The Economic Roots of the National Awakening in Jammu and

Kashmir (1846-1947) Thesis

Submitted in partial fulfillment for the award of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy In

HISTORY By

Ab Rashid Shiekh Under the supervision of Prof. S. Liyaqat H. Moini

Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History, ALIGARH MUSLIM UNIVERSITY, ALIGARH, 2013

Abstract 1

Abstract

The study ‘The Economic Roots of the National Awakening in Jammu and Kashmir (1846-1947)’ aims to trace the growth of ‘national consciousness’ among the people of Jammu & Kashmir in the backdrop of their economic deprivation. Ever since March 1846, when the British ‘sold’ it for seventy five lakh of rupees to the Dogra maharaja Gulab Singh, the predominantly Muslim-Kashmir together with the principality of Jammu and the frontier districts including Buddhist and Ladakh experienced unmitigated autocratic rule. A succession of maharajas, fostering ties with a small group of Hindu Pandits in the Kashmir valley and a more extensive network of Dogra kinsmen in Jammu, willfully trampled on the rights of their subjects but rarely succeeded in pushing an insensitive state administration to adopt even the most nominal of reforms. Practically no form of economic activity, not even prostitution, escaped taxation. Muslims were debarred from expressing their opinions freely, virtually excluded from the army and poorly represented in the government services. The state claimed exclusive ownership of the land.

The Dogra administration lacked active sympathy with the aspirations of the people not to speak of their prosperity or improving their standard of living. With the amalgamation of different territories by a new ruling class, came a change in the administration of the State. But it was precisely under the aegis of the colonial rule that the new regime established a permanent fit to ride roughshod over the interests and rights of the vast majority of their Muslim subjects. The new structure withheld the rights of citizenship from its subjects, the scope for articulating and assessing political demands as individuals was severely limited. Peasants in a small holding structure with as yet limited differentiation lived under common yet individually fragmented conditions of social and economic existence. Religious communitarian identity under these circumstances imparted the social base of solidarity to articulate class based political demands. The generally 2 stronger ties of dominance of the ruling class and their hegemonic power prevailed over the peasants in Kashmir were major factors in the relatively muted nature of resistance by peasants and labourers at the first instance. In addition, the decisive undermining of the artisanal economy threw many weavers―who formed the most important component in the non-agrarian system―into the ranks of agricultural labour and forged a potential link between weaver and peasants’ discontent.

The marked features were remarkable deprivation, destitution and oppression. There were many new problems as well as old ones, including persistence of famines and widespread hunger, violation of elementary political freedoms as well as of basic liberties. People were left with little choice and little opportunity of exercising their reasoned agency.

Most of the produce of the land was seized by the state while cultivators paid hefty taxes. Begar or forced labour was rampant as was corruption among state officials. As an insurance against revolt, the state banned Muslims from keeping arms and ammunition. Remarkably little organized resistance was put up by Kashmiri Muslims until the third decade of the twentieth century.

The argument the present study insists upon comes out still more clearly when one examines a society somewhat further on its development, where oppression has assumed a more complete form, and becomes economic rather than purely domestic in character. Such are the characteristics of slave economy. Here the psychological and human element is practically lacking, and the labourer is reduced to the condition of a brute. His acquiescence in usurpation is accordingly assured through fear, which causes him to look upon revolt as totally incapable of securing him his liberty. An imposing system of moral oppression succeeded in making the labourer really believe that he is a slave by nature that his chains have been forged by a superior power, and it is futile to strive to break them. This 3 fiction, built up with the secular assistance of clients and liegeman, becomes so formidable in the minds of the oppressed that they no longer dare to rebel against their masters, and bow instead before the destiny which condemns them to serve.

It is in this way the importance of economic factor as a subject of study is commensurate with the loss which they inflict. All other factors are real, and have more or less a vitality of their own. But it is impossible to divorce them safely from their material source. In the present study it is mainly the economic aspect that is presented, dissected and utilized to investigate the economic aspect in inclusive terms that integrate all other aspects, social, political, and cultural.

The major types of social organization of production that have been identified in this thesis did not display a remarkable degree of adaptability and resilience. The Dogra state concerned themselves with the stability of revenue receipts, armed the rentier landlords with considerable legal powers of extra economic coercion which laid the foundation of revenue and rent offensive. In the long run it facilitated the process of twisting the agrarian economy and society to an export orientation. The struggle for freedom was basically the result of a fundamental contradiction between the interests of the people of Kashmir and that of the Dogra autocratic regime. Kashmir during the period was economically regressed. The freedom struggle, thus, was a struggle for economic emancipation. As a result economic ideology developed which was to dominate the post 1930’s Kashmir.

The thesis has taken into board both the economic conditions as well as all those leaders who exercised the functioning of forming and guiding the growing of public opinion on economic deprivations and economic questions. The resolutions and proceedings of the Muslim Conference were effective in moulding public opinion only to the extent to which they filtered down to the people through mass campaigning and gatherings. As ‘national’ leaders they looked upon Kashmir and 4 its people realizing that they had common interests and destiny in the broadest sense of the term; who visualized the ultimate aim of self-government for all the people of Jammu and Kashmir or at least for the masses, rather than for a smaller, narrower body within it. The criterion in this respect has been what they professed and what they wanted in practice. The latter part has been examined at length in the main body of the thesis.

The thesis has mostly dealt not with the attitude and policies of the leaders as judged according to the canons of the science of economics, but with what the leaders said and their manner of saying about the basic economic and political understanding and approach. To attempt the latter task would involve a discussion on the evolution of the economic backwardness in Kashmir and the changes brought in it the consequences of which resulted in mass awakening. Therefore, the present study is not simply a study of the political developments in Jammu and Kashmir but calls into question the economic dimension behind these developments.

The corresponding evolution of means of control which should have taken place had been retarded by the competition of private interests, especially the landed class. Production was for gain only. The solution of the economic problems was not provided for by a system based on gross negligence to promote anything new. Kashmir turned into a slough of despond. Against the backdrop of this gross negligence, heavy taxation of agriculture and commercial activities tightened the noose on an emaciated and dejected populace. Mounting economic distress and political disaffection found a ready outlet. All this entails a rather different narrative from what the mainstream historiography of the freedom movement in Kashmir has usually adopted.

Moving away from the traditional approach, the present work has attempted to explore the economic dimension, with some focus on other aspects too, in order 5 to have a fuller understanding of the whole dynamics of the rise of the national movement. The previous studies have given only a surface treatment to the economic aspect; therefore, a need was felt to have a thorough understanding of the aspect. The present study has, therefore, been undertaken to objectively analyze the economic trajectory of Kashmir since 1846 to 1947, and aims at understanding the various facets of its underdevelopment and its impact upon the consciousness of the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

It was not only the rank and file but also the most elite section of the Kashmiri Muslim society was pushed to the wall. That small section which any oppressor or occupational force requires at local level to main its administrative apparatus was also drawn from non-Muslims and non-Kashmiris like Pandits and Punjabis. Small wonder that among those groups and sections of Kashmir who during the previous regimes had acted as instruments of oppression saw no hope under this regime, only the non-Muslim Kashmiris were found on the other side of the fence thus completed the communal divide. The majority community heard the sympathetic voices and saw the helping hand from such a state of economic oppression where exactions and state demand made eviction from land a relief rather than a punishment, where forests and forest lands were preferred over home and hearth, and where death looked a lesser misfortune than begar. The statistical definition of poverty changed for the worse. In fact, the categories of poor and prosperous became non-existent and were replaced by oppressor and oppressed. The rack rented peasantry and industrial labour exclusively belonged to the majority community—the oppressed, who were grounded under religious, racial, economic and regional oppression, untold exactions and countless disabilities.

Silk weavers, shawl bafs, English educated and religious class all discovered a convergence of interest in fighting the regime out. The increasing disillusionment among these classes in Kashmir in the context of denial of basic economic rights to them owed to their outright exclusion from the political and 6 economic structures, resulting in the eventual alienation. This irreoncible contradiction that emerged between the Dogra regime and the junior ally—the local elite—on the one hand, and the bulk of the people of Kashmir including the middle class, the working class and the peasantry, on the other hand, laid the seeds of the struggle for national liberation.

The problem that this study has attempted to address is, therefore, the growing economic backwardness of Jammu and Kashmir during the 2nd half of 19th century and early 20th century, and its consequences. The leadership, on the basis of their understanding of the economic policies of Dogra regime in Kashmir, formulated an alternative program for the development of an independent national economy. One can say without doubt that National Conference leadership got much popularity and success due to the redress of the economic grievances rather than of political issues. Though it is naïve to believe that only a single cause can lead to a mass outburst, yet the dominant trend has to be kept in view; in the present case the dominant cause was certainly economic in nature. The proverbial economic backwardness stultifying all progress put the whole economic spectrum in disorder. The absence of any kind of growth whether social, economic or political largely resulted in the stagnation of the society. The economic exploitation, problem of social (dis)adjustment and political domination by an ‘alien’ group gave rise to a vigorous battle for self-identification of the people suffering under an imposed political system which had rendered them sullen and submissive. Acknowledgements

‘I count myself in nothing else so happy As in a soul remembering my good friends’ —William Shakespeare

I claim responsibility for any flaws and errors in judgment that might be found at this time while offering profuse and humble thanks to those who have helped me take a seed of an idea and develop it into a thesis. I am obliged to many involved directly and indirectly in writing this thesis. I am beholden particularly to Prof. S. Liyaqat. H. Moini, my thesis advisor and mentor, for guiding me all through the writing of this thesis. His insightful suggestions, critique, and helpful guidance gave this thesis its final shape and meaning. Throughout my thesis writing period he provided encouragement, sound advice, good teaching, and lots of good ideas. I record my gratitude to Dr. Abdul Majid Pandith, my all-time favourite teacher for his provocative perceptive comments; his comments helped me to be serious. Our regular conservations have served to shape this project and kept me moving forward when I felt like I was getting only deeper in the woods. A statement of thanks here falls very short of being commensurate with the gratitude I have for his mentorship.

Much gratitude is due to Dr. Sunaullah Mir (Parwaz) for always reminding me of the bigger picture of academia, for providing countless dinners to help with nourishment, and above all, for being an inspiring educator. Sir, thank you for your incredible generosity in sharing both your knowledge and time.

Of course, I also owe many thanks to Prof. Tariq Ahmed, Chairman, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History, A.M.U., whose continued support, interest and concern I shall always be grateful for. Sir, you not only been more generous with your time, encouragement and suggestions than anyone could hope to expect, but you have also inspired me with your own dedication and exemplary humanitarian approach. I would also like to thank my pre-submission presentation team of examiners Prof. Tariq Ahmed, Prof. S.L.H. Moini, Dr. M.K. Pundhir and Dr. Hassan Imam who provided me an encouraging and constructive feedback. I owe an incalculable debt to Prof. Mohammad Afzal Khan, Prof. Mohammad Ashraf Wani, Prof. M. Yusuf Ganai, Prof. Jigar Mohammad, Dr. Syed Latif Hussain Kazmi and Dr. Javid-ul-Aziz for their encouragement, suggestions and intellectual support. I also acknowledge the various authors and institutions whose writings and help contributed to the content of my thesis. The intellectual environment of A.M.U. has also been critical in enabling me to maintain my motivation and enthusiasm.

My friends made sure that I ignore moments of despair and continue working on the project. To my dear friends, thank you for those weekly discussions I always looked forward to. I thank them all for keeping me grounded and reminding me what is important. I also thank many colleagues who have encouraged and helped me over the years, in ways great and small, sometimes probably without even realizing it.

I save my family, especially my father Mr. Ali Muhammad and my mother Mrs. Khadija, for last as they have an omnipresent and omniscient significance in my life. I have learned not to take for granted the unconditional love they offered so willingly. There are no words that measure up to suitably thanking one’s parents. My modest attempt follows. Thank you for shaping and informing my life’s path so far and for always responding with ‘of course, you can!’ to every hair -brained scheme I developed. Your wonderful sense of humour and strength kept me stuck to my job. My brothers and sisters listened to all my woes with kindness and always showed more faith in my ability to complete this study than I myself did. My in-laws frequently provided emotional support which was indeed crucial for me. Their indefatigable optimism and steadfastness has kept me connected to the process and enabled me to preserve through it. There are too many of you to list here, but please know that there is a part of all of you in all the pages that follow.

And I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the financial and moral support which I received from various persons, who thought that the study was fascinating and quelled moments of self-doubt. With great honour and delight I record my deep sense of gratitude to them for their kind cooperation that kept me animated. Above all, the completion of the thesis, whatever accomplishments I have realized along the way, I owe to my fiancée Sheikh Saira Hassan. Her spirit and determination have carried me through. She supported me along the journey. I owe her so much; I wish I had more to share in return.

My Thanks are due to the staff at the National Archives of India (New Delhi), Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (New Delhi), Jammu and Kashmir State Archives (Jammu, and Srinagar), Research and Publications Department (Government of Jammu and Kashmir), J & K Academy of Art, Culture and Languages (Srinagar), Seminar Library, Department of History, (University of Kashmir), Allama Iqbal Library (University of Kashmir), Seminar Library, Department of History (A.M.U.), Maulana Azad Library (A.M.U.), Central Library, Delhi University, and Jawaharlal Nehru University Library for their support and cooperation. I can’t, however, fail to acknowledge my heartfelt gratitude to Peer Abdul Rashid, Librarian, Trehgam Public Library for being so generous and cooperative in providing some valuable books for my thesis. This thesis is dedicated to my younger brother Mushtaq Ahmad Shiekh —with due respect, appreciation, and love —who untiringly supported me and sacrificed his career to help me stick to the way that I have chosen. I will always remember his dedication, excitement, and advice; his help has been priceless.

Ab. Rashid Shiekh Contents

Acknowledgements i Introduction

Chapter 1 Histori cal Overview of 1 Jammu & Kashmir State

Chapter 2 Psychological Impact of 15 the ‘Sale Deed’

Chapter 3 Economic Structure and 30 Making of the Crisis-I Agrarian Conditions; Institution of Jagirdari ; Lawrence Settlement; Peasantry and Peasant Existence —A Conceptual Framework ; Forced Labour

Chapter 4 Economic Structure and 86 Making of the Crisis-II Inherent Industrial Potential of the State; Shawl Industry ; Taxation; Silk Industry ; Fluctuation in Prices ; Wages; State of Trade and Commerce

Chapter 5 Emergence of Political Awakening 118 Twentieth Century Parallels; Early Phase; Contextualizing 1931 Events; Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah, National Conference and Kashmir —A Transitional Phase

Conclusion 187 Appendices 191

Illustrations 207

Bibliography 211

i

Introduction

Statement of the Thesis

An impressive structural transformation accompanied the monumental alteration in the economic composition of the Valley of Kashmir in particular, and the state of Jammu and Kashmir in general in 1846, after the emergence of a new ruling structure through the Treaty of Amritsar. This new structure was fundamentally rooted in a desire to exploit the purchased territories economically and was, therefore, reserved in respect of developing anything beneficial for the masses. It was a structure with remarkable deprivation, destitution and oppression where even ideas were suppressed and civil and political rights denied to the vast majority of people.

The national awakening of Kashmir was an outcome of the character and policies of the Dogra rule which brought its whole spectrum of life and culture to the brink of devastation. Since the main thrust of the regime was on economic exploitation, it became the most formidable cause for national uprising. It not only brought about the consciousness but also became instrumental in shaping and styling the movement. The programs and agenda of the Muslim Conference unmistakably reveal the deep impact of economic factor.

Kashmir became a part of the newly created state of Jammu and Kashmir ostensibly through a sale deed which deprived it of even having the status of a conquered territory. The whole valley was commoditized and sold like property. As a result it was treated more as an economic asset rather than a political possession. To add to this psychological trauma was the religious, linguistic and cultural divide between the rulers ’ own territories and Kashmir. Thus bereft of any bond with the people, the Dogra regime backed by the mighty British Empire reduced Kashmir to a serfdom. Starting with agriculture the regime gradually took over industry, trade and commerce, lakes, forests, and other natural resources for back-breaking taxation. Not satisfied, the naked and semi- starved human beings themselves were forced to act as beasts of burden for government forces and officials without any remuneration. In fact the oppression pursued even after death when the grave diggers were also subjected to tax. ii

There was such callous disregard for human misery that the famine enquiry report of 1878 showed that large number of deaths could have been avoided if only the cultivators would have been permitted to cut their crops before the start of rains that destroyed the autumn harvest of 1877. The rigid adherence to the revenue system in which assessments were made on the standing crops delayed the reaping operation.

The manpower required to man the official machinery were picked up from minority community, thus adding a communal dimension to the mechanism of exaction. The religious divide between the rulers and the ruled made class and community identical. The seemingly communal character which the resistance movement of the Muslims took was in consequence to the state policy which had communalized the political and economic fabric of the society to such an extent that the interests of the two communities became mutually exclusive: one the tenant, other the land holder; one the tax payer, other the collector; one the oppressed, other the oppressor; and one the subject, other the master. The bulldozing impact of this wanton oppression, exploitation and discrimination was that the social differences and class distinctions within Muslim society got obliterated to such an extent that progressive secular Muslims and traditional religious people made a common cause.

The people suffering under such a system for ages together need a complete shakeup to awake up to the high ideals of freedom and emancipation. Centuries of subjugation not only breed pessimism and make subordination a habit, but more importantly make man a matter of course. When occupation of a people is accompanied by an intentional campaign of dehumanization and mere biological survival becomes the sole motto, it needs a shake to the core which simultaneously threatens all the main purpose of life and an urge for revival is born. When the two times ’ meals to keep the soul and body together are difficult to come by, even after long days of toil and hard work, a rebellion is born.

It is not that economic factor is solely responsible for any revolution particularly when fatalism has become the norm. It takes collective working of social, political, cultural, religious and economic forces to rekindle elements of vitality in a society. But economic factor plays the dominant role as it touches every soul with equal intensity. The iii generalization made here, like the generalization in social and human sciences, is meant to indicate the dominant trend, fully conscious of the fact what E.H. Carr puts as ‘history is a process, and you can’t isolate a bit of the process and throw it on its own… everything is completely interconnected.’

The division within the territories of maharaja was known for their own specialization. Jammu was a sign of power centre where activities mostly of political nature were carried out. The territory of Kashmir was multi-dimensional in nature. It was in focus both in the eyes of the maharaja as well as in the British imperial power. It was a place within the territorial expansion of the maharaja which was paramount both in respect of economic as well political dimensions. To him it was more significant economically than politically; for the British, it was the other way round. Gulab Singh became the master of the province which during the preceding period was just next to Multan in respect of revenue generation.

Since a new ruling structure was brought about, this led to certain changes in the administration. But it was precisely under the aegis of the colonial rule that the new regime put a permanent siege over the interests and rights of the vast majority of its Muslim subjects. Peasants in a small holding structure with as yet limited differentiation lived under common yet individually fragmented conditions of social and economic existence. Religious communitarian identity under these circumstances imparted the social base of solidarity to articulate class based political demands. In addition, the decisive undermining of the artisanal economy threw many weavers ―who formed the most important component in the non-agrarian system― into the ranks of agricultural labour and forged a potential link between weaver and peasants discontents.

The ‘feudal ’ regulations hampered growth of production. There was a class whose main aim was not consumption but accumulation; there was the other who could not retain beyond what was required for subsistence. With the result the condition of the peasantry and urban working classes went out of gear, and none of these classes got a moment of thought for a long period of time; consequently these classes sunk low, passing through the worsening stages of poverty and degradation, reaching a stage where society almost refused to confer on them the status of human beings. To escape from such iv a situation was an uphill task but once these downtrodden classes realized their potential and significance for the society as a whole, they preferred not to lose any chance of the redress of their grievances.

The corpus of works available on the Kashmir’s struggle fo r independence has been written from different perspectives. However, no work has been conducted exclusively from an economic angle although it was the most dominant factor responsible for the growth of national consciousness among the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The present work attempts to explore the economic dimension, with some focus on other aspects too, in order to have a fuller understanding of the whole dynamics of the rise of the national movement. The previous studies have only given a surface treatment to the economic aspect; therefore, a need was felt to have a thorough understanding of this facet. The present study is an attempt to analyze the economic trajectory of Kashmir since 1846 to 1947, and its contribution to the growth of political consciousness in the state of Jammu and Kashmir.

The studies carried out so far on the theme of the ‘struggle for freedom in Kashmir’ are numerous and to review them all is beyond the scope of this work. Some significant works which have a paramount importance and relevance with regard to the study of the freedom struggle in Kashmir include Prem Nath Bazaz’s Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir (1954), G.H. Khan’s Freedom Movement in Kashmir (1987), M.Y. Saraf’s Kashmiris Fight for Freedom (1977), F.M. Hassnain’s Freedom Struggle in Kashmir (1988), U.K. Zutshi ’s Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir (1986), and M.Y. Ganai’s Kashmir’s Struggle for Independence (2003). The said writers have used a wide range of sources and a study of these works gives a basic outline of facts to the reader and enables a new researcher to explore the various dimensions left out by these writers and scholars. Each work is qualified in its own way.

Prem Nath Bazaz’s work may be taken more as a source and account of the facts than a complete history of the struggle for freedom in Kashmir. The author being personally witness to the developments has an immense contribution in recording, collecting and presenting the various facets pertaining to the struggle for freedom in Kashmir. His book despite giving a clear outline of the nature and character of the Dogra v regime has nonetheless undermined the role of various important characteristics that were hallmarks of the freedom movement. According to E.H. Carr, ‘in the first place the fac ts of histor y never come to us “pure”, since they do not and can’t exist in a pure form; they are always refracted through the mind of the recorder. It follows that when we take up the work of history, our first concern should not be with the facts which it contains but with the historian who wrote it.’ Bazaz , despite being the champion of highlighting the sufferings of the people of Jammu and Kashmir, has offered a minimum space to the historical facts and reality which otherwise form the bedrock of the freedom movement. He has overlooked the role and nature of the Muslim Conference, the first-ever political organization of the state. The author has not highlighted the role of the Muslim conference and the policies and programs formulated by it regarding the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The book has been written more with a pre-determined notion of facts rather than with an open mind.

The author has showed an open bias against the National Conference, especially after 1940’s onwards when he himself left the Conference; the author gives clear impression of a political rival rather than of a historian. Being a non-professional history writer he has not followed any proper methodology about the subject. Despite these drawbacks the book makes an important source for writing the history of the struggle for freedom in Jammu and Kashmir.

G.H. Khan’s Freedom Movement in Kashmir is more a summary of facts than a historical account. Though the study has covered a wide range of sources, it has been written under the official patronage of the post-1947 National Conference which to a large extent undermines the importance of the work. The work being from professor of political science lacks the depth required for a historical work. Each event and fact has been discussed under a separate sub heading which not only affects the essence of continuity but also creates problems in assessing the causes and effects of the various incidents in a cohesive manner.

M.Y. Saraf’s Kashmiris Fight for Freedom study is more like a collection and narration of facts than a thematic work. Volume first, which deals with the pre-1947 Kashmir doesn’t have any specific introduction and conclusion, which leaves the reader vi in wilderness without any concrete opinion and view of the history of the said subject. Like Khan, the author was also not the student of history and has, in several cases, failed to assess the value and impact of the facts and events in historical perspective.

F.M. Hassnain’s Freedom Struggle in Kashmir has given a superficial treatment to facts. The book seems to be more a dedication to the role played by the National Conference and does not offer a holistic view of the role of other organizations, individuals and circumstances. The author doesn’t provide any specific view and conclusion to his facts, which leaves the reader without any pragmatic view of the phenomena of the struggle for freedom in Kashmir.

U.K. Zutshi’s Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir , is based on a wide range of sources and has raised many queries and questions with regard to the emergence of mass awakening in Kashmir. Zutshi has presented various facts and has scrutinized the views of various authors professionally. But the author has not put the views and facts of his own work in a proper context and historical setting. The author has various views with regard to various historical events but most of the time they seem vague in nature. The greatest contradiction, perhaps, in his work is his viewpoint about the upsurge of 1931 which goes as: ‘the interaction between the all -pervading compulsions of British imperialism, the forces it generated and the changes it wrought in Kashmir seems to have resulted in the upsurge of 1931.’ 1 Through this argument the author squarely dismisses that the political consciousness among the people of Kashmir was at all responsible for the political upsurge; instead, he claims, the events were caused by the policy employed in Kashmir by the colonial government! Indeed one cannot ignore the role played by the British agency in the mass outburst of 1931, as has also been pointed out by authors like N.N. Raina; at the same time, it is nebulous to side line the Maharaja’s policies in every sphere of life in Kashmir which were, undoubtedly, primarily responsible for the accumulation of the mass discontent. Also, the British imperial power made changes in the nature and arrangement of power in the administrative domain of Dogra regime according to the imperial exigencies but these changes, as aptly argued by Christopher

1 U.K. Zutshi, Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir , Manohar Publications, New Delhi, 1986, p. 231. vii

Snedden, ‘did little to reduce Hari Singh’s overall power and internal control. Indeed, the British allowed Hari Singh to engage in practices that kept the majority of his subjects politically un-empowered and with no effective role in determining the fate of their lives or the lands on which they lived. ’2 Again, as has been remarked by Mridu Rai, ‘it is significant that the State of Jammu and Kashmir, formed in 1846, did not have Resident imposed on it until as late as 1885. And even then, although the Resident did indeed become an instrument of colonial interference within the State, there was always a significant lag between the colonial state’s ‘orders’ and their interpretation by the Dogra rulers. Indirect rule, in other words, still provided princely states with substantial leeway to determine their relations with their subjects’. 3

M.Y. Ganai’s Kashmir’s Struggle for Independence (1931-39) in the recent academic genre is a good addition to the existing corpus which deals with explaining the nature and character of the Dogra regime. The book, having used a wide range of sources, has more or less projected a perspective in it ―that Dogra regime was not only autocratic but also ‘communal’ . According to Ganaie, the freedom movement despite being primarily driven by economic factors assumed ‘communal’ colour, especially when the non-Muslims refused to become a part of the mainstream.4 However, in spite of admitting that the freedom struggle was a derivative of ‘economic nationalism’ , the said author does not keep focused on that very theme. Moreover, the work suffers from the paradox that the political struggle of the Muslims assumed ‘communal’ colour even when the author himself cites at many places the instances which refute his very argument.

Each work has made an indubitable contribution in exploring the various facets of the freedom struggle but among the aforesaid works no work has studied the economic factor in its totality; the economic factor has been treated as a product rather than a cause. The present study attempts to study the economic factor in an evolutionary, comparative, chronological and thematic framework. By the turn of the twentieth century the Kashmiris were hit hard by rising prices, diminishing employment opportunities in

2 Christopher Snedden, Kashmir the Unwritten History , Harper Collins Publishers India, 2013, p. 13. 3 Mridu Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir , Permanent Black, New Delhi, 2004, p. 14. 4 Muhammad Yusuf Ganai, Kashmir’s Struggle for Independence 1931 -1939, Mohsin Publications, Srinagar, 2003, p. 37. viii government services or professions and restrictions on sale and mortgage of their landed assets. This helped to create a curious amalgam of radicalism and social inhibitions which is crucial to the understanding of nationalism in Kashmir. The struggle for freedom was basically the result of a fundamental contradiction between the interests of the people and that of the Dogra autocratic regime. In time an economic ideology developed which was to dominate the post 1930’s Kashmir.

The people of Kashmir marched from the ‘realm of necessity to the realm of freedom’ and the year 1931 was the culmination of that. The thesis raises the question why did the uprising of 1931 break out as and when it broke out? The study identifies both the underlying and the triggering causes of the uprising.

Most of the studies have largely put the role of National Conference leadership as the harbinger of the nationalist consciousness among the people of Jammu and Kashmir. Of course, it played an important role but its role should not be treated as the national movement itself; national movement was much larger than the National Conference. It was a people’s effort to assert themselves. Besides, one cannot simply ignore the social and economic forces. Historical events are sometimes determined not by the conscious actions of individuals, but by some extraneous and all powerful forces guiding their unconscious will.

The present study is based on a wide range of sources. Among the conventional sources the focus is on primary sources which include the archival material from the Jammu and Kashmir State Archives (Srinagar and Jammu) and the National Archives of India (New Delhi). The departments of the National Archives from which records have been procured include the Foreign Department, Foreign and Political Department, and Home Department. The available records have been thoroughly used with a very critical examination of the literal and real meaning of the text.

The Jammu and Kashmir Government records accessible in the Jammu repository and the Srinagar repository of the Jammu and Kashmir State Archives have been used in this study extensively. The records which have been explored are: official documents, reports, memoranda, and press cuttings from the records of the Political Department, ix

General Department, Education Department, Vernacular Department, Old English Records and Publicity Department. Moreover, some of the rare books and manuscripts available in the Government of Jammu and Kashmir Research and Publication Department Srinagar pertaining to our period of study have also been used with an adequate scrutiny to eliminate all possible errors and generalizations.

Besides this, to minimize the limitations of the official documents and reports non-conventional sources have also been relied upon. The Kashmiri poetic literature available in the Jammu and Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages (Srinagar) proved an immense help in the probing and understanding of the undersigned theme. In the present study, a thorough investigation of census reports, official documents, private diaries, newspapers, and pamphlets has been made with the aim to build this historical mansion on the sound foundation of facts, with the objective of shedding new light on the past, which involves both the addition of new explored facts and the (re)interpretation of the known facts. Some of these have been accessed from the Archives while others from persons having a sense of recollecting the past records. Also, a few reliable online sites, such as, the ProQuest, Forgottenbooks.com, Archives.org, Jstor.org and the Digital Library of India, have been of immense help. The newspapers mostly used in this study are the Times of India (Bombay), the Muslim Outlook (Lahore), Siyasat (Lahore), the Tribune (Lahore), Al-Fazal (Qadian) and Hamdard (Srinagar).

Moreover, there is a scarcity of statistical data. Furthermore, the fragility of the data together with a lack of adequate archival material which is not made available to the researchers in the National Archives of India beyond the year 1929, poses a serious limitation; but to transcend this limitation the present study has attempted to make use of non-conventional sources such as folk narratives, oral histories and poetic literature. Regarding the general economic conditions of the people and their standard of living like entitlements and purchasing power, information has been drawn from various Government Gazetteers, Administrative Reports, and official proceedings.

The study comprises of five chapters. Chapter one starts with a theoretical discussion attempting to analyze the primary factors that led to the creation of the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir in the backdrop of the changing geo-political x scenario of the Sikh empire after the death of Ranjit Singh in 1839 and the results of the first Anglo Sikh War in 1845-46. The chapter also brings into focus the nature of the Treaty of Amritsar through which Kashmir was sold to Maharaja Gulab Singh. In this chapter an attempt has been made to cross-check the opinion of various historians and writers on the Treaty of Amritsar with an alternative framework. The chapter concludes with the opinion that the Treaty of Amritsar was more a ‘Sale Deed’ than a reward for the services of Maharaja Gulab Singh.

Chapter two develops the theme further with total concentration on the Treaty of Amritsar delineating the results and the impact of the Treaty on the mass psyche of Kashmir. The chapter discusses the structural change brought about by the Treaty and the way people of Jammu and Kashmir were treated by the Dogra Maharaja. The treaty consisting of ten articles was carved out at the complete alienation of Kashmiris. The region of Kashmir was occupied with its people at a psychologically most disadvantageous position, that is, as a bought-up commodity, while Ladakh joined as a conquered territory. This varied background had deep impact on the future psyche of the inhabitants of the three constituents. While Jammu had a sense of contentment as the power centre, Kashmiris who were left unrepresented and unprotected suffered from a sense of humiliation, dispossession and deprivation. By virtue of the Treaty began a process that enabled the overlooking, if not the outright exclusion, of the elementary rights of the people of Kashmir.

Chapter third examines the pattern of new agrarian relations that began to emerge in Kashmir from 1846 onwards. A drastic change took place in the agrarian composition of Kashmir. The ownership of the land with the king during the Dogra period was the new dimension which they added to land management problem of Kashmir. This new type of proprietorship meant as a sort of partible inheritance where the state is having the ownership rights and the cultivator acts as the primary laborer on the land he cultivates. This also gave rise to a pervasive system of exactions —both perennial and incidental — by the state machinery, the result of which was that the nineteenth century Kashmir got dominated by rural elite, with rich landlords exploiting the landless peasantry. xi

An attempt has also been made in the chapter to evaluate the impact of land revenue settlement, carried out by Walter Lawrence, on the socio-economic structure of Kashmir. The chapter endeavours to bring to fore the results of the agricultural policy which threw up the society into a situation in which a microscopic population lived a life of luxury, while the toiling masses were reduced to a pauperized lot who battled for barest survival. The peasant population remained stagnant and didn’t register much progress and the agricultural structure received a great setback as the peasantry lost interest in cultivation. The system of revenue collection proved a great boon for the revenue machinery as it provided considerable source of peculation to them. The merciless extraction of the maximum revenue from the cultivators, without providing them any incentive for necessary expansion, prevented any further large scale agricultural expansion. There was an absolute absence of peasant welfare measures. The main motto of the ruling elite had been, to quote Arthur Cotton (the outstanding authority on the on the modern irrigation works in India), ‘Do nothing, have nothing done, let nobody do anything. Bear any loss, let the people die of famine, let hundreds of lakhs be lost in revenue for want of water, or roads, rather than to do nothing.’ 5 The chapter aims to analyze the various methods practised by the state of which peasant was the direct focus. The main theme of the chapter is to examine the taxation system, peasant surplus, government monopoly on the distribution of rice; the impact of the forced labour on the agrarian structure, the social relations maintained by the Dogras which compel the overburdening, condemn the mass of cultivators to lives of increasing harassment and semi-starvation, the consequences of all these methods over the peasant consciousness and the role played by the emerging leadership in relation to the peasants’ cause.

Chapter four deals with the non-agrarian economic structure of the state. The chapter discusses in detail the historical evolution of both the shawl and silk industry and the role of the state in respect to their development. The chapter makes a case study of the interventionist role of the state into these industries and its consequences. It has been argued that the state-of-affairs in both the shawl and the silk industry has had a deep bearing on the growth of the national awakening in Kashmir. Both industries met with

5 Arthur Cotton quoted in, R. Palme Dutt, India Today , the Indian edition of 1969, pp. 213-14. xii crisis, and hence the shawl-baf revolt in 1865 and the silk factory revolt in 1924. The chapter highlights the importance of these industries to the state economy and deliberates upon the main problems faced by the people associated with these industries and their role in the mass awakening of Kashmir. The decline of shawl industry and shawl trade proved decisive in changing the course of the history of Kashmir. The shawl merchants who were a powerful class in the Kashmir valley mostly residing in the city of Srinagar, were trading in a commodity that brought Darbar lakhs of rupees as revenue; they also determined the Darbar’s relationship with the outside world. The decline of the powerful class of shawl merchants had far-reaching significance for the evolution of the social and political setting of late ninetieth and early twentieth century Kashmir.

Chapter five probes into the emergence of various forces and their role in highlighting conditions of the people of Kashmir. The chapter has placed the role of various socio-religious reform movements in historical context, as the twentieth century social milieu of Kashmir corresponded to similar movements in the ninetieth century British India. The chief objective of their mission was to secure self-identity for the people of Kashmir so that they could obtain for themselves an honourable status in social, economic and political spheres, which was almost denied to them. The chapter has examined the role of external factors like the Punjab press, the Khilafat movement, and the Civil Disobedience movement, since these factors significantly influenced the political consciousness of the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

The chapter has also highlighted the emergence of the middle class of Kashmir during early 1930s and their role in establishing an organized leadership to put an end to the Dogra rule. The pre-1931 economic scenario, which played the primary role in the outburst of 1931 uprising in Jammu and Kashmir, has been discussed in detail in the chapter. The events of 1931 culminated in the formation of the first political organization of the state in 1932 —All Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Conference —under the leadership of Shiekh Mohammad Abdullah. The leadership intended to present the Conference as an organization of the down trodden classes. Its flag, for instance, was red in color with a white plough in center, representing socialist revolution for the Kashmiri peasantry. One of the central arguments that the chapter carries is the extent to which the leadership was xiii able to create a mass base with an open economic orientation of their policies rooted in the antiquated social ethos of twentieth century Kashmir. In the end, the nature of the movement, the influence of the Indian National Congress upon the leadership of Kashmir and the formulation by the National Conference leadership of an alternative framework — the Naya Kashmir Manifesto —for the economic reconstruction of Jammu and Kashmir have been analyzed and discussed in the chapter.

To sum up, the principal theme which the study delves into is the nature of the political mobilization which it argues was rooted in the economic exploitation and deprivation. The study dissects the potential of the economic root as a rallying point behind the national awakening of Jammu and Kashmir.

It is important to note here that the terms used in the present study like ‘national awakening’ or ‘nationalism’, or even ‘nation’ for that matter, are not meant to be taken in the strict sense as is usually used by scholars within a particular methodological space; delving deeper into such terminology has been deliberately avoided in this study in order to not to deviate from the actual subject that this study aims to address. It can be safely presumed that here ‘nationalism’ or ‘national awakening’ correspond jointly to the community attempts towards amelioration from the exploitation and deprivation and were later joined by the other communities for the common good of all. The terms used are more a representative of the territorial conceptions of the leadership and the people and their yearning for rescuing the oppressed from the oppressors through nationalism than a theorization of the idealistic concepts like what constitutes a nation or what nationalism is. 1

Chapter 1

Historical Overview of Jammu & Kashmir State

Jammu and Kashmir has a long kaleidoscopic history. Much of the history of Kashmir is a record of the exploits of adventurers, who have subjected the inhabitants to the tyranny of a foreign and oppressive rule. 1 Kalhana, the twelfth century historian, gives a connected account of the history of the valley, which may be accepted as trustworthy record from the middle of the 9 th century onwards. Kal hana’s work was continued by Jonaraja, who brought the history through the troubled times of the last Hindu dynasties, and the first Muslim rulers, to the time of the great king of Kashmir Zain-ul-Abidin, who ascended the throne in 1420. The establishment of the Muslim rule in the fourteenth century which lasted for about five hundred years 2 without a break and left an indelible mark on the en tire matrix of Kashmir’s socio -economic, cultural and religious mosaic, when the bulk of the population became converts to Islam.

Another Sanskrit Chronicler, Srivara, carries on the narrative to the accession of Fateh Shah in 1486: and the last of the Chronicles, the Rajavalipataka, brings the record down to 1586, when the valley was conquered by Akbar. 3 Among the turbulent and brave Chaks Yakub khan, the last of the line, offered a stubborn resistance to Akbar, and with the help of the Bamba and Khakha tribes routed the Mughal army on their first attempt to the valley in 1582. But later, not without difficulty and some reverse, Kashmir was finally conquered in 1586. Akbar accomplished the conquest of Kashmir and made it a part of the province of Kabul. 4

For nearly two subsequent centuries it fell into the condition of an appendage of the Mughal emperors.5 Emperor Akbar himself visited the valley three times. He brought with him his revenue minister Todar Mal and settled the revenue arrangements of the

1 Dermot Norris , Kashmir the Switzerland of India A descriptive Guide with chapters on Sking and Mountaineering, Large and Small Game Shooting, Fishing, etc., London, 1932, p. 5. 2 Foreign Department, (K.W Secret-E), File No. 86, March 1883, NAI. 3 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol.XV, Karachi to Kotayam , Oxford, 1908, p. 90. 4 Ibid., p. 93. 5 Sir Francis Younghusband, Kashmir , London, 1911, p. 157. 2

valley. Todar Mal made a very summary record of the fiscal conditions of the valley. 6 But their rule coul dn’t register much progress and proved oppressive for the biggest segment of the population of Kashmir, the peasantry, as they increased land revenue from one-third to one-half, to bring uniformity in its fiscal system 7 ignoring, however, the single crop economic pattern of Kashmir. While the Mughal rule was underlined by oppression, drain of wealth and withdrawal of patronage from local talent and productive sectors, it on the other hand promoted the trade links with the Indian subcontinent, thereby benefiting the craft sector of Kashmir. No less important consequence of the Mughal rule was the laying down of pleasure gardens which became the permanent tourism asset of Kashmir.

The decline of the Mughal Empire, hastened by the capture of Delhi by Nadir Shah, in 1739, occasioned changes in the valley, and after several abortive attempts on the part of its governors to establish an independent rule, Kashmir was annexed in the year 1753 by Ahmad Shah Abdali, the Afghan ruler, and included Kashmir in the Durani Empire. From 1753 to 1819, it remained a portion of the Empire, being governed by Pathan Governors, whose rule was neither mild nor beneficial. 8 While Mughals made India their home, married, lived and died on the soil, the case with the Afghans was entirely different. Theirs, undoubtedly, was one of the harshest regimes that have ever taken hold of Kashmir. 9

It was with a feeling of satisfaction that the inhabitants of the country welcomed the change of masters which occurred after many sanguinary contests; the forces of Ranjit Singh defeated the Pathans, and Kashmir became a part of the Sikh empire. From 1819 to 1846, a series of rapacious Governors aided by famine, earthquakes and Pestilence reduced the population to 200,000 and turned half the cultivable area into a waste. 10 The abject condition of the Kashmiris has been well described by the French naturalist Victor Jacqumount, who visited the valley in 1833, and therefore, spared the pain of assisting as a spectator at the latest phase of national degradation. The Afghans,

6 W.R. Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, London, 1891, p. 194. 7 Ain-i-Akbari, tr. Jarrett, Vol. 2, Calcutta, 1949, p. 366. 8 W. Wakefield, The Happy Valley , London, 1879, p. 82. 9 M.Y. Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom , Lahore, 2005, p. 50. 10 Foreign Department, (K.W Secret-E), March, 1883, File No. 86, NAI. 3

he wrote, ‘Having during the last century despoiled the Mughals in this century, a general pillage has ensued upon each conquest, and in the intervals of peace, anarchy and oppression have done their utmost against labour and industry, so that the country is completely ruined, and the poor Kashmiris appear to have thrown the handle of the hatchet and to have become the most indolent of mankind. If one must fast, better to do so with folded arms than binding beneath the weight of the toil. In Kashmir there is hardly any better chance of meal for the man who works, weaves or piles the oar than for him who, in despair, slumbers all day beneath the shade of the plane tree. The Sikhs with swords at their sides or pistols in their belts, drive along like flock of sheep these people. Let the Dogras be substituted for the Sikhs.’ 11 Under the rule of the Sikhs Kashmir continued to be governed pretty much as usual by the representatives of the Sikh monarch, who never visited it himself, and whose principal object in its possession seemed to be the squeezing out of it as much revenue as its falling fortunes would allow. 12

As is a well-known that every rise has a fall, so, witnessed the Sikh Empire at Lahore. Maharaja Ranjit Singh died in 1839. After his death there was much violence and mutiny among the Sikh soldiery and the weak successors who were imbecile and inefficient couldn’t hold the Sikh Empire intact. 13 By this time Jammu was also a part of the Sikh empire. After the death of the Raja Ranjit Dev in 1871, Jammu and other principalities around it had become a part of the Sikh Empire. Gulab Singh (who was a descendent of Dhruva Dev), a petty chieftain of the hills, entered the services of the Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1812.14 As a reward for his loyal services he was awarded the title of Raja and granted the principality of Jammu in 1819. 15

Emboldened by the new rank, Gulab Singh started the process of consolidating Jammu. By the time of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s death in 1839 A.D., he had subjugated

11 Ibid. 12 Wakefield, The Happy Valley , p. 82. 13 Younghusband, Kashmir , p. 162. 14 Prem Nath Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, Srinagar, 1941, p. 26. 15 Ibid. In 1807 when Ranjit Singh’s troops were attacking Jammu, Gulab Singh distinguished himself by his services that he gained the favour of Ranjit Singh. After that he took service under the Sikh Ruler and when Sikhs acquired their influence over Jammu in 1818, they handed it over to Gulab Singh as a jagir. Gulab Singh was also given the title Raja. See Younghusband, Kashmir, p. 164. 4

most of the neighbouring territories and confiscated the fiefs of some feudal chiefs, where as in ‘other cases he had retained and attached to his government the nobles, while gradually lessening their political importance.’ 16 In the process he laid the foundation of a centralized government. He defined his concept as an effective government as one ‘in which the authority of the ruler was assured by force and the revenue came punctually.’ 17 Gulab Singh therefore, relied on the effective use of force as the basic objective and a method of political control throughout the period of their rule.18 Gulab Singh, a man of extraordinary power, very quickly asserted his authority. His methods were often cruel and unscrupulous, but allowances must be made. He believed in object-lessons, and his penal system was at any rate successful in purging the country of crime. He kept a sharp eye on his officials and a close hand on his revenues. Rapidly absorbing the power and possessions of the feudal chiefs around him, after ten years of laborious and consistent effort, he and his two brothers became masters of nearly all the country between Kashmir and the Punjab, except Rajouri. 19

The long internecine strife which followed the death of Ranjit Singh sapped the Sikh Darbar of its validity. The existence of a strong and hostile Sikh State in the North West of India couldn’t but be a constant danger to the safety of the British Indian Empire. The conquest of Punjab had, therefore, been an intense desire of the East India Company to complete its territorial aggrandizement. The game came to its conclusion after the breakout of the first Anglo Sikh war in January 1846; the Sikh army, commanded by decrepit and corrupt military leaders many of whom were in clandestine contact with the British, was defeated at a number of successive engagements. 20 The Darbar at Lahore turned to Gulab Singh, who had remained aloof from the scuffle so far, for leadership and invited him to take control of the affairs at Lahore. He was installed as Wazir at Lahore in 1846.21

16 Fredric Drew, The Jammu & Kashmir Territories: A Geographical Account, reprint, Srinagar, 1999, p. 13. 17 Ibid., p. 14. 18 G.H. Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir 1931-1940, New Delhi, 1980, p. 1. 19 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol. xv , pp. 94-5. 20 S.N. Gadru, Kashmir Papers , Srinagar, 1973, p. xiv. 21 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 28. 5

Gulab Singh, an ambitious politician and a scheming statesman, had realized the way Sikh Darbar had drifted apart after the death of Ranjit Singh. He knew well the significance of the rising strength of the British and the British involvement in northern India. In the British power gnawing at the southern borders of the Sikh Empire, Gulab Singh could foresee his emancipation from the Sikh hegemony and a deterrent to its domineering might. He had likely been cultivating the strategy of securing the British support to carve an independent state for himself right after the fall of Dhyan Singh from power at Lahore. 22 As a matter of fact, soon after the death of Ranjit Singh, the whole political scenario at Lahore Darbar changed and hostilities ensued between the Sikhs and the British. Ellenborough reported to the Queen on 14 th Feb 1844, ‘in the hills Raja Gulab Singh is extending his power with his usual unscrupulous disregard of the rights of others and of the supremacy of the state he pretends to serve. This conduct however makes him very odious to the Sikhs at Lahore.’ 23

With such designs in mind it was now that Gulab Singh wouldn’t give an open front to the army of the East India Company from whom he wanted to have favour and support. He left no stone unturned and for that, he took the advantage of the disunity and distrust at the court. 24 His intentions got green signal after the last and the decisive battle of the 1 st Anglo Sikh war fought at Sabraon in 1846, where the British mounted offensive on the Sikh positions. 25 The victory in the war gave the English the territory between

22 Hasrat Bikram Jit, The Punjab Papers , New Delhi, 1970, p. 69. 23 Ibid. 24 Gadru, Kashmir Papers , p. xiv. Though, Gulab Singh took the lead and was on the prominent position in the defeat of the Sikhs, he was not alone; the other key holder also in close contact with the British proved as the game changer as well. Both the commanders in chief, Lal Singh and Tej Singh, were in league with the British and had been promised proper consideration in case the Sikh army was destroyed. Many of the other court dignitaries also were in a secret liaison with the British, seeking the destruction of the army which threatened their corrupt existence. Gulab Singh, therefore, was not alone in quest of pecuniary or political gains. The Sikh leaders except a few men of ‘honour’ were involved in the plot aimed to get the Sikh army beaten by the British and then collect whatever they could of the spoils. Gulab Singh, however, had an advantageous position. He held a huge and very lucrative fief, was rich in money and materials and quite a few powerful legions of hill troops to support him in case he needed force an issue. 25 Joseph Davey Cunningham, argues, ‘that it was the pre -fixed terms and conditions that the understanding of the contestants met by an understanding that the Sikh army should be attacked by the English, and that when beaten should be openly abandoned by its own government, and further, that the passage of the Sutlej should be unopposed and the road to the capital laid open to the victors. Under such circumstances of discreet policy and shameless treason was the battle of Sabraon fought where the soldiers did everything and the leaders nothing. Hearts to dare and the hands to execute were numerous, but there was no mind to guide and animate the whole. For details see Cunningham’s, History of the Sikhs, pp. 317-318, Bawa, Jammu Fox , p. 108. 6

Sutlej and Beas and a claim of £1, 00,000 as war indemnity 26 for the Sikhs were held entirely responsible for having provoked the British by breaching the treaty of friendship the British had signed with Ranjit Singh in 1809.

The Sikh Darbar was reluctant to pay the indemnity in the wake of the debacle at Sabraon and offered ‘in perpetual sovereignty…all forts, territories, rights and interests, in the hill countries between the river Beas and Indus, including the provinces of Kashmir and Hazara to the British Government ’.27 Included as article IV of the Lahore Treaty this demand also provided quite literally the opening for the second Treaty, the Treaty of Amritsar signed on 16 th March 1846. It was through this Treaty that the present state of Jammu and Kashmir including Ladakh, Baltistan, Gilgit were ceded to the Dogra 28 chief Maharaja Gulab Singh and he was recognized as an ‘independent ’ ruler. 29 In this way Kashmir once again was subjected to Hindu Rulers who, however, were non-Kashmiris and alien to the existing socio-cultural and economic fabric of the land.

