a wider Mutiny movement. Infantry Regiment. Sixteen mutineers received way. The rounding up. Wounded and that throw long, ghostly shadows on the The uprising of sepoys in Singapore imprisonment of varying lengths, while five were bloodied after his capture, Chiste was prison’s high outer perimeter wall. Their By Umej Bhatia was a symptom of an overstretched and executed. Image reproduced from The Straits Times, heard reciting the Qur’an. Its familiar naked brown ankles are secured firmly by It was a century-old map of Singapore slowly declining British Empire, set during 23 March 1915, p. 7. surahs both balm and support. The tri- cotton . The final whispered mur- discovered in a London bookshop about the period of the First World War, with als. The cover-up. Documents sealed murings of the large crowd are hushed. 10 years ago that launched my quest. its unique cocktail of jihad, or holy war away for half a century or more in Major Hawkins steps forward. He reads The topographical map showed intrigu- propaganda, promoted by the Germans dusty archives, eaten by termites or out a statement in a firm and loud voice: ing features of a settlement in Singapore and Ottoman Turks, and ideas of the firebombed or misplaced. and its infrastructure, formed between Ghadar or Mutiny movement, pushed Turn back now to the scene outside “These five men, Subedar Dunde now-levelled hills and drained swamps, by Indian revolutionaries from across the Outram Road Criminal Prison in Khan, Jemadar Chiste Khan, 1890 with a port that was already the world’s the Atlantic Ocean. These ideas crossed 1915. A moss-splotched grey wall and Havildar Rahmat Ali, 2311 Sepoy seventh busiest in 1914. I was intrigued the Pacific to port cities like Hong Kong, terrorism, fake news and revolution in three lines of khaki-clad soldiers form- Hakim Ali and 2184 Havildar Abdul by a prominently marked German prison- Rangoon, Singapore and Penang, and an earlier era of globalisation. So many ing a square on the green turf. A red, Ghani have been found guilty of ers camp, setting me off on a journey to over the Indian Ocean to British India. echoes of the present can be found in laterite road separates the spectators stirring up and joining a mutiny and find the “lost treasure” of Singapore’s The Ghadar or Mutiny movement the past. I wanted to use a little-known from the spectacle. The little six-year- are sentenced to death by being neglected history just before, during part of the story that I tell had its roots event in a period that most historians old boy staring wide-eyed. The Khans shot to death… All these men of and after the First World War. not only in northern India, but also, and of Singapore and the region seem to with three others. About to face their the Indian Army have broken their The result is my book, Our Name more importantly, among the Punjabi overlook, to make this point. earthly fate in a few moments. They are oath as soldiers of His Majesty the is Mutiny: The Global Revolt against immigrants in the US and Canada. It brought With this book, I hope to show that not being sent back to the Kala Pani, the King. Thus justice is done.”6 the Raj and the Hidden History of the them together with Bengalis who had the history of Singapore, and even its dreaded black sea they had crossed to Singapore Mutiny, 1907–1915, which been leading an underground movement present and certainly its future, is driven reach Singapore, but to a blackness of focuses on an event usually known as the against the British for some time. An by its location and its positionality as another kind – sakrat-ul-maut – sense- Umej Bhatia’s Our Name is Mutiny: Sepoy Mutiny of 1915. The sepoys were idea of national identity was developing a global city. Our understanding of lessness. And not before jan-kandani The Global Revolt Against the Raj and Indian soldiers who turned against their among these revolutionaries without them Singapore is enriched by interpreting – the agonised sucking out of life. the Hidden History of the Singapore British officers and marauded through being fully aware of it. I found it especially events and episodes of its history by One choice remains for the proud Mutiny, 1907–1915 retails at major Singapore on the eve of their departure interesting that religious and even regional carefully tracing the contours of its Ranghars – they must uphold the Rajput bookshops and is also available for for Hong Kong. The account in my book identities were so fluid, and concepts global links and connections, with all the warrior tradition. Dunde Khan son of reference at the Lee Kong Chian differs from the conventional historical of race, nationhood and even religious opportunities, challenges and threats Khan Mohammed Khan, Chiste Khan Reference Library and for loan at narrative in that I uncover and tease out identification were in a plastic phase of that come with this globalism. And son of Mussalam Khan, two havildars selected public libraries (Call nos.: the globetrotting ideas and the rolling- definition. That phase is much less plastic telling that story creatively while staying (sergeants) and a sepoy (private) next RSING 959.5703 BHA-[HIS] and SING stone revolutionaries chased by imperial now, while the use of identity politics by the true to the facts with the demanding to them hold their heads up and look 959.5703 BHA). policemen who played their part in British Empire as a form of imperial control but rewarding long form of narrative straight ahead. They see heavy wooden influencing, seducing and subverting the has had lasting repercussions. non-fiction is all part of a universal story posts sticking out of the ground like sepoys to mutiny. Crucially, the mutiny The Singapore mutiny of 1915 of what happens when the unstoppable trained minds. This thinking was danger- dead men standing. But their izzat of was not just a local affair but a revolt and provided the canvas to sketch out a force of revolt meets the immovable ously open-ended and tumbled through manly honour requires them to remain insurgency with a global flavour, one of a broader story of war, migration, populism, object of power. their heads like the fake news Lance-Naik as steady and as erect as those poles. Fateh Mohammed had shared with his Khaki-clad army officers scurry father on the day the mutiny broke out: about in the square making final prepa- As Viceroy Commissioned Officers, men as an entertainer from home. Located in Chiste was a disciple of the enig- rations. They are joined by a gaggle of like the Khans were expected to know the far east of then undivided Punjab, matic Nur Alam Sham. A mysterious “The war increases day by day. civilian officials and warders. The civil- better than to encourage such seditious the district of Gurgaon was mid-way Muslim preacher and Sufi Master (pir), The Germans have become ians are in pristine white cotton drill talk. They sat at the of the pyramid of between Delhi and the sacred city of the latter had a cult following among Mohammedans. Haji Mahmood with matching solar pith Indian military labour that was recruited Mathura. It was not far from the place Indian and Malay Muslims in Singapore. William Kaiser... [whose] daughter on pomaded heads. To the spectators to defend the British Empire. Raised from of legend, where the Hindu god Krishna Nur Alam Shah delivered sulphurous has married the heir to the Turkish atop Golf Hill, the harried officials down the ranks of the sepoys for good service, was supposed to have sported with the sermons at his mosque on Kampong throne... to succeed after the below resemble brown and white ants they were trained not to question why cowherds’ maidens on the banks of the Java Road, just down the road from the Sultan. Many of the German in frenzied activity. The bureaucrats of but to do or die. river Yamuna. The people of Gurgaon house where Singapore’s first Prime subjects and army have embraced Empire dash around fussing right up to Fat Dunde certainly didn’t look were fond of song, poetry and the edible Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, would be born Mohammedanism. Please God the moment the five condemned men the part of a recruiting station officer. cannabis known as bhang. They were the a few years later. that the religion of the Germans are marched to their execution spots. But he appeared to have something to original hippies of India. As the First World War turned into (Mohammedanism) may be The firing squad is composed of 25 prove. Displaying a maverick streak, he In Singapore, Dunde also found a brutal conflict of attrition, Nur Alam promoted or raised on high.”5 men from the Royal Garrison Artillery wore non-regulation earrings, a Rajput other attractions. With Chiste, he enjoyed Shah had raised thorny questions for under the command of Second Lieuten- NOTES custom to project warrior virility. Dunde the company of a wealthy and sociable the sepoys to consider. To whom was All it took was a spark, which even- ant Frank Vyner. Wearing large khaki 1 Rajagopalan, M. (2000, April 13). Man, 91, scarred by also had unusual interests for a profes- Singapore merchant named Kassim loyalty owed? To which Kaiser and to tually ignited. An explosion of gunfire pith helmets, with their knobbly, white sepoy execution.The Straits Times, p. 35. Retrieved sional soldier and an officer at that. In Ismail Mansoor. A Gujarati Muslim from which Emperor? Charismatic Chiste also amid the noise and smoke of Chinese knees peeking out between pulled up from NewspaperSG. 2 Sareen, T.R. (1995). Secret documents on Singapore Singapore he had taken personal music Bombay, Kassim was a Walter Mittyish had a way with words. He persuaded New Year firecrackers and bomblets. A and “Bombay bloomers” , mutiny, 1915 (p. 717). New Delhi: Mounto. (Call no.: lessons from a musician from his village character who dabbled in sedition. The some of his men that the tide was turning cluster of little rebellions had erupted the firing squad resembles overgrown RSING 940.41354 SAR-[WAR]) of Bajpur in Gurgaon. Dunde was fond 65-year-old jihadi socialite opened his against British rule. Largely illiterate and within the regiment. Soon the sepoys schoolboys. In fact, they are artillerymen 3 Sareen, 1995, p. 720. 4 Sareen, 1995, p. 729. of playing his newfound instrument and weekend bungalow on Pasir Panjang unschooled, the thoughts of the sepoys had the run of the island. Chaos. Confu- who have exchanged their large-bore 5 Sareen, 1995, p. 731. singing to his men, an officer doubling up Road to the officers and their sepoys. did not match the precision or logic of sion. And then the inevitable betrayal. guns for rifles. 6 Sareen, 1995, p. 847. 42 43