Situated on the northern extremity of India the newly created princely state of Jammu and Kashmir occupied a very important and strategic position in the political map of the British Indian Empire. Its boundaries extended from the northern outskirts of the vast plains of the Punjab to the point where the borders of independent powers of Russia

26 Cunningham, The History of the Sikhs, p. 321. On the 15 th Feb. the Raja and several other chiefs were received by the Governor General at Kussoor, and they were told that the Dleep Singh would continue to be regarded as a friendly sovereign but the country between the Beas and the Sutlej would be retained by the Conquerors, and that a million and a half sterling must be paid as some indemnity for the expanses of the war and the 20 th February, the British army arrived in the Sikh Capital. 27 Charles Hardinge, Viscount Hardinge, Oxford, 1891, pp. 123-24. 28 The term Dogra was actually applied to the people dwelling between Siorensar and Mansar-two lakes and they claimed Rajput origin. Now there are many castes and many sects among the people. To one and all the term Dogra is applied and the only limits of the term are those of locality, for it is applied to hill tribes of all the faiths within a certain area. For details see Marion Doughty, A Foot through the Kashmir Valley, London, 1901, pp. 239-40. 29 Ashley Carus-wilson argues that, ‘Gulab Singh, the descendent of an old Dogra family, won confidence as mediator between contending parties in the distracted land. He was already Raja of Jammu, and in 1847, Lord Hardinge made him Maharaja of Kashmir. In fact, when the Treaty of Lahore closed the first Punjab war, he purc hased the throne out of the plunder he had carried off to Jammu from Ranjit Singh’s treasure in the fortress of Lahore. Politically the whole territory ruled by the Maharaja [was] called Kashmir, and formed a country equal in extent to England and Scotland. For details see Irene Petrie, Missionary to Kashmir, London, 1903, p. 109. 7

and China almost touched British India. The independent kingdom of Afghanistan met it on the North West. 30

From the societal point of view, the territorial composition, the identities of the subjects of the new state were characterized by a patchwork quality. 31 The three constituents of the state of Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh, their background as constituents of the state apart from the historical, religious and regional linguistic contradiction differed from one great immediate distinction rather con tradiction that is ‘as what’ they joined the new formation called the state of Jammu and Kashmir. While, Jammu was the ancestral fiefdom of the Maharaja with which he shared not only the dynastic lands but also linguistic cultural and religious affinities, the inclusion of Kashmir was a new phenomenon, which witnessed a fundamental change in the arrangement of new framework. 32 While the rulers were from Jammu the state itself drew its primary identity from control over Kashmir 33 most clearly illustrated by the fact that the short hand resorted to in referring to the state was always Kashmir.34

To return to our narrative, the Treaty of Amritsar was an off-shoot of the Treaty of Lahore. 35 By dint of the Treaty some territories were to be ceded by the Lahore Darbar to the British and the Darbar was obliged to pay. But in view of the non-payment of indemnity by the Lahore Darbar and the readiness of the Gulab Singh to pay the indemnity the British, keeping in view the stature, role and financial bankruptcy of their own treasury and Darbar, agreed to recognize, ‘the independent sovereignty of Raja Gulab Singh in such territories and districts in the hills as be made over to the said Raja by separate agreement between himself and the British Indian Government. 36

A week later, on 16 th March 1846, was signed a separate Treaty known in history as the Treaty of Amritsar by which the British Indian Government , ‘transferred forever i n

30 Shri Ganga Nath, Commission Report on Administration of Jammu and Kashmir , Jammu, 1944, p. 30. 31 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 36. 32 Ibid. 33 With the sale of Kashmir to Gulab Singh came into being a single entity known as Jammu and Kashmir because he was already holding Jammu-which witnessed nothing new and for Kashmir it was altogether a new phenomenon, in other words Gulab Singh proved as regime changer for Kashmir. 34 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 36. 35 The first Anglo Sikh war was concluded with the Treaty of Lahore on 9 th March 1846. 36 Hardinge , p. 132. 8

independent possession to him [Gulab Singh] and heirs male of his body, all the hilly or mountainous country, eastward of the river Indus and westward of the River Ravee…being part of the territories ceded to the British Government by the Lahore state according to the provisions of the Article IV of the Treaty of Lahore.’ 37 In return for the bountiful yield of the territories, including Kashmir which now came under his occupation maharaja Gulab Singh agreed to pay the British Government the sum of rupees seventy-five lakhs (half the compensation demanded earlier from the Sikhs) and in token of the supremacy of the British government, Article X of the treaty provided that in token of such supremacy Gulab Singh had to, ‘present annually to the British Government one horse, twelve perfect shawl goats of approved breed ( six male and six female) and three pairs of Kashmiri shaw ls.’ 38

The treaty consisting of ten articles has so far received divergent opinions and interpretations regarding its nature. The fundamental question is: was Kashmir sold to Gulab Singh or was it reward for his services? There are a number of historians who have opined that it was a reward to his services. To quote F.M. Hassnain, author of several books on Kashmir, ‘ according to the article III of the treaty Gulab Singh had to pay seventy five lacs of rupees in two installments, one of fifty lacs on the ratification of the treaty of Lahore and the other of twenty five lacs on or before October 1, 1846, and the rough draft of the receipt mentions that the total amount has been received between the date of the treaty and March 14, 1850. The East India was a commercial organization and as such all the amounts paid or received were accounted in its registers. There is no register bearing the entry of one core or seventy five lacs of rupe es anywhere…this shows that the transfer of Kashmir was a shadowy deal in which no cash transaction took place. It was simply a political gift and for political reasons. The British desired to curb the revolting spirit of hilly chiefs, Gurkhas and Afghans and this could easily be done by

37 C.U. Aitchision, A Collection of Treaties Engagements and Sunnuds Relating to India Neighboring Countries Vol.6, Calcutta, 1876, pp. 38-9. 38 Ibid. 9

keeping their tasted and trusted ally in the north of India.’ 39 Similar views have been given by some other scholars also. 40

Contrary to the aforesaid quoted view, there is sufficient evidence by which it can be proved that it was more a ‘Sale Deed’ than reward. On the basis of the documentary evidence it can be demonstrated that Gulab Singh paid the said amount to the British Indian Government. To cite Wakefield, a British official who visited Kashmir in 1875, ‘for relinquishing all the advantages that accrued to us from its possession, the supreme government sold this fair province to Raja Gulab Singh for the paltry and insignificant sum of seventy five lacs of rupees, and the Treaty by which it was assigned known as the Treaty of Amritsar dated 16 th March 1846.’ 41 Cunningham’s description regarding the transfer and the driving forces for the British to sell the territories to Maharaja Gulab Singh is: 42

‘The low state of the Lahore treasury and the anxiety of Lal Singh to get a dreaded rival out of the way enabled the Governor General to appease Gulab Singh in a manner sufficiently agreeable to the Raja himself, and which still further reduced the importance of the successor of Ranjeet Singh. The Raja of Jammu didn’t c are to be simply the master of his native mountains, but as the two thirds of the pecuniary indemnity required from Lahore couldn’t be made good, territory was taken instead of money, and Cashmeer and the hill states from the Beas to the Indus were cut off from the Punjab proper, and transferred to Gulab Singh as a separate sovereign for a million of pounds sterling. The arrangement was a dexterous one, if reference be only had to the policy of reducing the power of the Sikhs, but the transaction scarcely seems worthy of the British name and greatness. The arrangement with Gulab Singh was the only one of the kind which took place, and the new ally was formally invested with the title of Maharaja at Amritsar on the 15 th of March 1846.’

39 F.M. Hassnain , British Policy towards Kashmir , Srinagar, 1974, p. 17. 40 For the same view see, U.K. Zutshi, Emergence of Political Awakening In Kashmir ; Navnita Chandra Behera Demystifying Kashmir , Washington, 2006, p. 14; Dr. Abdul Ahad, Kashmir Re Discovered, Srinagar, 2006, p. 227. 41 Wakefield, The Happy Valley, p. 86. 42 Cunningham, The History of the Sikhs, pp. 323-24. 10

From the legal point of view Justice A.S. Anand formerly the Chief Justice of India, in his seminal treatise on the constitutional history of Jammu and Kashmir has analyzed the treaty to its depth and concludes that Kashmir was indeed for a total sum of rupees seventy five lakhs sold to Maharaja Gulab Singh with an area of 84,471sq miles and 21/2 million people. This transaction between the British government and Gulab Singh has been a subject of great controversy. The British government accepted a payment of rupees seventy five lakhs for transferring the state to Raja Gulab Singh, yet Sardar Panikkar, author of the biography of Maharaja Gulab Singh says, ‘in discussing this question of the transfer of Kashmir, it is…important to remember that there was no sale of Kashmir at all.’ 43 He basis his contention on the ground that even before this treaty was signed it had been agreed between the British government and the Lahore Darbar that the area between river Beas and Sutlej was to be transferred to raja Gulab Singh. This contention is of course, undisputable, but the treaty between the Lahore and the British left it to the British government to enter into separate agreement with raja Gulab Singh and the separate agreement was the payment of rupees seventy five lakhs for the territory of Kashmir. According to Justice A.S. Anand, when somebody accepts money in consideration for a transfer of a material thing, the transaction is nothing but ‘sale’. 44

The imperial Gazetteer refers to this transaction in the fo llowing words, ‘it is said of the maharaja Gulab Singh that …when he surveyed his new purchase, the valley of Kashmir … he grumbled and remarked that 1/3 of the country was mountains one third water and remained alienated to privileged persons. 45 Undisputedly, a person can’t purchase something unless it has been sold to him and if it is sold the transaction is a ‘sale’ and the time of the sale of Kashmir no consideration was given to the moral effects of the Deed. 46

43 K.M. Panikkar, The Founding of the Kashmir State, London, 1953, p. 104. 44 Justice A.S. Anand, The Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir its Development & Comments, New Delhi, 2006, p. 8. 45 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, vol. xv, p. 73. Emphasis mine. 46 Anand, The Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir , p. 8. 11

Though, there is a chain of scholars who have the same views 47 and remarked that the chief motive of the British government was to show their displeasure to the Sikhs and they could never have realized what they were doing.48 Both during and after the negotiations leading to the two treaties, Hardinge, the governor general, wrote letters in which he explained his reasons for the policies he pursued. Interesting enough, they indicate that, despite the favourable settlement he awarded to Gulab Singh, his earlier admiration for the Raja had diminished. In remarkably candid comments to his family he manifested more disdain than admiration for the man. To his sister he described the Jammu Raja as ‘the ablest scoundrel in all Asia’ 49 It was the dishonest attitude of the Raja that Hardinge treated Gulab Singh in a way to keep him convinced as Hardinge wrote that he [was] a rascal [they] should treat him better than he [deserved].50 But the more potential cause which compelled the British to bring about the transaction with Gulab Singh has been explained by Hardinge in a letter he wrote to the Secret Committee. The Governor General rationalized in detail his decision not to extend British rule over the hill territories. He argued that such a move would result in a clash with the neighbouring powers, the new frontier would be hard to protect, and the mountainous and largely barren regions would be an economic liability. 51 Hardinge also advanced a religious

47 For more details see Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging, p. 9; Chapter 1 st and 2 nd of Rai’s , Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects. 48 M.Y. Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom, p. 200. It was in a due course of time before the finalization of both the treaties that the British devised a scheme by which they in due course would assist Gulab Singh to acquire Kashmir. Hardinge, who had previously informed Peel on his resolve to make Jammu independent of Lahore, now conveyed to the British Prime Minister his intentions of selling Kashmir to the Raja. Convinced that the financially bankrupt Sikh government would be unable to pay the indemnity, he obviously planned to maneuver Lahore into surrendering Kashmir and other hill territories as compensation and in turn transfer the same to Gulab Singh. See, Bawa , Jammu Fox, p. 116. 49 Bawa , Jammu Fox, p. 118. 50 Hardinge to Emily March 2, 1846, Private Papers of Henry Hardinge, cited in Ibid. 51 Hardinge to Secret Committee, March 4 1846 FPNWF [Papers Relating to the late Hostilities on the North West Frontier of India], (London), p. 89 cited in, Jammu Fox p. 119. Margaret Cotter Morison states that in 1845-46 the whole Sikh power was grappling in a death struggle with the advancing English might. The Sikhs went down in the struggle, the army was defeated at Sabraon, they made a treaty with their conquerors by which, among the other things…Kashmir was ceded to the English in part payment of war indemnity, and the British government of the day [with a freehandedness which many Anglo-Indians have since regretted] straightway made over the country to the enterprising Raja of Jammu, Gulab Singh. The Dogra Rajput, Maharaja Gulab Singh, was a man of ambition and much force of character. Already previous to events of 1846 he enlarged his sovereignty by the conquest of Ladakh and Iskardo, thus holding Kashmir half encircled. By skillful running with the hare and hunting with the hounds during the first Sikh war, He [Gulab Singh] was able to make favorable treaty with the English on the conclusion of hostilities. In return for seventy five lakhs of rupees the independent sovereignty of Kashmir and all its dependencies was guaranteed to him by the British government, in a treaty signed in March 16 th 1846, a treaty which 12

reason for defending the creation of north western kingdom under Gulab Singh. Exhibiting the anti-Muslim stance characteristic of British officials since the disastrous war against Afghanistan, he wr ote to Peel: ‘I had done this on the principle that it is our policy to prefer Hindoo governments, or any race in preference to the Mohammdans on the great entrance into India. 52

With this corroboration it can be concluded that the imperial exigencies of the British to choose Gulab Singh, his alliance with them in the defeat of the Sikhs, the inability of the Sikhs to pay the war indemnity, contributed for the transaction of Kashmir in 1846, rather than accepting the theory that British simply rewarded Kashmir to Maharaja Gulab Singh. 53 Also contrary to the belief of many scholars that the transaction was a hoax and no money was actually paid, there is a substantial evidence to prove that Gulab Singh indeed paid the said amount to the British imperial power. In a letter dated May 12 th 1846, Hardinge informed Ellenbourgh that the Maharaja ‘[had] paid his first installment of fifty lakhs’. 54 The C ompany’s finical department at Calcutta has prepared a statistical table in which it has shown the sum and date of the payments, paid by Maharaja Gulab Singh to East India Company and the table clearly indicates that by the

brought this advantage to the English that on the outbreak of the second Sikh war in 1849, [which resulted in the annexation of the Punjab], the British rulers were not hampered by an hostile demonstration from the north. Nevertheless the action of the English in parting with Kashmir has been a good deal criticized both at the time and since, for it was asked: what had the Raja of Jammu done for us that his territory should be thus largely increased? But it resolved itself really into matter of expediency for the rulers at the time, they found it difficult to hold Kashmir with the Punjab still hostile and the neighboring hill territories independent, while it was also to their advantage to cripple the government of Lahore as much as possible, even at the cost of aggrandizing another country. See, Margaret Cotter Morison, A Lonely Summer in Kashmir, London, 1904 , pp . 57-59. 52 Hardinge to Peel March, 19, 1846, cited in, Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 119. 53 In answer to criticism of Hardinge that he rewarded Gulab Singh for his treachery, Lord Hardinge Wrote to Ellen borough that besides he was entitled to consideration they had their own interests, also, to attend to, which required that the Sikh state should be weakened and that the hills should be separated from the plains. For details see, Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom, p. 194. 54 Ref.30/12/21, no. 7, Ellenborough Papers, MS in the Public Record Office London, cited in Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 192. The same latter Hardinge communicated to the Secret Committee in a letter dated September 3, 1846. See Papers Relating to the Articles of Agreement for the Administration of the State of Lahore, London, 1847, p. 180. Dr. Abdul Ahad, earlier the profounder of the reward theory, argues in his article ‘Revisiting Treaty of Amritsar’ that it was the most terrorizing trickery of this size ever experimented in history was too haughty to recognize the people anything beyond chattel worthy of nothing but to sold in the open suck for such a little amount. See, Dr. Abdul Ahad, ‘Revisiting Treaty of Amritsar ’, Greater Kashmir, 14 th March, 2013. 13

end of July 1848 Gulab Singh had paid most of his debt. 55 The financial receipt for the purchase of Kashmir signed by the members of the Board of Administration of Punjab is on Exhibition at the Punjab Record Office Museum in Lahore. 56

It was against this background that the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir was formed which consisted three distinct physiographic divisions: the province of Jammu with the Siwaliks and outer Hills, largely an extension of the Punjab plains; the Valley of Kashmir, a structural basin that lies between the Pir Panjal and the Himadri, defined by the river Jhelum that flows out of Baramulla, meanders the vale; enters the Wular lake, leaves it near Sopore, flows into a narrow gorge across the Pir Panjal to Muzaffarabad, where it turns sharply towards the south; and the region of the greater Himalayas beyond the Kashmir valley to the north and east where Ladakh and Gilgit form habitable areas at very high altitudes. 57 It was again by means of the same treaty that such an expansion took place, otherwise the pre-Dogra distinctiveness of Kashmir was itself a marvel in its long line of historical tradition.

In 1846, sovereignty over Jammu and Kashmir was negotiated with the person of the ruler not with the people of Kashmir. As a result of this, the vast majority of the people, who happened to be Muslims found themselves unrepresented in an enterprise of Dogra domination. 58 Their honor, freedom and rights were bartered away by the two parties for their own vested interests. 59 The superior notion of Gulab Singh that he had purchased the valley gave him a strong conviction to commit any kind of oppression on

55 Dalhousie Papers, Ref. GD 45/6/254, (MSS in Scottish Record Office Edinburgh) cited in Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 192. Mirza Saif-ud-din a secret agent of the British in Srinagar, in his voluminous Akbarat-i-Darbar-i-Gulab Singh describes the Maharaja’s avarice for money in terms of the pressure exerted on him by the British for defraying the expanses he owed to them on account of the sale of Kashmir. M. Ishaq Khan, Crisis of a Kashmiri Muslim: Spiritual and Intellectual, Srinagar, 2008, p. 163. 56 Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 192. The receipt of the whole amount granted by the Board of Administration for the affairs of the Punjab at the request of the Dewan Jawala Sahai in addition to the receipts already given to his Highness agents by the receiving officers, for the installments received by them from time to time between the date of the Treaty and the 14 th March 1850. The day on which the last installment was paid into the Lahore treasury. See G.M.D. Sufi, Kashir Being a History of Kashmir: From the Earliest Times to Our Own, Vol.11, Delhi, 1974, pp.766-67. For further evidence see the copy of the receipt reproduced in Appendix I. 57 A.N. Raina, Geography of Jammu and Kashmir , New Delhi, 1981, pp. 9-10. 58 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 4. 59 Khan, Crisis of A Kashmiri Muslim Spiritual and Intellectual, p. 164. 14

the subjects of the land the state of affairs of which has been further described very well by Pearce Gervis: 60

‘All these epidemics and natural calamities have come upon the people, but in addition there have been the ever present conquerors, oppressors and masters who have taken and held the country in their power, each of the rulers which different edicts, each with changing moods, some kindly, others inhuman. For the most part over the years one community of the people had death always before them as the punishment for falling to do physically or accept mentally that which their masters forced upon them. They were starved by them of those necessities of life which they had both made and grown in plenty with sufficient and more to keep them and their families. They learned to lie in order to save themselves and their loved ones from destruction at times; they learned to hoard and hide against the famine which might come on them through the elements or the invaders, and because of that and their having little, to steal when the chance presented itself, they learned to fear the sword and the gun for what both have done to them and theirs. They learned to appear poor, and in doing so that those who taxed them might be deceived into extracting of what little they had to treasure.’

The people were dealt with very harshly during the era, not only this, they had been from centuries subjugated or intrigued against by stronger neighbours, rival imperialisms; bossed or exploited successively by Mughals and Afghans, Sikhs, Dogras and British …prolonged victimization and uncertainty seem to have to brought all their worst attributes to the surface, leaving others to await gradual discovery. This is the theme that has been attempted to be discussed in the following chapters.

60 Gervis Pearce, This is Kashmir, London, 1954, p. 330. It must be no ted here that the author’s exposition is also supported by the oral history of the period. Still the people who have witnessed the Dogra era narrate the same kind of pathetic stories and we still find certain remnants of cruelty exercised on the people. 15

Chapter 2

Psychological Impact of the ‘Sale Deed’

‘O breeze if thy happen to go Geneva way, Carry a word to the nation of the world, Their fields, their crops, their streams, Even the peasants in the vale, They sold, they sold all alas, How cheap was the sale’. —Sir Muhammad Iqbal 1 ‘Towards the people of cashmere we have committed a wanton outrage, a gross injustice, and an act of tyrannical oppression, which violates every humane and honorable sentiment, which is opposed to the whole spirit of modern civilization and is in direct opposition to every tenant of the religion we profess’.

—Robert Thorpe 2

Kashmir ’s legendary beauty meshed awkwardly with the destitution, illiteracy and infirmity of the vast majority of its people. Ever since March 1846 when the British ‘sold’ it for seventy five lakh of rupees to the Dogra warlord Gulab Singh, predominantly Muslim Kashmir together with principality of Jammu and the frontier districts including Buddhist Ladakh experienced unmitigated autocratic rule. A succession of maharajas, nurturing ties with a small group of Hindu Pandits in the Kashmir valley and a more extensive network of Dogra kinsmen in Jammu, willfully trampled on the rights of their subjects but rarely succeeded in pushing an insensitive state administration to adopt even the most nominal of reforms. Extreme poverty, exacerbated by a series of famines in the second of the nineteenth century, had seen many Kashmiris fleeing to Punjab. 3

The sale of Kashmir to ‘the tender mercies of Gulab Singh in considera tion of pecuniary equivalent to be his independent succession, and its sovereignty is now a source of weakness rather than strength to the great government [British Government] which sold five millions of men for so many bags of silver ’ observed Colonel Torrens. 4 The heart rending effects that followed were upon the great section of the people of the

1 Mohammad Iqbal, Kulliyat-i- Iqbal , Lahore, 1932, p. 640. 2 Robert Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, London and New York, 1870, p. 66. 3 Ayesha Jalal, Self and Sovereignty: Individual and Community in South Asian Islam Since 1850 , London and New York, 2000, p. 351. 4 Colonel Torrens, Travels: A Trip to Kashmir and Ladakh, London, 1877, p. 300. 16 land . The ‘Sale Deed’ of 1846, writes P.L . Lakhanpal, ‘p ut a largely populated Muslim state under the Dogra rule which has been characterized as despotic, tyrannical and sectarian.’ 5

The treaty, 6 consisting of ten articles didn’t mention anything about the internal administration of the state and in the external domain the Dogra monarch was protected by the British Indian Government. It found several critics in the British political circles. Robert Thorpe, for instance, lamented that, ‘by a government into whose hands British statesmen sold the people of Kashmir, by a government, therefore whose existence is a disgrace to the British name. It is at once a memorial of that foul act, when like the arch traitor of old; we battered innocent lives, which fate placed into our hands for a few pieces of silver.’ 7 Evidently Gulab Sing was left completely free to deal with it as he liked. He was to be the master of his kingdom. 8 In a similar tune, Wakefield criticized this British action. He wrote that the commercialism, based on laissez-faire which marked the economic policy of the Great Britain in those days, and ran deep into the veins of this sordid t ransaction in that ‘the huckstering spirit that so often prevails our national policy and which caused the great Napoleon to apply us the term of a Nation of shopkeepers was dominant in this case.’ 9

As such Kashmir became ‘the scene of vile oppression and abominable misrule and it remained trodden down and trampled.’ 10 The first essential distrust between the Centre articulated centuries later was born basically during the Mughal Rule. The first clash of cultures between Delhi and Kashmir only resulted in the former sneering at the

5 P.L. Lakhanpal, Essential Documents on Kashmir Dispute, New Delhi, 1965, p. 16. 6 The treaty was the groundwork of the British relations with Kashmir which bound the Maharaja to do and leave undone several things which distinctly marked him as a tributary and a feudatory, and the British government was bound to defend him against external enemies. Thus started a long period of alien rule on Kashmir, patronized and legitimized by the British apologists. Foreign Department, K.W. Political A, Dec.1879 Nos.250-289, NAI. The treaty was signed between the British government on the one part, and maharaja Gulab Singh of Jammu on the other, concluded on the part of the British Government, by Frederick Currie, Esq., and British Major Henry Montgomery Lawrence, under the orders of the Right Honorable Sir Hennery Hardinge G.C.B, one of Her Majesty’s most hono urable company to direct and control all their affairs in the East Indies, and by Maharaja Gulab Singh in person. Cunningham, The History of the Sikhs, p. 435. 7 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment , pp. 48-9. 8 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, p. 34. 9 Wakefield, The Happy Valley, p. 86. 10 Arthur Brinkman, Wrongs of Kashmir , London, 1867, p. 10. 17 latter and Kashmiris wishing nothing more than he be left alone to shape his identity through the native politics. Very little changed in five hundred years. The treaty was carved out at the complete alienation of the Kashmiris. 11 A Kashmiri possessed of characteristic ‘both intellectual and moral which command respect and admiration’ 12 was transformed into ‘what his rulers has made him.’ 13 He became alien to his own self and this self-estrangement engulfed him to such an extent that he left his own being to the mercy of the nature. A zenana missionary who once when she was once impelled to say, ‘O dear Kashmiri women, why won’t you wash?’ They looked towards her wonderingly, and replied, ‘We have been so oppressed that we don’t care to be c lean. ’ That explains all. Used abominably for generations, they used each other abominably; and so where Nature is fairest, one sees sadly illustrated the pregnant phrase of Wordsworth, ‘what man has made of man.’ 14

The region of Kashmir was annexed at psychologically most disadvantageous position, that is, as a bought up commodity, while Ladakh joined as a conquered territory. This varied background had deep impact on the future psyche of the three constituents: while Jammu had a sense of contentment as the power centre, Kashmiris suffered from a sense of humiliation, dispossession and deprivation. The projected ‘rascality ’ of the people during the period passed into one of the best known proverbs of India; that they were liars, cruel, and lazy, while they were so crushed down as to be incapable of lifting a hand in their own defence. But the causes behind their vices had a different reason. Their weakness and vices were those which are naturally and indeed necessarily developed under a tyrannical and rapacious system of government. 15 ‘Men were naturally lazy when their utmost energy will do no more than secure a greater profit for the tax-farmer; they were cowardly in the presence of a bureaucracy which was so powerful and omnipresent as to exclude all the idea of resistance, and they were liars, as false hood is the last refuge and hope of the oppressed. The agricultural population was generally of the Muslim

11 Dr Gull Wani, Kashmir Identity Autonomy and Self Rule, Srinagar, 2011, p. 22. 12 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 25. 13 Lawrence, the Valley of Kashmir, p. 283. 14 Irene Petrie, Missionary to Kashmir, p. 111. 15 Note by Mr. Fanshave on the famine of Kashmir, Foreign Department, K.W. (Sec.-E), March 1883, File Nos. 81-82, NAI. 18 creed, while the rul ers and the official’s class were Hindus. The ruler was the owner and seller of all the produce of the land that no one having any surplus to sell except jagirdars.

Writing about the psychological impressions of the people in 1920, traveller V.C. Scott O’ Connor says:

‘It is only of late, that the within the present generation and within past few years, that the clouds have lifted and that they have begun to raise their heads from the dust of centuries of oppression; and though they know that this change has really come and is like to stay, they can’t yet in their h earts believe in its duration. Children of light and of a land beautiful beyond the dreams of ordinary men, a profound sadness is visible in their eyes; and a great fear still lingers in their hearts. The fear is extraordinary in its manifestations; it assails men of gigantic frame and energy, and I have myself wondered to see such an one tremble all over his body [as a thorough-bred hunter may be seen quivering by the covert-side when hounds are at work on a winters morning; but with how different an emotion!] at the sound of an angry voice. Such a fear and such memories, of necessity provoke qualities of character and temperament upon which those whose past has been happier, are prone to look down with anger and a measureless contempt; but even in these respects, a marked difference is visible even to a careless eye, between the people of the fields and hamlets, and those of the city, and between the farmer in their intercourse with each other, and in their intercourse with those who are of the state, or who come with an air of power and authority in to midst. Beautiful also is the country, its beauty is marred by some of the habits of the people, by dirt and physical neglect. Even the beauty of the women is hidden for most part under somber and unattractive garments, as though experience had ta ught the race the virtue of concealment.’ 16

According to Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, the most important leader of the freedom struggle from the Jammu province, 17

‘They were the same people who were famous throughout the world in respect of their intellect and skill, but right now they are being considered as coward and

16 O’ Connor, The Charm of Kashmir, p. 180. 17 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , 1st ed. 1954, 3 rd ed., Srinagar, 2001, p. 59. 19

are not eligible to join the army services. 18 They [people] of the Kashmir were considered incompetent and inefficient. For them the doors of government employment were closed. ‘All this was possible because he had been ruled and enslaved. His freedom was taken away from him at the power of sword . His heart and mind, courage, bravery, and determination were snatched and smothered by force. It is ironic and shameful that the Kashmiris’ Muslim’s country the ‘heaven on the earth’ had turned more dreadful than hell. A Kashmiris fruit, flowers, sceneries, greeneries, packs; waterfalls were most beautiful in the world. Tourists and rulers of the time enjoyed and refreshed themselves with the beauties of Kashmir, but face of the Kashmiri Muslim had darkened due to famishment. For him and his country spring had turned into autumn. Wow! That people who lived in palaces and tall buildings had accumulated all their riches, comforts, wealth and fortune at the cost of the toil and blood of Kashmiri farmers and labourers. Possessed by arrogance, at the helm of power he considered it the meaning of life to oppress and subjugate the poor people. Will the world never judge these people? Will their crimes and atrocities remain hidden from the eyes of the God? In short Muslims of the valley had become a cipher, a naught at the level of mind, character, religious, economic and agriculture. Nature had taken away from him all the good human traits like honesty, benevolence, bravery, courage, resistance, struggle, sincerity, brotherhood, compassion and commiseration; simply because he had chosen to grin and bear the atrocious and tyrannical rule. Instead of trying to break the shackles of slavery and bondage he chose for himself his family and his future generation a disgraceful servitude; neglecting and disregarding the Islamic legacy and the spirit of great nations. Muslims of the valley had crossed all the limbs of slavery and now the wound of his slavery was no more new. Had it been fresh his fellow Muslims would have felt the pain and given a remedy. But the wound was now worn out and is requirement of a special treatment’.

However, the dire ct meaning of ‘Sale Deed’ has been emphasized more ever since. But mere ‘Sale Deed’ makes the treaty of Amritsar unique in political history because such deeds have been executed in other parts of the world in different times. Whole stretches of land have been sold and bought during the colonial period in Asia,

18 O’ Connor , pp. 57-8. 20

Africa and the American continent. But in Kashmir the Amritsar Treaty dispossessed people of their property and their ownership rights of their land, produce, creative work, cattle and even their lives. Now the sole proprietor of all this became the Maharaja of Jammu who got new title as Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir. In fact, the Maharaja not only owed the title to Kashmir by the treaty of 1846, but also the possession which he obtained in that year to the support given by the British power. 19

As already discussed in the preceding chapter, this was not the first time that the valley of Kashmir was held by the ‘outsiders’ having passed from Mughal to Afghan and finally into Sikhs hands. However, what did change critically at the same time as Kashmir was handed over to the Dogras was the nature of the political world of pre- colonial India more generally and Kashmir more specifically. 20 From an earlier seamless terrain of overlapping and layered sovereignties a lesser version of which they vested in Gulab Singh for their own strategic reasons they strengthened the position of their vassal preserved by the Treaty. Article nine of the Treaty embodies an undertaking that the British government will give its aid to Maharaja Gulab Singh in protecting his territories from ‘external enemies .’21 Towards this end, the British sought to vacate power held in pockets in Kashmir and transferred the same to the new Maharaja, in whom alone a personalized sovereignty was now to vest. This under wiling of Dogra rule by the British began a process that enabled the overlooking, if not the outright exclusion, of the elementary rights of the people of Kashmir. 22

19 Political Department, (P-Branch), File No.182-P (S) 46, 1846, NAI. 20 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p.27. 21 Political Department, File No. 498, (Confidential Sec. of 1931), NAI. 22 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 27. The British understood the treaty to transfer the rights titles and interests possessed by the Sikh Government in the territories concerned into their own hands. These were handed over, along with territory, completely and absolutely to Maharaja Gulab Singh. However before these rights interests had neither been possessed absolutely and exclusively nor transferred in the manner understood by the British. Instead they had been arranged along a hierarchy that recognized superior and inferior rights, established and maintained as relational entities through accommodative and negotiated process. The handing over of Kashmir to Maharaja gave great death blow to the earlier versions of layered sovereignty…wit h a ruling structure which hardly had any affinity and interests with the rights and interests of the ruled. It was a deal between the two as Mridu Rai argues that an important dimension in giving symbolic content to this relationship in pre-colonial India was the symbolic act of gifting a khilat [literally a robe] by the suzerain and receiving nazar [gold coins] or Peshkash [valuable such as horses] from a subordinate. See, Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, pp. 44-5. 21

This historical exclusion of the people of the land by dint of the Treaty has been summed by one of the contemporary of the times, Prem Nath Bazaz, in a more analytic and descriptive way, ‘While making this transfer the British authorities in India didn’t so much ascertain the views of the people of Kashmir on the subject. They did not consult even one of their leaders. It was altogether a sordid shameful affair devoid of all sense of fairness justice and equity. Two millions of people in the valley and Gilgit were sold like sheep and cattle to an alien adventurer and the whole transaction was made behind their back. The Treaty consisting of ten articles makes no mention whatsoever of the rights, interests or the future of the people.’ 23 With the conclusion of the treaty the people were stabbed in the back, forced into a state of quandary and once again in their history of misfortune falling from the frying pan into the fire. 24 It led to the significant consequences, as already mentioned, one such consequences was the declaration of absolute ownership of land, by none other than the founding father of the Dogra regime Maharaja Gulab Singh, null and void. 25 In the pursuit of their mercenary interests these alien rulers tried and drained the economy of the state to fill their coffers. Hence, the brutal exploitation of Kashmir. 26 In fact, the treaty of Amritsar stood on a different footing from those signed with the other Indian states in that no resident was appointed, giving full internal autonomy to Maharaja Gulab Singh. 27

It was against this backdrop that Lt. colonel To rrens has very well said, ‘poor Kashmiri when after so many vicissitudes of slavery to a foreign yoke, the hand of a powerful, just and merciful government acquired the territory by force of arms in fair

23 P.N. Bazaz, The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir Cultural and Political from Earliest Times to Present Day, c. 1954, reprint, Srinagar, 2003, p. 118. The treaty’s ten clauses only communicate the interests of the British and Gulab Singh. The sale of humans in such a manner would remain a recorded act of brutality and barbarity on the part of the British under which the independence of millions was jeopardized. This was a brazen faced bribe made manifest in the treaty of Lahore on 9 th March 1846 on 11 th march 1846 after giving a final shape in the form of ‘ugly and unlawful ’ transaction of landed property under the treaty of Amritsar on 16 th march 1846. Under the misconception that pen shall never supersede the sword and reason shall never prevail. For details see, Mohammad Sultan Pampori, Kashmir in Chains, 1819-1992, Srinagar, 1992, p. 28. 24 Pampori, Kashmir in Chains, p. 29. 25 For details see chapter four of this thesis. 26 G.T. Vinge, Travels in Kashmir, Ladakh and Iskardo, Vol.1, London, 1844, p. 256. 27 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 58. The most harmful aspect of the British over the state of Jammu and Kashmir was that while the inefficient administration would evoke the threat of interference from the colonial government, the causes of mal-administration wouldn’t be relieved si nce British influence was to remain indirect. 22 flight, and it seemed that at least its condition was about to be ameliorated, it’s old ill luck stuck by it still! That hand had an itching palm, and they were again sold into the hands of the philistines. The last state of that country was worse than the first, for Gulab Singh went far beyond his predecessors in the gentle acts of undue taxation and extortion. They had taxed heavily it is true, but he sucked the very life blood of his people, they laid violent hands on a large proportion of the fruits of the earth, the profits of the loom, and work of man’s hands but he skinned the vey flints to fill his coffers.’ 28 An account of a traveller during the closing years of Gulab Singh’s reign records the grinding oppression of that ruler and the poverty of the laboring people of Kashmir, who still harbored the hope that the British would take over and bring them relief. He wrote of how some men weeding in a field looked up as he passed and called out; ‘Oh! Sahib! When is the company’s reign to commence, when are we to eat a little of this we labor for?’ 29 The statement of the peasant very well elucidates that how much the men of the labor were psychologically caught in a situation where they were finding difficult to free themselves and to have a sigh of relief. Due to the Treaty of Amritsar the sense of self-estrangement among the Kashmiris got dominated day by day as is evident from the aforesaid mentioned statements. They became the strangers in their own land. 30 They lost the hope of recourse and were in search of remedy for their helplessness which they uttered who ever came to their way. It was a sort of protest which they did whenever they got, any means of vent. Mrs. Hervey, while on a visit to Kashmir, says that when she asked the people in a village as to why [they] did not complain to Henry Lawrence, the group of people asserted that ‘ [they] [were] prevented by the myrmidons of the Maharaja. Besides, [they] added that it seemed a futile exercise as the Maharaja was so overpoweringly civil to Lawrence Sahib that it was not likely he would listen to any complaints from us-log , kunghal [we indigents]. ’ Shrewdly the Kashmiris pointed out that ‘while the maharaja declared to the ‘ Burra Sahib’ ‘Sub Moolk aap ka, sub dowlut aap ka ’ [the whole country is yours all wealth is yours]…He exort{ed} the last farthing from his peasant and [was] making Kashmir a desert.’ 31 From the statement it is

28 Torrens Henry D’ O yley, Travels in Ladakh Tartary and Kashmir, London, 1863, p. 300. 29 Journals of T. Machell, Travels in Hindoostan the Punjab Scinde and Kashmir 1855-56, 198, cited in Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 59. 30 Sufi, Kashir, vol. 2, p. 768. 31 Mrs. Hervey, The Adventures of a Lady in Tartary, Tibet, China and Kashmir, 3 Vols., Vol.2, London & Co.: 1853, p. 229-30. 23 evident that the social perception of the maharaja’s rule among the Kashmir’s was that it was a sort of collaboration between the Maharaja and the British who were grinding them under the oppression because they were not in know till first half of nineteenth century who were the real masters as everything was done behind their back. The Maharaja, apprehensive as he was of British intervention in case the maladministration was exposed; he did not allow free movement of European visitors in the Valley. They were not allowed to stay there during the winter as that was the time of revenue collection and when complaints by the Kashmiris seemed to multiply. 32 ‘Kashmiri lost in antiquity after passing into the unfortunate circumstances which demoralized them. They were having the elements of what, in more fortunate circumstances, might be a very fine character. But they had for ages been subjected to that oppression which destroyed national hope and virtue, and kept them in the downtrodden state. 33

Invested with the absolute authority in 1846 the Dogra regime was in power for one hundred years. This sad and stern century of servitude stultified the growth of all kinds of the subjects of the land, leaving them in the backwardness of civilization. While in British India, and even in some of the Indian states many measures of reform were introduced to alleviate the miseries of the people, in Jammu and Kashmir the unenlightened absolutism of the rulers drove the people deeper and deeper into poverty and degradation. After the conditions became intolerable they made determined efforts to wrest power from the hands of the ruler. 34 With this Treaty a specific concept of state survived throughout the period, repeatedly. The Dogra rulers often invoked the treaty of Amritsar to establish their legitimacy and to perpetuate the notion of their superior ownership as the Treaty conferred upon them both de jure and de facto property. This is

32 Andrew Wilson, The Abode of Snow , London, 1876, p. 356-57. The visitors had to leave the country about the middle of October and strict rules were issued for their guidance when they were in the valley. Four authorized routes were for them, from where they can make their entry and were told to encamp only at the fixed stages and encamping grounds. 33 Ibid., p. 351. 34 New Kashmir the Political and Economic Manifesto of Jammu and Kashmir National Conference , 1944, reprint In English by Sheikh Nazir General Sec. National Conference, p. 169. 24 testified by a letter of Maharaja Pratap Singh to his Prime Minister in which the Maharaja wrote: 35

‘As you are already aware of the property rights in all the lands of Kashmir belong to the ruling chief exclusively, for the simple reason that the territories of Kashmir were purchased buy my late lamented grandfather, Maharaja Gulab Singhji and hence any sale of such land by anyone else is illegal.’

Thus, the treaty of Amritsar proved actually the sale of the fate of the Kashmiris. 36 Subsequently even their emigration was restricted, in fact strictly banned. In 1879, fifteen villages in the Kamraj division left their homes en masse by the Kaj Nag route, which was not carefully watched. The wazir of kamraj sent horsemen after them with orders to bring them back. 37 They had little hope of surviving in Kashmir, but death seemed more pleasing to them than death at Pindi or Jhelum. 38 The treaty therefore uprooted demographic structure of Kashmir without any positive impact, unlike another event in its long history. The tendency of emigration bears testimony to the extent of impoverishment among the people.

With the handing over of Jammu and Kashmir to the Dogras, the people lost the hope, and their lives turned absolutely apathetic. To give an instance of this, during the period of the settlement writes Lawrence, ‘I had hoped that the people would welcome a ten years assessment accompanied by the gift of hereditary occupancy rights, but their distrust in the administration is so great, that they all believe that my assessment will be immediately followed by some further demand from the state. 39 He further stated, ‘the worst village in the tehsil Kampura was assessed at Rs.984 and was utterly broken. I looked forward with pleasure to giving the good news, that the state had reduced the revenue to Rs.508, but the villagers of Kampura declined to accept an assessment. They said they were too broken to undertake any responsibility, and begged hard to be allowed to one-half the crop. I showed them by our papers that Rs.500 which I offered to take in

35 File No. 191/H-75 Bloc of 1906, Jammu and Kashmir State Archives, Jammu (JKA-J). 36 Khawaja Sana-ullah Bhat, Kashmir in Flames, Srinagar, 1998, p. 3. 37 Foreign Department, Demi-official from F. Henvey to A.C. Lyall, Dated Lahore Dec.1879, NAI. 38 Ibid. It was the mass impoverishment which led to mass emigration. 39 W.R. Lawrence, Settlement Officer, Kashmir to Colonel R.P. Nisbet, Resident, Kashmir, Foreign Department, dated Srinagar, the 13 th Nov. 1889, demi-official, NAI. 25 kind, was about one half less than a half share of the crop, and urged them, for their own and their children’s sake, to take the assessment and with it occupancy rights.’ Their reply was that ‘…there [was] no such thing as ‘rights’ in Kashmir , and rather than make [their] in any way responsible to the state, [they would] go to the city and work as coolies.’ 40

Horrendous instances have been recorded. During time of famine of 1879 it is said that not a single Pandit died of starvation (though the observation cannot be treated at its face-value), and Wazir Pannu , the governor, expressed the sentiments of the Pand it’s, when he angrily informed the starving people that there was no rea l distress and that he wished that no Musalman might be left alive from Srinagar to Ramban. These things were not easily forgotten by the people, and the Kashmiri proverb, ‘ Drag Tsalih Tah Dag Tsalih Nah’ which means ‘the famine goes bu t stains remain’ is full of truth. 41 It was difficult to find more abject and degraded body of men in terms of economic position than the Kashmiri cultivator. 42 Their very intelligence and aptitude for work seems to

40 Ibid. 41 Foreign Department, From W.R. Lawrence, Settlement Officer Kashmir to Colonel R.P. Nisbet, Resident in Kashmir, dated Camp, Kashmir the 2 nd Dec.1889, NAI. About the famine of 1878 writes a traveller, ‘On account of the famine then ranging there and that all the English who were then in Kashmir were to be required to leave the place. The writer who was en-route to Kashmir retraced his steps, as it was impossible to proceed under those circumstances. That the famine was a veritable one there is no doubt. But it was originally caused by, and its continuance may be attributed to, the conduct of certain number of corrupt an grasping Hindu officials who succeeded in large for themselves in the following manner:- the great cold which set in Kashmir so early in the autumn of 1877 did destroy to a considerable extent the crops then ripening. The people, however, would still have been enabled to get on till such time as they had sown and gathered in the spring crops of the following year, but the Hindu officials or their emissaries, made a house to house visitation and ascertaining how much grain each man possessed, they seized it at or below the normal price, the people having afterwards to buy back from them as much grain as they could afford to take which was barely enough to support life at the rate of 20 seers or 40 ib. to the rupee-a rate which would probably average nearly three times the price which these poor people had been paid for the grain thus forcibly taken from them. Mrs J.C. Murray Aynsley, Our Visit to Hindostan, Kashmir, and Ladakh , pp. 291-92. Foreign Department, No. 521, dated, 21 st August,1878, From F. Henvey, Officer on special duty in Kashmir to J.G. Cordery, Officiating Secretary to the Government of Punjab, No.521,dated 21 st August 1878, NAI. 42 Ibid. Though Kashmir has been extraordinarily endowed by nature, particularly in the matter of its capabilities for raising food supplies, and that, supposing the inhabitants of this favored country to be destroyed by hunger, the cause must be sought either in some unparalleled accident of weather and season, or in such external circumstances as the fiscal and commercial policy of the government, and the conduct generally of the rulers towards the ruled. The population of Kashmir was reckoned before the famine at about half a million, since no accurate census of the survivors was taken at time of the famine but some idea of the depopulation of the country can be drawn from the below mentioned authoritative description, ‘No Englishmen who carefully examined the summer city [Srinagar] in 1879 with a view to guessing its population ever put the people at over 60,000 souls, but nothing can be exactly known. A number of the chief valleys to the north were entirely deserted, whole villages lay in ruins, Some suburbs of the city were tenantless, the city itself half destroyed, the graveyards were filled to overflowing ,the river had been full of 26 have accentuated their degradation. They attributed their degradation to different things but the real cause behind their moral degradation was the tyranny and want of sympathy of the officialdom. 43 Lawrence records that he had sometimes said to the villagers: ‘the state can’t trust you, you hide government’s share of the crops and wou ld not pay even fair revenue.’ They replied: ‘we have never had a fair chance. It has never been Ek lafz (one word) with us. Nothing is permanent. The maharaja gave us an assessment in samavt 1937 (1880) and the officials said the assessment would be maintained. It was increased before the end of the year.’ 44 In a country ‘where the standard of comfort [was] so low, it [was] difficult to arouse a spirit of enterprise, and the form of government which conduce[d] most to the material bien etre of the people, is probably not the best calculated to promote their moral and intellectual advancement. 45

The treaty was a baleful event, if there has been a catastrophe to hit Kashmir politically, devastate it economically, ruin it socially and bash it psychologically, it was this treaty. 46 Brushing the Kashmiri pride massively the Amritsar treaty was negotiated to thrust upon Kashmir by those born in alien territories and brought up in an unfamiliar ethos, the British and their cohorts who with their sharply divergent civilizational moorings and racial stocks were neither related to, nor acquainted with the helpless victims, its inhabitants. These desperate people combined together at a very critical juncture of history and to bring Kashmir to their heels, perpetrating, thereby a heinous

corpses thrown to it. It is not likely that more than two-fifths of the people of the valley now survive.’ Monsieur Bigex, a French shawl merchant, notes that, whereas in former times there were from 30,000 to 40,000 weavers in Srinagar, now only 4,000 remain, and that orders from France for Shawls can’t be executed for wants of hands. It may be that the famine has fallen with most severity on the weaving class, but as the Persian proverb says, ‘a handful is a specimen of the ass -load.’ see The famine in Kashmir during 1877-78-79 by Mr. Henvey Foreign Department, confidential K.W-No.2 , NAI. 43 Ibid. 44 Ibid. 45 Foreign Department, From Colonel W.F. Prideaux, Resident in Kashmir to The secretary to the Government of India, Confidential No.714-5118, dated Srinagar, the 16 th October 1892, NAI. 46 Ahad, Revisiting Treaty of Amritsar . E.G. Hull states that, ‘no wonder that look of hel plessness is so often permanently stamped on the faces of the men and women living in such surrounding, absolutely devoid of intellectual or spiritual interest. Though Kashmiri spring has loveliness all its own when a dainty hoopoo comes forth from the tree hollow, and spreading his train on the young grass, with the crown erect, draws with his long bill his special luxuries from the freshened earth, while golden aureoles fly like sunbeams through the air, calling to each other, in jubilant notes, that spring has come! Thus winter after winter passes into spring, and deep the longing grows to see a similar transformation in the dwellers in the happy valley, who, living in the midst of so much beauty seem untouched by it even on the surface, ‘come from the p our winds, O Breath, and Breathe… that may live’. E.G. Hull, Vignettes of Kashmir, London, 1903, p. 58. 27 crime the parallel of which is hardly ascertainable in the history of any nation in the universe. 47 The plot they hatched was outrageously so scandalous, so immoral, so wicked, so treacherous and so disgraceful that it continues infuriating people of all shades opinion and ideology in Kashmir even after elapsing more than a century. The treaty of melancholy inflicted on the unfortunate people through the feudal route of Hindu autocracy that it brought in its wake to throttle the indigenous institutions of repute and the health economy beyond redemption. 48 In this way that the treaty caused a psychological vacuum among the people of the land, which became noticeable when the treaty met with uprisings shortly after the establishment of the Dogra rule 49 …which presented a unique basket of worst form of feudal exploitation, seeds of modernism and birth of people’s revolt against economic exploitation. 50

During the struggle for freedom, the common slogan was ‘ Bainamai Amritsar Tod Do Kashmir Ko Chod Do’ 51 [Quit Kashmir and abrogation of the treaty of Amritsar] defines without any question that how this historical incident shaped the political psyche of Kashmir deeply rooted in the economic oppression degradation and exploitation. 52 At the time of the arrival of the Cabinet Mission to India to work out a constitutional formula for the transfer of power. A memorandum was presented to the Mission by the National conference leadership. The memorandum contained the following lines, 53

‘The question of treaty rights of the princes has become a moot point between the people and the states, the princely order and the paramount power. For us in Kashmir, the reexamination of this relationship in its historical context is a vital

47 Ibid. 48 Ibid. 49 D.N. Dhār, Kashmir A Kaleidoscopic View, New Delhi, 2005, p. 55. In July 1847 over four thousand shawl weavers staged a demonstration and demanded the reduction of various kinds of taxes. K.M. Panikkar, The Founding of the Kashmir State, p. 139. 50 Ibid. 51 Rashid Tasir, Tarikh-i-Huryiat-Kashmir 1931-1939, Vol.1, Srinagar, 1928, p. 50. The slogan very well represents the profound and pervasive effect upon the mass psyche of Kashmir. 52 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 64. Thorpe argues that it was after the 1846 that a chain of misfortunes and miseries commenced. The change of coin the increased taxation prices inflation, the shutting up of the kotas, the mismanagement and oppression of the Dagshali the restrictions in the amount of the rice purchasable yearly by each shawl baf, the consequent diminution in their number, the consequent release of orders that no shawl or Sada- baf can leave either his employment or the cashmere valley. All these miseries and atrocities date from the iniquitous reign of Gulab Singh. 53 Political Department, Telegram From Sheikh Abdullah President Jammu and Kashmir National Conference to British Cabinet Mission, File No. 182-P(S)/46, Srinagar Dated 22 nd April, Lahore, 1946, NAI. 28

matter. Nearly hundred years ago, the people of Kashmir became the victims of a commercial deal by the covetous agents of the East India Company. For the paltry consideration of seventy five lacs of Sikh currency [less than half million pounds sterling] the people of Kashmir the land and its potential wealth were sold away to the servitude of Dogra house by the British East India Company. Then the Governor of Kashmir Shiekh Imam ud din resisted the transfer but was finally reduced to subjugation with the aid of the British. This Sale Deed of 1846 misnamed treaty of Amritsar sealed the fate of Kashmiri masses.

Sheikh Abdullah further declared that the ‘sale -deed confers no privileges equivalent to those claimed by state government’s treaty rights . As such, case of Kashmir stands on unique footing and people of Kashmir press on mission their unchallenged claim to freedom on withdrawal of British from India. We wish to declare that no Sale Deed however sacrosanct can condemn more than four million people men and women to servitude of an autocrat when will to live under this rule is no longer acceptable to the people of the land. We are determined to mould our destiny and we therefore challenge the moral and political validity of the Sale Deed, to which people of Kashmir were never a party and which has since 1846 been the document of their bondage. ’ He also wrote in the Telegram that Sale did not have the status of a treaty and entreated the people to contribute a collection of seventy five lakh rupees so that they could return the investment of the prese nt Maharaja’s grandfather and buy back the independence of Kashmir.’ 54 Sheikh Abdullah furth er reiterated that, ‘the immensity of the wrong done to the people by virtue of the Sale Deed of 1846 can only be judged by looking into the actual conditions of the people. It is the depth of our torment that has given strength to our protest.’ 55

It is unmistakable to state that during the freedom struggle, the nature and character of the treaty remained a hot debate of discussion among the leadership of Kashmir as a highly contemptible and mortifying document by which the Dogra rulers extended the era of Sikh oppression with new dimensions. 56 The Dogra followed the

54 Ibid. 55 New Kashmir the Political and Economic Manifesto of Jammu and Kashmir National Conference , p. 171. 56 During the quite Kashmir Movement forceful speeches were made by Sheikh Mohd Abdullah in which he particularly alleged that the people of Kashmir had been sold by the Treaty of Amritsar for seventy five lacs 29 footsteps of their predecessors. During their rule, no Kashmiri, especially Muslim, was allowed to join the army. To render them submissive, the masses were led to believe that their very existence depended on the tender mercies of their political masters, the will of the ruler was a command and its obedience was a must. The Afghans in Kashmir are known for their atrocious character; the Sikhs, for looking upon Kashmiris with contempt, and the Dogras for their racial discrimination. They gloried in pushing the people of the land into a state of utter demoralization, dehumanization, degradation and dispossession. The treaty changed and transformed Kashmir unlike another event in its long history. Some events have not only long lasting impact but also in many ways go on expanding over the history it’s narrative consequences a nd the way future events happen, and the Treaty of Amritsar had many such repercussions for the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

or seven pieces a head as slaves and people to be prepared for ‘bullets .’ He exhorted them to ‘Break the Amritsar Treaty’. For details see extracts from the Kashmir Residency, Fortnightly Reports from Jan. 31st to May 15 th 1946 , Political Department, File 13-C/46. (Top Secret, Srinagar, June, 1946), NAI. 30

Chapter 3

Economic Structure and Making of the Crisis-I

‘The rich ruleth over the poor and the borrower is the servant to the l ender.’ 1

3.1. Agrarian Conditions

Economic structure may be defined as the composition and pattern of various components of the economy such as, production, employment, consumption of trade and gross regional product. 2 Structural change is conceptualized as the change in relative importance of the aggregate indicators of the economy. The process of development and structural change are intertwined, implying as economic development. 3 The whole economic structure of Kashmir was based on the domestic union of agricultural and manufacturing pursuits, the silk and shawl being the pivots of the structure of the geographically-locked Kashmir.

The structure under review is a matter of comprehensive interest as this was the structure which was ‘irrational’ i.e. non -capitalistic, non-profit oriented. The society’s structure and level of mobility, the spirit of enterprise that its institutions and dominant social values permit, and least of all, its general level of education all exert very direct influence on its capital investment structure. A society that is backward in all these respects can, in the long run, have but a rigid, unresponsive economy.4 In respect of Kashmir the domestic structure and capital accumulation of the structure was invested largely in the traditional branches, though the domestic structure acquired an unfavorable trend.5 In the nineteenth century, Kashmir was dominated by rural elite, with rich landlords exploiting the landless peasantry.

1 Achille Loria, The Economic Foundations of Society , London, 1899, p. XI. 2 Sudhair K. Thakur, Fundamental Economic Structure & Structural Change in the Regional Economies: A Methodological Approach , Article provided by Region et Development, LEAD, Journal of the University du Sud-Toulon Var, 2011, p. 10. 3 Ibid., p. 10. 4 Ivan T, The Indivisibility of the Social and Economic Factors of Economic Growth- a Methodology Study , Seventh International Economic History Congress, ed. Michael Flinn, University Press Edinburgh,1978, vol. 2, p. 35. 5 Ganga Nath Report, p. 59. 31

The economic structure of Kashmir was purely agrarian in nature like any other agricultural society and agriculture was the basic source of livelihood supporting roughly 87.5% population of Kashmir. 6 With the establishment of Dogra regime in 1846 a new ruling structure was brought about. As the transfer came about through a ‘Sale Deed’, it came to pass that a country inhabited chiefly by Muslims was handed over to a non-local Hindu prince. 7 The Treaty affected the life and conditions of people in many ways. One such consequence was the declaration of all proprietary rights in land in Kashmir null and void. 8 The strong conviction of the ruler Maharaja Gulab Singh was that he had purchased Kashmir along with its people and livestock, in fact with all damned things which it contained. 9 This was strictly adhered to by the subsequent maharajas of the Dogra regime. 10 Maharaja Gulab Singh was so much obsessed with the payment of seventy-five lakhs of rupees for purchasing Kashmir, that he declared Kashmir as his private property and established a centralized system of government. The basic structure of the political system was however, allowed to remain ‘feudalistic in character’. 11 In this feudalistically oriented state, the socio-economic and political life of the people suffered unabatedly from the unsound policies of the ruling class which at the best helped ‘the upper classes of the Hindus in particular to consolidate and to fatten themselves at the expense of the masses.12 Thus, the ownership of the land with the king during the Dogra period was the new dimension which they added to land management problem of

6 Ibid. 7 Foreign & Political Department, (Secret-E), File No. 86, 1877-78, NAI. 8 Foreign Department, (Secret, E), No’s 422 -43, Pros. Dec. 26, 1846, NAI. It is pertinent to note here that we have a clear evidence of private ownership of land enjoyed by the people of Kashmir since the ancient times till Kashmir was sold to Maharaja Gulab Singh in 1846. For details of private ownership of land, See, Kalhana, Rajatarangini , vol. 1, p. 235 for ancient period; for Sultanate period see Tuhfat-ul-Ahab, p. 82, Manuscript, Research & Publication Division Srinagar, (henceforth RPD). For Mughal, Afghan and Sikh Periods see Mohd. Azam Didamari, Waqat-i-Kashmir , f. 147, RPD; Khalil Mirjanpuri, Tarikh-i-Kashmir, ff. 19-20, RPD. Also for further details, See, M.A. Kaw, ‘Land Rights in Rural Kashmir; A Study in Continuity and Change from late-Sixteenth to Late-Twentieth Centuries’, Aparna Rao (ed.), The Valley of Kashmir in The Making and Unmaking of a Composite Culture’ , New Delhi, 2008 , pp. 218-19. 9 Dhar, Kashmir-the Land and its Management from Ancient to Modern Times , p. 82. 10 Maharaja Gulab Singh’s son Maharaja Ranbir Singh clearly stated the conviction and it was therefore that he included the fallowing lines in his Dastur-ul-Amal , sanctioned by him ist samvat 1939 for the guidance of his successors, ‘this state has been crea ted by my honored father, the late Maharaja Bahadur [Gulab Singh] which is confirmed by the Treaty of Amritsar of 16 th March 1846, in our possession, without anybody else having any claim on it’, trans. from Persian, General Records, File No. 423 of Samvat 1939, JKA-J. 11 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 11. 12 G.H. Khan, Government and Politics of Jammu and Kashmir , Srinagar. 1988, p. 2. 32

Kashmir. 13 Though, the establishment of the Dogra rule brought a change in the administration as a result of the founding of Jammu and Kashmir State, yet the conditions of Kashmir continued to be as it had been under the Sikhs. 14 During the period of our study frequent land settlements were carried in other parts of the Indian subcontinent, and it was understood that the settlement would lead to more rapid accumulation of capital in agriculture and its improvement, but Kashmir was still passing through a traditional economic order. The geographical isolation from the rest of the subcontinent and the increasing neglect of the rural economic infrastructure through corrupt and inept bureaucratic management created alarming consequences for the agrarian economy. The distribution of land brought unbearable pressure on peasants and migration became more intense. The landless peasants became an inexhaustible source of manpower for the landlords and state officials for carrying out begar (forced labour). 15

The agrarian structure was the main industry of the state supporting the large population. The overcrowding of population on this sector was of serious dimensions, and ways and means were not found of relieving it, so that the state would make progress in the economic field. 16 Such physical and economic circumstances of the state justify that the production of food grains should have taken precedence over commercial crops and the accepted theory that an appropriate portion of cultivated lands should be cash crops and thereby increase the purchasing power of the agriculturalists can be applied to the state only subject to the overriding consideration that provision of food for both urban and rural population should come first. 17 Thus, the figures of density of population, of productivity of soil, of average holding, and of the percentage of cultivated area which the various crops occupied presented no alternative to the proposition which would have made agriculture as supporting structure. 18 The structure which was feudal in character was comprised of the various social classes of the society. These were the jagirdars, pattadars, chakdars and other segments of peasantry who made up all social classes in variety of ways. No pure and simple landlord class existed and chakdars were numerous.

13 Dhar, Kashmir the land and its Management, p. ix. 14 Younghusband, Kashmir, pp. 176-80. 15 Mirza Saif –ud-din, Akhbarat, 13 Vols., vol.1, f. 74. 16 Ganga Nath Report, p. 66. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid. 33

Although high officials and Maharaja theoretically agreed that the greatest rewards in society must go to agriculturalists, they concerned themselves more with the raising of taxes. The Maharajas, all in their turn, appear to have been preoccupied with the western penetration to introduce anything new and settled in field of agriculture 19 with a view to make larger profits. The marked features of the agrarian structure throughout the Dogra period were mounting pressure on land, the increased fragmentation of holdings, the volume of indebtedness, forced labour, the sad lack of interior communication and the general mental outlook of the landless peasants.20 Thus, the methods of agricultural farming practiced during the Dogra period offered no ground for optimism in regard to the increase in the yield of various crops. 21 The farmer on the whole clung to his ancient methods of agriculture, his way of manuring were unscientific, his use of labour was uneconomical, his failure to introduce crops to fill up the gap during the off season made his dependence on the seasoned crops very pronounced, and scientific rotation and artificial manuring were practically unknown. There was a distant lack of enterprise in taking to good cultivation. On the whole the picture of the peasantry was unsatisfactory. 22 The less incentive availability prepared the general psychological make-up of an agriculturist to such an extent which finally precluded him from taking any risks in regard to improvement in the methods of cultivation. Apart from the fact that his outlook on life and religion had made the average villager a victim of superstition, pathetic, contentment and sullen fatalism, thereby putting premium on lack of enterprise and inaction, the

19 A.P. Nicholson, Scrapes of Paper, India’s Broken Treaties Her princes and Her Problem , London, 1930, pp. 88-90. 20 Ganga Nath Report, p. 86. 21 The various crops which were cultivated can be divided into two categories kharif and rabi. The kharif included, rice, maize, cotton, saffron. Rabi included wheat, barley, opium, rape flax. The peculiar geographical setup has from the times immemorial been a serious handicap to intensive farming and diversification of crops in the valley. As a result of this the system of cultivation, was what is known as ek- fasli that is the land gives one crop in the year . The rabi crop which took four to five months to mature in other parts of the country took five to six months in the valley of Kashmir. See, Lawrence , the Valley of Kashmir, pp. 325-30. Since kharif was harvested by September/ October i.e. on the eve of snowfall there was little time to prepare the soil for the next crops. Rabi seeds were sown in such fields as had not been cultivated during the kharif season. See Fredric Drew, The Northern Barrier of India , London, 1877, pp. 172- 3. Since kharif crops took longer to mature in Kashmir, they left no time for kharif . In effect, therefore, Kashmir’s peasants had to subsist on a one -crop economy —either rabi or kharif . R..L. Hangloo, Agrarian System of Kashmir (1846-1889), New Delhi , 1995, p. 13. 22 Ganga Nath Report, p. 80. 34 average agriculturalist had little spare capital which would afford him any scope for adventure. 23

During the maharaja Gulab Singh’s reign several attempts were made to introduce a “satisfactory ” method of assessment but all of them proved unsatisfactory and also lacked a definite purpose. 24 The happiness and welfare of the people depended almost entirely on the agrarian sector, which had a momentous effect on the character and development of the people. 25 The state carried out a series of revenue assessments/settlements from the beginning till the end of the raj. But all of them were only aimed at the regularization of the extraction from agriculture and the maximization of land revenue which was necessary for the maximization of the profits. The methods of assessment carried out were those of batai (1846), kardari (1857), chakdari (1873), Ijara system (1876), village cash assessment (1880), Izadboli system (1882), and regular settlement of A. Wingate 26 and then that of Sir Walter Lawrence.

The revenue extracted from these assessments was drained away to the urban areas, especially the city of Srinagar —the home town of the revenue appropriators. The actual producers, peasants were left with bare subsistence, which forced them to part with their other material assets to fulfill their material needs. 27 The peasant was treated nothing more than a machine to produce for the idle population of the city which was motivated by political designs to check any type of rebellion from the elite section of Kashmir. As Wingate has put it, 28

‘He [peasant] is a machine to produce Sh ali for a very large and mostly idle city population. The secret of the cheap shali is because if the price were allowed to rise to its proper level, the whole body of the Pandits would compel the palace to yield to their demands’.

The famine of 1877-89, as a supplement to the other pretexts, provided the stimulus for the colonial government demanding an over hauling of agrarian rights and

23 Ibid., p.83. 24 Hangloo, Agrarian System of Kashmir, p. 51. 25 Ram Chander Dube, History of Revenue Administration in Kashmir , File No. 1644, 1927, JKA-J. 26 Wingate Report, p. 41. 27 Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvests: Agriculture Reforms in Kashmir Jammu , Srinagar 1951 , p. 36. 28 Wingate Report , p. 73. 35 relations in Kashmir. The famine inquiry report of 1878 showed that large tracts of the valley got depopulated; the measures to import grain or give relief were being executed so feebly by corrupt officials as to render them useless. 29 The famine had brought to light the inadequacy of the protection offered to Kashmiri cultivators by the agrarian arrangements of the Dogra State. 30 Lawrence had shown that great loss of human lives could have been averted if the cultivator had been permitted to cut their crops before the start of the rains that destroyed the autumn harvest of 1877. 31 The rigid adherence to the old revenue system, in which assessments were made on the standing crop, delayed the reaping operations. 32 However, this old revenue system compelled both the Maharaja as well as the British Indian government to reorganize the agrarian sector which gave birth to land revenue settlements. The impact of the settlement will be discussed in detail in the subsequent pages. Before that the land revenue practices of the earlier times and during the Dogras are necessary to examine. It was this chaotic and irrational land revenue system put in place centuries before on which some cosmetic changes were made. 33

Prior to the establishment of the Dogra rule, Kashmir had witnessed various ruling dynasties and undergone numerous phases in state formation and revenue generation. The practice of giving land grants to a few families in exchange for loyalty and support continued throughout the centuries. The rulers generated resources by levying a number of taxes, besides collecting land revenue from the cultivators. 34

Right from Lalitaditya we have a connected account of the developments of polity and economy. According to ancient custom the state claimed only one-sixth of the produce of land. This seems to be an established practice not only in Kashmir, but

29 Foreign Department, (Secret-E), March, 1883, File no’s 81 -82, NAI. Mr. Fanshawe’s note on the famine of Kashmir mentions that, Kashmir is a country in which, with ordinary foresight, there should be no famine. But where corruption, had entered the very marrow of officials such foresight was impossible. But, whatever may be said about the causes of the famine, the responsibility for the appealing waste of human lives that followed rests entirely on the Dogra rule and its officials. See Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, p. 67. 30 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 149. 31 Lawrence, the Valley of Kashmir, p. 213. 32 Ibid., p. 214. 33 Shakti Kak, ‘The Agrarian System of the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir —A Study of Colonial Settlement Policies 1860-1905’, Waltraud Ernst and Biswamoy Pati (eds.), India’s Princely States: People, Princes and Colonialism, Routledge, 2007, p. 82. 34 Ibid., p. 71. 36 throughout ancient India. 35 It is not known when the practice of recovering grains in addition to the state share sprang up but that the cultivators were left without surplus is evident from sources. The early evidence is found in the Rajatarangini . In the well- known advice to his subjects by King Lalitaditya Mukhtapid (697-738), whose reign was famed supposedly for peace and prosperity and is believed to have made the land fit for cultivation of rice, ‘every care should be taken that there should not be left with the villagers some more food supply than required for one year consumption, nor more oxen than wanted for (the tillage of) their fields. Because, if they should keep more wealth, they would become in a single year very formidable Damaras, and strong enough to neglect the commands of the king.’ 36 Although there is nothing in the passage quoted to show that it has anything to do with the question of collection, it may safely be deduced that in addition to the state share viz, 1/6 th of the produce further demand was made from the villagers or the producers of food grains in kind, which left them only as much as was required for personal use. 37

In the 14 th century with the establishment of the Sultanate, the state share of the produce is said to have oscillated, although Shah Mir, who assumed the title of Shams- ud-din, ‘abolished the exactions of his predecessors and having repaired the ruin caused by the invasion and exactions of Dalju, by written orders fixed the revenue at 1/6 th of the produce.’ And with the coming of Zain -ul-Abidin the measures he introduced went a great way to improve the condition of the people by making them once more stable, peaceful and prosperous. 38

To maintain economic and political stability in the Subah of Kashmir emperor Akbar sent a five member team in 1859, to formulate the pattern of land revenue assessment and to determine the nature and volume of collection. 39 Thus, a detailed report about the nature of land, its classification, production and appropriation was prepared, and the assessment of land and its revenues, carried out by the officials, made extremely difficult for the corrupt officials to continue their practices of depriving both

35 J.L.K. Jalali, Economics of Food Grains in Kashmir , Mercantile Press, Lahore, 1931, p. 27. 36 Ibid., p. 28. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid., p. 29. 39 R.L. Hangloo, The State in Medieval Kashmir, New Delhi, 2000, p. 112. 37 the state and the peasants of their due shares. 40 It was the first methodical settlement of revenue in Kashmir. 41

Generation of revenue was based on activities related to agriculture, village manufacturing and wood carving, weaving of woolen cloth, basket making, paper machie, silver and copper work shawl and carpet making, leather and furs. Taxes on all these economic activities and the import and export of various commodities provided revenue for the rulers, in particular the export of shawls and carpets. However, land taxes both in kind and cash formed a vital component of the revenue. 42 More than ¾ of the revenue of Kashmir state was drawn from land revenue and the cultivating classes. 43 Therefore, it was important to encourage prosperous and diverse agricultural activities including the cultivation of grain and fruits.

During the days of the old Hindu rajas, the state is said to have taken no more than 1/6 th of the gross produce, the theory being that, on a division of the population into the inhabitants of the country and the inhabitants of the towns 1/6th of the produce of the farmer was enough for the wants of the latter, as well as of the court and officials. The native dynasty of the Chak sovereigns took one half of the rice and one-tenth of the dry crops. 44 Abul Fazl writes that although 1/3 rd had been for a long time past the normal share of the state, more than two shares were actually taken, and in Akbar’s time reduced to one-half. 45 The Afghans left all vegetables and minor cearls and took five eights of the rice. 46 The Sikhs introduced the system of ‘traki’ i.e. exacting one or more traks of six sirs over above the fixed share. This was accompanied by cesses such as tambol, mandarin, rasum-i-daftar , and the like, and gradually the share of the state was augmented under one name or another, until at length in 1833 the Sikh governor Mian

40 Ibid. 41 Jalali, Economics of Food Grains in Kashmir , p. 30. 42 Shakti Kak, ‘The Agrarian System of the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir’, p. 71. 43 Administration Report of the State for 1889-90 , Foreign Department, (Secret- E), Feb.1891, File Nos. 295- 326, NAI. 44 ‘Mr. Henvey’s Note on the Famine of Kashmir, Foreign Department, (Secret-March), 1883, File No. 86, 1887-80, NAI. 45 Abul Fazl, the Ain-i-Akbari, trans. H.S. Jarrett, vol. 2, p. 366. 46 Kirpa Ram, Majmui-Report (1872-73), Srinagar, p. 18. 38

Singh (discussed later) seems to have abolished a few cesses and only exhorted 5/6 th of the crops. 47

The state of affairs when Gulab Singh took it over in 1846, we are being told, was deplorable. He took from 2/3 rd to three quarters of the gross produce of the land about three times as much as was previously taken. The crops when cut by the cultivators were collected in stacks. One-half was as perquisites of various kinds, leaving 1/3 rd or only a quarter with the cultivators, of this some was taken in kind and some in cash. We do not have any statistical data but the available evidence shows the whole system of assessment and collection was exceedingly complicated and workable only in the interests of the corrupt officials. Gulab Singh during his reign did very little to ameliorate this state of things. He took things as he found them and troubled little to improve them. 48 It was up to 1860 that the state took 3/4 th of rice, maize, millets and buck wheat, and 9/16 th of oil seeds, pulses and cotton. 49 Although he brought a degree of tranquility to Kashmir during the eleven years of his reign as Maharaja, as far as political situation is concerned, in the imposition and collection of taxes he acted as a veritable “economic vampire ”.50

The method of assessment during the period of Maharaja Gulab Singh was batai. Under this system, the estimate of the revenue was decided when the grain was in heaps and was divided in the heaps after threshing as in regular batai. 51 The total demand of the state amounted to half of the produce. In addition to this the peasant had to pay about sixteen percent of the produce as trakee and abwabs. Abwabs were the other cesses levied by various officials. 52 The net calculation amounted to 2/3 of the produce and 1/3 was left to the peasant. 53 One Kharwar of paddy was equivalent to sixteen traks . The peasant was supposed to offer to the government and other officials the following: land revenue-eight traks , traki -four traks , tax on rice straw and vegetable produce-1½ seers, tambol -one trak

47 Henvey’s Note on the Famine of Kashmir. 48 Younghusband, Kashmir, pp. 173-74. 49 Jalali, Economics of Food Grains in Kashmir , p. 38. 50 Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 183. 51 H.M. Lawrence, Transfer of Government to Maharaja Gulab Singh , File Nos. 33-44, Section C, 28 th January, 1848, JKA-J. 52 Kripa Ram, Gulzar-i-Kashmir , Persian, Lahore, 1877, RPD, Srinagar, pp. 256-57. 53 H.M. Lawrence, Transfer of Government to Maharaja Gulab Singh. 39 two seers , other cesses-one trak . Out of sixteen traks the peasant was left with two traks .54

Prior to the Lawrence’s settlement, any measure adopted, mostly resulted in taxing the cultivator beyond his capacity. 55 Since the settlement introduced by Todar Mal the crops used to be divided into kimiti and ordinary. The former included cotton, mong, tilgogal, sarsun, linseed, saffron, etc.; under the latter fell shali and maize, etc. The fixation of prices by the state was not feasible. For ‘ kimiti’ crops the state rate was much higher than the bazar rate , and if a lucky villager had to pay his demand in ‘ kimiti’ crops, he could purchase from the bazar and credit it the state at state rates, and thus, gain by the transaction even though he had to pay for the collecting agency; otherwise, the demand would be pressed to be paid in shali or maize, state rates for which were lower and the villager suffered, for it would leave him very little or even nothing to live upon.56

This haphazard mode of collecting was aggravated by the system of adoption of izadboli or auctioning of villages. Auctioning was nominal. The bid would be in the name some official or influential city man and even then no payment would be made by the bidder, and the demand would be shown as arrear in the books. Allied to this, the system of seed grain advance meant to advance grain to the cultivator to save him from starvation which never reached him ; the relegating of a village to the list of ‘ Sakim-ul- hal’ (unable to pay the demand –infirm condition) even though it had enough resources; the advice of Giriftani to collect arrears; the detestable system of begar or forced labour; and the exemption from it of people (villagers) who were fortunate enough to be hired labourers of a chakdar or an official, and seek protection under a ‘powerful name’ the unreliable system, of last, but not the least, heinous exaction of rasums and other numerous taxations —all these tended to abuse the system which was introduced with a view to improve both the cultivator, his land and the state revenues. 57 The vacillations, in the system of land revenue collection have, as noticed above, had a very disastrous effect

54 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, pp. 50-55. 55 Jalali, Economics of Food Grains in Kashmir , p. 41. 56 Ibid., p. 42. 57 Ibid., pp. 42-3. 40 upon the people, the villager as well as the townsmen. The villager if he ran to the city would join the member of paupers fed at state charity to whom shali was supplied at rates that were from the economist’s point of view, not allowed to rise along with the demand. The effect was crushing —‘the pseudo cash a ssessment was a double edged- sword invented to retard the progress of the times.’ 58

Lawrence argues that, the revenue was, as a rule, so high that the loss of one or two revenue payers was enough to ruin a village. The total demand of taxes levied on the peasant amounted to sixty percent of the gross produce. 59 Due to high pitch of land revenue demand the revenue fell into arrears both during the pre-settlement and post settlement periods. According to Lawrence, ‘so long the officials and relatives of officials are allowed to form new estates by withdrawing cultivators from khalsa village, 60 so long will the land revenue of Kashmir continue to decline.’ 61 The figures of the total demand and collection of land revenue from samvat 1975 to 1999 (1918- 1942 A.D.) are as under:

58 Ibid., p. 44. 59 Gazetteer of Kashmir and Ladakh , Calcutta, 1890, p. 106. 60 Khalsa villages were those villages which paid their revenue direct to the treasury and were not encumbered with charges for individuals or institutions. Another category of land was the jagir villages; the revenue of these villages was assigned by the state to individuals either as a reward for services rendered or to be rendered. The institution of jagirs of the Dogra period shouldn’t be confused with Mughal jagirs. While the Dogra jagirdar enjoyed unlimited powers and considered himself to be the virtual owner of the landed estate, the Mughal jagirdar was a mere functionary of the government. The main motive behind the assigning of these were more political exigencies than to pay any reward in lieu of services, because jagirdars served as supporting structure to the illegitimate ruling character of the Dogras. Third category was of those villages which were assigned for the maintenance of certain temples. These villages were maintained by a separate department called Dharmarath. See, Foreign Department, letter from W.R. Lawrence, Settlement Officer, Kashmir, to Colonel R.P. Nisbet, Resident, Kashmir, dated Srinagar, the 13 th Nov. 1889, demi-official, NAI. 61 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir’, Shimla Records, Foreign Department, Secret-E, NAI, Pros., File Nos. 106-110, February 1890. 41

Demand (in lakhs Collection (in lakhs Year/Samvat rupees) rupees) 1975 (1918 A.D.) 43.59 36.95 1976 44.99 43.30 1977 46.38 35.77 1978 47.67 36.07 1979 50.26 49.42 1980 50.18 48.30 1981 50.08 48.35 1982 50.32 49.72 1983-84 75.23 72.83 1985 50.61 50.55 1986 49.60 51.08 1987 50.90 50.40 1988 46.97 45.06 1989 52.14 50.87 1990 52.77 52.26 1991 55.80 52.53 1992 52.42 51.68 1993 53.22 52.06 1994 53.54 52.60 1996 53.55 52.71 1997 53.46 52.34 1998 53.53 52.49 1999 (1942 A.D.) 54.64 50.47

As is reflected in the table the demand has increased from about 44 lakhs to about 55 lakhs, an increase of about 25%. As against this the collection has increased from 37 lakhs to about 50 lakhs, although, there is a considerable gap between the demand and its 42 collection. 62 There was no fixity and finality fairly followed in the nature and collection of the revenue liabilities. Beyond the recognized taxation, (discussed later) there was other taxation quite as sure and as binding on the villages as the states claims. 63 Wingate has argued that, the revenue system was such that whether the cultivator worked much or little, he was left with barely enough to get along on till next harvest. 64 The prevailing system of realizing the demand in kind necessitated a separate department under a special officer, called the revenue commissioner ( Diwan-i-jins ) whose business was to arrange with the local officers for the transport of the grain to the public store houses to distribute it at fixed rates and to keep the accounts. The balance which remained with the cultivating class was not more than enough to meet their bare subsistence; on the other hand, the government, after providing the army and other departments was left with large surplus to which the urban population looked for support which by mere reason of the monopoly (discussed later in this chapter) they have to take under certain restrictions as to the price and quantity, the amount which a family may draw daily being regulated not by their means of purchasing but by the will of the government. 65 One adverse result of the heavy demand of revenue was that the cultivators opted for inferior type of rice variety. This was so because good varieties would attract greater attention of the revenue collectors and resulted in more exactions. As a result we see that although white rice commanded higher price and little yield but still red rice was preferred. Same was the case with wheat and barley. The orchards are said to have been uprooted by the people as these attracted the notice of the Darbar. High quality fruits which are acquired through grafting of the fruit trees like apple and pear were not raised for the same reason. 66

So surely was prosperity turned into pretexts for further extortion, that farmers have been known to decline offers of foreign seed, lest the unusually fine crops that might be expected therefrom, should catch the eye of the tax gatherer. The principal cause, therefore, of the ruin of the Kashmir’s agrarian set up was the pressure of the land revenue, which was assessed at such a proportion as to deprive the agriculturists of all

62 Ganga Nath Report, p. 135. 63 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir’ 64 Wingate Report, p. 26. 65 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , Calcutta, 1874, NAI, p. 08. 66 Foreign Department, W.R. Lawrence, Settlement Officer, Kashmir to Colonel R.P. Nisbet, Resident in Kashmir dated Camp, Kashmir the 2 nd Dec.1889, NAI. 43 incentive to extortion. 67 The arrangements for the collection of revenue were complex. In most parts of India the demand of the state was satisfied by a sum of money which was fixed for a term of years, the cultivator or his employer would theoretically do what he likes with his lands and his crops, and so long as he paid his due by the appointed day, he was unmolested. The Kashmiri peasant had no such privilege, not even in theory. In Kashmir the crops were actually divided upon the ground and in a manner which combines the greatest risk of loss to the ruled with the greatest certainty of extortion from the ruler. 68

The common practice was that to let out a circle of villages to a contractor, who engaged to deliver a stated quantity of grain representing an estimate of the government share, together with numerous petty cesses in cash and kind for the support of the Hindu priests, for the support of officials, for the expenses of the village servants and so forth. The contractor was remunerated by a percentage as commission, aided by a chain of officials who excepting in the lowest grades were Pandits and were therefore out of sympathy with the peasantry. All these were mostly irregularly paid and were consequently forced to live on the peasants ’ back. The list of these officials is as (1) the tarazudar or salesmen, weighed shares of the state and zamindar (2) the shakdar who watched the crops (3) The sazawal who controlled the shakdars , (4) the patwari or accountant (5) the muqqadam who aids the Pandit (6) the kardar over several villages arranged distribution of food, (6) the tahsildar in charge of several parganas . All these officials were to be supported by the peasantry; a heavy burden was, therefore, inflicted on them. 69

Not only was the high revenue demand of the state an abhorrent burden placed on the Kashmiri cultivators [while Pandits and Pirzadas were assessed at much lighter rates], 70 but it was made heavier by the food control system operating in the valley. The main crop grown in Kashmir was rice, for which no market existed in real sense of the

67 Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir . 68 Ibid. 69 Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir and Adjoining Districts of Kishtawar, Badarwah, Jammu, Naoshera, Punch and the Valley of Kishen Ganga, Calcutta, 1873, reprint, Srinagar, 2005, p. 110. 70 Ibid., p. 106. Apart from the governing class, the religious heads of the Muslim community of Kashmir were also responsible for much of the woes of the peasantry. 44 term, and its export had been prohibited since the early days of Dogra rule developing into the system of the state monopoly of grain selling, which was used by the official class to their own advantage. 71 No free market system was allowed, where prices would rise and fall in accordance with supply and demand. The grain monopoly was having private advantages and in general terms, however, it can be said that the official class of Kashmir would regard as calamity the introduction of any reform that would have the effect of introducing a free sale of rice in the Bazars, for the short supplies and restricted distribution were all in their favour. 72

The cash crops like, sarson, tobacco, cotton, linseed, saffron, walnut oil were taxed separately; also, fruit trees, honey, sheep and goats were taxed. Under the above listed items, the state share was not less than 3/5 th of the gross produce and what remained with the cultivator was even less than two fifth; sometimes it was only about one third of the total producer. 73 The abundance of the fruit, berries, and nuts, the extensive grazing area and forest produce, enabled the cultivators to survive, but an assessment so heavy reduced the cultivators, forcibly confined within the valley, 74 to the condition of daily labourers or slaves. 75

It would not be out of place here to mention that the country had never been subject to a fixed assessment and, of course the cultivator had always been uncertain of the extent of his future liability. 76 A crude system of fluctuating assessments, regulated not by any recognized theory or principle, but depending upon the will of provincial

71 Foreign Department, K.W. Political A, Dec.1879, File Nos.155-188, NAI. 72 Ibid. 73 Gazetteer of Kashmir and Ladakh, p. 106. 74 The past inhuman policy of imprisoning the people within the valley called Rahdari continued under the Dogra also, with strong conviction. In respect to the hereditary habits and social organization of the Kashmiri’s as effecting emigration one may quote the folk saying ‘ Mulk-i-Kashmir kaid be zanjir’ the truth was that the Darbar couldn’t effort to let the people go, because once in British territory, they would never return to the scene of so much poverty and oppression, and Kashmir would be deserted for a generation. The official theory was that emigration was permitted, but the people were so contended with the new system inaugurated by Diwan Anant Ram that they refused to abandon their homes, yet corpses were seen daily in the streets of Srinagar. See, Foreign Department, Political –A Dec. 1879, File Nos.155-188, NAI. 75 Gazetteer of Kashmir and Ladakh, p. 106. Of all the more valuable kinds of fruits 3/4 th of the annual produce was taken by government. See , Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir and Adjoining Districts of Kishtawar, Badarwah, Jammu, Naoshera, Punch and the Valley of Kishen Ganga Gazetteer of Kashmir, p. 101. 76 Pandit Bhag Ram, Report of the Administration of the Jammu and Kashmir for 1889-90, Jammu, 1891, p. 45. 45 governors and subordinates, had been in vogue to the great detriment of the agricultural classes. 77 As a result of this heavy demand of land revenue, peasants were often forced to give up cultivation and many times payments fell in arrears. In 1857, Maharaja Ranbir Singh issued an order that all arrears if not recovered by Nauroz (Persian New Year) day, may charge interest at the rate of Rs. two in cash and two kharwars of rice for every hundred, per month. 78 Here, it becomes evident that the revenue system continued to vitiate the entire agrarian economy till the end of the 19 th century, 79 and desperately a need was felt to have a land revenue settlement, which on the one side, would change the scenario to some extent but on the other side provide an opportunity to the British Indian government to intervene. The task was entrusted first to A. Wingate, who carried out a preliminary survey of land and submitted his report, and finally to Walter Lawrence. Before giving a clear outline of the settlement, it is necessary to investigate the nature and impact of the institution of jagirdari on the agrarian structure of Kashmir.

3.2. Institution of Jagirdari

Besides the excessive pressure of the heavy revenue demand and serving the revenue officials, the peasant was subject to another class called jagirdars. Jagirdar refers to those semi-autonomous chiefs who held large number of villages and did not personally cultivate the land and sustained instead on rented earnings of the land. 80 There were three types of grants made by the state to jagirdars; jagir grants made as reward for services rendered or to be rendered to the state; grants made for political exigencies and religious grants mainly for the support of religious institutions. 81 Every grant was made either as an equivalent of a certain annual sum of money or in respect of a certain area of land or in respect of whole villages. 82

The first category of the jagirs was given to kith and kin of the Maharaja, who were serving the state. These jagirs were quite large. For instance, the jagirs bestowed to

77 Ibid. 78 Y. Vaikuntham (ed.), Peoples Movement in the Princely States , Manohar, 2004, p. 169. 79 R. L. Hangloo, ‘the Magnitude of Land Revenue Demand in K ashmir (1846-1900)’, Social Scientist , Vol. 12, No. 6, 1884, p. 56. 80 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 239. 81 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 71. 82 Ibid. 46

Raja Amar Singh and Raja Ram Singh, sons of Maharaja Ranbir Singh, enjoyed the revenues of 80 and 38 villages respectively. 83 The jagirdar not only enjoyed the property rights 84 but also wide range of powers on his estate. They acted as real power holders within their estate. Their function was to collect revenue and to impose various other cases on the cultivators who formed those villages. The cesses, charged by the jagirdars were innumerable in number. 85 The cultivator’s working on the jagir lands were purely at the mercy of the jagirdar who could be at any time ejected, subject to the will of the jagirdar. 86

The peasants were mainly working as tenants on the land of the jagirdar and enjoyed immunity from Gilgit begar —the only protection which the peasants of jagir lands were having in comparison to peasants working on the khalsa lands. While explaining the state of jagir cultivators J.L. Kaye writes, ‘i t must be a mystery how in the face of such exactions the inhabitants of jagir villages have continued to cultivate the land. That they have done so can only be explained on the grounds that in khalsa villages the exactions of the revenue officials, before the current settlement, exceeded even those of jagirdars or that to escape the evils of Kar-i-begar , the cultivators considered it to their interest to pay this heavy price for exemption.’ 87 However, this didn’t mean that the cultivators working on the jagir lands were free from begar but they were subject to it by the jagirdars for their own needs and requirements. 88 Even if a river passed through the jagirdars lands, the peasant who fished in that river had to provide fish to the jagirdar. 89

Who were the jagirdars? And to whom jagirs were given? What were their powers? At the time of the establishment of Dogra Rule there were 3115 jagirs. 90 The institution of jagirdari was an age old institution in Kashmir. From the ancient times the rulers used to give lands as agraharas (jagirs) to individuals and religious institutions

83 Political General Department, File No 7, 1890, JKA-J. 84 Political and General Department, File No.117, 1896, JKA-J. 85 Political and General Department, File No. 122, 1896, JKA-J. 86 Political and General Department, File No. 232/H-12, 1908, JKA-J. 87 J.L. Kaye, Proposed Scheme for the Revision of Assessment in Kashmir Valley, 1904, NAI, p. 3. 88 Foreign and Political, File No.19/33, 1931, JKA-J. 89 Political and General Department, 76/1876, JKA-J, quoted in Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 72. 90 Nargis Das Nargis, Tarikh-i-Dogra Desh , Jammu, 1967, p. 631, K.M. Panikkar, The Founding of the Kashmir State , pp. 135-36. 47 mostly guided by subjective considerations. 91 Maharaja Gulab Singh tried to revoke all the establishing jagir order as he, unlike the Sikh Maharajas, was reluctant to grant Muslims any significant portion in the higher echelons of his administration and upon assuming power, he discharged most of the Muslim officials who were serving in the revenue department. 92

Besides the submission of the powerful Khaka and Bomba rajas of Muzaffarabad, there were also other Muslim jagir holders, Dharmarath holders and kardars in Kashmir whose power and holdings got shaken upon the inauguration of the Dogra Rule. 93 However, it seems that Gulab Sing h’s move was more guided by re-structuring of jagirs to create a new class of supporters, than by any other interest. Under the British pressure he was persuaded to leave all who had grants of lands of old standing in possession. 94 It was to exercise and propagate himself as a sovereign ruler that he sought the continuation of the jagirs to be at his pleasure. 95

At the top of giving of jagirs were the close relatives of the Maharaja. Second were the officials like governor and in the third category were some influential families like Naqashbandis of Kashmir. Jagirdars were mainly Dogras or Punjabi officials in the high positions of government or Pandits at the higher levels of the administration mostly residing in the city of Srinagar. 96 The chief jagirdars rendering civil services to Maharaja were Pandit Kamal Bhan, chief recorder keeper, Munshi Trilok Chand, chief treasurer, Hakim Azim, chief Physician, Lachman Pandit Dhar, governor of Kashmir, Wazir Ratnu, kotwal and Ganasha Chief Toshkhana, Wazir Punoo, Wazir Zorawoo and Raj Kak Dhar.97 These persons were rendering service to the state with a wide range of authority.

Jagirdars who were having the jagir of two or three villages besides the above cited were as Raja Amar Singh, Raja Ram Singh, Dewan Amarnath, Maharani Bandraji,

91 For Hindu period see Rajatarangini vol. 1, pp.18-34, Vol. 2, p. 4, For Mughals see, Akbarnama, Vol. 3, p. 287. 92 Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 171. 93 Rai, Hindu Rulers and Muslim Subjects , pp. 51-2. 94 Ibid., p. 53. 95 Ibid. 96 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 72. 97 Ibid. 48

Lachman Das, Nakashbandis, Malik Munwar Shah and many others. 98 With the passage of time the number of jagirdars went on increasing in order to create a strong supporting structure. Maharaja Hari Singh during a single year (1926-27 A.D.) granted jagirs to various persons valuing rupees 16,320.99 The persons to whom jagirs were given were Sobha Singh, Tarkur Kartar Singh, Takur Puran Singh, Rao Raltan Singh and Raja Hakum Singh. 100 In 1931 Maharaja Hari Singh on the occasion of the birthday of his heir bestowed jagirs to twenty persons, among whom eighteen were Dogra Rajputs and two were Muslims. 101

Absentee landlordism was one of the results of the jagirdari. Many of the jagirdars used to give their jagirs to ‘unscrupulous’ middle men known as mustajirs or revenue contractors, for a year at a time. 102 The jagirdars used to take revenue in kind which gave birth to more abuses. 103 This led to hue and cry and a committee had to be constituted in May 16, 1929. 104 The committee recommended that the revenue be taken in cash not in kind; because in kind the jagirdars demanded more than what was due. The committee’s recommendation for cash was accepted. It was also accepted by the jagirdars, on the condition that they should be granted more jagirs to compensate for them for the loss, they would sustain by the change. Most of the khalsa land, which ought to have gone to the peasants, was handed over to the jagirdars. What was more problematic in this connection was that large tracts of fertile lands in Kashmir were granted as fresh jagirs to some Rajputs of Jammu. 105

What appears from the scenario is that the promotion of the state-led institution of jagirdari was holding the neck of the poor peasant. 106 The dispossessed peasant was forced to trek hundreds of miles down to the plains in search of food. 107 A change

98 H.L. Rivett, Assessment Report of Mian Jagirs, 1896-97, Civil and Military Gazette Press, pp. 9-11, JKA-J. 99 Foreign and Political Department, File No. 48 of 1927, JKA-J. 100 Ibid. 101 Hassnain, Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , pp. 132-33. 102 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging, p. 77; The Glancy Commission’s Report, Ranbir Government Press, Jammu, 1932, p. 30. 103 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, p. 231. 104 Jagirs, Muafis and Mukarraris, Government of Jammu and Kashmir, Ministry of Revenue, February, 1956, Jammu and Kashmir State Archives, Srinagar (JKA-S), p. 56. Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 231. 105 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 31. Peer Hassan Shah, Tarikh-i-Hassan , Vol.2, reprint, Srinagar, p. 574. 106Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvests, p. 8. 107 Ibid. 49 occurred in the nature of these institutions only after 1930s. In 1933 as a result of the Glancy commission recommendations the people were given property rights of their ‘own’ land 108 along with the right of sale and mortgage, with no effective land Alienation Act.109 This backfired because the Act couldn’t prevent the peasant from disposing his land in times of difficulties. Thus, in a year’s period mortgages increased from 3,610 acres to 12,183 acres and sales increased from 9,208 acres to 21,499 acres of land. 110

The other two types of jagirdars were the Maufidars and Mukkararees. These were further leaching the vitality of the peasant and enjoyed more or less the same privileges as jagirdars. 111 The first was a religious muafi under which 1/3 rd of the land revenue was received by the muafidars in cash and the other two thirds in kind. 112 Not only they didn’t pay revenue on these free holds but they possessed lands in ownership also, for which they paid no land revenue. Thus the money to which state was entitled only filled the pockets of these privilege holders. 113 Non-religious muafis were given to those persons called Mukkararees, for the construction of works for public use such as bridges and wells and so on. But they were paying little service to the state and caring still less for the welfare of the common man. This was a group of ‘do nothings’ , a dead weight on the resource of the state, generation after generation. 114

All these classes were unproductive in nature, a stagnant burden on the economic structure of the state. These classes aggravated the problems of the state and reduced the cultivator. According to P.N. Bazaz, ‘the poverty o f the Muslim masses was appalling. Dressed in rags which could hardly hide his body and barefooted, a Muslim peasant, presented the appearance rather of starving beggar than of one who filled the coffers of the state. He worked laboriously in the fields during the six months of the summer to pay the state its revenues and taxes, the officials their rasum and the money-lender his interest. Most of them were landless laborers working on the assets of their absentee landlord. Their share of the produce was not enough for more than three months; for the

108 Foreign and Political Department, File No.196/R-10 OF 1933, JKA-J. Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 229. 109 Ibid. 110 Ibid. 111 Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvest , p. 15. 112 Wingate Report, p. 29. 113 Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvest , p. 15. 114 Ibid. 50 rest they had to earn by other means. During the six months they were unemployed and had to go outside the boundaries of the state to work as labourers in big towns and cities of British India. Their lot as such was no good, and many of them died every year unknown, unwept and unsung outside their homes.’ 115

The peasants were systematically worse than the inhabitants of the capital. They were taught by long and bitter experience to consider themselves as serfs, and to regard themselves as having no rights whatever. They were left for their own use so small an allowance of the produce of their land that they never, even in prosperous years, had more than barely sufficient with which to tide over until the following harvest. And in Srinagar itself the lower orders of society were better off only by comparison with the inhabitants of the villages. 116

3.3. Lawrence Settlement

It was after the death of Ranbir Singh, succeeded by his eldest son, Pratap Singh, a man of the most kindly nature, very shrewd, old fashioned in some ways, and intensely devoted to his religion. 117 He succeeded to an administration which had become a byword for bankruptcy, corruption and resentment and none to help him to restore order and system. The Brahmins, known as Kashmiri pandits, had seized all power and authority and the Muslim cultivators were forced to work to keep the idle Brahmans in comfort. In 1889 the Kashmir state was bankrupt. 118 The rich land was left uncultivated, and the army was employed in forcing the villagers to plough and sow the land and worse still, the soldiers came at harvest time, and when the share of the state had been seized and these men of war had helped themselves, there was little grain to tide the unfortunate peasants. 119 Lawrence states that a proverb of Kashmiri language which was often in vogue was, ‘ batta batta tah piyada patta’ implies that, ‘we are crying for food an d the tax

115 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir, p. 138. 116 Dermot Norris , Kashmir the Switzerland of India, p. 6. 117 Sir Walter Lawrence , The India We Served, London, p. 126. 118 Ibid., p. 127. 119 Ibid. 51 collector is after us!’ He claims that at the time of the commencement of the settlement of the land everything save air and water was under taxation. 120

At the time of Pratap Singh’s accession to the throne the Dogras had already ruled the valley for nearly forty years. Yet beyond restoring order in the land they had been able to achieve little. Condition of people had deteriorated physically as well as mentally. 121 Special codes were formulated and preferential treatments were given by the maharaja to his own community. As Mridu Rai argues, ‘ the Maharaja was in fact representing the interests of only the small Hindu segment of his Kashmiri subjects. The measures instated by the maharaja and passed by the state council that made even more transparent the state’s narrowly construed definition of subjects whose interests were to be prom oted.’ 122 In 1894 the Maharaja and the council inaugurated the ‘ Pratap Code’ ‘this being a regulation to ameliorate the condition of the Dogra Rajput’s, specially, the code was intended to provide Dogra Rajput’s greater access to land, on revenue -free terms for the first five years and at only half the rate subsequently, access to education, exemption of their villages from begar (forced labour) and of their cattle from taxation. Such anxiety for their ‘circumstances’ was reserved for the Dogras as they were the Maharajas ‘brethren’. 123 They were also excluded from the capital punishment, and Dogra jagirdars settled in Kashmir were released also from the requirement of obtaining licenses to possess firearms on the grounds that they could not be treated like the general public. 124 This was a significant concession in a state that had since Gulab Singh’s times worked actively towards appropriating a monopoly of coercive powers. 125 It is clear, as noted by Chitralekha Zutshi, ‘that the Dogra administration was attemptin g to create a class of men loyal to the state who, significantly, were not drawn from the ranks of Kashmiris; most were Punjabis or Dogras, alongside a few prominent Kashmiri Pandit bureaucrats. 126 In 1866-67 Maharaja Ranbir Singh granted chak lands to Hindus who were the members of his administration, on condition that they remain Hindus, accept

120 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 417. 121 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 126. 122 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim subjects, pp. 140-41. 123 Ibid. 124 Ibid. 125 Ibid. 126 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 71. 52 services nowhere else, and pay at a low revenue assessment. 127 Special consideration was also extended to Kashmiri Hindu landed interests so that while Muslim jagirdars were required to pay nazarana on their concession to a jagir, Kashmiri pandit jagirdars were confirmed in 1910 in their exemption from similar payments. 128 During the days of the great famine of 1878-1879 the Muslim subjects were allegedly discriminated against. This discrimination is reflected in the memorandum of early 1877 was stealthily submitted to the British viceroy at Delhi by some unknown Kashmiris making which made specific charges against Ranbir Singh the memorandum was never published in full. Parts of it that were subsequently quoted by some informed British writers in their books. In the memorandum charges leveled against the Maharaja were grave in character. The most serious charges made, were that in order to save the expense of feeding his public, Maharaja Ranbir Singh had preferred to drown boat-loads of Muslims in the Wular Lake. The British had taken these allegations seriously enough to appoint a commission of enquiry but Kashmiris Muslims had supposedly been too frightened to come forward to provide corroboration. 129 Although the Maharaja was exonerated, the outrage aroused by this publicity shocked the valley’s Muslims and called for some measure of intervention by the colonial government. 130 Even more critically, the Dogra Darbar’s attitude towards Kashmiri people during the famine had demonstrated its incapacity to rise above the preferential treatment of its already privileged Hindu subjects to the detriment of the Muslim cultivators who were the greatest sufferers. 131

It was against this background that Pratap Singh at the time of his accession to the throne was confronted with the conditions which were formally presented by a British officer on behalf of the viceroy that the maharaja shall have to just introduce certain reforms in his administration and secondly accept a British officer as resident.132 Though apparently it seems that the purpose of the British intervention was purely guided by the sympathetic attitude of the Britisher’s for the people of the Kashmir, in reality it was

127 Ibid. 128 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 141. 129 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 127. 130 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 142. 131 Ibid., p. 142. Though there some were other reasons of intervention, to discuss them is beyond the scope of the very chapter. For other reasons, in fact, more important and decisive than the above-cited, see Ali Mohd Pir, British Policy Towards Jammu & Kashmir (1846-1947), PhD. Thesis, Aligarh Muslim University, 2013. 132 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 128. 53 guided more by imperial exigencies than by any sympathetic consideration. Prior to the establishment of the residency it was thought necessary to compel the maharaja to introduce some reforms in Kashmir; the British thought that the move will be resisted, if it will not be guide by some people oriented measure. It was, therefore, thought necessary to introduce a settlement under the charge of an English officer and the connected reforms would immensely strengthen the Resident’s hands, which would put at his disposal a valuable and effective instrument for exercising his supervision which the British thought necessary and also act as check to the policy of excluding European officers from the service of the Darbar. 133

The measures, therefore, proposed by the colonial government in the state of Jammu and Kashmir were also guided by economic considerations besides other imperial exigencies. Among the proposed measures none was as thoroughgoing as the land revenue settlement operations instituted between 1889 and 1895 overseen, first by A. Wingate then by the British civil servant Sir Walter Lawrence. 134 The impact of all these settlements on the peasants of Kashmir who were groaning under the misrule is a question which needs a through probing in order to show the implications of Lawrence’s settlement both on the agrarian as well as on the socio-economic structure of Kashmir.

Lawrence condemned the administration of Kashmir for being opposed to the interests of the cultivating classes and to the development of the country and asserted that the officials systematically endeavoured to make themselves feared by the people. 135 Wingate too has argued the same —‘that the Kashmiri cultivator had been pressed down

133 Foreign Department, letter from T.J.C. Plowden, Resident in Kashmir to the Secretary of India, No.319, dated Srinagar the 23 rd June, 1886, NAI. 134 Walter Lawrence’s celebrated work The Valley of Kashmir has much to say regarding the wretched condition of Kashmir when he began his famous work of land settlement in 1889. In the book Lawrence draws an apt comparison between the condition of the Kashmir peasantry then and that of the French peasants just before the Revolution, and greatly to the advantage of the latter, who, however bad their plight, had never sunk to the same depths of hopeless degradation. In these circumstances it was not perhaps surprising that Lawrence found the people suspicious, sullen, and furtive, with every man’s hand turned against his neighbor, thrift and honest labour to be almost unknown, and bands of hungry peasants roaming the valley, anxious only to avoid the ubiquitous tax gatherer and to find the wherewithal for a hand-to-mouth existence. Lawrence besides exposing the inner contradictions of the society of Kashmir was also guided by the motive to justify the imperial intervention in the internal affairs of Jammu and Kashmir. He is still remembered by the people of Kashmir as ‘Laren Sahib’. 135 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir .’ 54 to the condition of a coolie cultivating at subsistence allowance the state property. ’136 Both A. Wingate and Lawrence spent a considerable time in the rural hinterland of Kashmir. They brought to the fore, in an unprecedented manner, the tensions that underlay Kashmiri society, pitting the interests of the Hindu community against those of the numerically preponderant Kashmiri Muslim cultivators within the framework of the Dogra state. 137

For the first time in the chequered history under Dogra rule, the rights of the peasants of were defined “ without any ambiguity ”.138 The eye-witness accounts, of course predominantly European, portray an improved picture of the post-settlement Kashmir which is in total contrast to the murky picture of the pre-settlement period. Two instances may be cited here, both recorded by European travelers, who are unanimous in their descriptions regarding the pre- and post-settlement Kashmir. Their accounts are supplemented by what Lawrence writes in his work; rather their accounts are highly exaggerated. O’ Connor in con versation with a peasant records, 139

‘…this chance halting place under the chinars of Panzin [name of a place] brought me also across the foot prints of another man whose name is engraved upon the history of Kashmir. For as the evening grew the village headman came and sat by the brook and conversed about his fields. “Sir ”, he said, “since Laren [W.R. Lawrence] we have had great peace. He came walking along the very road on his way to Wangat [name of a place] and I stood before him, thus, with folded hands, said “huzoor, here is great zulm (injustice), yon (that) field is mine, but another from the next village who has friends at court, has stolen it from me … and Laren said, “what is your name? ” And I said Sobhena the son of Futto, and he put it down in his note book, and then said, “what i s name of your field? ”, and I laughed and said, “huzoor, they call my field Bamjoo, ” and he put that also in his book, but said no more and took his way, and lo! In the fullness of day when the settlement was accomplished, my field was given back to me, and justice was done. ” “And who was Laren? ” I enquired… “ Laren, ” he replied, “was the great sahib who made

136 Wingate Report, p.19. Wingate notes that I saw mobs struggling and fighting to secure a chance of getting a few seers of the government shali , in a way that I have not witnessed since the great famine of southern India and found it impossible to obtain any record of bazar prices.’ Ibid., p. 17. 137 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 148. 138 Dhar, Kashmir the Land and its Management, p. 134. 139 O’ Connor, The Charm of Kashmir, pp. 147-48. 55

the settlement; the friend of all zamindars. Since his time a deep confidence has settled upon our hearts. It was he who said “ o wise ones do not part with your lands for they will one day become gold. ” Some of the other farmers of the neighborhood had by now quietly joined our party, when the headman had finished his tale; they echoed it with evident sincerity. “It is true, ” they said, “Laren was our great benefactor and our children’s children will remember his name.”

Another incident is recorded by E.F. Knight. About a village, that he had already visited once, he says , ‘this was once a considerable place, but the houses are now in ruins and on the wastelands the square of grass grown ridges shows the boarders of the former paddy fields. The whole of the inhabitants fled to India in the fatal year 1879. These people are now flocking back. After a year before our visit there were but seven families in the village, we now found thirty, for during the previous twelve months, twenty three families had returned from Punjab, where they were doing well, the report of Mr. Lawrence’s settlement work in their native land and of the security from oppression in the settled districts having reached these exiles.’ 140

Due to the settlement operations carried out Lawrence claims that the cultivators ‘now felt economically so secure as to voluntarily pay their land revenue before the date on which it f[ell] due, and the agriculturists who used to wander from one village to another in quest of the fair treatment and security which they never found, were now settled down on the lands and permanently attached to their ancestral villages. ’141 While it cannot be doubted that as a result of the land settlement the cultivating class felt secure and were a bit relieved, but that their grievances ceased to exist is, without an iota of doubt, an overstatement and misrepresentation of facts at the grass root level.

In the same tone the Census of 1901 has shown positive changes in terms of the material prosperity; considerable amount of waste land was brought under cultivation and the peasant was now in the position to sell his surplus grain to urban traders, thus entering the sphere of legitimate and lucrative trade. 142 Peasants ’ purchasing power increased

140 E.F. Knight, Where Three Empires Meet, London, 1893 , p. 79. 141 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 450. 142 Khan Bahadur Munshi Ghulam Ahmad Khan, Census of India, 1901, vol. XXII, Kashmir Part,1, Lahore, Civil and Military Gazette Press, 1902, Report, p. 10 . 56 fields fenced orchards planted, vegetables gardens stocked and mills constructed. But the Census does not provide any statistical data to corroborate the assertion. Despite these statements being highly exaggerated the land settlement, as Chitralekha Zutshi argues, led to the creation of settled peasants, a class that would become an increasingly important focus of the emergent political discourse in the valley at the turn of the twentieth century. 143

In the settlement the state demand was fixed for fourteen years, payment in cash was substituted for payment in cash and kind, occupancy rights were conferred on zamindars in undisputed lands, waste land were entered as khalsa , permanent but non- alienable hereditary rights were granted to those who accepted the first assessment, and all lands was carefully evaluated on the basis of the produce, previous collection and possibility of irrigation. 144

Paradoxically, with the land settlement carried out by Lawrence the position of the privileged holders of land rights primarily Hindu became more fully entrenched in the agrarian hierarchy of Kashmir 145 By the settlement the peasant got a legal status of occupancy on land but it didn’t confer upon him the status of a peasant proprietor. Legally land continued to be the property of Maharaja.146 This was from the Mughals onwards that the zamindars in Kashmir had possessed the undisputed right to cultivate and hold land. 147 The Kashmiri cultivators had the right to occupy land so long as they paid the revenue as it fell due but they could neither sell nor mortgage it. 148 The tenants at will held land subject to the will of the proprietor, who could eject them at any time. They were of two kinds namely (1) those that held land directly from a landholder or the state, and (2) those that held land under occupancy tenants.149 In Kashmir occupancy tenants consisted mainly of those tenants who held land at the time of Lawrence’s settlement and had once been declared by a competent court to be such. In the cities and

143 Ibid. 144 Bazaz, The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir, p. 133. 145 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 165. 146 Dhar, Kashmir the Land and its Management, p. 136. Bazaz, The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir, p. 134. 147 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, p. 165. 148 Bazaz, The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir, p. 134. 149 Ibid. 57 towns of Kashmir and the frontier districts people were given the rights of selling or mortgaging the land. In almost whole of the Jammu province, excepting the three tehsils of Ramanaga, Basohli and Mirpur, the people were declared to be proprietors of land, which was parceled out to tenants. In these three tehsils the landlords were malguzars and enjoyed the right of selling or mortgaging it. This was a glaring instance of the differential treatment that the people of Kashmir province, particularly of rural areas, received under Dogra rule —a case of provincial prejudice. 150

Lawrence’s settlement left privileges in the land more or less undisturbed. The land revenue demand was not significantly reduced under the land settlement, which meant that the weight of the collecting and managing authority continued to exercise a fair amount of power over the peasantry. 151 By converting a hereditary right to occupancy into a jurisdictional one sanctioned by the state, the peasant became a tenant of the state. In case of the absence of the paying his revenue in time he was liable to be ejected. 152 The settlement entrenched chakdars on their procured land by recognizing their occupancy rights on such lands, which helped bolster the new Dogra and Punjabi landed class ‘imported ’ into the valley by the state. 153 Rights in land enjoyed by these groups of non-cultivating class were not only maintained but were strengthened. The settlement confirmed the chakdars or Mukararidars. The chaks were granted to various persons of non-cultivating classes by entering them as assamis, that too on privileges rates. In such a scenario even the procured lands as mentioned above which the chakdars might have grabbed by fraud were legalized in their favour. 154 The settlement, therefore, legalized the absentee landlordism in Kashmir and strengthened the feudal relations which were eventually shattered after the passing the Big Lands Estates Abolition Act in 1950 that came as a major breakthrough in the agrarian history of Kashmir.

150 Ibid., p. 134. 151 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 100. 152 Ibid., p. 101. 153 Ibid. 154 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 426. 58

Jagirs lands were not included in the Lawrence survey, 155 and were kept in place by Lawrence. In theory they were returned into assamis of the villages in which their estates lay. 156 It widened the social gap more because of the slow impoverishment of the peasantry than the enrichment of the few. The new rights granted to cultivators by Lawrence settlement were balanced by bolstering a set of more conservative, compliant and favoured groups within the agrarian structure of Kashmir. 157 Hence a parasitical symbiosis was established which benefited the alien usurpers and paralyzed the host, who survived under conditions of a low level equilibrium, where the basic process of production and the level of technique were left virtually unaffected with the small peasant economy largely persisting on the basis of the organization of agriculture. It seems that the settlement was created as a shrewd device both on the part of the British as well as from the side of the Dogras, a “social buttress” in the context of an alleged spread of political discontent and recurrent peasant protests in Kashmir, though nonviolent in nature. Therefore, the establishment of the British Residency argues Ayesha Jalal, ‘curtail [ed] the powers of the maharaja by establishing a council of administration. While creating tensions between the maharaja and his imperial benefactors, cosmetic changes at the top were no substitute for t he massive facelift needed at the social base.’ 158

Besides the reduction of the peasant to a form of debt peonage reflected more far reaching consequences. Agricultural indebtedness had been marginal in the period before Lawrence settlement. Indeed both the settlement officers had commented on the uniqueness of Kashmir in that ‘the banya (the Hindu moneylender) of India’ was practically unknown in Kashmir. 159 This didn’t however mean that there was no credit mechanism in operation. Most of the larger villages had their wani or bakal who was usually a Muslim peddler running modest retail business in salt oil spices snuff, sugar, tea and occasionally cotton piece goods. The wani also doubled as a small scale moneylender under the system known as wad. Through the wad system therefore a borrower repaid his

155 Ibid., p. 239. The privileges which were enjoyed by the jagirdars were the application of the law of primogeniture to jagirs and muafis ownership rights on khalsa land and compensatory jagirs. See Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvests, p. 12. 156 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir , p. 426. 157 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 169. 158 Ayesha Jalal, Self and Sovereignty, p. 353. 159 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 387; Wingate Report , pp. 16-7. 59 loan in kind through the goods such as blankets fruit and grain… which would be evaluated by the wani at a lower rate than that at which he sold than on the market. 160 This led to the steady displacement of a society of homogeneous and relatively egalitarian village communities with sharp social and economic differentiation. It was a kind of money landing on compound interest. The account was maintained in the ledger in a most complicated manner. The borrower used to pay something every year but the original sum remained intact in his name. 161 It was kind of stagnant entrepreneurship. P.N. Bazaz, gives a detailed account of this, ‘rural indebtedness is staggering, the government never took the trouble of making any inquiry in this behalf. Incomplete and haphazard non official enquiries show that more than 70% of the people living in the villages are under debt. In numerous cases the produce of the land is pawned long before it is visible in the fields. Once a debt has been contracted it is never fully paid back. Too ignorant to understand accounts, the Muslim peasants are fleeced by the Hindu shakdars and Muslim wadars and khojas in ways shocking to fair minds. The debtor goes on paying something every year in cash and kind and yet the debt of a trifling sum of rupees thirty or forty is not paid in full during a life time. Consequently the father leaves the debt to his son and in this way the family remains perpetually under debt. The entire classes of peasants are virtual serfs of the money lenders.’ 162

During the post settlement period conditions worsened further with a marked increase in indebtedness. This was the direct result of Lawrence converting the payment of at least part of the revenue owed to the state from kind to cash. 163 Though figures regarding indebtedness are hard to come by, that it had grown into a significant problem, is attested by none but by the ruler Maharaja Hari Singh himself when he promulgated the Agriculturist Relief Act in 1926 with a view to freeing the agriculturists from the clutches of the money landers and protect them from usurious rate of interests. 164 By this time it had affected more than 70% of rural population of Kashmir as already mentioned, though efforts were made to reduce the indebtedness through the passing of the Act of

160 Ibid., p. 5. 161 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir, p. 44. 162 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, pp. 253-54. 163 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 169. 164 The Glancy Commission’s Report , p. 35. 60

1926. Despite the efforts the agrarian indebtedness in Kashmir seems to have increased over time as is shown by the facts that debts in Kashmir amounted to the total arrears in 1947 amounted to Rs, 12, 01,231. 165 As late as 1946 a British writer had observed that in a typical village every household was in debt and the usual rate of interest was 48% and that the tiller was indebted who might also be the land owner. 166 The resulting process was not only an increased burden on the peasantry, their poverty and indebtedness but it also led to increasing differentiation of classes and dispossession of cultivators who were reduced to a position close to serfdom or brought down into the ranks of the swelling army of the landless proletariat.

Related to the indebtedness of Kashmiri cultivators was the increasing pressure placed on the land in the early decades of the twentieth century. Peasants were forced to cultivate land and a good deal of land was available in Kashmir which was left uncultivated… for which the services of Lambardars and Tahsildar had often been enlisted to bring fugitive peasants back to cultivate the land. 167 The pressure on land got further aggravated by a steady decline in handicraft production due to the over taxation and the easy availability of machine made goods in the valley the result of which was that agriculture began to provide the only escape to artisan classes. 168 As a result of this in the early decades of the 20 th century the value of land increased not in terms of surplus but in terms of population of non-agriculturists.

Though by the Lawrence settlement permanent and occupancy rights were given to the Muslim cultivators, the conferral of permanent hereditary occupancy rights by Lawrence settlement had within it a loophole. Before the settlement the accumulation of revenue deficit against villages known as bakaya (outstanding) had been permitted without entailing that such arrears would necessarily result in the eviction of cultivators from the land. 169 After the settlement and in the conditions of growing pressure on the land the non-payment of outstanding revenue led to proliferation of what was known

165 Administrative Report, of Jammu and Kashmir State, 1948-49 , p. 55. 166 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 171. 167 Lawrence, Assessment Report of the Lal Tehsil , p. 37; The Valley of Kashmir, p. 420 168 Rai Bahadur Pandit Anant Ram, Census of India 1931, Jammu and Kashmir State Part 1,Report , Jammu, p. 222. 169 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 407-8. 61 euphemistically as the dustbardari (“voluntary ” relinquishment) of occupancy rights. 170 While the land so relinquished was not put on the market, since technically there was no right of alienation until 1932 the effect was only mildly different. The state reassigned them to any person who would agree to pay the arrears. This process resulted in the continued consolidation of large estates by the privileged landed classes and creation at the same time of a class of landless labourers. This process was conducive to the creation of a large section of landless labourers as existed by 1931. 171

To sum up the discussion, that Lawrence’s settlement had only theoretically provided a parity of rights in land for Kashmiris and the ills of an agrarian administration and a hierarchy of privileged otherwise left largely untouched, 172 and the privileges in the state that followed the broad lines of religious divisions among the subject population were not only continued but reinforced. 173 The built-in defects remained intact. The relation between the state, cultivator and the landlord remained as before. 174 The feudalistic character with the system of jagirdari was left intact and practically no change took place in the method of collection of land revenue by the officials. 175

Thus as already mentioned the marked features of the agrarian set up were the mounting pressure on land the increased fragmentation of holdings the volume of indebtedness forced labour (discussed subsequently under the sub-heading of the same name), the sad lack of interior communication and the general mental outlook of the landless peasantry collectively contributed for the making of the crisis and it were these disgruntled sections who later wholeheartedly supported Muslim Conference under the leadership of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and the consciousness roused in the actual tillers of the soil proved a challenge to the Dogra regime and entirely engendered a new spirit among the masses. 176

170 U.K. Zutshi, Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir, p. 141. 171 Ibid. 172 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 174. 173 Ibid. 174 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir, p. 18. 175 Ibid. 176 Afzal Beg, On the Way to Golden Harvests, p. 1. 62

3.4. Peasantry and Peasant Existence —A Conceptual Framework

Ever since the beginning of agriculture some five hundred years back rice has remained the predominant cereal in Kashmir. Its cultivators alone had the full status of a peasant. Rice cultivation has been its most distinct feature and rice cultivator makes a typical Kashmiri. Kashmiri culture has been synonymous with rice culture. Other crops like wheat, barley, lentil, maize, pulses have been subsidiary and on that land which was not suitable for rice cultivation, it had second grade status in the whole agricultural scheme. While dealing with peasantry we predominantly deal with rice cultivator. In Kashmir this biggest segment of the society constituted about 83% of the total population. 177

Kashmir was virtually dependent on this single crop and obviously it required a sound and well defined policy development. But instead of promulgating and pursuing any policy for its development the trust was put on taxation and exactions. Here an attempt is made to show how this approach rendered this single crop cultivation almost a non-profitable occupation.

In order to get an understanding of the state of the peasantry during the period it is essential to examine the state of peasantry prior to the establishment of the Dogra Raj. During the preceding Sikh period the peasantry of Kashmir much mired in poverty and migrations of Kashmiri peasants to the plains of the Punjab reached a high proportion, which is testified by the account of various European travelers who visited the land during the period. G.T. Vinge, who visite d the valley during the 1840’s , records, ‘Ranjit Singh assuredly well knew that the greater the prosperity of Kashmir, the greater would be the inducement to invasion by the East India company… and most assuredly its [Kashmir’s ] ruin had been accelerated, not by his rapacity than by his political jealousy, which suggested him, at any cost, the merciless removal of its wealth.’ 178

177 Census of India , 1891, London, 1893, pp. 14-5. 178 G.T. Vinge, Travels in Kashmir, Ladakh, Iskardo, the countries adjoining the mountain-course of the Indus and the Himalaya North of the Punjab, Vol. 2, London Colburn, 1842, p. 337. 63

Though the sources pertaining to the period bring fore the pathetic conditions of the peasantry but despite the fact, Kashmir’s econ omy came on a “stabilized ” track. 179 Moorcroft says that, ‘of some portions of the khalsa lands the sovereigns divested themselves by grants in jagir for various periods, but when the country came into the hands of the Sikhs, Ranjit Singh made a general resumption, and ousted the possessors of grants of land of every class and the khalsa lands were lent out for cultivation. 180 Due to the consequences of the famine of 1832, the Sikh governor Mian Singh realized the folly of heavy taxes and with a view to stimulating population, remitted the taxes upon marriages, and set to work to bring some order into the administration. Revenue divisions were made, and the villages were either farmed out to contractors or leased on the principle that the state took half of the produce in kind. Agricultural advance were made free of interest, proper weights were introduced, and fraudulent middlemen were punished.’ 181 One can’t deny the fact that Kashmir was the second richest province of the Sikh kingdom in terms of revenue receipts, next to Multan. 182

Coming down to the Dogra regime, a drastic change took place in the agrarian composition of Kashmir —the change of the law of proprietorship. 183 The Dogra ruler of Kashmir perfected the concept of personal rule soon after taking over the valley. In fact, he came to personify the state as he set about pacifying unruly elements in his newly acquired territories and laid down the economic structure of the valley whereby the distribution of rice became a monopoly of the state. The government set the price of rice

179 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , pp. 40-1. 180 Moorcroft, Travels in the Himalayan Province, vol. 2, p. 125. 181 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 200. 182 D.C. Sharma, Kashmir Agriculture and Land Revenue System Under Sikh Rule 1819-1846, Delhi, Rima Publishing House, 1986, p. 1. 183 Though the nature of proprietorship has been dealt with in the preceding subheading, what is important to mention here is that as according to Sumit Guha such type of proprietorship can be defined as a sort of partible inheritance where the state is having the ownership rights and the cultivator acts as the primary labourer on the land he, cultivates. Sumit Guha argues that what emerges in such type of proprietorship is not differentiation and accumulation in rural economy but a sort of flattened class structure. No accumulation, productive or otherwise, takes place in this structure and the economy runs on the way to asphyxiation, unless rescued by an exogenous development e.g. superior technology. In the context of Kashmir such a rescue came in the form of a colonial settlement of land when for the first time the rights of the cultivator were defined, but couldn’t prove a true remedial to the release of the cultivator from the fet ters of the ultimate oppressor…the privileged classes, taken to its logical extreme. The kind of scenario Guha presents envisages no potential for any kind of accumulation, productive or otherwise. See, Sumit A. Guha, ‘Agrarian Economy of the Bombay Deccan ’, in K.N. Raj (ed.) Essays in the Commercialization of Agriculture, New Delhi, Oxford University Press, 1986 . pp. 232-35. 64 and other commodities and undertook their supply to city population. 184 It was the foundation of such a kind of economic structure the reminiscent of which can be found in the ruling structure of the East India Company after becoming the masters in Bengal and southern India during the decade and a half following the middle of the eighteenth century, when they stepped into the shoes of the sovereign power by virtue of acquisition of diwani in Bengal and jagird in the Northern Circars and elsewhere. The legal forms which concealed these conquests are not material except in so far as they provided rationalization for the main acquisition, the power to levy and collect land revenue and other taxes. 185 Gulab Singh arrived on the scene although in a different setting, yet with a motive somewhat similar to the British —the motive of generating as much revenue as possible. His power to impose and extract taxes and revenue, despite his lack of legitimacy to rule over Kashmir, probably became the most significant factor in his thirst for greater revenues and profit.

The set procedure for the state monopoly of grain was that the grain reserved for the state was conveyed, as occasion required, on ponies or in boats to the public granaries, whence it was sold by officers appointed for the purpose at prices that seem extraordinarily cheap 186 when compared with those in India. 187 The common people reaped little advantage from the low prices. While the officers of government and the Pandit privileged class had no difficulty in obtaining as much as they needed at the fixed rate, the stores were often closed to the public for weeks together, and at other times the grain was sold to each family in a quantity supposed to be proportionate to the number of persons in the family. 188

To quote Vasant Kaiwar, ‘monopoly’ is a process analogous to the surplus drain in which wealth produced in the agricultural sector is siphoned off to the urban economy

184 ‘Demi-Official letter from F. Henvey to A. C. Lyall’ , 5 th Dec 1879, Foreign Department (Secret-E), NAI, 1883, File Nos. 83-85, p. 2; Wingate, p. 17. 185 Irfan Habib, Essays in Indian History Towards a Marxist Perception , 8th rep. New Delhi, 2010, p. 299. 186 The government rate in 1879, according to Henvey was at first rupees three of local currency, equal to company’s rupees 1 -14 per kharwar of rice in husk. The kharwar was reckoned at 90 local seers equal to nearly 80 British seers . The rice was loaded with dirt and moistened with water, so that it yields only half the quantity of cleaned grain. Therefore the rate was company’s ru pees 1-14 per mound of 40 British seers of cleaned rice, which gives over 21 seers per company’s rupees. See Mr. Henvey’s Note on the Famine in Kashmir, 1877-80’, Foreign Department (Secret), File No. 86, March 1883, NAI. 187 Ibid. 188 Ibid. 65 by the powerful merchant monopolies [the state in the case of kashmir]. By virtue of the monopoly over lucrative trading networks, merchants [state grain dealers] could effectively shut out the peasantry. 189 ‘The great staple of Kashmir i.e., rice ha[d] been practically kept in the hands of the Darbar, and the system of holding enormous stocks of unhusked rice and of selling the grain at very cheap rates ha[d] prevented the growth of indigenous grain merchants. The poor cultivators derived from their labour hardly sufficient to keep themselves alive, and the wages were kept down because the state s[old] the staple grain to city people [elite classes as well as artisans] at cheap rates below the market prices.’ 190

The cultivator used to hide the grain in order to keep, himself in ‘comfort’ for few months beyond the expectation of the state authorities. E.F Knight says, ‘it must be understood that the bankruptcy of a village in no way incommodes the inhabitants, save that it prevents them from working for any surplus produce which the state can call upon. The Kashmiri cultivator is quite reckless about the accumulation of the arrears. He knows that the state can’t recover them, while ejectment from his miserable home is no great punishment. The state indeed, rarely resorts to ejectment, as it can gain nothing by it. When the revenue collectors arrive at a village it is curious to observe sometimes how the farmer’s cattle, even his crops, vanish as by magic, having been taken up into the mountains for concealment, his earthen pots and his blanket being all that is left to him. The assami has but two objects in life…to earn his bare living from his fields, and to escape that curse of Kashmir, the begar or forced labor. He dare not accumulate wealth and exists from hand to mouth.’ 191

‘Characteristically, however, there is a shift of attitudes when the peasant confronts the person who has a lie on his surplus of rent or on his surplus of profit…the merchant,[state grain dealer] and the tax collector not only represent an actual or potential threat to him in his endeavor to balance the various funds that make his existence possible, but they are also connected to him by ties which are based on a single economic

189 Vasant Kaiwar, ‘The Colonial State, Capital and the Peasantry in Bombay Presidency’ , Modern Asian Studies , vol. 28, No. 4, Oct. 1994, pp. 793-832, Cambridge University Press, pp. 821-2. 190 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, pp. 390-6. 191 E.F. Knight, Where Three Empires Meet , p. 65. Emphasis mine. 66 or social interests usually motivated by the wish for gain. ’192 In Kashmir the cultivators did n’t seek to make money, for if it the officials he ard of it, it would at once be wrung out from them. For instance, the contractors on the Murree road offered high pay for the use of the farmers’ bullock -carts in the winter season, when these were not required for agricultural work, but the farmers, knowing that the pro fit wouldn’t be theirs refused to supply them. 193 The other professionals were doing the same. Knight mentions that a Shikaree (boatman) will often beg a sahib (Englishman) who had employed him to write a paper for him, stating that his pay has been but one half of that really given, so that he may deceive his rapacious tyrants and retain some portion of his earnings. 194

The reason for this lie or hiding the surplus is the limited productive capacity of the peasant, in his limited withholding power, in his limited purchasing power, in his attempt to keep the influences of the market at bay. Yet such exchanges [surplus] effective tie the peasant to the larger order at once facilitating his requirements for exchange and threatening his social and economic balance. It should be noted that when the peasants ’ arrangements for the exchange of commodities becomes part of a market system, the market effects not only the peasants produce, and the goods and the services he can command with it, but his very factors of production as well. 195 It is pertinent to note that in Kashmir the existence of a class of landlords whose real interests lay in living in urban areas and in assuming political office, and who saw the exploitation of the countryside as a quick way of accumulating wealth to use in their political and social ascendency deprived the cultivating class of any incentive. Such a system is self-limiting in that it reduces the cultivating populat ion’s consumption to the biological minimum. Thereupon the city benefits from the surplus drained from the rural areas by the collectors, without generating expanded rural productivity. The greater importance accorded to the city population in the economic system of the valley, argues Chitralekha Zutshi, ‘was an important theme in the political economy of the pre -colonial subcontinent in general, put cultivators at a further disadvantage, characterized by a one sided flow of grains from villages to the city of Srinagar in the late ninetieth century Kashmir

192 Eric R. Wolf, Peasants, New Jersey, University of Michigan Press, 1966, pp. 390-96. 193 E.F. Knight, Where Three Empires Meet , p. 66. 194 Ibid. 195 Wolf, Peasants, p. 48. 67 economy, remained in vogue with minor changes until the late ninetieth century. Kashmiri people were allowed a fixed amount of rations of their own cultivated produce; if an individual wanted more than the designated amount, he had to get permission from the officer’s in charge of government storehouses.’ 196

As already discussed, Maharaja Gulab Singh continued the revenue system of the Sikhs, and throughout India the general trend was the surplus extraction on behalf of or in the name of the sovereign ruler. Whatever the origins, it was the cardinal principle of the Indian agrarian system that land revenue should embrace the bulk of the surplus above the peasant’s needs of subsistence. 197 The Kashmiri cultivator besides paying the revenue of rabi and kharif crops, as already mentioned, had to pay various other cesses.198 In practice, the cultivator had to pay much more than half the share of the produce in the form of multifarious taxes to the state. These included the Nazarana , levied four times a year, and tambol about 20% of produce, taken on occasions of marriages in the ruler ’s family. 199 The cultivator had not only to feed the Darbar but the whole contingent of the middlemen, whose names have been already mentioned elsewhere, and actual sources of revenue fell short to meet the demand which was met from other assets than those of the crops. What was distressing was that there was no fixity and finality in the system of taxation. Below mentioned is a table of the levied taxes, by which one can understand the height and nature of the demand of taxation.

196 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , pp. 65-6. Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 18. 197 Irfan Habib, Essays in Indian History Towards a Marxist Perception , pp. 297-98. There is a big lacuna in most of the studies carried out on the agrarian structure of Kashmir pertaining to our period, that they have neglected, rather have given a least consideration to the social processes ongoing in Kashmir in comparison with colonial India. But the fact of the matter is that Dogras treated Kashmir on par as the British imperialists treated India as colony. There is a much similarity in various methods that were in vogue in British India were in vogue in Kashmir. It is therefore imperative that the layer of ‘isolation’ should be shattered to bring out the real historicity of the facts into fore. 198 Wingate Report, pp. 18-9. 199 Ibid. Mirza Saif-ud-din a British spy in the Maharaja’s court, classified the taxes charged on the peasants as state share of the revenue, rasum (rasum was the revenue extracted by revenue officials from each village as their personal share), and additional state collections. See, Mirza Saif-ud-din , Saif-ud-din Papers, Vol.1-2, RPD, Srinagar. 68

Chilki Chilki Rs. anna Rs. anna Tax of 2 percent ( Do kharwari ) 18 13 Tax on apricot trees 200 10 0 Sala, jalus 201 18 13 Nazrana , tax for support of 99 0 temples, tax for dispensary, etc Kanungo tax 03 14 Tax on Maharaja’s temple 02 08 Patwari tax 03 14 Tax on account of establishment 77 3 Tax on account of and granted to 58 09 chakdar 202 Tahsildars 12 Chob-i-kot 21 Tahsildar’s Assistant 8 Wool 12 Naib-tahsildar 8 Grass 8 Parcha Navis 5 Share of crop taken by Zilladar 9 Mir Chaudhri 13 Share of crop by Mir Chaudhari 7 Mir Chaudhrai’s Assistant 11 Share of crop taken by Patwari & 7 Lambardar Mir Zilladar 5 Items taken by Police 6 Zilladar 10 Tahsil Establishment 7 Rassad-Talabana 25 Wasil Bāki Navis 10 Blankets (Rs. 6 paid for blankets 4 Sihaya Navis 3 of RS. 10 value) Ponies (Rs. 18 paid for pony of 22 Tahsil Treasurer 2 Rs. 40 value) Others 5 Tahsil Kanungo 4 Ghi taken 12 Twenty fowls taken for officials 5 Sheep taken 6 Tahsildar’s fine 10 Violets, Zira and Guchis 4 Miscellaneous 4203 Item for permission to pay as 5204 Nikah (wedding) tax raised from revenue 1 kharwar of cotton 10 to 100 rupees 205

200 This particular village actually did not grow any apricot trees, File Nos. 106-110, NAI, p. 2. 201 Sala: A tax for Sanskrit schools; Jalus was a tax on account of expenses of English visitors. 202 Whether the chakdar cultivated the land or not, the cultivator was obliged to pay the amount assessed. 203 Foreign Department, W.R. Lawrence, Settlement Officer, Kashmir, to Colonel R.P. Nisbet, Resident, Kashmir, Dated Srinagar, the 13 th Nov. 1889, demi-official, NAI. ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir’. Robert Thorpe states that peasant ended up paying out of every 32 traks of each Kharif crop 21 traks and 11 ⅓ seers as revenue in kind and out of 32 traks of each Rabi 20 traks and 6 3/4 as revenue in kind, besides paying the share of the fruit, animal tax, sheep and goat, ponies, putto, ghee, fowls and honey…the accounts of all the taxes were kept by the pat wari and Mokuddum and the distribution of retuned money…on some of the articles . Thorpe , Cashmere Misgovernment , pp. 13-6. 204 It is said that this item was of great importance. The state accepted a certain portion of its revenue in cotton, oilseed and pulses and gave for these articles a commutation rate considerably higher than the market price. The villages would buy cotton from the bazar at Rs 8, and pay it to the government at Rs. 14 and was worth their while to bribe the Tahsildar for the privilege of paying their revenue in highly price commodities. The village in question never grew cotton. 205 Khalil Mirjanpuri, Tarikh-e-Kashmir, MS, RPD, Srinagar, p. 331. 69

The prevalent system of making exactions led to the establishment of a machinery for observation and regulation of the process by which peasant-owned land became encumbered with debt and thus subject to potential appropriation by the agrarian bureaucratic management. Having a long list of taxes and cesses it shows that the taxation policy of the Dogras was ‘to continue most of the time hono ured cesses and taxes based probably on the principle of maximum exactions from the people which they could be compelled to disgorge even at the cost of their maximum displeasure short of desertion or revolt and the inhabitants of Kashmir grumble but pay.’ 206

In fact it seems that Gulab Singh considered his purchase of Kashmir a financial investment and was determined to squeeze as much rich economic dividends from his investment. 207 As possible keeping in view the purchased notion of Kashmir, the harsh taxation system of the pre Dogra period was not only maintained, but in some ways broadened. 208 An eyewitness Hodson who accompanied Henry Lawrence to Kashmir in 1850 writes, ‘the king is avaricious and is old…and he won’t look beyond his money - bags. There is a capitation tax on every individual practicing any labor, trade profession or employment, collected d aily.’ 209 Similar view has been expressed by Mirjanpuri, ‘in the extortion of money he [Gulab Singh] used a hundred arts and opened new doors of tyranny.’ 210 Such taxation must have produced a great hue and cry, especially among the cultivating classes and to deter them from abandoning their occupation, the government equaled the fee ‘on the transfer of land to the amount for which it was sold.’ 211 The tax measures aggravated the cultivator condition to such a degree that for them ‘there seemed no way to live the ir lives and sustain themselves except by the grace of God.’ 212

In fact in the taxation system of Dogra regime no product was too insignificant, no person too poor to contribute to the state. Saffron formed another monopoly, so was

206 Sukhdev Singh Charak, Life and Times of Maharaja Ranbir Singh , Jammu, 1985, p. 32. 207 Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 169. 208 Ibid. 209 Trotter Capitan Lionel J., The Life of Hodson of Hodson’s Horse, London, 1901, p. 86. 210 Mirjanpuri, Tarikh-e-Kashmir , p. 331. 211 Ibid. 212 Mirza Saif-ud-din , Saif-ud-din Papers, Vol. 2, fol. 28. 70 salt and the aromatic plant called kot including paper tobacco.213 Same was the case with brick-making and the dead was not buried save by licensed and “privileged ” grave diggers [who also had to pay taxes]. There was a cess of from 4 to 20 annas levied on each house on the villages. 214 Of course it is very rare, if not impossible, for a man to raise himself singlehandedly by his economic bootstraps to the level of productivity above and beyond that demanded by the ‘mandatory payments’. 215

The helplessness of the peasant to resist the grinding oppression received the attention of the poets of the time like Wahab Parray, Abdul Ahad Azad, Gh. Ahmad Mahjoor, and many others. Wahab Parray (1845-1914) spoke out clearly in an outspoken manner the misfortunes of the cultivating classes and wrote: 216

‘How many oppressions of the time can I count? The authoritarian rulers have steeped the mulk into chaos, Anyone who is employed has to pay tax, The plundering department is called Nakdi Mahal (cash only) How many oppressions can I count on my fingers? Every lion here has a hundred or more dogs with him to rip the people apart.’

Abdul Ahad Azad (1903-1948) in his poem ‘ Greeznama’ (story of the peasant) has pathetically described the pith of the state of the peasantry in Kashmir and says:217

‘God gave me life it is truly his kindness, But except that my everything is my own toil and blood, My heart is ruptured and I am ringing like a lute, The age of slavery has shackled me like a snake, This poison and fear as emaciated me, In destitution, weakness, poverty and poor expression, I am not swayed by any bodies’ progress or bravery,

213 ‘Henvey’s Note on the Famine in Kashmir, 1877 -80’, Foreign Department (Secret), File No. 86, March 1883, NAI. 214 Ibid. 215 Wolf, Peasants, p. 15. 216 Nagi Munawwar and Shafi Shauq, Kashur Adabuk Tawrikh , Kashmiri Department, University of Kashmir, 1978, p. 247. 217 Abdul Ahad Azad, Kuliyat-i-Azad , Srinagar, J&K Academy of Art culture and languages 3 rd Ed. 2005, pp. 191-92. Emphasis mine. 71

I have been created by God but their flesh and blood is made of my blood, This didn’t irritate me earlier but now it causes irritation, I glance at this age and look at my own self, Those very people are my enemies, to whom I have dedicated my life, The advocacy of the poor and peasants befits Azad, How much I like and how much flow of their thoughts I have.’

As every person is the product of his social environment, so were these poets. Azad, like all the poets, was the child of his environment and, in the words of Bansi Nirdosh, it shaped his social consciousness. However, Kashmir, at that time, was an aching and ailing society, to which Azad provided a cure. Azad was born at a time when on all sides there was hunger, poverty, scarcity, narrow mindedness, insufficiency and helplessness. He hailed from a tenancy class family which was crushed in the grip of feudalism and jagirdari system. This class reflected a deep cultural degeneration and social demoralization. In such circumstances when ideas are suppressed and traditions limit social change, man is denied a happy existence and his deep sentiments are atrophied these poets from sub conscious, carry the drama into their own imaginations; if not vitiated by their own mental height, carry through intuitional knowledge to enlighten their future thought. Azad thus enlightened the people to understand the future and make it worthwhile. His thoughts reacted to the situations very well and composed verses to bring a better life to the Kashmiri. 218 In fact behind the peasants back was a large phalanx of social groups, undermining his producing faculties to grow, with a feudal outlook on life. As Kingsly Devis has said these classes were in habituation to ‘profit by squeeze’ 219 giving nothing in return, the consequence of which was mass ‘peasant insolvency’ well depicted in the above quoted poetic stanza. The ‘insolvent ’ character of the peasantry is further illustrated by Mrs. Hervey, who while narrating the material conditions of the peasants, wrote, ‘they declare that no one dares to have cooking pots of brass or copper, earthen vassals are all they may keep

218 Dr. Manzoor Ahmad Fazili, Socialist Ideas and Movements in Kashmir (1919-1947), New Delhi, 1980, p. 170. 219 Vasant Kaiwar, The Colonial State, Capital and the Peasantry in Bombay Presidency , p. 809. 72 in their houses, to avoid being robbed by their sovereign still further.’ 220 During the normal times the peasant could not dream of having a food stock which could suffice his basic necessities till he could harvest his crops…’ ‘It is sure’ asserts Lawrence ‘that the condition of the cultivators in Kashmir is infinitely worse than any other Native state of India.’ 221 In the backdrop of the undefined tax rate, constant fragmentation of holdings, and chronic poverty where subsistence took priority over investment, and rendered many cultivators unable to make ends meet, the peasantry of Kashmir co uldn’t evolve well defined anti-feudal consciousness. However, wishing the abolition of the system of landlordism, they struggled passively for the restoration of their lost rights in land. Mr. Henvey records that ‘… insurrection in Kashmir is not to be looked for. Ages of wretchedness have emasculated the people. It is true, signs of desperation have occasionally shown themselves, and do still appear from time to time. Such signs are the incendiary fires which occurred in Srinagar, every night during the winter of 1878-79, the purpose of the incendiarists being to plunder the stores of rice which were believed to have been accumulated in the houses that were burnt. ’222 To acknowledge the historical fact, the aim of the peasant’s struggle was to reduce the political and social weight of the land administration and jagirdari. However, when they failed they fallowed the path which the peasantry throughout the colonial India followed. 223 The common method of resistance followed by the peasants was migration to Punjab. 224 Letting land uncultivated, flight of the peasants from the villages as illustrated in the table below, showing how collections had fallen off in 252 villages, owing to the land having lately gone out of cultivation. The below mentioned figures gives the total:

220 Mrs. Hervey, The Adventures of a Lady in Tartary Tibet China and Kashmir, 3 vols., vol.2, p. 230. 221 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir .’ 222 Mr. Henvey’s Note on the Famine in Kashmir, 1877 -80’, Foreign Department (Secret), File No. 86, March 1883, NAI. 223 For details of the peasants’ methods of mobilization and resistance in colonial India, see Mridula Mukherjee’s Peasants in India’s Non -Violent Revolution Practice & Theory, Chapter Nine , pp. 394-419. 224 For example by spring 1879 there was no seed left to sow during the autumn season. In the meantime prices of food grains shot up, since the state was unable to prevent revenue officials from hoarding state grain, mostly maize and barley. Thousands of Kashmiris migrated to the Punjab. See Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging, p. 80. 73

Demand from 252 Collections Remarks on the Year Villages (in rupees) (in rupees) harvest Samvat 1937 3,88,613 3,45,031 Very good harvest (1880 A.D.) 1938 3,96,274 3,51,5 47 Good 1939 4,23,44 3,53,673 Good 1940 4,64,200 2,44,389 Poor 1941 4,69,701 4,09,562 Very Good 1942 4,36,872 1,97,841 Poor harvest 1943 4,41,357 2,31,550 Fairly good harvest 1944 (1887 A.D.) 4,41,403+44 2,48,369 Good Total Rs. 34,61,904 Rs. 23,81,962

The oppression and exactions created such an economic environment that the peasants who under normal circumstances dreaded eviction from land had to be forcibly tied to the land. Occupancy rights not only lost their value but became occupancy obligations. Those very cultivatable fields which were once regarded as anadata [lord of the flood] became shackles of captivity. These villages scattered over 14 tehsils. How they broke down could be illustrated by citing an instance as below. The khewat of the village of Asham was fixed at Rs.1, 275. The collections for samvat 1937 and samvat 1938 were Rupees 1271 and rupees 1,411. In samvat 1939 the village was sold by auction to a contractor for r upees 2,095 and the contractor fled after two years and for samvat 1943 and 1944, the collections were Rs. 553 and Rs. 782. Wingate says that, ‘when I saw the village its fine lands were mostly lying unsown and its houses empty. After enquiring why the cultivators don’t return I came to know that because of the outstanding balance against the village is enormous…last year found the Tahsildar trying to secure the entire crops of the miserable 74 few who were left in a vain attempt to about one third of the demand, but with the more likely result of ensuring the complete dissertation of the place. 225 It is noteworthy to mention that the emphasis placed by James Scott on the right to subsistence in his study of the peasant’s revolts in south East Asia seems relevant with the peasantry of Kashmir, like the peasants in colonial India too, protected in various ways when their subsistence was threatened. When crops failed or famine stalked the land, or when prices crashed, or when they rose so much that the rural poor couldn’t buy enough food, protests broke out. The poorest sections loot ed bazars and withheld rents, others asked for reduction or remission in government taxation. These types of protests generally tended to be short lived, since it was usually an immediate reaction to a desperate situation. 226 The desperate situation of the peasants of Kashmir in the words of Walter Lawrence was that ‘the peasants were overworked, half starved, treated with hard words and hard blows, subjected to uneasy exactions and every species of petty tyranny…while in the cities a number of unwholesome a nd useless professions, and a crowd of lazy menials, pampered the vices or administered to the pride and luxury of the great.’ 227 It was at the turn of the century in the post settlement era, in the thirties of the twentieth century, when the cultivator was somewhat redeemed of his serfdom and assured of some rights. 228 In 1932, after the establishment of the Muslim Conference, the organization succeeded in widening its social space due its peasant oriented programmes, the manifestation of which can be seen in the ‘National Demand’ presented by the Conference in 1938.

225 Wingate Report, p. 31. 226 Mridula Mukherjee, ‘Peasant Resistance and Peasant Consciousness in Colonia l India: Subaltern and Beyond’ , Economic and Political Weekly , vol. 23, No. 42, Oct.15, 1988, pp. 2174-2185. E. F. Knight says that he along with W.R. Lawrence in Islamabad received several complaints of over assessment and the cultivators threatened that they would desert their farms unless a reduction was made. This was a threat which was frequently carried out. E.F. Knight, Where Three Empires Meet, p. 73. 227Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 2. 228 Glancy Commission Report , p. 27. 75

3.5. Forced Labour:

‘Begar [forced Labour] is really the bottom of all the misery and mischief in Kashmir. Gilgit is the bugbear of the Kashmiris.’ 229 ‘Begar mean[t] to the Kashmiris far more than the mere impressment of labour, for under its comprehensive name every kind of demand for labour or property [was] taken but not paid for by the officials. ’230 The man liable to begar was an ‘outlaw’ without rights of any description, and begar was looked upon by officials as an incident of serfdom which entitled them to take all things, either labour and commodities, free of payment from the villagers. Such a system took out heart of the people, and many villages, formerly famous for special kinds of rice or for fruits, rather than expose themselves to the constant exactions of the officials, took to cultivating more common kinds of rice and cut down their fruit trees. 231 Forced labour, till the beginning of the twentieth century was the most pronounced feature of Kashmir administration. 232 However, a clear distinction must be made between the forced labour employed for transport of goods and the labour used for production purposes. The latter is considered to be the essential ingredient of European feudalism. In Kashmir both forms of forced labour were present, in the economic organization of the post 1846 period. 233

229 Foreign Department, Srinagar the 13 th November 1889 (Demi official) from W.R Lawrence, Settlement officer Kashmir to Colonel R. P Nisbet, Resident, Kashmir, NAI. 230 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 411. 231 Ibid., p. 413. The power wielded by the officials under the system of Mujawaza, by virtue of which they could deprive a village of its year’s food stocks, was great, but not so great as the power wielded by them in the levy of begar . 232 Mohd Ishaq Khan, Perspectives on Kashmir Historical Dimensions, Srinagar, 1983, p. 71. 233 Ibid. Though there was no special laboring class in Kashmir, agricultural land being sufficiently available for the existing population. Whatever labour was available was available in the cities was exempt from begar and thus the whole burnt fell on the rural population, especially on the peasantry. Labour was mostly required to carry loads to Gilgit or render services to foreign visitors. Gilgit being a frontier district of Kashmir, the 76

The genesis of the corvee in Kashmir may be traced to very ancient times. The first reliable reference to it is found in Rajtarangni. 234 King Samkaraverman (883-902), is said ‘to have given to this corvee a systematic organization ( rudhabharodhi ) and to have used it also for fiscal extortion’, though he was certainly not the first to resort to begar for transport purposes. 235 During the time it was the harbinger of misery for the villagers. 236 It continued under the Sultanate, Mughals, Afghans and Sikhs in different forms. Sultan Shihab-ud-din enforced begar on the Hanjis [boatmen community]. They were obliged to serve him a week in every month, the practice which was later on abolished by Sultan Ali Shah. 237 During the period men were forcibly employed for collecting Saffron 238 and in return they received a certain quantity of salt as wages. Thus, the labour was forced but paid, although meagerly. The Mughal king Akbar conquered Kashmir in 1586. Under the great Mughals the compulsory labour was without any doubt due from the people, but with this difference, that it didn’t tak e the form of unpaid Labour, as Lawrence observes, ‘that huge sums were paid by Akbar to the coolies who worked on the construction of the Hari Parbat fort, and the inscription on the Kathi Darwaza expressly states that no one was impressed and that all were paid. ‘Mah Karda ba kas begar nya’ implies no person worked free on this construction. Lawrence further argues that another couplet on the same inscription states that the emperor furnished one core and nine lakhs of rupees and two hundred Indian artisans for the work. The durability of some of the buildings of the Mughals suggests that the work was paid, for buildings constructed by forced and unpaid labour didn’t last long. 239 There is evidence that the institution of forced labor got revival in Kashmir under the Mughals too. Iqtad khan the last Mughal Governor sent by Emperor Jahangir to

Maharaja was bound to defend the frontiers under treaty obligations. So normally loads were carried to send provisions and other essentialials for the maintenance of the army over there and when there used to be some kind of disturbance, the quantum of army movement would increase the dimensions of begar and thousands of begaris , therefore, were pressed into service as human carriage of load. What made it forced labour was that it was taken, against the will, when the peasants used to be busy with their farming operations. Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, pp, 413-14. 234 Kalhana, Rajatarangini, Eng. tr. M.A. Stein, Book V, Verse 172-4, p. 209. 235 Ibid. 236 Ibid. 237 Muhibul Hassan, Kashmir Under the Sultans, Srinagar, 1974. p. 51. 238 Abul Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari, tr. Blochman, Delhi, 1965, p. 90. 239 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 196. 77

Kashmir proved to be very cruel who revived the old practice. 240 But Shahjahan dismissed him and abolished the iniquitous custom of begar .241 Aurangzeb during his reign seems to have been solicitous of the laborers. Bernier the French traveler informs that on the occasion of Aurangzeb’s visit to Kashmir 30,000 porters were employed to carry the luggage of the camp from Bhimber to Kashmir, in those days however, the porters received crowns for every hundred pounds weight carried from Bhimber to Kashmir. 242 The peasants were coming voluntarily in the hope of earning a little money. But the period of our study when it was rumored that transport was needed for Gilgit there used to be the general stampede among the villagers. 243 The institution of begar continued both during the Afghan and Sikh period with utmost rigour. Moorcroft has given a graphic account of the Sikh period and states that people accompanying them were seized as unpaid porters, and were not only driven along the road by a cord tying them together by the arms, but their legs were bound with ropes at night to prevent their escape. 244 But during the period of our study the institution of begar assumed dangerous proportions. 245 The state benefited from this sale of the peasant labour both for the purpose of the state as well as for foreign tourists. It was a system in which peasants at any time be drafted into the service of the state known as begar . It entailed the services such as carrying loads of rations and other supplies to Gilgit for the state, or for foreign visitors on their journey around the valley or for royal processions from one part of the state to another. 246 Maharaja Gulab Singh himself employed forced labour on more than one occasion for carrying his baggage from Kashmir to Jammu. 247

240 Khawaja Azam Didamiri, Tarikh-i- Azam , Srinagar, pp. 138-39. 241 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 196. 242 Ibid. 243 Ibid., p. 114. 244 William Moorcroft and George Trebeck, Travels in the Himalayan Province Of Hindustan and the Punjab in Ladakh and Kashmir, 1819-1825, vol.2, 1 st Pub, London, 1825, reprint, Delhi: 1971, p. 124. 245 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight For Freedom , p. 273. The system assumed extremely dreadful proportions in Kashmir valley under the early Dogras mainly because of the frontier wars for the conquest and the consequent necessity of providing the troops on the move as well as the huge military establishments in the conquered territories with adequate supplies. 246 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 66. 247 Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 169. 78

During the 1853 Gilgit 248 camping, each cultivator had to carry at the rate of eight traks of load per head, consisting of rations and supplies for the soldiers in Gilgit. Peasants’ were reduced to animals of burden, without any hope of payment for such services. Only in the case of requisition for Begar being made by foreign visitors could the peasants expect a payment of ¼ annas for every stage of carrying a load. 249 Huge complaints were made by the people of Gurez to Maharaja Pratap Singh during his Gilgit road inspection tour regarding the oppression of the officials and the wages which they did not get for the labour they are called upon to perform. 250 It further testifies that it was an unpaid labour. The whole demand of begar was thrown on the khalsa peasants as along with city and town population Pandits, Pirzadas, Sikhs and the peasants of the privileged right holders were exempt from begar .251 It acted as demoralizing and almost intolerable burden on a large section of the agricultural population. 252 It was really bottom of all misery and mischief in Kashmir. The constant preoccupation of Kashmiri cultivator was to escape from it as it was levied without consideration either for the ability of individual families to spare the labor otherwise required for agricultural purposes or for the particular phase of the agricultural cycle in which it was demanded.

248 H.R. Pirie, a traveler, describes the vagaries and nature of the Gilgit road: … a military road which has overcome such difficulties in its making as no other road in the world has to contend with. For besides the great forces of nature arrayed against it, impregnable against cliffs, rivers in flood, avalanches of snow in winter and of rocks the rest of the year, snowstorms and freezing winds meaning certain death to those overtaken by them with famine ever in waiting to swoop down on the workers should any one blunder on delay in sending up the long caravans of grain from the far distant base… A road that has taken a tremendous toll of the lives of men, the author says, ‘the first time I went on it, an old Kashmiri transport driver to ld me, ‘when I was a boy of sixteen, I wept much, because on both sides of the road lay so many dead men.’ The traveler says at the best of the times one comes to places where the wheeling vultures gather over a baggage pony which has succumbed to the hardships of the road and there are still terrible bits near Gilgit where all the resources of science are powerless, after any great storm the road is carried away, and can never be mended without loss of life.’ See, H.R. Pirie, Kashmir the Land of Streams and Solitudes, London 1909, pp. 64-71. 249 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 66. 250 ‘Diary of an Inspection Tour to Gilgit Road by The Maharaja Pratap Singh ,’ Civil and military Gazette Press, Lahore, 1893, p. 23. 251 ‘Logan Report on the Financial Conditions of Kashmir’, Foreign Department, Secret -E, Pros., June 1892, Nos. 133-135, NAI, p. 29. Lawrence argues that in consequence of these exemptions, out of a total population of 814, 241, 52,216 men were free because they were Hindus, 4,092 because they were Sikhs and 114,170 because they were Muslamans residing in the city and the towns, the groups exempted were the cultivators working on the land of Kashmiri Pandits, Jagirdars and Dharmarath department. Out of total population of 814,241 persons, 350,000 were exempt from begar by rule, and that another 50,000 were exempt by favour. See Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 412. 252 Foreign Department, Secret-E, May 1893, File Nos.112-125, NAI. 79

Why it assumed dangerous proportion during the Dogra rule? Why not during the preceding dynasties? It was mainly due to the fact that the earlier part of the Dogra rule as already mentioned was worked by an intense military action in the border areas for which thousands of villagers were seized for carrying supplies to Chilas and Gilgit 253 for putting down an insurrection in Chilas, a territory adjoining Gilgit where hundreds of Dogra soldiers were killed in a futile attempt to occupy the Chilas fort. When news of the disaster reached Srinagar, the Maharaja made frantic efforts to reinforcements to the battle ground. Resorting to begar , he rounded thirty four men from Kashmir and Jammu and sent them to Chilas. In the fever of excitement Gulab Singh even conscripted children but subsequently spared most of them from the ordeal. Foodstuffs were often collected without payment, and on one occasion three to four hundred men who had gathered at the Jamia Masjid for the Friday prayers, where marched to the Hari parbat fort to carry ammunition destined for Chilas to the boats in the lake below. 254 It is natural that such actions were deeply resented by the subjects but their complaints fell on deaf ears. Referring to Gulab Singh’s complete preoccupation with the revolt, Saif ud din recorded, ‘nowadays Maharaja Sahib is, day and night, worrying and talkin g about Chilas. There is nothing else on his tongue except this subject.’ 255 Lawrence records that, ‘Gilgit to the Kashmiri is a constan t terror. When it was rumored that transport was wanted to convey the baggage of the troops going to or coming from Gilgit there was a general stampede among the villagers. I have seen whole villages bivouacking on the mountains when the agents for the collection of transport arrived in their tehsil and inhuman punishments dealt out to men who demurred to leaving their homes for two or three months with the prospect of death from cold or starvation.’ 256 On entering in a village a traveler Mrs. Hervey records that, ‘while entering I heard nothing but weeping and on inquiry, found that two hundred villagers were then being taken away to Gilgit. It is really distressing to hear nothing but mourning

253 R.G. Taylor Punjab Political Diaries vol., vi, pp. 81-82, NAI. 254 ‘Saif -ud-Din Papers’, 31 st July 1851, Vol.4 fols. 45/1, 51/1, 55/2, 56/2, 61/2, 61/9, RPD, Srinagar. 255 Ibid., August 1, 1851 vol. 4, fol. 69/2. 256 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 413. 80 and lamentation in every village one enters.’ 257 Generally it gives birth to pessimism which ultimately snatches ones sense of self, sense of being and ultimately sensibility. Lt. Colonel Taylor found about ten instances of begar in Kashmir in which a large number of men were engaged under compulsion by the government. In the Lal Assessment report Lawrence claims that ‘[he] dwelt on the fact that in assessing villages [he] ha[d] to deal with the half time labourers, and it [wa]s no exaggeration to say that the cultivator ha[d] on the average to do ten days of forced labour in every month. 258 While making enquiries into this question of begar he asked the cultivators why they objected to carrying a load for four annas a day to which they replied that, ‘the loss caused to their crops by their absence at a critical time is not compensated by a wage of four annas.’259 Lawrence describes begar as one of the worst forms of tyranny in Kashmir and entirely hostile to the satisfactory working of any revenue system in the country.260 A system which in a thinly populated country suddenly carried off the whole able-bodied population of a village or forced a cultivator away from his home or his fields, when perhaps they needed his presence and labour the most …261 Narrating the collection and how they were collected and loaded Tyndale Biscoe writes, ‘that at Bandipora they were collected and loaded up. The only rations allowed them was a seer of rice per day, this had to carry, plus the straw for making their straw shoes, plus their load of food for the garrison. No provision was made for them as they crossed the snow passes, so that many died on the road, and often it happened that when they did reach Gilgit, they were sold as slaves to wild inhabitants of the inhospitable region. The grandfather of one of servants, who was sent there, was exchanged for a Chinese dog, but later on he escaped. 262 Lawrence argues that, the chief thing that breaks

257 Mrs. Hervey, The Adventures of a Lady in Tartary, Tibet, China and Kashmir , Vol. 2, p. 229. 258 Foreign Department, Secret-E, February, 13 th Nov. 1889, Nos. 295-326, 1891, NAI. 259 Ibid. 260 Foreign Department, Secret-E, February, 29 th Jan.1890, No.15-l dated Lahore, 1891, NAI. 261 Ibid. 262 Ibid. Dr. Arthur Neve in his book Thirty years in Kashmir writes, ‘For many years after I came to the country the mere name of Gilgit struck terror in to the Kashmiri. For him it had the most alarming meaning. It spoke of forced labour, frost bite on the lofty passes, and valleys of death, where the camps were haunted by cholera and starvation. Early in April news reached that the frontier tribes were on the war path, and order was issued for a levy of 5,000 porters to accompany the two regiments sent to reinforce the garrisons. Neve says, that I was at Islamabad endeavoring to fight an epidemic of cholera by sanitation and noticed coolies collecting from all the surrounding regions, each with his blanket, spare gross shoe, his carrying crutch, and light frame of sticks and rope in which to carry the load upon his back and I was present on the great 81 down a village is begar and in order to escape from it, a village will submit to any loss or hardship. He goes on to say that in 1887 impressed labour was required for Gilgit, and the rumor of the loss of life on the road filled the villagers with alarm. Three villages were sold to a Pandit Badri Nath, an ex-governor for sums varying between Rs.50 and Rs.63. the amount of the purchase money was of course ridiculous, but the real consideration was exemption from begar . A fourth village was sold to a Hindu held in veneration as an ascetic. He gave Rs 50 for a very fine village and obtained from the district officer an order of exemption for forced labour. The fifth village was a very large and wealthy one near Baramulla. It was bought by the Tahsildar for Rs.300 Chilki and was exempted by his influence from forced labour. The Tahsildar Badrinath didn’t consider it necessary to disburse the Rs 300 from his own pocket, but deducted the amount from the arrears entered against the village. 263 It led to the process of extermination, depopulation and dehumanization. 264 While not ignoring the numerous references about the Gilgit begar —the most dreadful form of forced labour in Kashmir —one cannot simply blame it on the Maharaja’s shoulders only. Gilgit was very much important for the British—probably more than what it was for the Maharaja —and in spite of that forced labour was resorted to. The European sources have left no stone unturned in criticizing the maharaja but the British officials have simply been divested of their responsibility in carrying out this practice. The only instances where we find a few words written against the British for this institution is in the carrying of luggage; in the same breath, the writers claim that the porters were paid. But whether this assertion is true or not, we do not know due to paucity of sources for the given period. Another dimension of begar was the rule which exempted all jagir and Dharmarath villages, all tenants of chakdars, and Hindus from begar , and put the whole burden of

concourse on a green meadow in front of the mosque when a sort of farewell service was held for those starving on this perilous journey. Loud was the sobbing of many and fervid the demeanour of all as, led by the mullah, they intoned their prayers and chanted some of their special Ramzan penitential psalms, even braver men than the Kashmiris might well have been agitated at such a time, when taking farewell of their loved ones! Who will till their fields? What would happen during their long absence to their wives and children? Too what perils would they themselves be exposed in the crowded bivouacs and snowy passes of that deadly Gilgit district? Arthur Neve, Thirty years in Kashmir, London, pp. 139-40. 263 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir .’ 264 Ab. Rashid, Institution of Begar in Kashmir (1846-1947 ), in Central India Journal of Historical and Archaeological Research, Vol. 2, July-September 2013, No. 7, p. 90. 82 forced labour on the Muslim cultivators of khalsa villages. 265 The chakdars, chiefly Pandits, who were given lands for cultivation on easy terms. A condition of the grant was that the chakdars should import cultivators or get them from the city. Lawrence says that I found many chakdars estates cultivated entirely by men who formerly lived in khalsa villages and paid revenue to the state. They left their villages in order to escape from begar , and they no doubt were more comfortable on a chakdars estate than they ever were in their old village. 266 It has also been reported that as a rule the cultivation in Jagir and Dharmarath villages, and on chakdars estate was somewhat better than that which was found in khalsa villages. 267

The institution of begar provided great opportunities to revenue officials to squeeze the cultivators in lieu of the exemption from begar Wingate writes that the way of collecting coolies is more discontent than is necessary. A requisition was made say for instance 500 coolies…while putting forwarding the requisition, the Tahsildar doubles the number. His emissaries quadruple it, and so a village that ought to supply five coolies is asked for twenty, fifteen men have to buy themselves off 268 after paying a bribe of two annas per head. 269 And the cultivators who couldn’t pay for their release would go to horrific lengths to escape their impressment for tasks of the state. 270 The villagers used to pay Rs. 70 to 90 per head in order to purchase their exemption. 271 In fact begar had been a demoralizing and almost intolerable burden on a large section of the agricultural

265 See Wingate Report, p. 37 . Mirdu Rai argues that this aspect ultimately promoted the many cultivators to leave khalsa (government) land to work on begar free lands and those Muslim cultivators who worked on the Dharmarath villages in order to obtain release from begar , for that they had to pay a price as Lawrence argues that, the existence of Dharmara th villages constituted a divided authority in the state an ‘imperium in imperio’ as Dogra’s had placed Dh armarath villages within a separate judicial authority over which its own officials presided, and the vast majority of the Dharmarath villages used to be Muslim cultivators, this meant says Rai their subjection to the laws of an institution with a very clear Hindu religious identity. See Rai , Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects, pp. 155-56. 266 Foreign Dept., Secret-E, February, 29 th Jan.1890, No.15-l dated Lahore, 1891, NAI. 267 Ibid. 268 Wingate Report, pp. 37-8. 269 Foreign Dept., Secret-E, February, 29 th Jan.1890, No.15-l dated Lahore, 1891, NAI. 270 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 413. 271 Ibid. 83 population…and its abuses were so deep rooted and flourished which ultimately stopped its abolition for a long period of time. 272

Under its comprehensive name other kinds of demand of labor were also made. It consisted ‘of requisitions of village produce and was a form of purveyance on behalf of officials. Under this system the peasant was subjected to labour demands such as building houses for nobility, and to variety of regular and irregular levies, some of them very onerous. For example it was normal for the peasant to supply wood grass, milk, poultry, grain, blankets and an occasional pony, cows and sheep free of cost to officials ’273 … ‘and higher officials would build houses in the city or cultivate waste lands through the unpaid labour of the villagers. ’274

The institution of begar proved detrimental in other aspects too. Sometimes the sons of the deceased revenue defaulter’s were subjected to begar for repayment of state dues by the officials. 275 It implies that begar had got hereditary nature during the period, a feature not associated with the preceding ruling dynasties. The peasantry was subjected to road construction, carrying of official carriage both public as well as private 276 and to cut wood from the jungle for the royal use. 277 The practice virtually reduced the cultivator hopeless and created in him a pessimistic outlook of life.

The institution of begar had, not unexpectedly, a pernicious effect on the socio economic structure of Kashmir. It led to the destruction of the property rights of the cultivators and reduced them to a state close to serfdom. 278 It led to the displacement and migration of the cultivators which resulted in a total dislocation of agricultural and other

272 From the Resident in Kashmir to the Vice-President J&K State No.1028 dated, Sialkot, the 25 th March 1892, Foreign Department, Secret-E, NAI. 273 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 414. 274 Ibid. 275 Administration Report of Jammu and Kashmir State, 1889-90, pp. 21-22. 276 Political & General Department, File No. 213, 1913, JKA-J. 277 Pt. Kanhaya Lal, Lahore, Political Diaries, vol.VI, p. 260, NAI. 278 Hangloo, Agrarian System of Kashmir, pp. 117-18. Ernest F. Neve writes that, ‘every year the levy of coolies for Gilgit placed in the hands of Tahsildar (the district Magistrate) great powers of oppression. And from the chief of the local administration down to the humblest peon of the tehsil this was an unfailing source of income. Meanwhile, the poor and friendless, or those who had incurred the wrath of the authorities, were seized and sent off on the hate task of carrying loads a thirteen days journey over rough mountain tracks to Gilgit. Their condition was absolutely little better than that of the slaves. See E.F. Neve, Beyond the Pir Panjal, Srinagar, reprint, 2003, pp. 53-4. 84 economic activities. It was an activity mostly conducted in the summer months when the passes remained open at a time when the peasant was supposed to be present in their fields, but owing to his absence rendered him from poverty to impoverishment, incapable of even paying his share of revenue to the state. 279 It acted as an obstruction in the growth and development of an organized labour class in Kashmir and was detrimental both from the social and economic point of view. It was the deprivation of one’s self and self of being.

It has often been maintained by the historians of Kashmir’s modern history that i n the late eighties of the 19 th century, after the intervention of the British colonists in the administrative domain of Kashmir, the evils of begar began to decrease. The construction of the Gilgit road and the opening of the Jhelum valley road in 1890 might have helped in some measure in reducing the instances of begar. While Lawrence attempted to bring a fundamental change in the system of begar on the one hand, but on other hand he justified the continuation of the system of begar. He suggested that it was necessary at any rate for a time, for the extension of improved communications and good roads in Kashmir. 280 It is understood that British apologists tried to project themselves as sympathizers of the people of the land but at the same time did not hesitate in perpetrating human demoralization through the practice of begar.

It should also be borne in mind that despite the Darbar’s orders regarding the ban o n forced labour and claim of the some of the writers that it was abolished in 1920, 281 the case does not seem to be so. The practice likely continued with a modification in its nature, till the late thirties of the 20 th century.282 With a new dimension, a begar cess of one anna per rupee in Jammu and half an anna in Kashmir was levied. 283 Though the Glancy commission reports mentions that females were exempted 284 yet there is evidence

279 E.F. Knight, Where Three Empires Meet , p. 68. 280 From Colonel R. Parry Nisbet to the Secretary to the Government of India , Foreign Dept., Secret-E, February, 1890, NAI. 281 P.N.K. Bamzai, Cultural and Political History of Kashmir, Vol.3, Srinagar, 1994, p. 109. 282 Glancy Commission Report, p. 39. The report mentions that in many cases officials of the Maharaja flouted the orders and villagers were often employed by them for carrying their baggage free of charge over long distances. 283 Translation of Memorandum dated 13 th May 1892, submitted by the Revenue Member to the State Council Resolution No. 4, May 1892, Vide Resolution No.24, dated 23 rd May 1892, NAI. 284 Ibid. 85 in which women are shown weeding a field while a Dogra soldier is keeping a vigil on them. 285 Although the orders for its abolition were issued in 1891, and in 1920 an effort was made to abolish it altogether, it continued in various forms up to 1947. One such form of forced labour was the construction and repair of canals and embankments 286 which were constructed without the free will and payment. In sum, forced labour gave a great setback to the emergence of revenue-paying peasantry the consequence of which, the absence of a stable cultivating class in Kashmir. This point has been emphasized by Wingate 287 as well.

After probing the available data on the subject of agrarian structure of Kashmir, one reaches to the conclusion that economically speaking the subjects became the victims of an unregulated economic system and the cultivating classes had very little, if any, capital powers. They comprised impoverished communities that lived a marginal existence. It was not only economic impoverishment that they faced but without exception these people were economically powerless. The statistical definition of poverty changed with time, but they always lived on the margin, with a bare minimum of land, calories, education, medical care, worldly goods and security In other words, these people had no way of advancing up the social ladder because they lacked nutrition, education and sanctuary —the commodities necessary for a group to enjoy economic mobility. Kashmiri people in general and the working class people in particular didn’t have these opportunities until the fruits of the national movement were realized. Years of struggle and poverty played an important role in defining Kashmir in the face of an awakening that was renowned for its affluence. Yet through this struggle there were leaders who tried to account for and fix the identity of Kashmir and its people.

285 See Illustration 1. 286 M.Y. Ganai, Kashmir’s Struggle for Independence , p. 52. 287 Wingate Report , p. 38. 86

Chapter 4

Economic Structure and Making of the Crisis-II

Generally speaking, Industry can be segregated into two parts: the relatively capital intensive large scale industry, and the relatively labour intensive small scale industry. Examples of large scale industry are cotton spinning and weaving mills. Examples of small scale industry included handloom textiles, leather manufactures, metal utensils, pottery, food processing, wood work, carpet shawls. A large part of labour intensive industry consisted of handicrafts. Whereas the former is largely machinery- based, the latter is mostly tool-based; also the latter is located in small wage workshops and family enterprise. 1

The industries in Dogra-ruled Kashmir can be placed in the second category, i.e., relatively labour intensive small scale industries. By defining industrialization to mean substitution of labour intensive by capital intensive products, however, instead of explaining the various dimensions of industrialization, here the focus will be on the state of industrialization in Kashmir during the period of our study.

4.1. Inherent Industrial Potential of the State

In the state of Jammu and Kashmir very few industries existed, despite the state being rich in mineral resources. 2 Many surveys were carried out during the period, which leave no room for doubt that there were immense potentialities of mineral development. 3 Prior to the establishment of the Dogra Rule, Kashmir was known for its arts and crafts apparently receiving great impetus under Sultan Zain-ul-Abidin who not only revived the industries which had either disappeared or declined, but also introduced new ones. 4 The great interest which the king took in the development of arts and crafts is further evident from the fact, that if he came to know of any artist or a craftsman from Iraq, Khurasan, or Turkistan was on a visit to the valley, he would induce him to teach his people whatever he knew. In fact the Sultan wouldn’t permit him to leave Kashmir until he had done so. It

1 Tirthankar Roy, Rethinking Economic Change in India Labour and Livelihood , Routledge, 2005, p. 105. 2 Ganga Nath Report, p. 36. 3 Ibid., p. 30. 4 Hassan, Kashmir under Sultans, p. 92. 87 was in this way that the sultan introduced for the first time in Kashmir the use of the weavers brush and loom and the weaving of silk cloth. 5

The arts and crafts earned Kashmir worldwide fame. The only industries of major importance were the Kashmir and Jammu silk industry, Karan Singh woolen mills, Kashmir Pharmaceutical works, Resin and Turpentine factory and Kashmir Match Factory. In addition there were some medium sized industries like Kashmir willows, Jammu Tannery, Silk weaving concerns, Indianite Factory at Miransahib, and Santonine Factories at Baramulla. 6

In general, industrial enterprise was spread over forest exploitation, sericulture, weaving of textiles, wood-working, flour milling, oil milling, basket making, dairy farming, tanning, manufacture of paper machie, silver wares, carpets, pharmaceutical preparations, poultry farming, building and the exploitation of mineral deposits. But up to late 1940’s there was no modern organization of industrial workers exis ts except a trade union of the silk industry nor had rules yet been framed to enforce the Factories Act which regulate labour in these industries, the associations of industrial workers, their working hours, compensation for accidents or non-employment of particular class of people. Owing to the delay of enforcing this legislation we have no doubt that there was a great deal of sweated labour employed in these industries particularly the smaller ones.

The condition of industrial organization was also unsatisfactory. Only industries connected with forest exploitation, sericulture, matches, extraction of indianite and one or two of the carpet factories were independently financed. The forest industries and sericulture were owned, controlled and financed by the state while match-works and santonine factories were privately financed and controlled. The carpet factories, most of which were owned by private financiers, obtained subsides from the state during years of depression, but the great bulk of the smaller industries particularly those which deal with luxury articles, worked on a system entirely out of tune with modern conditions of industrial organization. The old institution of crafts and middlemen financiers who generally call the tune in regard to design, wages, and purchase of raw material, sale of

5 Ibid. 6 Ganga Nath Report , p. 97. 88 finished and by products was prevalent. Cooperative sale and purchase of articles were practically nonexistent. 7

Kashmir during the period of our study was in possession of over 153 industrial establishments. 8 All these establishments were nourished mostly under the “protecting care ” of the state and the private enterprise in the industrial concerns of the major importance has not been prominent to an extent that it should have been. 9

4.2. Shawl Industry

Kashmir has since early times enjoyed a worldwide fame for its beautiful shawls. Kashmiri shawl developed over last three hundred years, through four different periods of foreign political rule, that is, the Mughals, the Afghans, the Sikhs and the Dogras. 10 However, it is impossible to speak of one ‘great period’ in the development of the Kashmiri shawl. Each culture brought with it its own unique contribution. The development of the Kashmiri shawl was influenced directly by changing historical circumstances; it reflects times of peace and of war, of famine and prosperity as well as changes in royal patronage. 11

The early Mughal period represents an important and prosperous moment for the Kashmiri shawl. Though the origin of the shawl goes to much earlier times, but it was not until the Mughal period that the industry achieved its full potential. 12 Authentic records are available which point towards a large scale of trade in shawls in the time of Akbar. Abul Fazl makes a special mention of Kashmiri shawl; while describing the industries of Kashmir, says, ‘woolen fabrics are made in high perfection, especially shawls which are sent as valuable gifts to every clime. 13 He also records that, ‘His Majesty is very fond of shawls. By the attention of his Majesty the manufacture of shawls in Kashmir is in a very flourishing state.’ Moreover, according to him a shawl in Akbar’s time could cost anything from Rs. 200 to Rs. 1200 and they were always greatly valued as presents and

7 Ibid., p.98. 8 Kashmir Industries, The Times of India, February, 15, 1924, p. 21. 9 Ganga Nath Report, p. 97. 10 Frank Ames, The Kashmir Shawl & its Indo French Influence , Timeline Books, New Delhi, 2004, p. 15. 11 Ibid. 12 Ames, The Kashmir Shawl and its Indo-French Influence, p.18. 13 Abul Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari , trans, Colonel H.S. Jarret, Vol. 2, p. 353. 89 of course, as bribes. 14 Bernier who visited Kashmir in 1665 with Aurangzeb says, ‘what may be considered peculiar to Kashmir, and the staple commodity which particularly promotes the trade of the country and fills it wealth is the prodigious quantity of shawls which they manufacture and which gives occupation even to the little children.’ 15 Bernier explains the size of an average shawl as being about five feet long two and half feet wide and with decorated borders less than one foot deep.

As the Mughal kingdom began to collapse and Kashmir came under the rule of the Afghans, the Kashmiri shawl industry began to focus increasingly on the west, while the export to the Indian market showed signs of decline. In spite of this change, the government of Hyderabad in the Deccan, under the rule of Nizam-ul-Mulk, continued to be a rich outlet for the Kashmiri shawl where it remained the conventional dress of the nobles at court. 16

During the rule of the Afghans Kashmir was reduced to the lowest depths of penury and degradation, a slavery lasting for sixty seven years. Their cruelty threatened the life and property of all foreigners who had been residing in Kashmir; about ninety firms established by Hindu businessmen were closed down as their owners returned to their home land, while nearly half the population of Kashmir left the terror stricken land permanently. Nevertheless, shawl weaving continued during these difficult times and accounte d for a significant portion of Kashmir’s revenue. The shawl industry of Kashmir seems to have received an impetus again during the Afghan rule under governor Sardar Aziz Khan in whose time the income from shawls was four lakhs of rupees. 17 The popularity of shawls resulted in a brisk trade. 18 Nadir Shah the Persian ruler apparently considered Kashmiri shawls quite prestigious and valuable enough to be included in the

14 Brigid Keenan, Travels in Kashmir, Permanent Black, 2006, p. 189. 15 A. Mitra, Notes On the Arts and Industries in Kashmir, Honorary Curator, Sri Pratap Singh Museum, Srinagar, 1906, p. 1. 16 Ames, The Kashmir Shawl and its indo French influence , p. 24. 17 Mitra, Notes on the Arts and Industries in Kashmir , p. 2. 18 Ames, The Kashmir Shawl and its indo French Influence , pp. 24-5. 90 fifteen elephant loads of lavish gifts that he presented to the sultan of Constantinople in 1739.19

Under the Sikhs the industry was in a flourishing state during the governorship of Dewan Kripa Ram. 20 The export from Kashmir into British territory in 1805, for example, was valued at only Rs 141,757, and shawls constituted 91% of it. 21 Though great pestilence and famine of 1819 decimated the number of the shawl manufacturers yet Moorcroft observed in 1824 that the whole value of shawl goods manufactured in Kashmir may be estimated at about thirty five lakhs of rupees per anum or say three hundred thousand pounds. 22 A good quantity of articles of shawl stuff was still manufactured in Kashmir. 23

During the nineteenth century shawl industry developed the features of capitalistic production. Earlier, it was the master craftsmen who invested money and organized production under their own guidance. 24 But then, the persons traditionally belonging to family connected with shawl trade and not necessarily master craftsmen, organized shawl production by investing money and employing master craftsmen on wages. 25 The production was organized in, what are called, karkhanas [factories]. The karkhandar [the owner] employed 300 to 400 weavers. 26 It led to the subsential growth of the industry both in terms of the number of operational looms and the workers employed. 27 The value of shawls exported in 1862 was £171,709 to £491,441. 28

Again, the non-availability of sufficient statistical data pertaining to the said period prevents us from saying anything certainly regarding the condition of the shawl

19 Keenan, Travels in Kashmir, p. 189 Keenan argues that Nadir Shah may very well have acquired the shawls that he gave to the sultan when his army sacked Delhi, earlier that same year. And when the British sold Kashmir to Maharaja Gulab Singh, they wrote in to the Treaty that every year he [Gulab Singh] must present them three pairs of Kashmir Shawls. 20 Mitra, Notes on the Arts and Industries in Kashmir , p. 2. 21 Dharma Kumar and Tapan Ray Chaudhuri (ed.), The Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. 2, Cambridge, 2008, p. 245. 22 William Moorcroft and George Trebeck, Travels in the Himalayan Province of Hindustan and the Punjab , p. 194. 23 Ibid., p. 186. 24 Dhar, Kashmir A Kaleidoscopic View, p. 40. 25 Ibid. 26 Diwan Chand Sharma, Kashmir under Sikhs, Jammu, 1983, p. 176. 27 Dhar, Kashmir A Kaleidoscopic View, p. 40. 28 Census of India, 1921, vol. xxii, 1921, pp. 180-2. 91 industry. One assertion, however, may be deduced from the available data, however meager, and the descriptions provided by travelers —that the shawl industry occupied a key position in the non-agrarian economic setup of Kashmir, and that its condition was relatively better during the Sikh period than during the subsequent years when the Dogras ascended the throne. That the shawl industry and its decline had a direct bearing on the people of Kashmir needs to be probed. That is what has been attempted in the subsequent pages.

The shawl manufacture had to undergo a long apprentice before acquiring the shape of a finished product. First the women would pick the coarse hairs from the im ported wool. In this process ⅓ of the weight of the wool was lost and the remainder was packed in layers with rice flour slightly moistened with oil and was subjected to a pressure under stone for about forty eight hours, whereby it was cleaned and spun into thread by women. 29 After the process of cleaning and spinning of raw material was overtaken, it was taken to Karkhanas or workshops where the weavers used to weave it into shawl on wooden looms. 30 The workshops for manufacturing shawls were found in many parts of the valley but mostly they existed in the city of Srinagar with primitive technology.

Shawls were of two types: loom-made and handmade. 31 In the loom system a karkhandar [shawl manufacturer] employed a number of shawl bafs (shawl weavers) in his karkhana . This number ranged from twenty or thirty to three hundred. 32 The karkhandar used to buy spun thread from the pui-woin or dealer, to whom it was disposed off by the spinners, and got it dyed of different colures before it was distributed among workmen. 33 There were about hundred karkhandars in Kashmir in 1873.34 The shawl weavers were put under the complete control of the master workmen (ustad ). There was usually one ustad every twenty five or thirty shawl bafs .35 At the end of each month, the ustad took to karkhandar ‘an account of the work performed in tha t time by each of

29 Foreign and Political-A, File Nos. 66-70, March 31, 1848, NAI. 30 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , p. 28. 31 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 27. 32 Ibid., p. 27. Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir, p. 53. 33 Ibid. 34 Ibid., p. 28. 35 Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir , p. 53. Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 28. 92 the men under him’ and drew so much pay for each, which was regulated by the amount of the work done. 36 Usually the sum realized by the shawl bafs from the karkhandar was from three to five chilki rupees a month, 37 inclusive of the amount deducted by the government for rice, which was sold to the shawl bafs. Such a paltry amount was not sufficient to support the family of a shawl baf, 38 with any approach to comfort, even in so fertile a country like as Kashmir.

4.3. Taxation

The Gazetteer of Kashmir (1873) notes that ‘a larger revenue than that which is obtained from the land is realized from the shawl manufacture, every shawl being stamped and the stamp duty being 26% upon the estimated value.’ 39 The whole functioning of the shawl industry right from the collection of the wool from the bushes and other sources, till the finished product reached customer generated tremendous economic activity so much so that this industry became an inseparable part of the economic and cultural ethos of Kashmir. 40 Almost all the households in the city of Srinagar and other areas were fully or partially, directly or indirectly, involved in this industry and derived some kind of economic advantage. Of course, the industry formed the considerable source of revenue to the government, but it went beyond limits in taxing the industry. 41 The Afghans had no taxation policy; they devastated Kashmir without any rules of the game. The Sikhs did have a taxation policy, which was tough and harsh in nature. 42 The Afghan governor Karim Dad Khan, introduced the institution of Dagshawl ; yet it were the Sikhs and Dogras who firmly rooted this institution in the soil of Kashmir and enjoyed its fruits at the cost of the weaver. 43

The shawl weaver was in continuous bondage due to exorbitant rate looms taken from the contractor, inherited from father to son, as the payment of money was a pittance, and the part of payment compulsively paid in the form of rice, their staple food. Both

36 Ibid., p. 54. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid. 39 Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir , p. 101. 40 Dhar, Kashmir A Kaleidoscopic view , p. 41. 41 Ibid. 42 Ibid. 43 Ibid. 93

Maharaja Gulab Singh and Maharaja Ranbir Singh had a monopoly of sale of rice in the valley, which has already been mentioned. Large quantity of rice was yearly stored in state granaries in Srinagar where it was being distributed among the city population, the majority of whom were the shawl weavers and other artisan classes. 44 Thousands, of these men and of other artisans in the city who just keep body and soul together. 45

The intrinsic worth of a shawl depended upon the fineness of its threads, general harmony of colour and perfection of workmanship, but to this must be added the factious elements of taxes levied on raw material and on the manufacture at various stages. To such a degree of fineness was embroidery carried on the loom that weavers occasionally lost their sight over the work. 46 The annual tax levied by the Maharaja on each shawl weaver was Rs 47-8 chilki rupees 47 though the condition of the shawl weaver was not good during the Sikh period. Von Schonberg, a traveler to Kashmir, has given a comparative description of the conditions of the people associated with shawl-making. He notes that: 48

‘They will never allow the workmen the ready money, the government provides clothes, firing and other household necessities, charging as usual a hundred % profit. This is managed very skillfully and so arranged that the poor artisan is always in debt and I will add that the shawl weavers seem to be most unfortunate…the childhood of the weavers children ceased abruptly at the age of five, when they were considered old enough to work on the looms and contribute to the family’s meager budget and thus another human being enters on a career of wretchedness and rears children, who in turn, become heirs to his misery … Later under Maharaja Gulab Singh their lives became even more intolerable. Shawl weavers were required to pay still more tax and a new law was introduced forbidding any weaver whether ill or half blind or old and tired, to abandon his loom unless he could find someone to replace him. They were also forbidden to

44 D.N. Dhar, Artisans of the Paradise, Art and Artisans of Kashmir From Ancient times to Modern Times , New Delhi, 1999, pp. 45-6. 45 ‘Note by Walter Lawrence on the Position of the Cultivating Classes in Kashmir .’ 46 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , p. 28. 47 A chilki rupee worth eight to ten annas of the British Indian rupee was introduced by Maharaja Ranbir Singh. Khan, History of Srinagar, p. 84. 48 Keenan, Travels in Kashmir , p. 197. John Irwin, The Kashmir Shawl , London, 1955, p. 9. 94

leave the valley… and those who succeeded joined other expatriate weavers in the Punjab.’

The exaction and extortion forced artisans to fall back on land which led to de- industrialization and peasantization. 49 John Irwin figures out that 25% of the value of a shawl was charged on each shawl and its assessment and collection were formed out to corrupt body of officials, whose illegal exactions were said to have amounted to further 25% of the value. 50 Before 1833, the duty on shawls was levied at three annas per rupee of value. After words a tax of rupees 96 per annum per shop was fixed and extended to one thousand shops. Subsequently, the duty was raised to rupees 120 per shop. The shawl weavers were greatly underpaid. On 6 th June 1847, they struck work, and about 4,000 shawl weavers set out for Lahore. They were working under the system of indenture. 51

The occupation of shawl weaving was hereditary more from compulsion than choice, for the son seems to had no option but to follow in his father’s steps. 52 About the shawl weavers called khandawao Dr. Elmslie says, ‘there were 23,013 in the valley of Kashmir, all Mohammedans, and are most miserable portion of the population, both physically and morally. Crowded together in small and badly ventilated workshops, earning a mere pittance, and insufficiently nourished, they suffer from chest infection, rheumatism and scrofula. When a woman wishes her neighbour ill, she says may you get a shawl weaver for a husband! ’53

The shawl weavers continued to remain steeped in poverty during Maharaja Ranbir Singh’s reign. 54 A booklet Kashmeer and its Shawls written by an anonymous gentleman was brought out in England in 1875 to celebrate the visit that the Prince of Wales was to make to Kashmir, and to educate the public on the now extremely meddled subject of the Kashmir shawl, The book was written as a series of questions and answers between a fictitious mother named Lady Ann and her daughter Lily. The gist of the

49 Roy, Rethinking Economic Change, p. 94. 50 Irwin, The Kashmir Shawl, p. 9. Wakefield records that the manufacture of shawls being under government control, a duty was imposed on every pair made, heavy penalties being also inflicted if a genuine article is not produced. See Wakefield , The Happy Valley, p. 145. 51 A Handbook of Jammu and Kashmir State , 1927, NAI, p. 23. 52 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , p. 28. 53 Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir , p. 33. 54 Khan, History of Srinagar, p. 63. 95 question answer interaction clearly points out the sad conditions through which the shawl manufacturing was going on in Kashmir during the reign of Maharaja Ranbir Singh, 55 although, Lawrence records that best shawls ever made in Kashmir were manufactured in the time of Maharaja Ranbir Singh [1865-1872].56 Andrew Wilson who visited Kashmir during the time of Maharaja Ranbir Singh mentions that, ‘the shawl weavers get miserable wages and are allowed neither to leave Kashmir nor change their employment, so that they are nearly in the position of slaves, and their average wage is only about three half pence a day. 57 Some external factors are also believed to be responsible for the decline of the industry. The French and German war of 1870 no doubt gave a great setback to the international market of the industry, but at the domestic sphere no readymade solution seems to have been provided for its recovery. The census report of 1921 refers to the situation in which the government derived from the shawl industry ‘an income of about seven lakhs per annum during 1846-69; it, however, doesn’t say anything about the years that followed 1869, except for lamenting the loss of the industry after that period. This too points to the fact that there were many unfavorable factors that were undermining the industry since a long time before the Franco-German war of 1870.58 It was the harsh taxation and high custom duty that the industry was unable to flourish. 59 The adverse effects of heavy taxation were not felt so long as there was an increasing demand; as the demand declined suddenly after the fall of France, the heavy taxation served as an important factor speeding up the collapse of the industry. 60

Although, as already mentioned, the shawl trade received a deadly blow from the impoverishment caused by the French and German war, and afterwards by the change of fashion which expelled these fabrics from the French and American markets, yet it was always a marvel how the industry could have outlived the impositions to which it was subjected, nor indeed, could it have survived but for the cruel regulations which forbade a

55 Keenan, Travels in Kashmir , p. 193. 56 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 376. 57 Andrew Wilson, The Abode of Snow , p. 366. 58 M.S. Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi, 1945, p. 50. 59 Trotter Capitan Lionel J., The Life of Hodson of Hodson’s Horse , p. 86. 60 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 51. 96 weaver to relinquish. 61 The wool was taxed as it entered Kashmir, 62 which was brought from writes Andrew Wilson, ‘the finest of the goats… from Tufran , in the Yarkand territory and it [wa]s only on the wind swept steppes of Central Asia that animals [we]re found to produce so fine a wool. 63 Besides wool the manufacturer was taxed for every workman he employed; again, he was taxed at various stages of the process according to the value of the fabric, and lastly the merchant was taxed before he could export the goods,64 and an export on shawls was raised up to 25% ad valorem. 65

Foreign competition, which began to make its appearance during the second quarter of the 19 th century and became stronger as the years rolled by, was another factor responsible for the decline. 66 The East India Company was anxious to shift the industry from Kashmir to Paisley, and they spared no pains to do so. Pashm and shawl patterns were sent to England and the Scottish weavers at Paisley began to imitate and compete with Kashmir. 67 The use of aniline dyes in place of vegetable dyes proved one of the causes for the decline. By the use of these dyes in Kashmir the popularity of its shawls in Europe declined. The adoption of the foreign designs in place of the indigenous designs stuck a blow to the industry. 68 There was no major state in India which was suffering so much from lack of regulated marketing facilities as the state of Jammu and Kashmir. 69 The whole Kashmir province was not having a single market worth the name where the producer and buyer could meet and do competitive business. 70 In the Jammu city, on the other hand, there were one or two markets which were neither controlled nor regulated. 71 It goes on to show that there was absence of an initiative to develop industries and to standardize them. 72

61 ‘Henvey’s Note on the Famine in Kashmir, 1877 -80’, Foreign Department (S ecret), File No. 86, March, 1883, NAI. 62 Ibid. 63 Andrew Wilson, The Abode of Snow , p. 366. 64 ‘Henvey’s Note on the Famine in Kashmir, 1877-80’, Foreign Department (Secret), File No. 86, March , 1883, NAI. 65 Ibid. 66 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 51. 67 Ibid. 68 Lawrence, the Valley of Kashmir, p. 376. 69 Political Department, File No. 292, year, 1938, JKA-J. 70 Ibid. 71 Ibid. 72 Political Department, File No. 100/c, 1938. 97

On the other hand, very low wages were given to weavers which were calculated according to the number of sticks of pashm thread prepared by each one who could work the stick in woof and warf one thousand times was reckoned to have performed work worth one stick. The daily wages of weavers averaged between two and six annas. 73 It was a poor industry for the weavers, though a lucrative industry for the state who took rupees 30 per annum from employers of shawl weavers per head, an import duty of 20% on the manufactured article and an export duty of rupees 7.15 on a long shawl, and Rs 5.13 on a square shawl. 74

The raw materials were increasingly scare and hardly any guidance about designs or quality control or commercial intelligence was available to craftsmen. 75 They were obliged to wait for months, if they order any special pattern. This was partly due to a want of capital, but the chief cause was the utter absence of enterprise and energy. 76 That apart, ubiquitous middleman would grab the profits and further impoverish the community. That was one of the main reasons why the children of craftsmen were disillusioned and inclined to give up traditional vocations. 77 O’ Connor while visiting the valley in 1920 picturizes the working places of shawl weavers as: ‘ A narrow and widening stair that suggests the middle ages climbs through the interior of the houses to the lighted rooms, in which the workers are busy over delicate embroideries, no less than seventy five men and boys in a space that would be cramped for half a dozen Englishmen. ’78

It was against this backdrop that the shawl weavers in Kashmir revolted several time against the oppressive regime. Labour is a dynamic process through which the labourer shapes and moulds the world; he lives and stimulates himself to create and innovate —a trait which remained absent in the labourer class of Kashmir during the period. When labour is destructive, not creative, when it is undertaken under coercion and not as the free play of process, when it means withering not the flowering of man’s

73 Lala Ganeshi Lal, Siyahat-i-Kashmir , translated into English and Annotated by Vidya Sagar Suri, Monograph No. 4, Punjab Government Record Office Publication, Simla, 1955, p. 33. 74 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 375. 75 Janak Singh, Woes of Kashmiri Craftsmen, Menace of Middlemen, The Times of India, Nov. 29, 1975. 76 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 374. 77 Janak Singh, Woes of Kashmiri Crafts Men Menace of Middlemen , p. 375. 78 O’ Connor, The Charm of Kashmir, p. 40. 98 physical and intellectual potential then labour is a denial of its own principle of man. It was such a kind of labour in Kashmir where after working from dawn to dusk, their earnings hardly touched their subsistence level. After working from dawn to dusk a shawl weaver could get no more than four pence in a wage per day. He could earn seven or eight rupees per month out of which he paid five rupees in tax which left him three rupees to live on. Dr. Allama Iqbal was mortified at their miserable condition. After visiting the valley in 1921 he left behind a subversive couplet which spread around the whole of Kashmir… 79

‘Ba resham qaba Khawaja az mehnat-e-oo Naseeb-e-tanash jama-e-taarey’ ‘While you are destined to cover your body with rags’ The khwaja’s silken robes are the fruit of your labour’

The labour class of Kashmir associated with the shawl weaving manifested a spirit of revolt against the intolerable conditions. Their historic revolt on 29 th April 1865 80 was an event of far reaching significance. On this date the weavers marched in a procession towards Zaldagar (name of a place in Srinagar) to present their grievances to the governor at his residence and ‘in bittered despairing mood, the shawl bafs made a wooden bier such as the Muslims use to carry their dead to the place of internment. Placing a cover over the coffin, they carried it to and from the procession, exclaiming, Raj Kak (head of the Dagshawl department) is dead who will give him grave’? 81 Raj Kak maneuvered a myth and wrongly reported to the governor wrongly that they would attack his house and kill him. Unnerved, he hastily rushed a large force under the command of Colonel Bije Singh who pushed the unarmed hungry multitude towards the narrow Haji Rather bridge and most of the processionists, after having pursed by the soldiers, fell into the marshy canal and got drowned. Hundreds of workers suffered minor and major injuries and at least twenty eight dead bodies were returned to the people by the army. 82 On the next day the victims were paraded in a procession with the declared intention of placing them before Ranbir Singh to seek his justice. They were stopped in the way and

79 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, Flames of Chinar , Srinagar, 2006, p. 4. 80 Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 30. 81 Ibid., p. 32. 82 Ibid. Nab Shah, Wajeed-ul-Taarikh, p. 201, cited in Dhar, Kashmir the Land and its Management , p. 140. 99 forced to bury the dead without being provided an opportunity of representing their grievances to their ruler. 83 Their ring leaders were ruthlessly beaten and two of them, Abli Baba and Sheikh Rasool, lost their lives in the procession and Sona Shah and Qud Lala were sent to the Bahu fort in Jammu. 84 The nature and character of the revolt implies that it was likely the first organized voice for freedom of the artisan classes of Kashmir against the deteriorated economic conditions. Of course, the shawl weavers had revolted during the Maharaja Gulab Singh’s time. In 1847 the weavers assembled and demanded that the maharaja give them permission to emigrate to Punjab or change working conditions in Srinagar. Gulab Singh conceded that the weaver was to be paid only according to actual work on the loom and he could change his employer if he so choose. 85 However, these promises were put into practice and gradually the centers of the industry shifted from Srinagar to Amritsar as the weavers migrated to the Punjab in the hope of better working conditions. 86 These type of revolts remained localized and fizzled out after some time. The harsh taxation policy of the government appears to have given due allowance to its decline and the condition of the weavers. 87 The state monopoly prevented the growth of competition and private enterprise. In order to retain the monopoly, large advances, sometimes two or three years before delivery of the wool, were made by Maharaja to the Shepherds of Changhthan, to have the monopoly of their supply.88 Commenting upon the decline of the shawl industry in Kashmir Prem Nath Bazaz says, ‘it is a sad commentary on the economic progress of Kashmir during the reign of the Dogras that such a gigantic industry which supported lakhs of poor people and supplemented the meager income of a large part of the peasantry by keeping them employed during idle months of winter, became almost extinct in 1925. The charkha which was a prominent part of the household property in Kashmir lost its vigor and importance too. ’89

83 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for freedom, p. 291. 84 Ibid. Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir, pp. 79-80. 85 Frank Ames, The Kashmir Shawl & its Indo-French Influence , p. 42. 86 Ibid., p. 40. Charles E. Bates, A Gazetteer of Kashmir , p. 53; Thorpe, Cashmere Misgovernment, p. 30; K.M. Panikkar, The Founding of the Kashmir State, p. 134. 87 Hangloo, Agrarian System of Kashmir, p. 137. 88 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , p. 30. 89 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir, pp. 7-8. 100

The decline of shawl industry and shawl trade proved decisive in changing the course of the history of Kashmir. The shawl merchants, who were a powerful class, in the Kashmir valley were mostly residing in the city of Srinagar, were trading in a commodity that brought Darbar thousands of rupees as revenue; they also determined the Darbar’s relationship with the outside world. 90 The decline of the powerful class of shawl merchants had far-reaching significance for the evolution of the social and political landscape of late ninetieth and early twentieth century Kashmir. 91

4.4. Silk Industry

History is absolutely silent with regard to the origin of silk industry in Kashmir beyond the fact that it is very ancient, and it is intimately connected with that of Bukhara with which it has always had interchange of ‘seed and silk.’ 92 For centuries, perhaps progress in the silk culture was stifled by the continuous political changes in the country. 93 After the decline in Hindu ascendency, the rulers failed to realize the benefit of fostering a profitable industry. 94 During the fifteenth century king Zain-ul-Abidin (1420-1470) the great king of Kashmir is said to have been the first to give his attention to the cultivation of Silk in Kashmir. 95 The sultan introduced first time in Kashmir the use of weavers brush and loom, and the weaving of the silk cloth. The patterns on the silk cloth were so exquisitely made that the valley became famous for it. 96 After the death of Zain-ul- Abdeen the industry fell in disarray and, it is believed that by the time of the Mughal conquest sericulture in Kashmir had declined to a considerable extent. The Mughals tried to bring about a revival, but it is not known how far their earlier efforts succeeded. 97 Abul-ul-

90 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 84. 91 Ibid p. 87. 92 Lawrence, The valley of Kashmir, p. 367. 93 Rattan C. Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry: A Study in Industry Organization, Westminster, 1919, p. 21. 94 Ibid. 95 Charles Girdlestone, Memorandum on Cashmere and Some Adjacent Countries , p. 35. 96 Hassan, Kashmir under Sultans, p. 92. 97 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 21. Mirza Haider Dughlat in his book Tarikh-i-Rashidi refers to the large number of mulberry trees cultivated for feeding the silkworms among the wonders of Kashmir. Mirza Haider Dughlat states that th e people wouldn’t allow the leaves to be used for any purpose other than that of food for silkworms. See, Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 367. 101

Fazal r ecords that, ‘the mulberry is little eaten. Its leaves are reserved for the silkworm. The eggs are brought from Gilgit and little Tibet. 98 Therefore, it can safely be assumed that during the 16 th century Kashmir possessed a silk producing industry deriving its raw silk from within the country. 99 The famous Kashmiri shawls and woven silks were exceedingly popular in Akbar’s court, where frequent exhibitions were given of the artistic productions of the weavers of the Mughal Empire. Yusuf Khan, the feudatory chief of Kashmir under Akbar, realized the importance of these exhibitions and, under the imperial injection, passed regulations by which the rearers and the spinners were brought together. By these immense measures the silk industry in Kashmir was given a fresh impetus and it continued to flourish. 100 Silk cultivation flourished in Kashmir during Afghan period. 101 During the Sikh period, William Moorcroft wrote in 1824, the silk produced was ‘insufficient for domestic purpose’ . G.T Vinge’s account of 1835 is reassuring. Vinge records that considerable quantity of silk was produced and that the same was taken by the Sikh Governor Mian Singh who used to pay producers in rice and that 2/3 rd of the total produce was exported to the Punjab. 102 By the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century there started a gradual decline in the silk production of Bengal. But the silk industry in Kashmir was reorganized on commercial basis before the last decade of the nineteenth century. So the loss incurred by the Indian silk industry in Bengal was more than regained by the development of sericulture in Kashmir. The latter became an important source of raw silk and was likely to play an important part in the European silk markets 103 …which unfortunately it couldn’t because of some development at home and abroad. Munshi Ganesh Lal, a tourist who visited Kashmir in 1846 records in his ‘ Tuhfa-i- Kashmir’ [wonders of Kashmir] that silk producing industry was scattered through villages in remote corners of the valley and didn’t form a combination. The production of

98 Ain-i-Akbari , tr. Jarrett, vol. 2, p. 349. 99 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 22. 100 Ibid. 101 Sufi, Kashir, vol. 2, p. 574. 102 Ibid., p. 575. 103 Ibid., p. 28. 102 raw silk was limited to certain areas where the rears worked up the indigenous silkworm and woe the raw silk into cloth privately in their own cottages. The inefficiency of organization in the industry was due partly to the absence of commercial enterprise and partly to the difficulties of transport. But in spite of all these flaws the state derived revenue of about £2,000 a year from silk culture. Munshi Ganesh Lal argues that if there were proper organization the state could obtain revenue of about £ 10,000 a year from the silk industry alone. 104 This was the period of the Sikhs and the beginning of the Dogra Rule. Maharaja Gulab Singh during his reign entrusted the charge of Silk industry to his court physician, Hakim Azim, but a period of decay set in due to the destruction of the crop, all over the world by a pebrine disease 105 and the industry remained in unorganized state till the year 1869 when Maharaja Ranbir Singh took up the task of its revival with the spirit of modern industrial reformer. 106 The need was to reorganize the industry on scientific and commercial lines in order to with stand foreign competition. Being a keen and enthusiastic reformer he took steps to modernize the silk industry of Kashmir. At the very outset the Maharaja got one hundred twenty seven rearing houses built in different parts of the Kashmir valley. 107 Reeling appliances and machinery were imported from Europe and a large department was formed for the purpose of developing of silk. 108 Every possible effort was made to increase the standard of efficiency of the rearers, and new guilds were instituted to carry out the directions of the authorities. The basic aim was to establish the silk industry on purely business lines and to extend its export trade. 109 Not only this, a guild of laboring class was formed out called Kiram Kush or silk worm rearers, with certain privileges like the exemption from

104 Sufi, Kashir, vol. 2, p. 575; Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 30. 105 Sufi, Kashir, vol. 2, p. 575. It was thought that this epidemic, which had already spread all over Europe, would prove fatal to the silk industry and in order to avoid a disastrous industrial depression among the silk producing countries, the European government sent expedition to different parts of the world to obtain the silk worm eggs. Consequently, two Italian ‘graineurs’ producers of the silkworm eggs for purpose of reproduction’ set out for Calcutta in 1860 and then proceeded to Kashmir. They sent a large quantity of seed (eggs) back to Italy. From their revealing account one may safely assume that sericulture in Kashmir was practiced on a considerable scale in the middle of the nineteenth century and there were great prospects of extending the production of silk in Kashmir on a commercial basis. See Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry, p. 32; Sufi, Kashir, vol. 2, p. 575. 106 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 32. 107 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 154. 108 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 367. 109 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , pp. 32-33. 103 begar .110 They could use the houses of the villagers for breeding and rearing purposes and were also to act as informers for any damage done to the mulberry trees by villagers. In this way the industry was organized almost as a state monopoly. To ensure effective implementation of the policy the chief justice of Kashmir Mr. N. Mukherjee personally superintended the operations, but the only improvement he was able to effect from 1869-1871 was in the quality of the silk reeled, which he did by specially organizing a body of reelers and taught them better methods of reeling, than those which had been in practice and a striking improvement took place in the samples of raw silk which were sent through the government of India to Her Majesty’s secretary of state. 111 The silk brokers in London to whom samples were presented gave a positive response and report. According to their findings, the reeling’s methods had been slightly improved and the quality of the silk produced was better than that of the Bengal silk, but much attention had not been paid to the rearing of the Silkworms. 112 Through the efforts of the chief justice the authorities also turned ambitious to develop the industry on proper lines; subsequently some development is visible in the industry and the income of the industry raised to as much as five lakhs rupees a year. 113 The year 1878 proved a turning point for the future of the industry. In the year plague, which subsequently made its appearance all over the world, made its appearance in Kashmir in 1879 and became so virulent that the industry had to be abandoned and nothing was done for its revival till 1888.114 The sudden downfall of the industry has been attributed to the aforesaid occurrences, but only one cause can’t be sufficient for the absolute abandonment of the industry. There might be other economic reasons which in collaboration with other causes ruined the industry. On e can’t deny the possibility of the decrease due to the destroying of the whole of the cocoon harvest, but at the same time other causes can’t be excluded as well. It was quite evident that the task of revival was undertaken on too large a scale to ensure success especially when Kashmir was not fully ripe for it both from the

110 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 154. 111 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 33. 112 Ibid. 113 Report on Administration of Jammu and Kashmir State 1889-90 , p. 63. 114 Lawrence, The valley of Kashmir, p. 367. 104 financial as well as from industrial point of view. 115 The Kiram Kashs (silk worm rearers) had become a privileged class of people; they abused their power, annoyed and oppressed the villagers that the latter didn’t take much interest in the rearing of worms. The other official staff authorized by the state to carry out its orders overstepped their authority in many cases, and it was natural that the industry should have become unpopular among the villagers. 116 The state had no clear plan about the industry. It is believed that the silk worm disease in 1878 was due to the importation of foreign seed, which should have been first well inspected. The cost of buildings and machinery was enormous, more than it should have been. The rearing huts were scattered in all parts of the valley, which rendered proper supervision impracticable. Those who were not interested in silk worm rearing were forced to do so, the consequence being loss of seed. 117 The investment was done in haste, at a time, when there was scarcity of capital in Kashmir. 118 It can be said that the silk industry in Kashmir became a victim partly to inefficiency, lack of organization and partly to the aforesaid disease. Again in 1889 to revive the industry the services of a Bengali expert Mr. Rishibar Mukherjee were taken who conducted the operations successfully from 1890 to the beginning of 1894 in carrying out a healthy local seed.119 In 1889 Sir Thomas Wardle, then the president of the Silk Association of Great Britain, wrote to the British Resident stationed in Kashmir about the prospects of sericulture in Kashmir and in 1891 there was an exhibition of silk in London. Sir Thomas Wardle ‘wished to see Kashmir well represented as a silk producing country.’ This was a great event in the sericulture history of Kashmir. 120 The samples were sent to England for microscopic examination. After the examination of these samples Kashmir administration was advised to adopt an improved method of cocoon reeling. The state was told, ‘there is not the slightest dou bt that it might be the foundation of a large remunerative industry, and with such a beautiful climate, as Kashmir is favored, and it would add to the immense useful ness both to Kashmir as well

115 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 37. 116 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 157. 117 Ibid. 118 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 37 119 Ibid., p. 39. 120 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 158. 105 as to India.’ 121 But did it really happen? As before the partition of India into two dominions we find the absence of full-fledged type of industry in the modern sense of the term, despite the immense natural resources. Importantly the Dogras were against the industrialization of the state because of their fear that growth of economic prosperity would further the political awakening. 122 Though the state tried to modernize the industry, it seems that it could not improve to the extent to which it was expected. This might be because the improvements which were introduced up to the year 1895 were more or less on an experimental basis. The further extension of the industry which involved establishment of the filatures, and by the end of 1910, ten filatures were in full working order.123 However, the improvements and extension of the industry were mainly technical in character 124 and the industry from 1900 to 1942 witnessed many phases of growth and decline. 125 The reforms carried out during the period of Maharaja Ranbir Singh couldn’t achieve much popularity as the reforms were conducted on purely official lines in which coercion likely played a great role. 126 There was no real skilled supervision, disease attacked the silkworms and the enterprise languished. 127 But in spite of mistake and failure, it was proved that Kashmir could produce a silk of high quality. 128 The decline of both the shawl and silk industries played a significant role in the evolution of the political landscape of Kashmir. The chief obstacles which prevented the ultimate growth and development of the industry have been discussed below. The state took various steps with regard to the growth and development of the industry and appointed an expert as director of sericulture, which somewhat changed the conditions prevailing in the silk industry. 129 Machinery was imported from foreign countries and rearing houses were established; samples were sent to England which greatly increased the quality of silk production. B ut on the other hand state’s approach in

121 Sir Thomas Wardle, Silk in Kashmir, first pub.1904, reprint Srinagar, 2000, p. 15. 122 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom, pp. 24-5. 123 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 40. 124 Ibid., p. 40. 125 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 189. 126 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol.XV , p. 128. 127 Ibid. 128 Ibid. 129 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 45. 106 various aspects of the industry proved detrimental and obstructed the progress of industry. No effort was done by the state to develop an indigenous seed production which is directly linked by the ‘cost of production’ which includes the price paid for the silkworms’ eggs, and therefore the part of the circulating capi tal which is invested in the purchase of the raw material is an important item of the net cost. Items of seed cause a proportional increase in the cost of production of raw silk, and thus, leave a proportionally smaller margin of profit to the producer. 130 Secondly the price paid for the imported seed was nearly 4s per oz. If the total amount of the seed used in a year on the average, about 40,000 oz’s, the capital invested in the purchase of the raw material from a foreign country amounted to £ 8,000. If during the same year, the labour charges amount to £30,000, the ratio between these two items of the cost of production is only to 3 ⅓ . The difference between the labour charges and the charges for the raw material becomes less as the price of the seed rises. On other hand, the lower price of the seed grown in Kashmir [which is only 1/3 of the price paid for the foreign seed] causes a proportionate reduction in the charges for the raw material and thereby again leaves a large margin of profit in the long run in the coffins of the state. 131 The seed and silkworm are extremely sensitive to climatic changes. Indigenous silkworm could stand changes in climate much better than foreign races, and the silk produced in Kashmir before the introduction of foreign races has been declared better in respect of thread than the silk produced from foreign races. 132 From an economic point of view localized production could have developed another subsidiary industry. Foreign seed acted a great barrier in the development of the industry in respect of dependence on the mercy of foreign ‘graineurs’ and prevented the home industry to become practically self-sufficient. Following the aforesaid advantages of the development of local seed one is justified in assuming that the indigenous seed having been acclimatized in Kashmir for centuries, gives a better quality of thread than the product of the imported seed. 133

130 Ibid., p. 82. 131 Ibid., p. 83. 132 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 199. 133 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 84. 107

Most of the peasants who were associated with the silk rearing were simultaneously associated with the agriculture. In both the methods of production scientific methods were absent. With the result whereas the yield of about 100 lbs per ounce of seed was not uncommon in France and 120 lbs was not considered exceptional in Italy, the yield per ounce of seed in Kashmir never went beyond 80 lbs for most part of its manufacture, and was as low as 30 lbs in 1940- 41.134 Sometimes there used to be higher temperature in the rearing room, and sometimes it fell below the required limit, and many worms would die. Overfeeding, less space, less care, wet leaf and excessive humidity were some of the defects which ultimately rendered the industry in great loss. 135

4.5. Fluctuation in Prices

Fluctuation in prices played a vital role in the future progress of the industry which never remained progressive for the peasant. The average income of the rearer varied from 15 rupees 4 annas and 5 rupees 4 annas a month. This income was inclusive of the cost of leaf; adding this, the rearer ’s income was reduced to below the subsistence level. 136 7/8 th of the total number of mulberry trees stand on private holdings,7/8 th total quantity of cocoons reared in the state, the supply of leaf was coming from the private holdings. In Mysore the cost leaf per lb. of cocoons raised, works out at 3-7 rupees 12 annas. The price circulated by the Kashmir government was annas 8 per lb. of cocoons, the figures of which were even not accepted by Tariff Board according to the board it was ‘very much less than necessary elsewhere’ 137 because of the government’s monopoly there was no any competition, the state was the sole dealer and buyer of the produce. In 1916 H. Maxwell-Lefroy while presenting his report on an inquiry in to silk industry in India states that ‘in Kashmir the mulberry trees were a state monopoly. The rearer was not allowed to keep cocoons, reel them or produce seed.’ 138 In the monopolized system of labour the labour sells his labour to the employer for a certain fixed sum and general increase in the profits of the production, due to a rise

134 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 200. 135 Ibid., p. 201. 136 Ibid., p. 219. 137 Indian Tariff Board Sericulture Industry , vol. 1, p. 47. 138 H. Maxwell-Lefroy, Report on an Inquiry into the Silk Industry in India , Vol.1, Calcutta, 1917, p. 42. 108 in prices, makes no difference in the share of the individual rearer. 139 R.C. Rawlley, an expert on the field concerned, argues that, ‘the Kashmir silk industry is a state monopoly and owing to a complete control of the sources of production and labour supply there is no room for a competition in the labour market’ 140 the presence of which from the industrial point of view is very important. The results of the aforesaid discussion show that there was a general absence of any well thought policy for the expansion and consolidation of the industry. While realizing the pith of the aforesaid discussion one may argue also that the under-discussed causes partially acted as important factors for the overall extinction of the industry. The problem of wages, which galvanized the whole structure, gave birth to new social forces in the form of the labour strike of 1924 which acted as a step forward in the maturing of political consciousness of the fleeced masses of Kashmir.

4.6. Wages

The question of wages assumes paramount significance when one talks about the growth and development both of the labouring class and silk industry of Kashmir. Both are interconnected and reciprocal to each other. This is a question which has seldom received the attention it deserves in the industrial set up of Kashmir during the period of our study. The nature of wages may differ from territory to territory because of the variance in the socio-economic setups. The efficiency of wage mechanism has a direct bearing on the output of the industry. The prevalent wage system during the period can be described as ‘price -cum-piece-wages’ .141 Under this type of the system of wages the rearer enters in to a contract and binds himself to rear the seed [which remains state property] in his own house, and with his own appliances and to obtain mulberry leaves from his own trees, if he has any, or otherwise to secure them from the trees nearby his house and village and to handle the seed according to government instructions and to deliver the cocoons, this prepared at a place and in return for a sum decided upon by the government in

139 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , p. 110. 140 Ibid., p. 114. 141 Piece rate wages can be defined as when an employee is paid a fixed rate for each unit of production or in other words, he or she is paid by results or payments by results. Time rate wages are based on per period of work time on the job. See , Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 217. 109 advance. 142 The irony of the fact is that there was a difference of output of production in the silk industry of Srinagar as compared to the silk industry of Jammu although Kashmir was the hub of its production in the earlier periods. The reason was the unequal distribution of seed; Jammu was provided with more seed than what was given to the rearers from the valley of Kashmir. 143 From the table one can infer that Jammu was in a better position than Kashmir. 144 As compared to the nature of the work the rate of remuneration was very low. The scale of wages allowed bare subsistence to the workers who as a rule couldn’t afford to enjoy the comforts of life. They had not only to feed themselves against the vagaries of nature and unskillfulness of their work but their families as well. 145 Apparently, it seems the challenges of bare subsistence, unequal distribution, and low wage rate forced the silk worm rearers to raise the banner of revolt and they sent telegrams to both Lord Reading and the Punjab Press. This was one of the major developments of the first quarter of the twentieth century Kashmir that in 1924 the workers in the state owned silk factory resorted to strike,146 though the strike didn’t last long due to the oppression unleashed by the Maharaja administration. 147 Martial Law was imposed on the silk factory workers who instead of persuading the maharaja to redress their grievances, sent telegrams to British Indian Governor General Lord Reading. 148 The problem of wages, least availability of raw materials labour and financial conditions on the one hand and the absence of ready markets, on the other, proved destructive for the progress of the industry. 149 With the passage of the time the silk- rearers and workers switched over to competing crops. ‘There was a general falling off of the enthusiasm for silk worm rearing [in Jammu and Kashmir state] on the part of the rears as a whole ’, writes T.C. Wazir, the chief director of sericulture in his report on the

142 Ibid., p. 218. 143 Ibid., p. 219. 144 Ibid. 145 Rawlley, Economics of the Silk Industry , pp. 115-16. 146 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 87. The details about the strike are given in chapter 5 of this thesis. 147 Ibid. 148 The original text of the telegrams is reproduced in chapter five, pp. 128-29. 149 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 226. 110 sericulture industry of Kashmir. 150 In the late thirties people turned paddy yielding fields into fruit gardens, barren lands were turned into orchards, and the planting of mulberry trees seized to continue sericulture thus lost its future in the domestic economic setup of Kashmir. At the time of the partition the State could not boast of any industry in the modern sense of the word.

4.7. State of Trade and Commerce

There is not much data available as far as trade is concerned which renders it difficult to make a statistical sketch of the trading activities in Dogra-ruled Kashmir. Therefore, here reliance has been put on the reports and contemporary accounts and wherever possible some statistical information has also been provided. Generally speaking, an attempt has been made to broadly assess the state of trade and commerce, without going into the specifics, so that it could be seen that how far the conditions of the trade and trading classes were responsible for the resentment among the people and what role did they play in the political movement that the state witnessed during the first half of the 20 th century. There is a close relationship between industry and trade; both are interrelated to each other. One can’t sustain without the well-being of the other. Kashmir from the ancient times was having socio cultural and trade links with different regions of Central Asia. 151 In many parts of central Asia, including Kashmir, the chief cities functioned as entrepots for the passage of merchandise in addition to serving as markets for local produce. Srinagar in particular, the heart and present summer capital of the state, on account of its peculiar geographical position, remained a connecting link with various regions of central Asia. It provided the most convenient ground for the meeting of various cultures represented by the traders of the Yarkand, Bukhara, Badakhshan, Khotan, Kashgar, Turkistan, China, Ladakh, Tibet, Baltistan and Kashmir. In fact it was the Srinagar’s special role in Central Asia’s commercial and cultural history that itself provided the environment and shaped the history of Kashmir. 152

150 T.C. Wazir, Report on the Investigation into Conditions of the Sericultural industry in Jammu and Kashmir, 1942, p. 22. 151 Mohd. Ishaq Khan, Perspectives on Kashmir, p. 25. 152 Ibid. 111

Although Kashmir has usually been regarded as a ‘self-supporting country ’153 owing to its geographical barriers and remoteness from the outside world, there is evidence that before the opening of the cart-road from Rawalpindi to Baramulla in 1890 some Kashmiris were also involved in private trade. They went down every winter to work in the Punjab and carried brisk trade1 in commodities such as salt, sugar, tea, metals, and tobacco.154 Besides this trade, a class of professional muleteers carried out transactions with Punjab bullock drivers. 155 Three trade routes were followed. Of these the most direct was the road which crossed the Banihal pass and ran to Jammu. The most popular with the pony men was the old imperial road which ran over the Pir Panjal and reached the railway at Gujarat and the third was the route known as the Jhelum valley road, which ran along the river Jhelum from Baramulla to Kohala. 156 The opening of the Jhelum valley road in 1890 as an important route brought several advantages to Kashmir. It caused economic dislocation to a good number of Muslim trading families. A large influx of the Punjabis into Kashmir for business or employment, not for pleasure after the improvement in the means of communication, marked the important feature in the changing economic relations. 157 Under Mughal rule Kashmir abandoned its isolation, and its natural beauty attracted people from all over Asia. In terms of trade and commerce, during the Mughal period Kashmir enjoyed a brisk trade as part of the great high way of central Asia. 158 Trade continued to be carried out at a considerable level both during the Afghan and Sikh rule. 159 In contrast with the Afghan period, the shawl in the Sikh period, with its boldly sweeping curves, was more ‘grandiose ’ in design than ever before. 160 During the time of the Sikhs the first direct link between Persian shawl manufacturers and those of Kashmir was achieved. 161 The decline of the shawl trade is visible from the closing years of the Sikh rule and appears to have intensified during the first three decades of the Dogra rule.

153 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, vol. xv , p. 132; Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 383. 154 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, vol. xv , p. 132. 155 Ibid. 156 Ibid. 157 Khan, Perspectives on Kashmir, p. 135. 158 Frank Ames, The Kashmir Shawl & its Indo French Influence , p. 27. 159 Irwin, The Kashmir Shawl, p. 9. 160 Frank Ames, The Kashmir Shawl & its Indo French Influence , p. 33. 161 Ibid., p. 35. 112

The period of our study was marked by more rapid ways of completing a kani shawl . Due to the large areas of design to be woven, the pattern was broken down into fragmented parts, each woven separately, at times at separate looms. 162 In fact the general tendency, as the shawl developed through the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, was towards an increasingly fragmented construction as compared with the single piece shawls made in Mughal times. 163 The shawl industry in Kashmir was so important that a government department, named Dagshawl , had been maintained for long to deal with it. Maharaja Gulab Singh reorganized the department. Notwithstanding the fact that quite a number of industries existed in Kashmir, the number of people associated with them was not very large. The 1931 census records that trade engage only 4% of the total earners. 164 The traders having no recognized union and were mostly ignorant of the modern methods of advertising their goods living on the profit they make in the process. The money economy was generally absent in the village and barter system prevails which adds to the profit of the shopkeepers who in the grading grains into different kinds generally assess their value at a lower rate. 165 The usual method was to make each product a state monopoly, and to farm out the monopoly to some contractor [generally given to the ‘outsiders ’ and ‘favourites ’ of the Maharaja]. 166 The custom duties were annually formed out to contractors who were among the Maharaja’s favori tes, which were almost prohibitive duties levied on all merchandise imported or exported. 167 During Maharaja Gulab Singh’s time Partab shah of Rawalpindi was the contractor for custom and paid to the state twenty thousand rupees a year. 168 Silk, saffron, chob-i-kot , violets, various kinds of forest products, hemp, tobacco, waternuts, and paper were at different time monopolized by the state. 169 Kashmir for a long time couldn’t give birth to a strong indigenous trading class, which was prevented by t he monopolized system like Lawrence says that the selling of the unhusked rice by the

162 Frank Ames, The Kashmir Shawl & its Indo French Influence , p. 44. 163 Ibid., p. 58. 164 Rai Bahadur Pandit Anant Ram, Census of India, 1931, vol. xxiv, Jammu and Kashmir State Part 1, Report , Ranbir Government Press, Jammu, 1933, p. 213. 165 Ibid. 166 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 417. 167 Younghusband, Kashmir, p. 93. 168 Copy of a letter from T.D. Forsyth, Commissioner and Superintendent to Government of Punjab Foreign and Political-A, July 1863, File Nos. 73-75, NAI. 169 Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir, p. 417; Younghusband, Kashmir, p. 94. 113

Darbar at his own hands prevented the growth of indigenous grain merchants 170 which was the case both with the shawl and silk industries. The monopolized system hindered the flow and growth of both the capital and foreign enterprise. 171 The people in the absence of any class of enterprising traders were compelled to trade for themselves and beyond the barter, devoted themselves to agriculture. 172 It took a long span for the emergence of an indigenous class of traders. The monopolized system acted as a check in the flow of money and the people associated with the economic activities were fully at the mercy of the state which ultimately prevented the growth of potential surplus of these classes. With the result there was a general increase of imports over exports. For example in 1892-3 the total imports from India were valued at 48.7 lakhs. In 1902-3 the imports reached 118 lakhs, in 1904-5 the total value was 115 lakhs. 173 In late eighties of the 19 th century a change took place in the administrative domain of Kashmir —the establishment of the British residency in Jammu and Kashmir. It was the time when the lucrative shawl trade was practically dead. 174 Among the steps taken to improve the means of transport and communication the major development was the construction and opening of the Jhelum valley cart road in 1890, which laid positive impact on the trading landscape of the valley. 175 Prior to the construction of the cart road the signs of the development of trade were there but they were primitive in character. As a matter of fact, cash money was extremely scarce in Kashmir till late 1890s so much so that the high officials were mostly paid in terms of kind. The opening of the vehicular roads marked the beginning of the “modern ” external trade in Kashmir, 176 and possibly the relative monetization of Kashmir economy. Although it cannot be denied that the opening up of the roads must have brought some positive changes in trade and commerce, terminology like “modern” external trade and “additional boost” 177 seems more like an exaggeration. There is little data available

170 Ibid., p. 390. 171 Ibid. 172 Ibid., p. 391. 173 The Imperial Gazetteer of India, vol. xv , p. 132. 174 Ibid., p. 133. 175 Khan , Perspectives on Kashmir, p. 136. 176 A.M. Dar, Trade and Commerce during Dogra Rule in Kashmir, Faridabad, 1999, p. 87. 177 Ibid., p. 187. 114 data to show that the trade actually got a boost during the immediate post-1890 period. The imitation of the European business techniques by Kashmiri traders appears to have been positive sign 178 but the State-initiative again seems to missing. This is apparent in the very first decade of the 20 th century. In 1905 as a result of the Swadeshi Movement in which foreign goods were boycotted, provided an opportunity to the shawl industry of Kashmir to revive its old craft on a commercial scale. But the opportunity was allowed to slip by, and nothing was done by way of supplying the demands of the Indian market. 179 The chief obstructions why Kashmir couldn’t revive its flow of trade again at this time were the lack of capital, scarcity of labour, lack of proper supervision and standardization, absence of the proper adjustment in the demand and supply. 180 But in spite of this, the movement seems to have had a positive impact on the trade of Kashmir; it seems that the absence of initiative and sincerity on the part of the state prevented the development of the trade. What is significant is that the shawl industry and shawl trade were showing the signs of revival in 1905-6, albeit this time it was in the form of pashmina cloth and embroidered shawls rather than kani or woven pattern shawls. 181 The world war first laid an optimistic impact on the trade of Kashmir as was the case with several industries in other parts of India. There was a great demand of the woolen items of Kashmir, but the war time boom it again showed a downward trend as soon as the war began to come to an end.182 Due to the war there was decline in the imports, which proved a boon to the local industry and gave it a chance to thrive. But the opportunity was not utilized fully, and soon after the war imports again increased over the exports. The import figures which stood at 574 maunds valued at rupees 88,236 in 1917-18 at once shot up to 951 maunds valued at rupees 1, 51,632 in the following year,183 thus affecting adversely the balance of trade. Therefore, it may be said that the immediate gain of the war was that the production and trade got increased, the export trade got up and the import trade, on the other hand, came down. The decrease in the imports meant greater internal market for the local industry than hitherto it had. So the

178 Ibid. 179 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , p. 57. 180 Ibid., p. 58. 181 Trade Report of 1909-10 , p. 27. 182 Trade Report of 1918 , p. 40. 183 Ibid. 115 demand increased not only from outside, but from within as well, with the natural consequence for the prosperity for the industry. But this demand and prosperity proved short-lived, and the export in 1926-27 was less than the import after the war.184 The opportunity provided by both the Swadeshi Movement and World War first to Kashmir to modernize its industries and to increase the prospectus of production and trade on scientific basis, and to capture the foreign markets permanently was not done. 185 Production at both the times increased spontaneously and without any plan, with the result that as soon as the war came to an end, foreign manufacturers again flooded Kashmir market, and the exports began to come down. 186 On the part of the state authorities there was the absence of a definite and comprehensive set of rules and concessions applicable to all industrialists. There was an absence of an advisory board, financing facilities and tariff board, and very heavy road tolls and custom duties which amounted to over 14 annas per mound in each direction irrespective of the class of material carried. 187 Customs were levied on all goods entering the state. All parcels whether sent through the posts or through northern railways or any other agency were liable to duty. 188 Separate rates of customs were followed in case of privileged persons, state and imperial departments. 189 Absence of better roads and communication and irrational imposition of road tolls and export duties,190 absence of protection to indigenous industries,191 and the heavy taxes levied by the government were the greatest drawbacks on the trade having a tendency daily to thin the number of the workmen in the country,192 and gave a setback to the trading activities. It was not only the rank and file but also the most elite section of the Kashmiri Muslim society which was pushed to the wall. That small section which any oppressor or occupational force requires at local level to main its administrative apparatus was also

184 Trade Report of 1927, P. 46. 185 Ganju, Textile Industries in Jammu and Kashmir , pp. 70-1. 186 Ibid. 187 Political Department, File No. 20/C I-10 of year 1936, JKA-J. 188 ‘A Pamphlet containing Information of Visitors to Kashmir relating to Customs and Excise Department’ , Political Department, File No. 123/GC 143, 1939, JKA-J. 189 Report on the Administration of Jammu and Kashmir for Samvat 1987-88-1990, p. 21. 190 ‘A Pamphlet containing Information of Visitors to Kashmir relating to Customs and Excise Department.’ 191 Administrative Report of 1987-1990, p. 25. 192 Lala Ganeshi Lal, Siyahat-i-Kashmir , translated into English and Annotated by Vidya Sagar Suri, Monograph No. 4, pp. 33-4. 116 drawn from non-Muslims and non-Kashmiris like Pandits and Punjabis. Small wonder that those groups and sections of Kashmir who during the previous regimes had acted as instruments of oppression saw no hope under this regime; only some non-Muslim Kashmiris were found on the other side of the fence, thus, completing the communal divide. The majority community heard the sympathetic voices and saw the helping hand from such a state of economic oppression where exactions and state demand made eviction from land a relief rather than a punishment; where forests and foreign lands were preferred over home and hearth; where death looked a lesser misfortune than begar where men was valued lesser than a Chinese dog; the statistical definition of poverty changed for the worse. In fact the categories of poor and prosperous became non-existent and were replaced by oppressor and oppressed. The rack-rented peasantry and industrial labour exclusively belonged to the majority community —the oppressed, who were grounded under religious, racial, economic and regional oppression untold exactions and countless disabilities. It is further pertinent to note that the aforesaid sections of the society saw no hope of optimism under this regime and made vital contribution to the growth of national consciousness. Silk weavers, shawl bafs , English-educated and religious class all discovered a convergence of interest in fighting the regime out. Thus, the policy of economic oppression was followed in every sphere of economy. The newly-emerged middle class of Kashmir, the high impositions on the economic activities of these classes which throttled the growth of trade, with a favoured policy of the maharaja towards non-Kashmiri traders aggravated resentment among the influential Muslim merchants and traders. As already mentioned, the shawl merchants having lost their principal source of income with the decline of the shawl trade began to shift to other trades to maintain their standard of living and influence in society. 193 During the formative stages of the national movement in Kashmir the prominent and leading Muslim trading families like Shawls and Ashai’s played a very significant role. 194 Among the Shawls Saad-ud-din Shawl was the prominent one, and one should bear in mind that Shawl had not only played a leading role in submitting the memorandum to

193 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 87. 194 Dar, Trade and Commerce during Dogra Rule in Kashmir , p. 189. 117 viceroy Lord Reading in 1924 but was also involved in the silk factory riots. 195 He was man of great political foresight, writes M.Y. Saraf and rightly deserves the honour of being treated as the father of the modern political movement of the Jammu and Kashmir, who was banished by the Dogra monarchy from Kashmir and spent his forced stay abroad in building up a slow but steady movement outside the state for the cause of his motherland Kashmir. 196 Thus, the combination of causes like state monopolies, heavy burden of taxes on trade and industry, techniqual stagnation, inefficient means of transport and communication, absence of the promotion of the trading activities, and lack of capital all proved detrimental to the development of trade and commerce in the state. In the thirties of the 20 th century was the time when the old nobility was in decline, including shawl merchants and jagirdars, while revenue officials had penetrated into the inner core of the society and new landholding elite of the Kashmir valley had appeared on the scene. The peasants could not prosper as a result of the settlement but were now a recognizable class whose interests became the focal point of the movements that Kashmir witnessed in 1910s through 1930s. 197 The issues which the merchant leadership highlighted among the fleeced masses of Kashmir were the woeful condition of the peasantry, ownership of land, forced labour and open oppression, which were first highlighted by the leadership of Kashmir after 1931 and got merged into an organized whole under the banner of the Muslim Conference with S.M. Abdullah as its most important leader. The policies and programs adopted by the conference for the further awakening of the masses will be discussed in the next chapter.

195 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom, p. 335-39. 196 Ibid. 197 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 105. 118

Chapter 5

Emergence of Political Awakening

I

The Twentieth century witnessed the rise of great revolutions and democratic movements throughout the world. The Bolshevik revolution in Russia in 1917, that shook the world, offered a fresh paradigm. Even more abundantly, so were subsequent upheavals in Germany, C hina and countless other countries experiencing revolution’s in the later twentieth century. 1 In fact the revolutions have nevertheless sought legitimacy in doctrines of popular sovereignty all traceable to claims first explicitly made in 1789 in France.

In fact the changes occurring at the world political scene as well as in the neighboring areas of British India laid a positive impact on the political scene of Kashm ir. Kashmir, ‘in 1846 witnessed a critical break in its nature and arrangement of power-the establishment of the Dogra rule. This rule ushered in a new stage in Kashmir history for a number of reasons. Although recognizing its strategic and economic importance to their empires, the earlier rulers of Kashmir Mughals, Afghans, and Sikhs had ruled the region through proxy while remaing primarily engaged with the concerns of their larger empires. For the Dogras, however, Kashmir itself was the empire; as a result, the story of Kashmir under the Dogras is imbricated with the story of the fashioning of the Dogra dynasty itself.’ 2

The fashioning of the Dogra dynasty, in its turn, was thoroughly intertwined with the project of the British colonialism in mid-nineteenth century India. Doubtful about their decision to hand over Kashmir― which occupied a strategically critical position― to a minor Hindu Raja from Jammu who also happened to be ruling a Muslim majority population, the British began a policy regarding Kashmir which was geared towards endowing Gulab Singh’s dynasty with the ideals of legitimate rule. 3 While the Dogras

1 William Doyle, The French Revolution A Very Short Introduction, New York, 2001, p. 9. 2 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 47. 3 Ibid. 119 would be subject to constant security, Kashmiris became the subjects of a twice-removed situation within colonial rule, with dual loyalties and no clear means of seeking redressal for their grievances. 4 Hence the Dogra regime was explicitly safeguarded by its peculiar relation to the imperial authorities; the political consciousness in the state, thus, arose slowly and in the face of great obstacles. 5

5.1. Early phase

Kashmir was a place where overt political discussion was deemed none of the subjects business. Until 1932, there was a blanket ban on the publication of newspapers. The absence of any freedom of press, platform or association amounted in actual practice to an almost complete estrangement between the ruler and the ruled. 6 The only sort of political activity that was allowed was the formation of societies for religious and social reform. Prior, to their formation they had to declare that they would not engage in any type of political activity. 7

However, taking advantage of the limited space provided by the Dogra state, there was a proliferation of socio-religious reform organizations beginning with the last decade of the 19 th century. In 1919, a list showing the presence of roughly twenty societies, anjumans and sabhas within the state representing a variety of particularized interests, 8 was superseded by another list prepared by the Darbar in 1927 which reflected an exceptional increase in the number of these societies totaling about more than one hundred within quasi-political and religious categories.9

Both the communities of Muslims and non-Muslims were responsible for the emergence of the movements in the state; it was, however, the later which had taken the lead in social reform movements. The most prominent among these sabhas, societies and

4 Ibid. 5 Alice Thorner, ‘The Issues in Kashmir’ , Far Eastern survey, Vol.17, No. 15, August 11, 1948, pp. 173- 178. 6 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 94. 7 Political Department, OER, file no.66/102-C, 1924, JKA-J. 8 Political Department, File No. 312/7-C, 1919, JKA-J. 9“List of Societies, Sabhas and Anjumans in existence in Jammu and Kashmir” on 31 st Dec. 1926, General Department.1928, JKA-J. 120

Anjumans were Arya samaj in 1890, 10 Dogra sabha founded in 1903, yuvak sabha, the most important social political organization of the Kashmiri pandits. The necessity of forming the said organization was for reasons nonpolitical in nature 11 …but with the passage of time Yuvak Sabha became a common political forum for all Kashmiri Pandits.12

Among the Muslims, Anjuman-i-Nusrat-ul-Islam was the earliest and the most important socio religious organization in Kashmir. In 1889, with its founding by Mirwaiz Rasool Shah, he established a primary school, originally a maktab , which developed into the Islamic High School by 1905. 13 The school received the patronage of the Dogra maharaja from 1904 onwards through small grants enabling Muslims to receive both religious and secular education. 14 The aim was to facilitate education for the most backward children of the Muslim community and to help in their educational efforts as much as possible and to inculcate in them good manners, a sense of mutual cooperation and unity. 15

The Anjuman-i-Nusrat-ul-Islam published its official journal called Halat –wa- Rouidad . This journal was published yearly contained useful information about the yearly activities of the Anjuman. It also contained speeches delivered at its annual convocation by prominent men from within and outside the state. The student s’ participation in such events was an important feature of the Anjuman ’s activities. 16

However, the role of the Anjuman with regard to the reformation of the Kashmiri society entitled not only making Kashmiri Muslims aware of their inadequacies, but also awakening them to the benefits of modern education. The Anjuman shed light on the twin agenda of the Muslim leadership of this period. The Anjuman ’s aim was to, ‘ensure religious and worldly education for Muslim children who are backward in education’ and to ‘create an aptitud e for reforms, social awakening and mutual unity among the Muslim

10 Political Department, File No. 215, 1910, JKA-J. 11 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 57. 12 Ibid. 13 U. K. Zutshi, Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir, p. 165. 14 Old English Records, File No. 68/p-57, 14 September, 1903, JKA-J. 15 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 60. 16 Ibid., p. 61. 121 community’. 17 The leaders of the Anjuman were aware of the disabilities of the Muslims that they had been suffering from. The leaders of the Anjuman advocated that that there was an intimate relation between social reform and economic progress. Centuries of sufferings had made the people lazy, lethargic and tradition-bound; they had been suffering from evil social customs. The need was to reform the community so that they were brought to the level of modernism. 18

The leaders of the Anjuman were highly influenced by the movement launched by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan about whom they made recurrent references in the annual convocations of the Anjuman. Although, its leadership was entirely composed of the religious elite, they developed a religious discourse which attempted to provide for the regeneration of the Muslim community alongside its advancement in the western education. Unlike the religious elite of the British India like Deobandi’s who launched a bitter critique of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, the Kashmiri religious elite had appropriated his methods as a model for the educational and ultimately for economic advancement of the people of Kashmir. 19 While highlighting the sufferings of the people they reflected an international outlook, Khawaja Mohammad Maqbool Pandit, one of its prominent members, went so far as to give example of Japan and Germany which as nations had risen from their helpless conditions to claim their God given position from the world. 20

The leaders of the Anjuman explicitly stated that it was not the king or the preacher or the administrator, but rather the educated, which would raise the moral fiber of the society. The leaders of the Anjuman also lamented in their annual convocation of 1913 that the Kashmiri masses were not introduced in education in large numbers due to their abject poverty, but now the educated from the state and other schools had attained ‘a space’ in the administration, and the traders had benefited from these educatio nal centers,

17 Halat-wa-Rouidad, 1913, p. 1. 18 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 64. 19 Halat-wa-Rouidad , Annual Report of the Convocation of the Madrasa Anjuman-i-Nusrat-ul-Islam, Srinagar, 1901, p. 10. 20 Halat –wa-Rouidad , Annual Report of the Convocation of the Madrasa-i- Anjuman-i-Nusrat ul-Islam, Srinagar, 1915, p. 15. 122

Muslims had to come to their senses. 21 Despite the progressive outlook and role of the Anjuman its activities, by and large, remained urban in nature.

However, placing the role of the socio religious reform movements in historical context, these movements in the twentieth century social milieu of Kashmir corresponded to similar movements in the ninetieth century British India. These movements brought home upon their respective followers that the outmoded social customs and practices that had been observed or traditionally accepted as norms in the name of religions were not only irrational or unlawful but also the cause of their weakness as well as social and economic inequality. 22 The chief objective of their mission was to secure self-identity so that they obtained for themselves an honorable status in social, economic and political spheres, which was almost denied to them. These movements, therefore, naturally connected with economic and political objectives and were independent. 23 They certainly generated both social and political consciousness and roused the people to a sense of awakening, which paved the way for anti-feudal and anti-colonial trends in the emerging political movements in Kashmir. 24

However, as explored in the previous chapters, the very nature and character of the Dogra rule deprived the people even of the elementary rights of the humanity. This sparked off searing attacks on the Dogra rulers from the very inception, and since newspaper publication was not allowed in the state until 1932, Muslim-owned newspapers in the Punjab brought out to fore the economic and religious oppression under which the people of Jammu and Kashmir in general and Muslims in particular were groaning. If the press dared to incant, not only were its owners deprived of proprietary rights of land, but subjected to arbitrary acts of eviction, oppression by the ‘pettiest officials’ and the compulsory and unpaid requisition of their labour, from all of which the non-Muslims were exempted. The press criticized the state’s failure to provide for the education of its Muslim subjects, thereby disqualifying them from lucrative jobs in administration, monopolized by the Hindus by keeping the majority subjects in abject

21 Halat-wa-Rouidad , 1913, p. 13. 22 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , pp. 399-402. 23 Ibid. 24 Ibid. 123 poverty. The press criticized the Muslim religious elite of Kashmir for their failure to provide a strong leadership. 25

The growing discontent among the people, with the passage of the time, assumed robust dimensions. The sense of the deprivation and denial of rights combined with the growing consciousness among the working class people of Kashmir as they started to question the misrule of the state. As already discussed in the previous chapter, the first challenge the Dogra rule witnessed ―as reported by the contemporary sources― was in 1865 from the shawl weavers. The driving forces behind the uprising were the miserable economic conditions of the weavers of the shawl industry in Kashmir. As the exploitation grew more and more, so did grow class consciousness of the workers in their class solidarity as is evinced by their protests from the beginning of the Dogra rule against the practice of employing them in bondage, arbitrary acts of officials and heavy taxation.

In 1886, soon after the imposition of the British Resident in Kashmir at 1886, at least two petitions had been delivered to the Resident, signed by some seventeen or eighteen respectable Kashmiri Muslims, with an anonymous address, addressed to the viceroy and the Resident. The subject of the petitions was to say that the Muslims of Kashmir had hoped that with the establishment of the Residency there would be some relief from the ‘tyranny and oppression’ they had suffered for many years at the hands of the state. 26 In 1909 yet another memorandum addressed to the viceroy from a group defining themselv es more broadly as the ‘representatives of the Kashmiri Muslamans’ again with an anonymous address and identified only by illegible seal prints, spoke of the ‘hopes’ for ‘justice and safety’ of all Kashmiri Muslims, which the representatives believed, only the British Resident could guarantee, ‘for justice and safety’. Th e representatives made some far-reaching demands relating to an increase in the number of Kashmiri Muslims in the state’s administration to offset the overwhelming dominance of the ‘patronage groups’ of the Dogra regime. The representatives also highlighted the question of the education of Kashmiri Muslims. According to the representatives the greatest cause responsible for the lack of education was the absence of the Muslims

25 Paisa Akhbar , Lahore, 11 September, 1912, NAI. 26 Foreign Department, Secret- E/ Pros., October 1886/Nos. 235-300, NAI. 124 among those in charge of education, both as inspectors of schools and instructors. It was argued that Muslim teachers were best able to cater to Muslim educational interests. 27

Support for this increasingly assertive posture adopted by the Kashmiri Muslims also came from outside the state. The All India Educational Conference meeting in Rangoon in 1909, appealed to the maharaja of Kashmir that since Muslims formed a clear majority of his subjects, the number of Muslim teachers and school inspectors should be increased and additional arrangements of scholarship should be made available to Muslim students. 28 Also speaking from outside the State with regard to the condition of the Kashmiris was the Muslim Kashmiri Conference (Lahore) that had since the early twentieth century served as a forum for expatriate Kashmiris to give ventilate to their grievances against the Dogra administration in Kashmir. 29 The conference made appeals on behalf of Kashmiri Muslims, regarding their rights to educational advancement and representation in the state. In the same year the C onference drew the maharaja’s attention to the resolutions of the All India Mohammdan Educational Conference and requested the maharaja to act upon them.

At the C onference’s annual session in 1912 the Kashmiri Muslim conference suggested that the Kashmiri Darbar employ ‘Muslims from the Punjab in the state services if competent Muslims in the st ate couldn’t be found. In response to their suggestion maharaja gave the example of the definition of ‘state subjects’ instituted in 1912 which ‘ obliged ’ him to reserve administrative posts for the latter. Since this had not prevented the employment of Pun jabi Hindu officials, the rulers’ justification was regarded as a clear instance of the discrimination practised against the Muslims in the state. 30 It is essential to point out that Kashmiri Muslim expatriates in the Punjab faced discrimination in terms of recruitment to the army, educational institutions and in other areas of administration. Therefore, petitioning the Dogra state for the recruitment of the

27 ‘Petitions of the Kashmiri Muslims regarding the employment of Muslims in the Kashmir State’, Foreign Department, (General B), Pros., January 1909, nos. 15/16, NAI. 28 Political Department, File No.70/p-37, 1911, JKA-J. 29 Gh. Nabi Khayal, Allam Iqbal aur Tahreek-i-Azadi Kashmir , Srinagar, 2011, p. 90. 30 Political Department, File No. 254/p-127, 1912, JKA-J. 125

Kashmiri Muslims from the Punjab in to the departments of administration clearly had an economic motivation. 31

However, by the beginning of the second decade of the twentieth century and in the beginning of the third decade, the demands of both internal and external organizations on behalf of the Kashmiri Muslims were becoming increasingly embroiled with the larger political issues, both in Kashmir and the Punjab. In its resolutions of 1918 at Rawalpindi Muslim Kashmiri Conference (Lahore) demanded an efficient share both for the Punjabi Muslims themselves as well as for the people of Kashmir. 32 The Pandits as compared to the Kashmiri Muslims formed only the five percent population of the Valley as against the ninety-three percent of the Muslims but had maintained and consolidated themselves sooner because the Muslims entered the fray of state politics considerably later than the Pandits. Kashmiri Muslims were also concerned to correct their position in education prior to active participation in politics. The Kashmiri Pandits were well in advance of the Muslims in taking to modern education. Therefore, the efforts of the Muslims at mobilizing in favour of privileges for representation in the state services had no resonance in what was, at best, a miserably educated Muslim community. However, the year 1907 marked a decisive shift when a representative group of Kashmiri Muslims spoke out on behalf of the subjects of the maharaja, with a serious concern with making their own social leadership in Kashmir as they seemed to be concerned about the plight of their co-religionists. The representatives also brought into light the lack of Muslim representation in the state administration and suggested only that education can make their situation better. They pointed out that the backwardness of the Muslims was caused by non-Muslims officers who ignored the interests of the Muslims and the Hindu teachers who wished to keep the Muslims illiterate. 33

The root cause behind the backwardness of the Muslim subjects of the maharaja was brought into fore by the Sharp Committee Report in 1916. Mr. Sharp, the educational commissioner with the British government of India, visited at the request of the Kashmir Darbar, the educational institutions in the state, examined the demands of the Muslims,

31 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 192. 32 Ibid., p. 199. 33 Foreign Department (Internal A), Pros. February 1907, Nos. 15/16, NAI. 126 enquired into their grievances and submitted a report containing his recommendations for the guidance of the state authorities. The report pointed out that the system however, is top heavy. Poverty and agricultural class basis of Kashmiri Muslims was the reason for the lack of literacy among them. The commission in its report felt that the Muslims in the state were so overwhelmin gly poor that they couldn’t send their children to schools. 34 However, after the publication of the report it was ‘safely ’ put into the archives from where nobody could find it out. Fifteen years later Glancy commission (discussed later) had to admit that, ‘no one appears to be aware of the nature of the report submitted by the educational expert.’ The Muslims rightly felt aggrieved over such a state of affairs. For years they complained and protested, fretted and fumed, but all to no purpose. 35

However, during the period the discourse of the Muslim leadership converged on the issues of the slow progress of education among Muslims and their lack in state employment on which they focused more to get the redress. Although the Darbar claimed time and again that it was doing its best to promote the educational position of the Muslims, the leadership held the state responsible for the small number of educated Muslims and even small number of Muslims employed in state government services. 36 But with the passage of time the nature of the demands started to take a broader shape; in 1920, for instance, the demands of the Muslim leadership moved far away from the provisions of education to the major demands of more economic rights. 37

In 1922, Anjuman-i-Nusrat-ul-Islam president, Mirwaiz Ahmadallah, presented a representation to the council of the state for consideration. In the representation, he clearly accepted the flaws of the Kashmiri Muslim community- such as their apathetic attitude towards English education as the reason for their illiteracy. However, just as clearly he pointed out to the duty of government in alleviating this apathy by promising employment to educated Muslims in the state services. The remedies suggested in this representation made it clear that, by the early 1920s, the demands of the Kashmiri Muslim leadership had gone beyond the provision of educational opportunities. But the

34 ‘A Note on Education in the State of Jammu and Kashmir’ , 1916, NAI, p. 2. 35 Bazaz, Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir, pp. 131-2. 36 ‘Petition of grievances by the Muslim representatives of Kashmir’, General Records, File No.3/5, 1918, JKA-J. 37 General Records, File No. 566/ad-9, 1923, JKA-J. 127 platform of education had become a means for their leadership to force the state to acknowledge the distinct demands of the people of Kashmir, which derived from its particular economic and political situation in the state. 38

Thus, besides demanding the appointment and recruitment in various government departments, the rest of the demands of the representation, however, are most significant, since they reflect the changing political climate of the valley. The representation demanded that the council abolish the begar system, return the religious place of the Muslim community, granting of proprietary rights of their own land and considering the numerical strength of the Muslim population, allot them seats in the representative Assembly that might be brought into existence in the future. 39

With the spread of education and political evolution in British India, which couldn’t but act upon the minds of the people of the state began to dream of an independent political power, the ground for which had not yet been fully exploited. Till 1920s the character of the leadership associated with various Anjumans was more or less local in influence but the inspirations and reflections of the major political waves sweeping through British India brought in its sway the nascent political consciousness of the people of Kashmir. In this context the Khilafat movement, which from late 1920s onwards began to play such a seminal role in Muslim nationalist agitation in British India aided and abetted not only by Mahatma Gandhi but also two prominent figures of the Kashmiri origin Pandits Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru and Moti Lal Nehru, had relatively an impact upon the political life of Kashmir. The movement affected both the Jammu and Kashmir provinces, but remained mainly confined to Muslims, and made no significant impact upon the local Pandit community despite the role played in it in British India by Tej Bahadur Sapru and Moti Lal Nehru. 40

However, this is not to suggest that the Khilafat and Non-cooperation movements raging in British India failed to have an impact upon the political landscape of Kashmir. The mass character acquired by the Khilafat movement in Kashmir made it imperative

38 Ibid. 39 Ibid. 40 Alastair Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy, 1846-1990 , Karachi, 1993, p. 87. 128 for the leaders to shift the venue of Khilafat meetings from the coffins of mosques to the public arena. The first mass meeting of this kind was held at Id-gah (prayer ground) Srinagar, on August 1, 1920. The meeting was attended by twenty thousand people and was presided over by Moulvi Mohammad Yusuf Shah. The popularity of the movement made the government alert and a serious note was taken of everything that was going on. The Khilafatists were being strictly watched by the state authorities and the intelligence agents of the government of British India. The governor of Kashmir had gone to the extent of warning the chief organizers of the movement either to stop the agitation or face the consequences. 41

The main significance, which shouldn’t be underestimated of the Khilafat movement in Jammu and Kashmir was the introduction of the many of the Muslim leaders of the Muslim community to the name of the Mahatma Gandhi. 42 The sympathetic consideration to the Khilafat issue by the people of Kashmir, the emergence of the Khilafat and Non-cooperation movements, the press in the Punjab which projected the sufferings of the people of Kashmir in British India were a few of the key factors which seems to have objectively and subjectively had a cumulative effect in building up a major mass upsurge of the Kashmiris from 1931, onwards. But the effects were neither immediate nor very direct. 43

Already in the previous chapter the origin and development of the silk industry has been discussed. The worsening labour conditions of the industry gave birth to labour uprisings, which marked another important milestone in the history of the struggle for freedom in Kashmir. In 1924, Kashmir experienced a crisis which was to mark another important stage in the evolution of political opposition to the maharaja’s rule. 44 The silk factory workers at Srinagar gave an expression to get their economic grievances

41 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , pp. 82-85. 42 Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy , p. 87. 43 Prakash Chandra, ‘ The National Question in Kashmir ’, vol. 13, No. 6, Social Scientist , pp. 35-56. 44 Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy , p. 87. 129 redressed by an organized strike in 1917 and then in 1924 45 and ‘ showed themselves as the harbingers of a new epoch of mass struggle for emancipation.’ 46

Dr Allama Iqbal, while on a visit to Kashmir in 1921, wrote a poem ‘ Saaqi Nama’ in the famous Mughal garden ‘Nishat Bagh’ in Kashmir . In the following couplets, the poet depicts the condition of the silk weavers: 47

‘Kashmiris are slaves by temperament, They worship grave stone as idols, Their mind is devoid of great ideas, Unaware of their ego, they are not ashamed of themselves, With their blood and sweat they weave silk into the master’s gown, Yet wear tattered clothes themselves, O God! breathe a new life into Kashmiris, So that ashes revive as embers. ’ As if Iqbal’s ‘prayer’ had been heard, the silk factory workers launched the agitation in 1924. The shawl weaver’s revolt in 18 65 and the silk factory workers revolt in 1924 clearly brought out the solidarity of the laboring classes against the economically and politically oppressed.48 N.N. Raina, one of the observers of the political scene in Kashmir regarded the revolt of 1924 as a ‘dress rehearsal for the events of 1931 -34.’49 Both the uprisings were suppressed with the use of considerable violence by the government. The telegrams sent by the silk factory workers spoke more and more pointedly of oppression by the Dogra Darbar. For instance, more evidence, a telegram reads: ‘Sub ject of the telegram: ‘Marshal Law in force … kindly save us Muslim inhabitants’.

Another goes as: 50

‘Kashmiris silk factory Muslim coolies approached of bribery of pandits of consideration about thirty imprisoned rest marshaled out deaths yet unknown wounded about sixty. Maharaja tries to hush up whole case, insisting raises to deny occurrence, kindly soon relieve from tyranny.’

45 D.N. Dhar, Kashmir a Kaleidoscopic View , pp. 57-8. 46 N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres 1846-1980, New Delhi, 1988, p. 65. 47 Khayal, Allama Iqbal and Tahreek-i-Azaadi-e-Kashmir , pp. 188-9. 48 Prakash Chandra, The National Question in Kashmir , p. 44. 49 N.N. Raina, ‘Hegemony of the Working People: A Specific Feature of our Freedom Movement, Srinagar, 1978, p. 6. 50 Telegram No.2 , Foreign and Political Department, (Secret), File No. 19 (2) - p/1924, NAI. 130

Another telegram concludes depicting the same nature of oppression, addressed to his Excellency the Viceroy at Simla. 51 The striking weavers at the silk factory trampled under the hooves of cavalry commanded by the crown prince Hari Singh and made the people believe that with an immense sense of self-worth they could spark a quest for the attainment of their deprived socio-economic and political rights.

The communalization of the feudal structure was the basis of Dogra Hindu rule, which hampered both the economic as well as the political awareness of the people of Kashmir. As a newspaper claimed, ‘t he Hindus from outside were given the opportunities to have contracts, establish trade and industry in far more favourable terms than those offered to the native subjects. ’52 Even then, the communal nature of the feudal economy was evident in the fact that out of twenty five jagirs that were granted during first five years of Maharaja Hari Singh’s 53 rule (1925-1947), only two were granted to Muslims. Such an open discriminatory policy hampered the growth of a regional bourgeoisie and development of capitalism in the state. In fact feudal fetters retarded industrial development to such an extent that a noted representative of the Indian capitalist class, Jamnalal Bajaj complained that the ‘cottage industry in the village of Kashmir was not valu ed by the government’. 54 This deprivation had obviously an effect on the political expression of dissent when it occurred.

It was in this scenario of deteriorating economic, political and social conditions that in 1924, when the Dogra regime under its strong mechanism suppressed the uprising, which was spearheaded by the signatories to the historic memorial that had been submitted to lord Reading in 1924. 55 As pointed out earlier, the telegrams sent by the silk factory workers to Viceroy brought to the fore the grave situation in Kashmir, and exposed the condition of the ordinary people in Jammu and Kashmir to the attention of the British Indian government in a manner which was difficult to ignore. When in

51 Foreign and Political Department, 1924 (sec.), File No. 19/2-p/1924, dated, 22/7/1924, NAI. 52 The Kashmiri (weekly), Lahore, 7 th February, 1925. 53 Though being considered liberal, but it was a small beginning, and only served to underline the newly aspiring Muslim Kashmiris awareness of deprivation. Piecemeal benevolence didn’t sit well at all with the Kashmiris deep-seated sense both of being superior and being a victim. David Devdas , In Search of a Future: the Story of Kashmir, New Delhi, 2007, p. 7 . 54 Tiyag Bhumi , Ajmer, vol. 3, No.2, 1929, p. 169. 55 Bazaz, Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 139. 131

October, 1924, the Viceroy Lord Reading, visited Srinagar he was presented with a memorandum signed by many prominent members of the Kashmiri Muslim community, (including the Mirwaiz-i-Kashmir) which outlined their grievances not only in the context of silk factory, but in all aspects of their life. 56 Chitralekha Zutshi, argues that, the presenting of the memorandum to Viceroy was a last ditch effort made by the Kashmiri leadership to act as representatives of a united Kashmiri Muslim community, at the same time openly challenging the authority of the Dogra sta te’. 57 The prominent demands of the memorandum included: (i) Property rights in land should be granted to the tenants, as these have been forcibly snatched away from them, (ii) Muslim representation in the state council should be according to their ratio in the population, (iii) To weed out corruption from services which had exceeded all limits, an Imperial tribunal be appointed to enquire into these complaints and award punishment, (iv) Since, agriculture was the principal occupation of the people, the governor of Kashmir valley should be a Muslim and if Muslims of required qualifications are not available, some Englishmen may be appointed to the post. Similarly, Muslims should be appointed to important posts such as the superintendent of police, superintendent customs etc., Other demands were the protection of the Muslim religious establishments, the abolition of all forms of forced labour, equitable distribution of government contracts to all communities, providing a legislative Assembly in which Muslims were properly represented,

The memorandum in fact provided an outline of reforms which any effective organized opposition to the maharaja’s a utocracy could hardly fail to follow, it indicated to the political department of government of India, which was responsible for the British crown’s relations with the Indian princely states, that there existed serious social and political problems in Jammu and Kashmir. 58 Swift action was taken against the authors of the memorandum who clearly subverted the legitimacy of the Dogra state in Kashmir. 59

A committee of inquiry was appointed to probe into the grievances presented in the memorandum. The commission in response refuted the grievances in great detail,

56 Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy , p. 87. 57 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 203. 58 Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy , p. 88. 59 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 204. 132 attributing their seditious nature to the work of ‘agitators from British India’. The commission took the written statements from each of the signatories of the memorandum, who were awarded varied punishments. The leading memorialist khawaja Saad-ud-Din Shawl was banished from the state. Among the other memorialists, Khawaja Hassan Shah Naqshbandi was deprived of his jagir; Khawaja Nurshah Naqashbandi was dismissed from his services and the rest of the signatories of the memorial were reprimanded and warned. 60 With the exile of the Shawl, the unrest gained momentum. Srinagar was handed over to army, but it appeared that its fear was on the wane. 61 The repressive policy of the Dogra regime helped to build a strong public opinion in and outside the state. Meetings were held in several places like Lahore, Jabalpur, Jattan, Sialkot, Gujranwala, Wazirabad, Simla, Amritsar and in many other places condemning the repressive policy of the Dogras and calling upon the British government to intervene and safeguard the rights of the Muslim citizens of the state. 62

The memorandum was basically an expression of a long felt desire of suppressed and deprived masses of the people of Kashmir for a demand of economic justice and restoration of human dignity, but was put down heavily by the authorities on the grounds that the representative institutions were at that time beyond practical politics. 63 The failure of the memorandum to convince Lord Reading did, however, sharpen the consciousness of being victimhood among the elite of Kashmir. According to R.L. Handa, ‘the memorandum br ought nothing to the Muslims, but it certainly gave a fillip to their movement to put forth their demands in an organized manner.’ 64

The memorial was construed as revolving around the issue of the exclusion of Muslims by the state government from government posts on the basis of their lack of educational qualifications and it was declared that their demand for proprietary rights was irrational. 65 However, the claims of the Dogra oligarchy and the British imperialists regarding the demands as ‘irrational’ and their claim in the improvement of socio

60 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom , pp. 338-9. 61 Ibid . 62 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 98. 63 G.S. Raghvan, The Warning of Kashmir , Srinagar, New Delhi, 1993, p. 36. 64 R.L. Handa, History of Freedom Struggle in Princely States , New Delhi, 1968, pp. 249-50. 65 Ibid. 133 economic and political conditions of Kashmir was made evident most poignantly in 1929 by Sir Albion Banerjee, a Bengali Christian, civil servant who had been employed in the state as Foreign and Political minister. Banerjee, as a trained administrator with a successful record in other states shared gloomy anticipates regarding the prevailing conditions in the Kashmir. Muslim Outlook, a newspaper published from Lahore worked that having been Dewan of both Cochin and Mysore, it was expected that his services would streamline the antiquated system for the toiling masses of Kashmir. He ha[d] rendered valuable services to the maharaja of Kashmir. He gave learne[d] advice in all important matters of administration, chiefly under finance in connection with which he affected an increase in revenue, a retrenchment of expenditure and the exploitation of the rich and abundant sources of the country.’ ‘Banerjee professed to be so much above communitarian considerations in a state where a small minority rule[d] with an iron hand on overwhelming majority and left Kashmir ‘unwept, un honored and unsung’. 66

Disgusted with the policy of the rulers and the inability of even conscientious members of the administration to effect a change, he resigned from the post he had held for two years. Banerjee reportedly resigned on the grounds which he made public through the Associated Press in Lahore that ignited protests not only in Kashmir but also in the Punjab newspapers. He bore witness to the fact that: 67

‘Jammu and Kashmir state [wa s] laboring under many disadvantages with a large Mohammedan population absolutely illiterate, labouring under poverty and very low economic conditions of living in the villages and practically governed like dumb driven cattle. There [wa]s no touch between the government and the people, no suitable opportunity for representing grievances and the administrative machinery itself require[d] overhauling from top to bottom…it ha[d]… no sympathy with the people’s wants and grievances.’ He also said that there is hardly any public opinion in the state. As regards the press it is practically non- existant, with the result that the government is not benefited to the extent that it should be by the healthy criticism’.

66 ‘Muslim Outlook’ , Lahore, 18 January, Foreign and Political Department, File No. 7(5)- R of 1929, Government of India, ‘R’ Branch N os. 1-2, NAI. 67 ‘Civil and Military Gazette’, Foreign and Political Department, File No. 7(5) - R of 1929, Government of India, ‘R’ Branch Nos. 1 -2, NAI. 134

In the course of his remarks Sir Albion said, ‘that the state administration was rotten from top to bottom, he described it as ‘a looting show’ and declared corruption to be rampant from the highest officials downwards. 68 Banerjee argued that ‘low economic condition[s] of the people wer[e] responsible for the moral evils which existed. The state government wa[s] taking drastic steps to combat the evils, but they couldn’t be entirely eradicated until and unless village life was rais ed to a higher level… who were living very poor lives and the artisans who were well known throughout the world for the excellent quality of their workmanship, but unfortunately in recent years the quality was steadily deteriorated and the need of the hour [was] to raise the standard of masses who had fallen to prey to various abuses and evils owing to grinding poverty’. 69

The resignation and press conference of Banerjee produced a great stir in the young minds of Kashmir. Whatever his attentions, he may aptly be said to have awakened them from the slumber and his statements laid a constructive impact in the maturing of emerging political awakening in Kashmir. 70 Undoubtedly, the educated classes were affected by the incident and their consciousness was to manifest itself during the subsequent years.71

5.2. Contextualizing 1931 Events:-

As already mentioned, the nature and orientation of the political discourse in Kashmir from 1920, onwards entered into in a new phase by the middle of the 1920s. It was in such an unsettled societal milieu that another new class joined the social climb. Its notion of superiority was based on a new paradigm of status, one that threatened not just to shake up the current hierarchy but to bring down stratification itself. This was the class of the newly-educated Kashmiris. This class had been the first to take advantage of the combined efforts of the Muslim leadership and the state at encouraging Muslim education and received higher education in British India. The increasing impact of education, the influence of the press and publication market on the common Kashmiri, rise of Srinagar

68 Foreign and Political Department, File No. 247 of 1929, NAI. 69 ‘Muslim outlook’ , Lahore, 18 January, Foreign and Political Department, File No. 7(5)- R of 1929, Government of India, ‘R’ Branch Nos. 1 -2, NAI. 70 M.I. Khan , History of Srinagar , p. 173. 71 Taraq waheed, ‘Genesis of the Freedom Movement in Kashmir’, Mohammad Yasin and A. Qaiyum Rafiqi, (eds.), History of the freedom struggle in Jammu and Kashmir , New Delhi, 1980, p. 119. 135 as the center of competing ideologies and the general economic discontent of the valley’s inhabitants could be clearly seen in their attitude towards the state. The discontent among the people towards the end of the 3 rd decade of the twentieth century could also be partly explained on the basis of the developments taking place elsewhere in the world which affected the state’s economy in way or the other.

The Kashmir economy was found to be very sensitive to this development. High valued handicrafts, carpets, embroidered goods, felt mattings, paper machie, carved sliver and wood work, precious and semi-precious jewelry… have had their market mostly in western countries. It were only the shawls, pashmina goods, dry and fresh fruit, saffron which were sold mostly in Indian subcontinent. With the beginning of 1930, the whole economy of Kashmir took a sudden downturn… compounded by depression in agricultural prices on a global scale. Paddy wouldn’t fetch as shown in the census reports of rupees two per ‘ass load’ (about seventy five kilograms) in the market while the people starved. 72 The situation thus took a turn for which there were few precedents in terms of starvation and destitution even in the long run and chequered history of the state. By 1930, Kashmir was simmering; ready to explode. It was evident that a major mass explosion was quite on the cards, the only moot point was what shape it would take and whom it would hit.

The valley’s contact with the Punjab resulted in the increasi ng number of Muslims travelling to Punjab; the limited spread of education had encouraged a concomitant expansion of the publication market, particularly in Srinagar. There was an exceptional increase in the circulation figures of the newspapers of both English and Urdu between 1911-1921 and the number of daily or weekly newspapers in circulation by 1921 had risen to a staggering 2000, with the number for English newspapers being as high as 450. 73 Besides this, there was an exceptional increase in the circulation of number of books, published at printing press in Lahore, Amritsar, further attesting the growing relationship between Punjab and Kashmir politics because Punjab during this period was the hotbed of nationalist activities. 74 All these developments laid a positive impact on the

72 Ibid., pp. 216-8. 73 Census of India 1921, Jammu and Kashmir, p. 90. 74 Ibid. 136 nascent political psyche of Kashmir. The emerging educated class, which played a pivotal role in the formation of the future political discourse of Kashmir. It was in part a consequence of the development of various associations interested in educational reform of Kashmir and of a number of young Kashmiri Muslims, several of whom passed the level of secondary education and went to institutions of higher learning in British India such as the University of Punjab and the Aligarh Muslim University.

It was a time when modern politics were taking shape in different parts of the world. Particularly in the Indian subcontinent, leaders of the movements had a clean slate on which to design models for the management of communities emerging from a feudal, agrarian past into the opportunities of the twentieth century. The stay of the youth of Kashmir in British India for the purpose of education was more for these men than just to gain education. These men came to witness various political during and ideologies especially while their stay at Aligarh Muslim University. Upon returning to Kashmir with the fervor of new ideas and armed with academic and professional degrees these men found the Dogra state unwilling and unable to accommodate their needs. Facing the problem of unemployment and a seemingly rapidly disintegrating community, they consolidated into a leadership that would lead Kashmir out of Dogra rule.

These young educated people having come out from the portals of Indian universities, as already mentioned, started to organize themselves. To begin with, they demanded government jobs for the educated youth. On the other hand, Kashmiri Pandits who had taken advantage of the presence of schools and colleges in Srinagar were more advanced in education and state service than the Muslim educated youth. In 1905 was established the Sri Pratap College Srinagar, where mostly Pandits got themselves educated. By 1925, hundreds of Pandit graduates after the completion of their studies came out with a great hope to hold posts in the administration. While competing for the jobs they faced a chunk of discrimination by Punjabis and next by Dogras who were wielding authority in places of power. 75 The Pandits got disappointed with the policy and attitude of the government which openly favoured the people against the natives of the

75 Bazaz, The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 138. 137 land. Hence the policy of the discrimination became more manifest during the ‘enligh te ned’ Dogra ruler Maharaja Hari Singh.

In response of the discriminatory treatment the Pandits carried out an organized agitation in the outside press against the policy of the Dogra maharaja. They demanded a freedom of press, a due share in the government services, establishments of associations, and representation of the people in the administration of the state. 76 But initially their demands remained only confined to newspapers. In practice they failed to organize an active political forum to pressure the state to concede these demands. 77

Later on, however, the movements of the Pandits for the struggle of the rights called ‘ Kashmiris for Kashmiris’ gained momentum as a result of which the maharaja appointed a commission under the chairmanship of Major General Janak Singh to define the term ‘state subject ’. The commission submitted its report in 1927 defining the term ‘state subject ’.78 The term ‘state subject ’ divided the subjects into three categories…class first state subject, class second and class third.

Being educationally advanced than the Muslim community, the Pandits and the Rajputs of Jammu became the immediate beneficiaries of this step of the government. Needless to say that that the Muslims were yet out of picture. The Pandits adopted a narrow communal and opportunist posture. They demanded job security for themselves. This narrow communal attitude was condemned by the congress leaders of British India like Tej Bahadur as ‘unsound in principle’. 79

At the same time the emerging Muslim middle class appeared on the scene. They organized themselves into the Reading Room party, the closest thing to a political outfit that the regime would tolerate. The party functioned under a committee of which Sheikh

76 Ibid. 77 Khan, Freedom Movement in Kashmir , p. 103. 78 As per the definition of the term, all persons born and residing in the state before the commencement of the reign of maharaja Gulab Singh and also the persons who settled there in before the commencement of Samvat 1942 (1885) and have since been permanently residing in the country are hereditary subjects of the state. Bazaz , The History of the Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 140. 79 ‘Letter from Tej Bahadur Sapru to Kashyap Bandhu’, Albert Road, dated 5 May 1934, Sapru Papers, Nehru Memorial library, New Delhi. 138

Mohammad Abdullah was the general secretary. 80 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah along with his other young associates, Mohammad Rajab, Qazi Saif-ud-din Qadri, Gh Ahmad Mukhtar came to Kashmir after completing their educational degrees at Aligarh Muslim University, which in 1930 had become the nerve of Muslim unrest. 81 During the period of their study in Aligarh Muslim University, some of the newspapers of Lahore had already started to speak out about the condition of the Kashmiris. These people, in order to make the voice of the newspapers more strong, started to work for their consolidation. 82 While coming to the valley these people from outside came with their novice political concepts. At that time there was neither any political party nor organization in Kashmir nor were there such audacious people who could to form an organization, union or an amateur political party. However, this group of young educated men, which included people like Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, Mir Mohammad Rajab and Molvi Bashir Ahmad set up a partially hidden Reading Room in S rinagar in Syed Ali Akbar’s somewhat dilapidated house, where in one part of the house, post master Mohammad Sikander was also residing. It was decided that secret political discussions will be held and steps will be taken, both at personal and organizational level, to eliminate economic deprivation in the valley. Thus, the members of the Reading Room were picked over.

80 Rashid Taseer, Tahreek-i-Huriyat-i-Kashmir , 1931-39, (Urdu), vol. 1, Srinagar, 1978, p.83. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah with a middle class family background was born in Soura, Srinagar in 1905. His father Sheikh Mohammad Ibrahim was a shawl trader. His father started off with a small business, but with persistence and hard work turned it into a medium scale enterprise. Abdullah passed his matriculation in 1922 from the state high school Fateh kadal , and it was with great difficulty and after several meetings with the educational minister that he secured admission in the Sri Pratap College Srinagar, the only college, then in the whole valley of Kashmir. After passing the, F.S.C in 1924, he tried to get admission for B.Sc. in the Prince of Pales College, Jammu, because science had not been introduced at degree level in Srinagar. But his admission was refused on the ground that the seat has been already allotted to the son of an officer, though not a state subject. Finally he took admission in the Islamia College, Lahore for B.Sc. at the time of the rejection of his application by the college principal Mr. Suri, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah approached General Samander Khan, the leader of the Anjuman-i-Islamia which had been setup at Jammu then to help the Muslim candidates with such problems. The General along with a few of his colleagues agreed to plead sheikh’s cause. But he still couldn’t get for what he approached. To quote Sheikh, ‘As we were leaving the principal’s office, General Samander Khan tried to console me, ‘sorry about all this, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah you touched Suri’s vulnerable spot when you spoke about your rights and o ppression of your people. A less blunt man would have been accepted. You are strong and courageous, but flattery is a sure winner. Pity that Kashmiri Muslims are not allowed in the army. You could make an excellent solider.’ Sheikh’s struggle first to get admission then job in the state services which he couldn’t get according to his will and wish made him realize the injustice which remained ingrained in him for a long time. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, Flames of Chinar, pp. 19-20 . 81 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar , Srinagar, 2006, p. 21. 82 Taseer, Tahreek-i-Huriyat-i-Kashmir , p. 77. 139

To continue the activities of the Reading Room a committee was organized to collect the funds from the people. A room was taken on rent in Zaina Kadal , Srinagar.Then after some time, the location was again shifted to Fateh Kadal, in the house of Mufti Jamal-ud-din where an organized election was held for the members of the Reading Room. Mohd Rajab was elected as the president and Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah as the secretary.

After the formation of the reading room meetings were held regularly. According to Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, ‘the reading room served as a rendezvous, where national issues were discussed and amongst other things, it deplored the existing conditions.’ 83 It was at the same time that the party members started to campaign through various newspapers regarding the condition of the Kashmiri people. They opened a window to the world to appraise it of the wretched conditions of Kashmir. Letters were sent to Urdu newspapers of Lahore. Besides this the Reading Room party members contacted Rajini P. Dutt, editor of the progressive journal, Indian States whose founder was Sir Albion Banerjee.

It was for the first time that the historical account of the reality of Kashmir became evident to the world. Maluna Azad Subhani, the preacher at the Jama Masjid of Calcutta visited the Reading Room party, who was both a believer and lover of freedom. He expressed solidarity with the ideology of the Reading Room party and instructed the members how to start a people’s movement. 84 After the publication of the news in Zimindar (a daily newspaper of Lahore) of the visit of Subhani, the government got terrified and tried to hold him but by that time he had left the state. 85

It is important to mention here that, in the meantime in the province of Jammu an Association namely Young Men’s Muslim Association came in to being. Though, the Association was founded back in 1924, when its first session took place under the presidentship of Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, it was not in organizational shape. 86 In the session of the Association, according to Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas a large number of

83 Ibid. 84 Ibid. 85 Ibid., p. 79. 86 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash, pp. 40-3. 140 people participated and the leaders of the Association became the hope of the political future of the people of Jammu. The Association highlighted socio economic conditions of the people in comparison with the people of British India. 87 The Association played a vital role especially among the depressed people of Jammu and Poonch in arousing among them the spirit of national feeling and political behavior. 88 According to Chaudhary Ghulam Ab bas, ‘the oppressed unr espectable and despairing Muslims of the valley of Kashmir were in the state of wretchedness. It was, may be, because the Dogra Darbar considered them as bonded slaves, thereby justifying the oppression, the like of which is found in the condition of the Roman slaves, long before the birth of the Christ. These self-appointed masters of Kashmiri Muslims were not ashamed even in the arena of the twentieth century’s new culture and tradition…of the degree of oppression and tyranny they subjected the people to ’. 89

The Reading Room party at its first instance presented a memorandum to the council of ministers, while Maharaja Hari Singh was away in England to attend the Round Table Conference from where he and his wife proceeded to France. In his absence the memorandum was presented against the Civil Service Recruitment rules framed by the state council. 90 The new rules were designed to make qualifications instead of patronage. The recruitment rules restricted the entry of the Muslim youth in the government employment, who at that time were in search of employment. Some of the rules were: A candidate shouldn’ t be above the twenty years old; Arabic was replaced by Sanskrit; a candidate seeking employment should have good family background. Besides this if a candidate fulfilled all the required qualifications, still the government was having power to reject his/her application without assigning any reason. 91

While presenting the memorandum, according to Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, in response the members of the council took great pains to explain that the Maharaja’s government was very kind to the Muslims and that it was most ungracious of the representatives to oppose it! P.K. Vatil recounted instances of the maharaja’s ‘kindness ’.

87 Ibid. 88 Ibid., p. 39. 89 Ibid., p. 57. 90 Taseer, Tahreek-i-Huriyat-i-Kashmir , pp. 79-80. 91 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar , p. 50. 141

Abdullah’s reply was ‘that Muslims wanted no mor e than their just rights ’. Members of the council especially Vatil, tried to come down and said that such activities would be ‘appropriately dealt with’. However, Abdullah spoke with great firmness: ‘if recruitment rules are not amended the consequences wo uld be unpleasant’. Abdullah’s retort infuriated them and they abruptly ended further discussion. 92

Though the memorandum, according to Abdullah, ‘had no immediate effect, it did create a stir among the ruling elite. ’93 The state at that time had no newspaper and in order to express their self-expression the leadership took the help of the Punjab press. In fact, the impact of the Punjab press and more particularly the concern of the Kashmiri expatriate settled across northern India in general and Punjab in particular made a significant contribution. Some such persons of eminence have played very important role in the Kashmiri awakening and in highlighting the plight of the people. These person of eminence include Allama Iqbal, Sonaullah Amritsari, Mohammad din Fauq, Saif-ud-din Kichloo and host of other persons. 94 Some of these people influenced Kashmir situation both by their ideas as well as actions. Iqbal, with his deep emotional and intellectual commitment to Kashmir, must have been tremendous inspiration through his poetry to the emancipative forces working for Kashmir. In one of the annual sessions of Kashmir Conference, Dr. Iqbal said:

The clutches of tyranny and ignorance have made us wretched, As if a clipper has clipped our wings, O God, destroy the hands of tyranny which has, Suppressed the soul of the freedom of Kashmir.

A number of periodicals and papers were published from Lahore solely devoted to the awakening of the Kashmiri Muslims and focusing on their plight. Among these periodicals was one weekly Kashmiri Magazine brought out by Munshi Muhammad din Fauq; Inquilab edited by two famous Urdu editors and writers Maulana Gh. Rasool Mahar and Abdul Majid Salik. After the entry of the paper in the state it was banned, while editors of the paper started a new weekly paper namely ‘ Kashmir ’ but after a passage of time its entry was banned and the editors of the Inquilab started a new paper

92 Ibid., p. 53. 93 Ibid. 94 Ibid., p. 55-6. 142 namely ‘ Mazloom-i-Kashmir’ and ‘ Akbhar-i-Kashmir .’ 95 It is, therefore, imperative for one researching on the awakening of Kashmir to acknowledge the contribution of the outside forces, before the beginning of an organized movement. Up to this period the major thrust of the Reading Room Party leadership was to get the grievances of the Muslims redressed in general and of the unemployed educated youth in particular. Shankar Lal Kaul, a Pandit writer under the pseudonym of ‘Kashmiricus ’ in an article brought out the nature of the Dogra state’s recruitment policy in the united India and Indian states. He claimed that,

‘Kashmiris are treated as strangers in their own house, in their own country, their status is nil. A post of ru pees forty falls vacant in some office…ninety to one an outsider is brought to fill it up… and the state officials who indulge in this luxury have not… good sense enough to bring at least as good a man from outside to fill up the post, as could be availabl e in Kashmir… a good for nothing outsider almost illiterate… but whose qualification is a communal or geographical alliance with some powerful official in the state…is given a post to which a Kashmiri graduate may aspire… the latest civil and military list s of the state presents the miserable spectacle of five percent Kashmiri Hindus, one per cent Kashmiri Muslims… and less than seven per cent of the rest of the state subjects. Two colleges were established by the state authorities… every year more and mor e pour into them… and what are their prospects? The state has encouraged then to be ambitious… diverted them from and unfitted them for pursuing humble occupations… in short, the end is… it has ruined them.’ 96

In 1930, a significant political development took place when Sheikh Abdullah and Chaudhary Gh. Abbas met at Jammu where they sought each other’s cooperation for the future progress of the movement. Both were the leading political figures and were running the semi political organizations respectively in Kashmir and Jammu province. Their meeting resulted in preparing a strong front to voice against the autocratic rule.

The exposition of the policies of the maharaja by the Punjab press, the public campaign of the Reading Room party members, the forerunner of the Muslim conference,

95 Ibid., p. 58. 96 ‘Miserable Kashmir’ an article published in United India and Indian States, Madras dated 22, September 1921, Political Department, OER, file no. 73/97-C, 1921, JKA-J. 143 the efforts by the Young Men’s Muslim Association Jammu helped to create a united front, which succeeded in creating quite a stir among a people accustomed for long to a passive submission to oppression. 97 Alongside, there were other happenings on all too familiar a pattern: the desecration of the Holy Quran and ban on Khutba (Sermon) events took place in Jammu. The happenings further surcharged the atmosphere. All this was clearly calculated to accentuate communal bitterness, polarization of communities as antagonistic entities rather than a united front of the oppressed against oppressors and social parasites of all hues. 98

The government made efforts to polarize the people on religious grounds and to give the grievances of the people a communal colour. At the same time maharaja Hari Singh at the advice of the G.E.C. Wakefield, the minister for political affairs, invited a representative delegation which was permitted to submit their grievances before the maharaja. 99 The represen tatives of both the Young Men’s Muslim Association Jammu and the representatives of the Reading Room party were invited. 100

The Young Men’s Muslim Association nominated Mistri Yaqub Ali, Sardar Gauhar Rehman, Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas (president of the Association) and Sheikh Abdul Hamid. The Reading Room party in Kashmir called a public meeting on 21 st of June 1931 to choose their representatives. According to Shiekh Abdullah, ‘in Kashmir the selection was done on a large scale. We organized ourselves with the dual purpose of electing delegates, unifying the different factions and bringing the people on one platform. Followers of senior and junior Mirwaiz were always at loggerheads. We managed to create a sort of rapprochement between them. A well-attended meeting was convened in the open space in front of Khanqah-e-Mualla. This was the beginning of our movement for independence. We swore on an oath of loyalty to the nation. Seven representatives were elected, Mirwaiz Moulvi Yusuf Shah, Mirwaiz Ahmadullah, Agha Hussain Jalali, Khwaja Gh. Ahmad Ashai, Munshi Shahabuddin, Khwaja Saad-ud-din Shawl and Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah.’ 101 According to Prem Nath Bazaz, ‘this was

97 N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres , p. 88. 98 Ibid. 99 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar, pp. 79-80. 100 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash, p. 73. 101 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar , p. 84. 144 one of the most important meetings in the history of the movement. In certain respects it was unique. Both of the irreconcilable Mirwaizes appeared on the same platform. Mirwaiz Yusuf Shah entered the precincts of the Khanqah-i- Mualla which neither he nor perhaps his forefathers had done before. Even Moulvi Abdullah, an Ahmadi, was also present. All the sectional differences had been relegated to the background. Whole community was unanimous in its demands.’ 102

The arrest of Abdul Qadir 103 provided an occasion for the open mobilization of Muslims in the valley for his release. It was while he was being tried at Srinagar central jail premises that a vast concourse of people thronged to witness his trial on 13 th July 1931. The armed police there resorted to firing; seventeen fell down dead immediately, and several died afterwards. It was found on the 26 th of July, that twenty one persons died as a result of the jail incident. 104 Without demoralization, the people carried their dead on charpais (cots) taken from the police lines outside the jail wall and went towards the city in the form of a procession. The people carried a blood-soaked banner in front and raised slogans. Public opinion among the Muslims had, by this time, crystallized on the point that the government and the Hindus were inseparable and one stood for the other. Almost all the officials were Hindus- the Maharaja was a Hindu. 105

The situation both inside as well outside the valley followed by the 1931 incident has been discussed a t length by most of the writers of Kashmir’s modern history .106 However, what is important to mention here is that the incident of 1931 was unique in various ways, not just the beginning of the Kashmiris struggle for freedom against the Dogra Raj. The incident was a catalyst but of course could not happen have happened

102 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , p. 125. 103 It was almost at the end of the meeting at Khanqah-i-Mualla that Abdul Qadir (who belonged to the NWFP and had come to Srinagar with a European visitor as an attendant) came on the scene and ‘exhorted people to rise from the thralldom of passivity to fight for their rights.’ According to him, ‘the time [had] come when [they] must retaliate with full strength.’ Pointing towards Raaj Mahal [place of the Maharaja]’, he said, ‘to pay them in their own words.’ 103 His was a vitriolic speech against the Dogra Maharaja; he was arrested soon after this under Article 142 of the Ranbir Penal Code. General Records, file no. 85/p-6, year 1931, JKA-J. 104 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p. 76; N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres , p. 88. 105 Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , pp. 129-30. 106 For details see, Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom , pp. 375-390; Bazaz, History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , pp. 146-9; Bamzai, History of Kashmir , pp. 715-8. 145 without any causational process. It was not a spontaneous outbreak but was preceded by many important developments, which suggest that emancipative forces were already at work in Kashmir. The symptomatic of these included shawl baf agitation of 1865, reformative role played by various organizations, the presenting of memorandum to Lord Reading, the silk factory workers revolt, Banerjee’s exposit ion of the nature of the Dogra Raj; its impact, emergence and role of Reading Room party, and most importantly the fast growing economic discontent among the people.

There is also evidence that the ‘specter ’ of Bolshevism entered the state even in the form of literature and Russian currency was confiscated from certain traders in Kashmir. 107 Such types of activities were bound to have an emancipative influence on Kashmir situation. Therefore, on the basis of the above stated developments, which stretched over a number of years, with in the environment of sustained period of uncertainty, disorder and conflict. Despite the fact, that the public arena was strictly restricted in the state prior to 1932, the people could not remain unaffected. According to Chitralekha Zutshi, ‘the Kashmiri Muslim leadership had crafted and laid claim to a public space in which they debated and defined their political agenda as well as the contours of their community identity. What can’t be doubted of course is that 1931 explicitly changed the course of Kashmir politics, steering it towards the anti-colonial movement of British India’. 108

However, the root cause of the mass awakening in Kashmir have been taken into least consideration by most of the scholars. It was in fact the invidious position of Muslims in Kashmir society, who comprised 53% of the population of Jammu province and 93% of the Kashmir province, but were without any wealth or influence, 109 which was the precursor of their agitation. At the policy making level, power was shared between the dynastic ruler maharaja Hari Singh and a four executive council, which in 1931 consisted of the maharaja’s brother, two British officers loaned by the government

107 OER, File No. 61/30-c of 1919, JKA-J. 108 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 211. For a fuller discussion regarding the course of events in 1931-32 and how these events as well the preceding and succeeding political developments were linked with the broader political atmosphere of British India, see Suhail R. Lone, Indian National Movement and the Freedom Struggle of Jammu and Kashmir , M.Phil. Dissertation, Aligarh Muslim University, 2013. 109 Anant Ram, Census of India 1931, vol. xxiv, Jammu and Kashmir State, part 1, Report, p. 14. 146 of India and a Sikh. In the bureaucracy, the share of different communities was as under: 110

% % of % of % of Muslims Hindus Sikhs of Others Total total total total total Gazetted 163 29.21 361 64.69 23 4.12 11 1.97 558 Non- 4943 32.04 9281 60.15 769 4.98 436 2.82 15429 gazetted

At the local government level the disparity was less marked overall but non- Muslims still dominated, especially in Jammu. For instance, the Tahsildar in Kotli and Rajouri, the superintendent and deputy superintendent of police and nearly all the Magistrates were either Sikhs or Hindus, while in Mirpur tehsil it was estimated that 94% of patwaris (village record keepers) were Kashmiri Brahmans. 111

Besides, the low ratio in the employment, the overall economic scenario of the Valley, as already discussed in the preceding chapters and pages, gives clear evidence about the root cause of the ‘national awakening in Kashmir’. The worldwide economic depression beginnings in 1929 had also begun to have an impact on a wide cross section of Kashmiri society. A large population in Srinagar was dependent on the different handicrafts industries such as shawl and carpet weaving, silk, Paper Machie and silver works. Though, the state being rich in other natural resources at the time of the depression the development of industries was in an inactive state or had reached only the infant stage of development without any protection. 112 The census report of 1931 mentions that, ‘the principal natural resources available to the state and its people for raising wealth and converting that wealth into necessities of life required by the higher standard of life into which the progress of civilization is pushing the peoples of the world

110 Pamphlet entitled ‘ Facts about Kashmir’ , Ministry of State Government of India, Kashmir Branch, File No. 8 (25)-K/49, 1949, P. 4, NAI. 111 Report by Major General, Finlayson, G.O.C., Mirpur, dated 17 th February 1932, Political Department, File No.1/29/870, 1932, JKA-J. 112 Anant Ram, Census of India 1931, vol. xxiv, Jammu and Kashmir State, part 1, Report, p. 36. 147 day by day are noted below than that pushing feature in Jammu and Kashmir. ’113 The depression created alarming consequences to the employment of thousands of adults and immatures in Kashmir and also the prices of shawls had considerably fallen. An era of cheap shawls had set in and cheapness was acting adversely on the quality of produce. 114 The depression reduced the workmen and petty shopkeepers to low straits. The shawl embroiders and the paper machie artists were thrown out of job. Distress and frustration were writ large on every face. 115

The already high land tax was further increased in 1930 by up to 14.4% in several southern tehsils of Jammu; 116 in Srinagar, the food control policy of the Dogras had been breaking down gradually since the summer of 1931, when the rice crop was ‘scantier than usual’ as a result of flood s and the ravaging effects of a crop disease called rai. In the conditions of shortage, the poorer segments of the city’s population had been finding it increasingly difficult to obtain their staple at a rate higher than they could afford. In the countryside the zamindars were unwilling to relinquish their limited harvests, wishing to hold on to as much of it as possible for themselves. This caused prices to take a dramatic turn upwards further aggravating the problem in Srinagar. 117 The agriculturist was not getting a fair return for his labour. There was a horde of intermediaries who were intercept[ing] a major portion of the profit; while the agriculturist was getting very little, the consumer had to pay much more. 118

To improve the position of the agriculturists the Dogra Darbar in 1926 passed a Land Alienation Act in 1926 to control the land transfer by sale or mortgage, which disallowed the transfer of the newly acquired rights to any but a member of the agricultural classes and prohibited the alienation of more than 25% of any holding for a period of ten years. The peasants exercised this right in full for the liquidation of debt. These sales increased the fragmentation of holdings which resulted in the transfer of much land to members of the agricultural classes who were not cultivators and the

113 Ibid., p. 236. 114 Ibid. 115 Bamazai, History of Kashmir , p. 707. 116 Memorandum by Resident, dated 1 Jan. 1932, Foreign Department, File No. f/5/28/870, 1932, NAI. 117 N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres , p. 54; Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 271. 118 Anant Ram, Census of India 1931, vol. xxiv, Jammu and Kashmir State, part 1, Report, p. 212. 148 alienation of land on a large scale to non-cultivating owners was bound to lead to greater difficulties in the feeding of a rapidly increasingly population. It also led to soring land prices and the desire to own land among the richer classes of the valley usually non- agriculturists, was so strong that land previously valued at Rs 20 per kanal was alleged to have been sold at Rs 300 per kanal .119

Less money was spent on education, sanitation and other public services than on the maintenance of the courts. Newspapers were heavily censored, and political parties banned. As one probes deeper, however, it becomes clear that Muslims were the prime sufferers. 120 Press censorship was focused on Urdu papers printed in Lahore whish were read mostly by Muslims. Under a new dispensation of 1927, the legal definition of state subject hood was altered in way that excluded all Kashmiri Muslims domiciled outside the state from entering the public service or holding immovable property in Kashmir, and the Muslim share of state scholarships and places in government schools was the smallest of the three communities. 121

Thus, in this way according to Prakash Chandra, ‘in the 1931 upsurge, the plebian masses (of artisans, traders and peasants) laid siege to the capital of Srinagar. For the first time, the national aspirations of the Kashmiris were awakened during this popular uprising’. 122 ‘It was not a frenzied mob looking to kill in the name of religion, but one intended to redress the i mmediate economic grievances of Kashmiri Muslims’. 123 Before probing further the consequences of the uprising of 1931, it is essential to mention that, why only the year 1931proved decisive in the case of awakening of Kashmir.

According to Ian Copland three factors contributed. These were the launching of the Civil Disobedience Movement in British India, death of the hereditary spiritual leader of the Srinagar Muslims, known as Mirwaiz and third, the emergence of Muslim political class. Though the death of Mirwaiz was an important event, the claim of Ian Copland

119 R.G. Wrefoord, (Census Commissioner J&K State), Census of India, 1941, Vol. xxii, Jammu and Kashmir , Jammu, 1943, p. 16. 120 Ian Copland, ‘Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir’, 1931 -34, Pacific Affairs vol. 54, No.2, 1981, p. 234. 121 Ibid. 122 Prakash Chandra, ‘The National Question in Kashmir’ , p. 43. 123Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 224. 149 does not have much substance as the events unfolding at the political firmament of Kashmir before 1931 proved that the death was not much contributory cause of the 1931 awakening. As discussed in the previous chapters the movements and agitations had taken place in 1907, 1920 and 1924. In fact, even after the Mirwaiz had abandoned the Khilafat agitations, it was still carried on by the people for some more time.

There was also the example of the Civil Disobedience movement in British India, which showed the people of Kashmir —Muslims and Hindus alike —that hereditary authority, could be resisted. Even the British Resident was impressed by the solidarity of the hartal (strike) which f allowed Gandhi’s arrest in 1930, and noted that it marked the beginning of a new era in Kashmir politics. 124 The old Mirwaiz had been a staunch supporter of maharaja, and his restraining had helped to keep the more radicals Muslims in check. With his death, the Dogra Darbar not only lost a powerful instrument of social control but had to contend with a bitter succession dispute between the old man’s eldest son, Yousf Shah, and the head of the junior branch of the family, Muhammad Ahmadallah Hamandani, which galvanized the Muslim community as no purely political issue could have done. 125 The third factor as already mentioned, was the emergence, in the late 1920’s of an embryonic Muslim political class able and willing to carry the torch for the freedom of the suppressed masses of Kashmir. Most of those who took part in the July uprising were daily wage labourers, artisans especially weavers, but the direction of the movement was controlled by a core of middle class professionals-mainly teachers and lawyers- belong ing to Srinagar based Muslim Young Men’s Association. One such was Shiekh Mohammad Abdullah about whom as already mentioned an employee in the Kashmir education department, who before and after July 1931, established himself as a

124 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, 1931-34, p. 103. 125 Ibid. According to P.N. Bazaz, ‘After the death of Maul ana Ahmad ullah, Mirwaiz of the Jama Masjid in the early 1931, about the lakh of Muslims accompanied the mourning procession which fallowed the bier towards the graveyard. The procession was held by the Reading Room party who were conspicuous by their activity in honouring the dead and arranging the procession. Maulana Yusuf Shah, an earnest Youngman with some education, was installed as the new Mirwaiz of Jama Masjid. He was in entire sympathy with the Reading Room party and promised all help. He was prepared to allow the young men to use the Jama Masjid as their political platform. Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , pp. 119-20. 150 tireless organizer and the Young Men’s most gifted orator, by September 1931, he was perhaps the second most influential Muslim in Kashmir after the Mirwaiz. 126

The July 1931, uprising sent a wave of indignation among the Muslims all over British India, resulting in protests, meetings, and processions almost in several cities, towns and villages expressing their sympathy and solidarity with the people of Kashmir and calling upon the British government to dispose Hari Singh and take the state under its direct administration. Press statements were issued by all prominent Muslim leaders condemning the outrage and assuring the Kashmiri Muslims of their full support. 127 To coordinate these activities Mirza Bashir-ud-din Ahmad, Amir of the Jamat-i-Ahmadiya took initiative in convening a meeting of some leading Muslims at Simla on 25 th of July 1931, to consider the situation. It was in this historical meeting that the foundation of All India Kashmir Committee was laid. 128 The leaders of the committee expressed deep sympathy with people and assured their full moral and material support to their struggle. The committee passed resolutions-to bring pressure on the British Indian government to help the people of Kashmir in securing to them the elementary rights of life hitherto denied to them, to acquaint the ruler with the real affairs of the state, appointment of an independent commission of enquiry in Kashmir affairs, and to make affairs of the Kashmir known to the entire civilized world by various means of print media.

In response to the appeal issued by the All India Kashmir Committee (Qaidan Gurdaspur), to observe Friday August 14 Kashmir day was observed throughout India and the participants sympathized with their Muslim brethren in Kashmir in their sufferings. The local Khilafat Committee had also arranged to observe the day in Bombay. The committee passed resolutions too. In one of the resolutions, the president in a lengthy speech described the sufferings of the thirty two lakhs of Kashmir Muslims and the atrocities perpetrated on them by the officers of Kashmir. Messages were received from Punjab, Delhi, Gorakhpur, Cawnpore, Nagour, and other towns in British India about the observance of Kashmir day by Muslims. 129 The Kashmir Committee also

126 Ibid. 127 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom , p. 454. 128 Taseer, Tahreek-i-Huriyat-i-Kashmir , vol. 1, pp. 141-2. 129 Times of India , ‘Kashmir Day in Bombay’, August 15, 1931. 151 arranged for the publication of news about Kashmir in British newspapers such as the Daily Telegraph, Ring Post and Sunday Times, London. The Kashmir Committee supported the demands of the Kashmiri Muslims for the expulsion of the Hari Kishen Koul and the introduction of reforms. 130 In brief the committee not only provided moral and material support to the people of Kashmir but also gave wide publicity to their cause and helped the people of Kashmir in presenting their case before the Midelton Commission on 5 th Dec. 1931 and the members of the committee also played an important role in the formation of the All Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Conference. 131

Before mentioning about the next phase of the freedom for struggle of rights, it is pertinent to mention here that after the 13 July uprising most of the chosen representatives of the people of Jammu and Kashmir including Chaudhary Gh Abbas and Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah were arrested and kept locked in Hari Parbat Fort. But their arrest too proved insufficient in the restoration of the law and order situation. As a matter of fact says Bazaz, ‘it added fuel to the fire of wild excitement, which held the people in its grip. As it was, 13 th July saw the beginning of the gigantic force behind the mass movement’. 132 Until the release of the leaders complete strike was observed. According to Chaudhary Gh Abbas , ‘up to our release complete strike was observed successfully by the people, this step of the people of Kashmir was so strong and national in nature that it broke the record of the all previous strikes observed in British I ndia’. 133

The aftermath of the 13 th July shook the whole state including the administration; it un-nerved the maharaja. An official commission under the presidentship of Sir Barbour Dalal, chief justice of Srinagar High Court, was set up to enquire in to the causes of the happenings. 134 However, the commission was boycotted in both Jammu and Kashmir provinces, with huge demonstrations to condemn the policy of the government regarding the appointment of the commission. Despite opposition it submitted its report on the 24 th of September 1931. 135 The findings of the committee presented ‘the movement not

130 Saraf, Kashmiris Fight for Freedom , p. 460. 131 Shiekh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar , p. 157. 132 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 148. 133 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p. 88. 134 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 148. 135 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p. 96. 152 against the Maharaja person or his reign, but as a movement of the Muslims against the Hindus of the valley, many of whom held positions of power within the government. According to the committee’s report, ‘even extremist Muslims had full faith in the maharaja and the laws he had enacted for the betterment of his subjects. But they complained that ‘a section of the Hindus had overpowering representation in the government and the s ection oppressed the Mohammedans’. 136 The report made frequent reference of establishing communal peace and future prevention of communal tension in the state; paradoxically, on the other side, admitting the fact that the incidents of 1931 might represent the genuine economic and political grievances of the Kashmiri Muslim population. According to the report, ‘the gri evances [paucity of state Muslims in state service] does exist… the grievances becomes acute when the Mohamm edans themselves find that they have no ability to satisfy their natural desire for a voice in the government of the state…this dissatisfaction is a perpetual source of embitterment of the Mohammedan intelligentsia[sic] religious grievances in order to force the government to accept their claim for a much larger share in the state tha n they enjoy at present’. 137

According to P.N. Bazaz, ‘in fact the riots enquiry committee started with assumption and wrote its report on this basis. The Hindus became definitely hostile to the movemen t and openly and solidly joined the government forces to get it suppressed’. 138 The findings of the committee further didn’t mention anything to say about the entire absence of freedom of press, platform and association in the state. May be due to the reason according to Bazaz that such demands were nationalistic in essence and the committee, which had presumed from the outset that the unrest was communal, didn’t like to countenance them. 139 Instead to evaluate the internal situation the committee blamed the Punjab press and role of the All India Kashmir Committee for such an outburst on the part of the people of Kashmir. 140

Surprisingly, a representation made by a deputation of Muslims to the Maharaja claimed/declared that ‘true to their tradition…’ the deputatio n not only asserted the non-

136 Barjor Dalal, Report of the Srinagar Riot Enquiry Committee 1931, Srinagar, 1931, pp. 44-5. 137 Ibid., p. 45. 138 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 135. 139 Ibid., p. 139. 140 Barjor Dalal, Report of the Srinagar Riot Enquiry committee, p. 23. 153 communal nature of the Muslims’ movement but squarely put the blame of communalism on the shoulders of Pandits. For the first time the term ‘communal’ is seen in the context of Hindu-Muslim relations in the state.

However, it is a debatable point whether the Kashmiri Muslims or Hindus were advocates of communalism . According to Mridula Mukherjee, ‘the nature of any particular movement flows not from its forms of struggle or methods of mobilization, but from the nature of the primary contradiction that is sought to be resolved, its social and political objectives, its ability to mobilize and politicize wide sections of the masses, its capacity to challenge the existing order and pose the question of structural change, its long term impact on areas and social classes not directly involved in the struggle, on society as a whole and on the relationships of power and exploitation’. 141

The demarche of the Muslim representatives further stated that the 1931 shouldn’t be dismissed as an outburst driven by religious passion but the result of the years of oppression and suppression. According to the representation, ‘the causes of the present troubles and the tale of oppression to which the Muslim subjects have been and are being subjected have a long history behind them and it would be no place to mention them here. Suffice it say that the non-Muslim community was actuated by definite purpose to interfere with the religious affairs of the Muslim subjects and the ball was set rolling by the officers of the government, for example the prohibition of Khutbal-i-Eid-ul-Zuha, the insult to the Holy Quran, the dismantling of mosques, the stoppage of Azan , were the heart rendering events of a nature which grievously wounded the religious feelings and prestige of the peaceful Muslim subjects and they were so impressed by the shortsightedness of the authorities that they considered ‘Islam to be in danger’. 142 In fact religious oppression also played energetic role in the outbreak of the mass mobilization in Kashmir, but was it, to use D.N. Dhanagare’s phrase, ‘only the symptom and not the disease’. 143 Religion providing, an avenue for organization, and propaganda and a sense

141 Mridula Mukherjee, Peasants in India’s Non Violent Revolution , p. 390. 142 ‘Representation made by deputation of Muslim representatives to His Highness,’ August 15, 1931, p. 5. 143 D.N. Dhanagare, Agrarian Conflict, Religion and Politics: The Moplah Rebellions in Malabar in the Nineteenth Century and Early Twentieth Century’ , A journal of Historical Studies , No. 74, February, 1977, p. 141. 154 of oneness or communality among the Muslims, which transcended the formidable barriers of class, education and region.

Therefore, even if the Muslim leadership used religious tools for political mobilization, it cannot outrightly be labeled as a communal movement when the primary contradiction that it sought to revoke is taken into consideration. Nor can this label be put on the whole Pandit population, for they too were more drawn into the political activism by the class interests, and not necessarily by religion.

Although as already mentioned previously, the government keeping in view the growing mass unrest tried to divide the communities on religious lines by hurting the religious sentiments of the one community against the other. This is one of the problems in studying the freedom struggle of Jammu and Kashmir and a chain of scholars often label the movement as an outburst of the religious fanaticism, which is not the case. In fact, the future vision as well as the actual practice of the national movement, was clearly democratic; it was consciously anti-monarchial, anti-authoritarian, and anti-totalitarian. In fact, a basic critique of the Dogra regime made by the Muslim leadership was that it was not democratic, it didn’t base itself on fully representative institutions, and it curbed civil liberties and the freedom of the press and the like.

The period between from, 13 July 1931 up to September 1931 can be characterized as the first phase of the freedom movement. The successful termination of the short-term movement which resulted in the release of its leaders gave a great flip to the activities of the people of Kashmir. It strengthened the movement against the despotic nature of the Dogra regime. The representatives chosen some days before the 13 th July became the confirmed and recognized leaders of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. 144

During the period of 1931, the leaders of the national fame from British India visited Kashmir and expressed their solidarity with the people of Kashmir. 145 This produced a sobering effect on both sides and through the intervention of Syed Sir Newab Mehr Ali Shah, a moderate Muslim politician of some standing in British India, an understanding was arrived at between the Dogra Darbar and the representatives of the

144 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 149. 145 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 143. 155 people of Kashmir. On 26 th of August a temporary truce was signed. According to the terms of the truce the leadership was obliged to stop the all political activities, it was undertaken that the Muslims would remain loyal to His Highness, that they would not be affected by the outside influence and would present their legitimate demands in due course of time to the maharaja. 146 But the signing of the truce created a great stir among the people against the representatives. It exposed the lack of political foresight among the signatories of the truce. From its nature it became clear to the people that the truce was more in favour of the government than in the interests of the people. By giving an undertaking the leaders put themselves under political bondage.147

The people’s repose upset the leaders . While explaining their position, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and Moulvi Mohammad Yusuf Shah swore on the Quran that they wouldn’t betray the nation, Sheikh while pleading that he held the nation dearer than his own life said, ‘the government asked for two months to consider our demands. If during this period the government practised deception we shall not sit quiet, nor shall we let the government feel comfortable. You see it very soon that our sacrifice for the nation will puzzle the government of Kashmir, the government of British India and the entire world’. 148

The Kashmir Pandit community was at same time exhibiting a hostile political behaviour towards the Muslim leadership in their public meetings. They had grown hostile against the government and blamed the latter for having made the truce with the Muslims without their consent and cursed the maharaja and his administration. The Pandits, who considered themselves secular nationalists, didn’t even appreciate the statement of Dr. Mohammad Alam, a reputed C ongressite, ‘that the demands of the Kashmiri Muslims were of national character’. 149

However, it was against the environment which the truce created that the leaders again made the bold statements and defied the condition of truce which in no way benefited the masses. According to Prem Na th Bazaz, ‘But one might ask; what was there

146 Ibid. 147 Ibid. 148 Al-Fazal , (Qadian), December, 8, 1931, p. 4. 149 Al-Fazal , September, 10, 1931, p. 1. 156 in the terms of the truce which benefited so much so that they responded to the call again so readily? The truth is that the masses had once risen in revolt owing to grinding poverty and hunger. They wanted to end the regime that was the cause of their economic backwardness’. 150 Commenting on the inefficient political foresight of the leadership at the time of the truce Bazaz is of the opinion that the leadership couldn’t derive the best advantage of the situation and utilize this gigantic force for higher purpose. The leaders, while playing the historic role of leading the masses, couldn’t realize that importance of their charge and toyed with it. An enormous force which could have changed the very complexion of the government of Kashmir was allowed to fritter away. The leaders reduced the movement for securing a few demands, which they were bound to alter keeping in view the growing mass unrest. 151

The growing mass unrest led the breakage of the truce on September 21st 1931, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah was arrested on the ground that, ‘before and after the truce he broke the understanding by making political speeches in mosques under cloak of religious exhortations’. 152 In the meanwhile various incidents followed like the huge mass gatherings and strikes followed the arrest of Sheikh. On September 22, twenty two thousand people assembled in the Jama Masjid for a meeting. 153 The government responded with repression which led to the killing of four persons and about thirty got injured. 154

The significance of the events of 1931 lies in the fact that they marked the entry of new political developments in Kashmir. The 24 September of 1931, was another important day in the history of Kashmir. On this day the masses in spite of their leaders behind the bars made an attempt of armed struggle against the state. Sources point out that not a single non-Muslim was harmed by the Muslim mob. In the absence of the leaders again they proved that the struggle was political and non-communal in nature and directed entirely against the ruling structure. 155 To substantiate the argument that the

150 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 145. 151 Ibid., pp. 145-6. 152 Foreign Department, File No. 12-C/131, September, 28, 1931, NAI. 153 Home and Political Secret, File No. 423 (2) of 193, NAI. 154 Ibid. 155 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 148. 157 nature of the movement was nationalistic in character not against any community, Mahatma Gandhi once said, ‘what can be the meaning of communalism in the stat e which is overwhelmingly one population according to religion? What can communalism mean in, say, Kashmir or the frontier, where the population is predominately one faith?’ 156 R. P. Dutt states that ‘where communal strife has since been reported from Indian states in certain cases, as in Kashmir in 1931-32, this has commonly been a mis- description of an entirely different struggle unconnected with communal questions; thus in Kashmir the issue was that of a popular rising of a four fifths Muslim population against a ruler who happened to be Hindu; this was misreported as a communal rising, although the British press was compelled to admit that ‘paradoxical position’ of ‘a ‘communal rebellion in which not a single Hindu has been killed.’ 157

The September event widened the mass base of the movement, in which there is evidence that thousands came from the countryside with all kinds of crude weapons to participate in these demonstrations. It was a protest simultaneously against the selfish, bourgeoisie leadership against truce. 158 To control the movement from further expansion the Dogra Darbar acted severely and a monstrous ordinance framed on the lines of ordinance promulgated for the Burma rebellion some years ago, became the permanent law of the state. 159 What further complicated the situation by October 1931 for both the British and the Dogra government was the emergence of yet another Punjab based group known as the Majlis-i-Ahrar-i-Islam (commonly known as Ahrars). The party was founded in Lahore, and reflected a unique blend of religion and politics in the multi- cultural province of Punjab. Their movement had a distinctly urban, middle class character in stark contrast to the landowner dominated All India Kashmir committee founded by the Ahmadiya sect. 160

156 Harijan, September, 17th 1938. 157 R. Palme Dutt, India Today , p. 455. 158 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 150. 159 J.L. Nehru, The Unity of India Collected Writings (1937-1940), New York, 1942, p. 37-8. The Notification No.19-L, originally issued on September 24 th 1931, to direct the course of Martial Law in Srinagar and other places. It was withdrawn on October 5, 1931, and promulgated again on June 1 st 1933. Hundreds of arrests were made under this notification during the first two Civil Disobedience agitations and during 1938. 160 The Times of India , September, 5, 1931. 158

The Ahrars were composed of anti-British urban Muslims and reformist members of the Muslim religious section with links to the Indian National congress. The plight of the Kashmiri Muslims under a Hindu ruler supported by the colonial government became the focal point of their propaganda. 161 The Ahrars having broken with the congress over separate electorates for Muslims, the Ahrars didn’t wish to be seen as drifting into the conservative circle of the Muslim League. Like their former partners in agitation they were self-styled revolutionaries opposed to the presence of the British and to the traditional rule of landlords and princes. In taking up the cause of Kashmiri Muslims, the Ahrars were able to pose not only as defenders of Islam, but as the patrons of the weak and the oppressed. 162

The presence and role of the All India Kashmir Committee rival to the Ahrars in Kashmir after the 1931 represented everything that was an anthem to the Ahrars; they were determined to discredit it by usurping its role as the cha mpion of the people’s movement in Kashmir. 163 On 12 July 1931, the Ahrars demanded an independent investigation into the conditions of Muslims in Kashmir. 164 At the same time the All India Kashmir Committee too called for an enquiry by the government of India into the uprising of 13 July, determined the observance of 14 August as ‘Kashmir Day’ and went so far as to suggest a review by the British parliament of the 1846 Amritsar Treaty. 165

In the mid-August 1931, Mazhar Ali was dispatched to Sialkot to recruit the volunteers for a jathabandi (non-violent protest march) in to Kashmir. 166 By early October 1931 some 2,000 jathadars , red shirted in imitation of Abdul Gaffar Khan’s of NWFP, entered Kashmir where they were immediately detained by Darbar police. 167 As their entry began to grew, as the stream of volunteers kept flowing they were arrested and taken back to Sialkot, and the authorities were forced to reconsider 168

161 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 262. 162 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, p. 238. 163 Ibid. 164 Tribune , 14 July, 191, p. 8. 165 Ibid., 29 July 1931, pp. 7-8. 166 The Times of India , September 5, 1931. 167 Ibid., October 6, 1931. 168 Ibid. 159

However, what made their entry much important and effective in Kashmir was that they had gained symp athetic adherents with in the state. While Jammu’s Muslim cultivators had welcomed the Ahrar Jathas, the Ahmadiyas and Sheikh Abdullah were locked into their own mutually supportive alliance. 169 The Ahrar’s Jaths mobilizational activities in the Jammu province provoked months of violent attacks that racked the tehsils of Mirpur, Rajouri, Kotli, and Seri between 1931-1934. Largely a rural revolt, Muslim cultivators directed their wrath against Hindu revenue officials, land owners and moneylenders and engaged in no revenue campaigns. In reaction the state took the ‘unfortunate decision in January 1932 of extracting revenue forcibly in Mirpur tehsil by sending out its collectors under armed escort. 170 According to Prem Nath Bazaz, ‘nearly 4500 Jathas Volunteers entered the state boundaries in the month of October. Encouraged by their presence, Jammu Muslims intensified the pace of political demonstrations.’ The situation grew too difficult for the maha raja’s government to handle on its own and so the state was compelled to call in British troops. 171

However, the arrival of the British troops didn’t prove an ultimate solution to the mass upsurge, instead the events swiftly moved to a climax. Inspired by the example of the Ahrars, Muslims in the border region of Jammu and Mirpur began to take out their Jathas of their own, while in Jammu city huge crowds occupied the streets and threatened to launch Civil Disobedience. 172 Oppressed, indebted and grindingly poor, the Muslim peasants of Jammu were ripe for mobilization and they listened attentively to the speeches of the Ahrars. They began to organize and to hit back. On 10, January 1932, villagers from a hamlet near Mirpur ambushed a party of Amils (revenue collectors) and forced them to flee. 173 The Sahukars (moneylenders) in Mirpur were rich. For a long time in the past they ha[d] been bleeding the poor peasants by extorting their hard earned pennies in the shape of interest on imaginary or genuine debts. Even after having 300%

169 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 263. 170 Ibid., p. 264. 171 The Times of India , November 4, 1931. 172 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, p. 241. 173 Ibid., p. 242. 160 interest the loan still remain[ed] intact and [was] never written off. A large number of peasants [were] born in debt, remain in debt all their lives and [died] in debt. 174

The preaching of Civil Disobedience and defiance of authority produced a hatred for the Dogra government. Almost all the Sahukars were Hindus. Therefore, all Hindus were perceived as enemies by the Muslim peasantry, of Mirpur.175 Most of the land was acquired by Hindu Sahukars, traders and some by larger landowner and the rest by officials, some of whom were not even residents of the state. 176 These Sahukars faced the brunt of the peasantry when the whole villages and the property of these moneylenders was burnt down by the peasants and the entire buildings razed to the ground in the greater part of the tehsils of Mirpur, Kotli and Rajouri. Economic and religious factors, played equal parts and for the first time being it was difficult to separate them. 177 It is also important to mention that in areas where some Muslim were known to be moneylenders, their houses too were looted, so proving that the strained financial relations between the agriculturists and moneylenders as one of the main causes of revolt. Although the Ahrar agitation in Kashmir soon dwindled from the lack of the support and factionalism it certainly jolted the Dogras and the colonial government, since the Ahrars refused to give up their stance as ‘savio urs of Kashmir’. 178

To control the situation from further deterioration the British govt. directly interfered in the internal affairs of the state. On 25 th September following a summit conference at Viceregal lodge, Watson (Political Secretary) called on the maharaja to get rid of Hari Kishen Koul (the Prime Minister) and to accept the services of a senior political officer, Sir Bertand Glancy to head an enquiry into the grievances of the Muslims. 179 Prior to the direct British intervention the Maharaja, keeping in view the growing pace of the movement and that it could not be suppressed, announced a general amnesty. He also proclaimed that ‘if any section of his subjects desired to submit its

174 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 163. 175 Ibid. 176 Note by Settlement Commissioner, J&K State, OER, dated 1 st April 1915, File No. 273/H-79, JKA-J. 177 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 163. 178 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , pp. 220-21. 179 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, p. 242. 161 reasonable demands they would receive his sympathetic consideration’. 180 Following the announcement several memorials were submitted by different communities. It will not be out of place to discuss briefly the contents of some of these;

The memorial submitted by the Muslims was an elaborate document and the demands contained in it were of national character. 181 The memorial outlined a constitution and a number of fundamental rights. Some of these were: Freedom of Assembly, Freedom of speech, Freedom of press, perfect equality of rights and equality of treatment for all state subjects in all respects. An attempt was made in this memorial even to visualize the constitution and according to it, ‘every citizen of the state should be eligible for election to the Assembly irrespective of his creed or nationality’. Added to this there was demand for the increase of Muslim representation in the services, since until then the disparity between their percentage in population and representation in services was enormous. 182

The memorial submitted by Kashmiri Pandits endorsed too the demand for a representative Assembly. The memorial stated that, ‘they we re as anxious as any other community for the introduction of constitutional government and they were equally anxious that the body politic be not corrupted by the canker of communalism’. The Rajput memorial didn’t relate to any constitutional problem at al l. 183 In these memorials it is evident that none of the communities preferred to play the communal card at this point of time.

Subsequently, on 12 th November 1931, Glancy Commission was appointed which consisted of four non-official members headed by Bertrand Glancy, a senior member of the Indian political service, to make out a case for reform. 184 Importantly the commission had not invited complaints from individuals but from representatives of the only recognized entities in the state. The function of the com mission was to ‘enquire into and

180 Kashmir, by General Secretary, All India State People’s Conference. Bombay, January 1939, p. 7. 181 Ibid., p. 8. 182 Ibid. 183 Ibid. 184 Glancy Commission Report , p. 1. The four non-official members were Prem Nath Bazaz, one non-Muslim member from Kashmir province and G.A. Ashai, one Muslim and Lok Nath Sharma, one Hindu from the Jammu province, and Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, one Muslim from Jammu, each nominated by their respective communities. 162 report on the various complaints of a religious and a general nature, already submitted to his Highness government and also such complaints as might be directly laid before the commission’. 185

The report of the commission when it finally appeared in March 1932 satisfied nobody. But the recommendations of the commission confirmed the fact that the Muslims had real grievances. 186 Its recommendations included ‘complete religious liberty; an expansion of primary schools, recruitment of additional Muslim teachers, a clear recognition by the Darbar on the occupancy rights of the land, the abolition of Malikana (dues paid to zamindars) and kacchari (grazing tax), and the appointment of a franchise commission to draw up a scheme of representative government, abolition of begar and promotion of industries, grant of freedom of press and platform. 187

The recommendation offended the Darbar and its Hindu supporters. The organization of the Kashmiri Pandits Sanatana Dharma Young Men’s Association , founded in 1925 for religious purpose but actively engaged in politics from 1931, termed it a challenge to minorities and sacrifices of their interests at the altar of the majority community, and started what is popularly known as ‘Roti Agitation’ as protest against the recommendation of the commission. 188 On the other hand, the Muslim members of the commission, G.A. Ashai and Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas decline to sign the final report and appended a joint note of dissent calling for proportional representation in the public service within ten years. 189

Prior to the publication of the report in January 1932 Sheikh Abdullah was arrested for a minor ‘breach of peace ’ under the provisions of the notification 19-L and sentenced to six months imprisonment. 190 His arrest gave birth to mass arrest, but soon after the publication of the report Sheikh was released. As argued by Ian Copland, ‘it was different Shiekh who emerged from jail in 1932. Tempered by his confinement, angered

185 Ibid. 186 OER, File No. 225, p. 3, 1933, JKA-J. 187 For more details see, Glancy Commission Report , pp. 50-53. 188 ‘Mehendra Singh’s (General Secretary Hindu Yuvak Sabha Jammu), Letter to Prime Minister’ April 21, 1932, Political Department, File No.306/p-s/124/1932, JKA-J. 189 Glancy commission Report, pp. 56-58. Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p. 113. 190 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 164. 163 by Colonel Colvin’s (P.M . of the Maharaja) refusal to let him testify before the Glancy Commission and disillusioned-like everyone else in the Muslim camp by the conservative tone of Glancy Commission Report, the Shiekh now proceeded to release his considerable potential as a political leader’. 191

II

5.3. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, National Conference and Kashmir —A Transitional Phase

Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah about whom mention has been made previously was a master political strategist who dominated the political scene of Kashmir for five decades. ‘Kashmir’s struggle, for freedom, the mass awakening in Kashmir under the leadership of Sheikh are synonymous, coeval and concomitant. In fact, the political uprising in the state has been the outcome of the untiring efforts of this giant patriot, who relinquished state services and plunged into the uncharted sea of public life with firm determination and terrific zeal and gathered the afflicted and tormented people under one banner, with the aim of putting an end to the oppressive regime and establishing democratic popular government in the state.’ 192

The people of Kashmir, who were groaning under iron heels of a top heavy and despotic administration, found in the Sheikh Abdullah their friend, philosopher and guide. Not only did they give a healthy response to the clarion call of their leaders but they pledged to suffer and sacrifice everything for the cause of freedom and to follow the leadership of Sheikh Abdullah with unflinching faith and tenacity of purpose. 193

Sheikh’s strategy was twofold : first to unify the movement, and to consolidate his hold over the people of Kashmir. In June 1932, at the first instance he led a demonstration in honor of Kashmir Martyrs Day. In October Shiekh hosted the stat e’s first ever political Conference 194 …as per the recommendations of the Glancy

191 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir , p. 246. 192 ‘Abstract from the newspaper, published in the issue, dated 4 th September 1948 of the Blitz an English Bi- Weekly of Bombay’, File, No. 8(14) -k/48. 1948, New Delhi, NAI. 193 Ibid. 194 Ian Copland, Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir , p. 246. 164

Commission, which also urged that minimal freedom of press and public expression should be tolerated. Some limited halted action on the Glancy Commission’s pr oposals was undertaken in the fo llowing years. But through the 1930’s and 1940’s it became increasingly clear that the autocratic regime couldn’t be reformed to the extent demanded by an increasingly mobilized, politically conscious people. 195

To give a flying start to his first ever political endeavor for people of Jammu and Kashmir, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah with the support of his comrades laid the foundation of the first known full-fledged political organization of Jammu and Kashmir known as the All Jammu and Muslim Conference in October 1932 (the name of the same organization was changed in 1939 as All Jammu and National Conference) with himself as its first President. Its principal leaders were Sheikh Abdullah from the valley and Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas from the Jammu region besides Mirwaiz and others.196 The aim of the conference was to direct the nascent but growing political movement to its logical end of social and political change. Though, theoretically the Muslim Conference was a political party aimed at safeguarding the interests of the Muslim community alone, yet the policy of the Muslim conference as enunciated by its several presidents from time to time, has been national in essence. 197

In his first presidential address the elect president Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah laid down in unmistakable terms the following:198

‘I consider it necessary to make our position clear at the very outset with regard to our movement, it is not communal nor it is directed against any particular community, to assure my Hindu and Sikh brethren that we will endeavor to put an end to their miseries and troubles just as we will do it for Muslims, our country’s progress is impossible so long we don’t establish amicable relations between the different communities. This is possible only when each community learns to appreciate the like view point of other communities. He called on Kashmiri Muslims to unite, gain education and be prepared to serve notice to the

195 Sumantra Bose, Kashmir Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace , Harvard, 2003, p. 20. 196 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p. 121. 197 For a detailed nature of its Presidential addresses see, Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims, 1931-1939: Selected Documents, Pakistan, 1985. 198 Ibid., pp. 220-32. 165

government as well to participate in Assembly elections as soon as they called. Sheikh recalled the past glory of Kashmiris, which was lost when they became the slaves of non-Kashmiris. While appreciating the Glancy Commission’s recommendations he bitterly criticized its non-implementation by the administration and demanded withdrawal of ordinances in the Mirpur along with the freedom of the press and use of the political platform. Elaborating, he critiqued the setup of the proposed constitutional Assembly and demanded restoration of the people’.

Though hampered by various difficulties including the reactionary propaganda of clergy class and the communal frenzy that prevailed at that time, Abdullah, by dint of his immense sincerity and devotion to the masses, brought out an organization and discipline in the movement which soon made him beloved of the people and their leader in the fight against the forces of exploitation and reaction. 199

The food control policy of the Dogra Darbar was in deteriorating condition since the summer of 1931, when the rice crop was ‘exiguous than usual’ due to various reasons like floods and the disastrous effects of the crop disease called rai . In conditions of scarcity, the famished sections of the city’s population had been finding it increasingly difficult to obtain their staple at an affordable rate. In the rural areas the zamindars were not ready to sell their produce, wishing to hold as much of their produce as possible. This caused a dramatic rise in the prices which pushed the situation from bad to worse. Though, the harvest season of 1932 was better than the 1931, the Darbar’s decision to import grains from British India signaled a sudden downswing in prices, which caused a great loss to the cultivators, with the result that between 1931-32 both the poor segments of the city and the poverty stricken peasantry had a cause for discontent. In this, the leadership of the Muslim conference found fertile ground for further mass mobilization. 200

As discussed in the preceding pages, the disastrous impact of the economic depression of 1929 on the non-agrarian sector of Kashmir created a congenial atmosphere for Sheikh to garner the support of the effected classes like shawl and carpet weavers and

199 All India State People’s Conferenc e, Kashmir, p. 10. 200 Anant Ram, Census of India 1931, Vol. XXIV, Jammu and Kashmir State, part 1 , pp. 123-5. 166 paper machie workers. Labour unrest in the silk factory in Srinagar, brewing on and off since 1924, provided the leadership with another constituency of supporters. In a lengthy note presented in 1932, Sheikh elaborated on the problems faced by the people in the context of the collapse of the silk trade. 201 Abdullah alleged that the precarious conditions of the silk factory, in Srinagar in the recent times has been partly due to the trade depression and mostly due to the irresponsibility of its managers. According to sheikh the impoverished conditions of the silk factory workers was made worse by the irresponsible behavior of the Pandit dominated managerial staff. The latter were accused of embezzlement, with holding the pay of labourers to ensure a captive workforce; the displacement of large number of workers rendering them jobless in the harsh years of depression, the non-payment to others. Encouraged by Sheikh Abdullah, the workers at the silk factory adopted belligerent attitude both against the managerial staff as well as against the Darbar, which provided an opportunity to carve out a space for himself as well as to force the government to put an end to the growing economic discontent. 202

In the chapter three, the post settlement scenario has been discussed; a period which saw the emergence of a body of landless labourers. Forced labour had reduced the Kashmiri cultivator to no control of his own labour; added to this were the rising agrarian indebtedness, and the crushing revenue demand that continued to be extracted by the revenue department. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah criticized the govt.’s anti -cultivator policy because the prevailing rate of revenue in Kashmir was more than the prevailing revenue rate in Punjab. During Sheikh’s visit to Mirpur the peasants of Bhimber the frontiers of which are contiguous with Punjab. Some of the inhabitants of the Bhimber were holding the land holdings in both Punjab and Bhimber. 203 The Punjab government was providing every facility of irrigation to the peasants but the peasants of Kashmir were both without protection and irrigation facilities and there was much difference between the revenue rates of the Jammu province and Kashmir. The revenue rate of Kashmir according to Sheikh was higher than the revenue rate of Jammu. 204

201 ‘Labour Unrest in Srinagar ’, Political Department, 1932, File No.2/3, JKA -J. 202 Political Department, File No.216/P.S-250, May 1936, JKA-J. 203 Mirza Shafi, (eds), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims, 1931-1939, p. 423. 204 Ibid. 167

Throughout 1930’s and the 1940’s , Sheikh in collaboration with his comrades Mirza Afzal Beg and Bakshi Ghulam Muhammad, seemed to be weariless, listening to the complaints of the peasants, drawing petitions on their behalf and turning the Muslim conference most powerful representative voice of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. On behalf of the cultivators demands were made by Abdullah, for responsible government, a reduction in land revenue by 50% and correction of the usurious rates at which money was lent. Abdullah adopted socialist symbols and rhetoric, and even desired a flag for his party, coloured red imprinted with a white plough. 205

A further Depiction of the state of the landless labourers and the creation of the ground for secular protest is found in the poetry of Ghulam Ahmad Mahjoor (1887- 1925), a well-known poet of Kashmir. Mahjoor, through his poems, proved an inspiration for Shiekh Abdullah, 206 Mahjoor through his poems sung out the condition of the downtrodden and stressed on them to come out of their centuries old slumber and tried to inspired them to fight for their rights. Conscious of the urgent need for progress and unity, he gave a new and cheerful call for material and cultural regeneration. His poems came as a spontaneous expression of change and were imbued with revolutionary zeal and a high sense of patriotic fervor. During the period of the thirties he has most genuinely presented the throbs of the ordinary man bent under social and political injustice. At the same time he has held to him the promise of rosy dawn. 207

Portraying the sad plight of the landless peasantry Mahjoor writes, 208 ‘My grandfather’s life, property were mortgaged for a mere penny, The loan that I toiled all my life to repay, is still unclear, Even after yearlong toil I am left starved, Usurers, goldsmiths gobble up all my earnings, After day long toil, I have to contend with the half meal, The master does out…Alas! He realized my sad plight.’

205 ‘Resolution of Muslim, General Records, File No.134/D -4, 1940,JKA-J. 206 Ajit Bhattacharjea, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah: Tragic Hero of Kashmir , New Delhi, 2008, p. 40. 207 Mahjoor, Poems of Mahjoor, Tr. T.N. Kaul, New Delhi, 1988, p. 26. 208 Ibid. 168

Mahjoor goaded the people on to action, urged them to work out their own salvation and be ready to face hardships that might befall them. How progressive he was in his outlook can be judged from the following verse, 209

Who will fre e you, o ‘bulbul’ While you bewail in the cage? With your own hands, work out, Your own salvation, If you must awaken this rosy, Habitat, give up harp, Bring about earthquakes and thunder, raise tempest.

Therefore, in late 1930’s the Kashmiri Muslim leadership began the gradual articulation of the agenda and discourse of the movement in clearly national terms, one that addressed the issue of the Kashmiri nation as a whole. Socialist ideals, which had the potential to unite people of different religious affiliations under a single political and economic programme, became the basis of the movement. More significantly still, the concept kashmiriyat, with its emphasis on a united, syncretic Kashmiri cultural identity, came to inform the political discourse of the period. 210 More significantly the social significance of the emerging leadership lay not only in the interpretation it provided of the Kashmiri past and present or the contribution made to the literary and cultural traditions but above all in the fact that it made this knowledge a wide popular consciousness. The spread of nationalist consciousness in this way ultimately helped in the emergence of a composite Kashmiri culture without any emphasis on Muslim sectarianism. Thus, by 1939, every conscious of Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh community joined the national movement. 211

The second annual session of the Muslim Conference was held in December 1933 at Mirpur, a town in Jammu province, Sheikh Abdullah being again elected the president. Besides stressing on the non-communal nature of the movement, Sheikh embraced the demands of all sections of the people evident from the fallowing extracts: 212

209 Mahjoor, Kuliyat-e-Mehjoor , p. 53. 210 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 244-5. 211 Prakash Chandra, The National Question in Kashmir , p. 43. 212 Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims, p. 291-305. 169

‘It gives me immense pain to see the rights of the people being smashed indiscriminately. If the movement were to concede to the people of the state what they had cruelly, it is bound to do good to Hindus and Sikhs as much as to the Muslims. The achievements of the Muslim conference so far have benefited all communities equally. The freedom of press and platform…and other co ncession have not been wrested from any particular community but from the unwilling hands of the Darbar itself and have been distributed equally among all. Abdullah also in his address discussed the state of the jagir lands, traders and other working class people . The government’s in sympathetic attitude has thrown these classes out of gear.’

In the meanwhile the Darbar announced that an Assembly would be convened early in 1934, on the basis of the recommendations of the Franchise Committee. Not surprisingly, the entrenchment of autocracy and the corresponding lack of political freedom were reflected in the fact that up to 1934 Kashmir lacked the most rudimentary form of legislature wherein grievances could be voiced. The word of maharaja was law and any effort to question such authority could be, and was, treated as sedition. 213 Hence the announced state Assembly was to be known as Praja Sabha (the subject’s Assembly). In the Assembly there were thirty three elected seats out of total of seventy five, of which twenty one were reserved for Muslims while ten for Hindus and two for Sikhs. The rest forty two were to be nominated by the Maharaja and all ultimate powers were reserved to the maharaja. 214

The use of communal constituencies, a highly restricted electorate (as little as 3% of the total adult population as has been estimated by some observers), and by no means impartial system of security of nominations and the presence of nominated and appointed members (who were in majority in the 1934 constitution), combined to produce a far from perfectly democratic arrangement. 215 The Franchise was restricted to village and district headmen, priests, managers of religious property, holders of titles, those who paid rupees twenty either as land revenue or municipal tax or rupees sixty as rent, those who owned a house worth rupees six hundred or more. Medical practioners, pensioned

213 Michael Breacher, The Struggle for Kashmir , Oxford, 1953, p. 8. 214 R.G. Wrefoord, Census of India, 1941, Vol. XXII, Jammu and Kashmir , p. 5. 215 Lamb, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy , p. 92. 170 officers, and those who had passed the middle school examination or its equivalent. Women in general were excluded except for those with the required educational qualification. It was intended to enfranchise about 10% of the adult population, but in practice this franchise gave the vote to 3% or less. 216

Thus, in the proposed Assembly the recommendations for an elected majority was replaced by an official majority and its powers of legislation were greatly reduced. It adopted the conclusions reached by the Franchise committee which embodied the creation of narrow electorate possessing property and educational qualifications. As compared to this the minimum qualification for the Franchise, in the Travancore state Assembly was the payment of rupees one as land revenue, and the payment of municipal or income tax irrespective of the amount paid. 217 Instead of boycotting the limited electorate the leadership, despite realizing that the Praja Sabha was a powerless body, they decided that by contesting the elections and wining seats, the Muslim Conference could demonstrate its popularity in the state and use the Sabha as a forum to propagate its ideology of nationalism. In the 1934 elections to the Praja Sabha, the Muslim Conference won all the twenty one seats of the Assembly earmarked for Muslim community. 218

However, the leadership took a strong note of these changes on the ground that Franchise committee had no business to alter the recommendation of Sir B.J. Glancy and to undo his work in this direction. Voicing the feelings of the people of Jammu and Kashmir, Abdullah issued the following statement on Jan. 29, 1934: 219

‘The people of this country didn’t spi ll their blood for such a mock show. It was an extremely disheartening document; no community will get benefit from it. Sir B.J Glancy, though not agreeing with the legitimate aspirations of the Muslims had recommended majority in the proposed Assembly in unambiguous terms. It was no business of the Franchise committee to turn down this recommendation. What hopes can the people of this country have in this kind of Representative

216 Wreford, Census of India, 1941, Vol.XXII, Jammu and Kashmir , p. 5. 217 Kashmir, All India State People’s Conference, p. 12. 218 Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah , Flames of Chinar , p. 192. 219 ‘Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah’s Report on Franchise Committee’, Mirza Shafi, (eds), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims , p. 311-7. 171

Assembly where the dead weight of the official and nominated majority will always be ready to crush the popular voice’?

Criticism of a similar nature on the proposals of the Franchise committee was voiced by almost all the political bodies within the state. The government treated this criticism and the original recommendations of Sir B.J. Glancy with scant respect. Recurrent attempts by the elected representatives to persuade the government to accelerate the process of reforms failed. Thus, in 1936, they resigned from the Assembly. According to P.N. Bazaz, ‘Astonishment descended upon an un -expectant outside world when it read in the newspapers in autumn 1936 that the entire block of the elected members with the solitary exception of one Hindu member walked out of the Kashmir Assembly as a protest against the unsympathetic attitude which was persistently maintained by the government towards the public demand s’. The Tribune of Lahore wrote: 220

‘From the events that have happe ned in the Assembly during the last few days it is evident that there is a general awakening in the state and that the people can no longer be satisfied with the toy legislature, though it may be given the grand eloquent name of Praja Sabha’

The Muslim Conference not only fought for responsible government but also attempted to bring other communities in its fold. In view of the un representative nature of the constituted Assembly, the leadership under the supervision Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas the sent a memorial to the government on 15 th February 1934, in which they observed that, ‘the demand of the people was for full responsible government’ as unless there is a ministry responsible to the country no recommendations are carried.’ The government replied ver y curtly that, ‘it was not prepared to discuss constitutional reforms.’ Chaudhary Abbas, therefore, decided upon an immediate programme of civil disobedience. 221 The leaders stressed that the hour had come for all sections of the people to combine against the encroachment of the government on their democratic rights. Responsible government and self-government couldn’t be the monopoly nor the aspiration of Muslims only but of the entire people. Attempts to rally up all sections of

220 OER, File No. 152/A-7 Bloc E, 1936, JKA-J; Bazaz, Inside Kashmir , pp. 190-91. 221 Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, Kashmakash , p.124. 172 people all shades of opinion under one banner were made by calling a meeting of all people of any political standing. As also before starting the civil disobedience movement, the leaders of the Muslim conference, notably S.M Abdullah, issued the following appeal to the minorities: 222

‘L et me hasten to say a few words to my non-Muslim countrymen. The poor Kashmiri Muslims has since the commencement of this battle of liberation of motherland fallen a prey to a vicious propaganda which has sedulously carried on by interested parties in different parts of India. Time has now approached when we should shed all fear and distrust of each other and bridge the gulf which has unfortunately separated us. The past three years must have shown to you that however, hard you may cry the demands of Muslims, so far as they are legitimate, have become irresistible, and no force on earth can with stand their rising tide of democracy that has actuated their mind. So whether you will or not, Kashmir will in years to come have a constitution while make it incumbent upon our rulers to part with the autocratic power and transfer more share of administration in the hands of common people and masses. The spirit of the age demands it. Would it not be better, therefore, in your own interest and in the interests of the country at large if instead of standing as a stumbling block in the way of liberators of the motherland as you have mostly done so far, you were good and kind enough to stand shoulder to shoulder with your Muslim breathen? Speaking for myself this is an appeal that I would make to you from the depths of my heart as well as a well-wisher of your country as well as mine. Speaking for the Muslims I may assure you that they are prepared to give you the same safeguards, weightages, and all that is necessary in the constitution for minorities, that the Indian National Congress is prepared to give the Muslims of British India and other minority communities. Perhaps we should be more liberal. Let the dead past bury its dead. The Assembly proposed by the Franchise committee is an ill wind that blows no body good. So, if the Muslim and not theoretical gushes out of you. And that means a reply in the shape of counter statements but a real change of hearts’.

222 Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims , pp. 316-7. 173

Sheikh’s declaration of Kashmir as motherland was a quite new turn in Kashmir politics far above from assigned label of communalism. In its weekly issue Hamdard 223 articulated the nascent national ideology of mid 1930’s . Kashmir attained the status of mother nation and its inhabitants became the children of Kashyap Rishi. The newspaper contended that the formation of Responsible government in the state rested on the coming together of Hindus and Muslims under one flag since they were the two sons of the mother nation. 224

It was early in 1935, Sheikh Abdullah and Prem Nath Bazaz (1905-84), the Ex- non-official member of the Glancy commission from the Kashmir. Bazaz the left leaning pandit jointly started an Urdu newspaper called the Hamdard as a ‘standard bearer of democracy and unity of all Kashmiris without any considerati on of caste or creed.’ 225 It was to revive the tolerant spirit characteristic of Kashmir culture and to espouse the cause of secularism and social democracy in the state. 226 Hamdard was a weekly Urdu newspaper. The opening ceremony was performed by, Dr. Saif-ud-din Kitchlew, respected congress veteran of the Punjab. This might be called the dawn of nationalism in Kashmir, an early sign of which was the united demonstration staged by the legislative members of the Assembly. 227

Abdullah’s efforts to garner the sup port of all communities for a common platform assumed a new direction from 1935 onwards. Abdullah and Bazaz extended a joint invitation to Jawaharlal Nehru to visit Kashmir in 1936 in an effort to boost their attempts at establishing a joint Hindu Muslim National front in politics. Although, Nehru declined, Abdullah had the opportunity to meet him in the NWFP the following year, a meeting that so impressed Abdullah that he in unambiguous terms expounded his faith on nationalism. In an exclusive interview to press representative at Lahore Sheikh observed, ‘communalism in the state owes its origin to the false propaganda of the communalist leaders of the Punjab. I desire that those self-made guardians should no longer interfere in

223 Hamdard was an Urdu weekly published jointly by Abdullah and Bazaz from 1935 onwards. It was the first newspaper of its kind in the Valley which was started on the basis of Hindu-Muslim collaboration. 224 Hamdard , Srinagar, May 9, 1936, JKA-J. 225 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 160. 226 P.N. Bazaz , Kashmir in Crucible , Srinagar, 2005, p. 32. 227 Ibid. 174 our internal affairs. It shall be earnest endeavor henceforth to shape the political movement in the state expressly on the principles of the Indian National Congress. Let us all rise above petty communalism bickering’s and work jointly for the welfare of the masses. I appeal to my Hindu breathen not to entertain imaginary fears and doubts. Let me assure that their rights shall not be jeopardized if they join hands with the Muslims’. 228 Acc ording to Chitralekha Zutshi, ‘S heikh Mohammad Abdullah true to his word remained pro Congress in ideology and politics for the remainder of his political career in pre 1947 Kashmir. An important, consideration in Abdullah’s decision to orient himself, with the congress’s increasingly leftist leanings on so cial and political issues, were similar to the socialist ideals being propounded by the Muslim conference for Kashmir at this time’. 229

Kashmir leadership observed the Responsible Government Day all over the state in 1936 for the first time. A fresh appeal from Abdullah to non-Muslims brought to his side numerous Hindus and Sikhs who freely joined the processions and meetings. Thousands of peasants and labourers attained the meetings. A wave of mass awakening spread from one corner of the state to the other. 230 The fifth session of the Muslim Conference was held at Poonch in 1937 which was again presided by Abdullah. In his presidential remarks he declared that they had ‘demanded responsible Assembly and independent administration. From the beginning of the freedom the demand for a better constitution had not remained the demand of Muslim dominated areas of the state alone, but the other communities had also joined live life of penury alone but all those who live in the state’. 231

In 1938, Muslim Conference issued a manifesto known as the ‘National Demand’ with a view to demonstrate and acquaint the people of J&K, with their basic objectives of the movement, the acquisition of elementary rights, and basic rights of citizenship

228 Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims , pp. 454-5. 229 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 250. 230 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , p. 162. 231 Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims , p. 452. 175 through a progressive form of government that would be responsible to the people. 232 In the preamble of the manifesto the following declaration was made: 233

‘The background of the movement is the appaling poverty of the masses of Kashmir, and the growth of unemployment among the educated classes. Thousands of Kashmiri peasants and labourers have to leave their homes, in winter, to earn a meager living in far off places. The land revenue demand of the government is exorbitant and the urban population is crushed under the heavy incidence of numerous taxes. There is an appealing waste of human life due to absence of adequate medical facilities. The administration of the state is top heavy. The government is indifferent to the most pressing problems of the people, for instance the problem of rural indebtedness, illiteracy, growing unemployment, t he problem of preventable diseases’.

The elected members of the Legislative Assembly criticized the Governmen t’s financial policy which was doing meagerly for the benefit of the masses. In 1938-39, it published a detailed summary of expenditures incurred by the govt. under different heads. The critique noted that 10% of the total state income was spent on education, which was obviously an insufficient sum for the education of thirty six lakhs of people. The literacy rate among males was as low as 7% not to speak of females. Only, 3.5% of the total revenue being spent on medicine. Agriculture claimed the meager sum of 6% which was meant to be spent on the uplift of the peasantry and the improvement of crops. As against this, about 19% of the total income was spent on the maintenance of the state forces, while Privy Purse consumes 16% of the state revenue. All the mentioned figures show the extreme wastefulness wit h which the people’s money was spent. 234

The weekly Hamdard published its ‘Responsible Government Number’ on the 5 th of August 1938. The same day the ‘Responsible Government Day’ was observed over all

232 Ibid., 425-35. 233 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , p. 197. 234 ‘A Critical Analysis of the Budget by the Selected Members of the Assembly’ in, Mirza Shafi, (eds .), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims , pp. 408-22. 176 the state and the meetings were attended by a very large number of people of all the communities. The fallowing resolution was adopted in five hundred meetings: 235

‘This mass meeting of the people places on record its complete repudiation of the present system of irresponsible government and wishes to express its faith in the establishment of complete Responsible Government which alone can curse the ills of the people. Therefore, this gathering appeals to all patriotic persons to muster under the banner of freedom and to be prepared for the coming struggle of liberty. Victories of that struggle alone usher in a period of complete political, economic and social emancipation.’

The rhetoric of the Muslim Conference during these years resembled the discourse on Kashmir of regional belonging from the pre-colonial period. However, there were some qualitative difference between the two. ‘The rhetoric of the 1930’s had moved from the conception of Kashmir as Mulk, which can be conceived as land, place, or homeland, to watan , a more territorial conception of the nation. Kashmir was no longer simply a beautiful land that had sunk into oppression; it was a nation with boundaries congruent with the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir that had to be rescued from exploiters though nationalism. This is not to suggest that the territorial boundaries of the Kashmiri nation were fixed in this period. Simply that the Muslim Conference presented a more concrete and some instances territorial conception of the Kashmiri nation. Furthermore a sense of the Kashmiri nation was fixed in this period simply that the Muslim conference presented a more concrete and in some instances territorial conception of the Kashmiri nation. Furthermore a sense of desperation and anger at the incessant persecution suffered by Kashmiris pervaded this discourse. Several authors quoted Ghalib’s famous verse to draw attention to the fraudulence of the appel lation of paradise on earth for Kashmir, which was in reality steeped in poverty and decline: 236

‘I know the reality of paradise, but it is a good thought to entertain the heart. In the words of Kashmiri poet, they think that decadence comes cheap here/ I say that there is an abundance of sorrow here’.

235 Hamdard , Srinagar, July 3 1938. 236 Chitralekha Zutshi, Languages of Belonging , p. 250. 177

However, most significantly a national movement that promised equal citizenship required the participation of minority communities, not their hostility as seemed to be the case in Kashmir. As a result the Muslim leadership made repeated attempts to persuade the minorities’ communities to join their struggle. 237 The conference’s session of the 1937 was held in Poonch and was presided over by S.M. Abdullah. The session in fact paved the way for the proposed constitutional changes in the nomenclature of the Muslim conference in order to throw it open to those progressive non-Muslim leaders who shared the advanced political aspirations of the Muslim conference.

As already mentioned, in January 1938 Sheikh met Pandit Nehru and accompanied him during his frontier tour. Abdullah sought his guidance about the future line of action, after his careful consideration to the latest developments in Kashmir politics, Pandit Nehru considered it advisable that Muslim conference should change its name for that of national one as it was consistent with its programme and policy which were already national in character. 238

In his presidential remarks to the sixth annual session of the Muslim Conference on the 26 th March 1938 Abdullah observed, ‘Like us [Muslims] the large majority of the Hindus and Sikhs in the state [had] immensely suffered at the hands of the irresponsible [Dogra Rule]. They [were] also steeped in deep ignorance, here to pay large taxes and are in debt. He urged the members of the party to end communalism by ceasing to think in terms of Muslims and non-Muslims when discussing [their] political problems… and open [the] doors to all such Hindus and Sikhs, who believed in the freedom of their country from the shackles of an i rresponsible rule’. 239

A resolution was therefore moved in the annual session of the conference in March 1938, that the Muslim Conference should change its name into that of National Conference. Certain constitutional difficulties arose which made it necessary to postpone discussion on the resolution. In June 1938, however, a meeting of the working committee of Muslim conference was held in which the same resolution was passed by a majority of

237 Ibid., p. 252. 238 J.L. Nehru, The Unity of India Collected Writings (1937-1940), p. 230. 239 Bazaz, The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir , pp.160-61; Mirza Shafi, (eds.), The Political Struggle of Kashmiri Muslims, 1931-1939, p. 453. 178

17 against 3 votes. This enabled the responsible Hindu and Sikh leaders to join Abdullah. They therefore, set themselves to the task of educating mass opinion in favour of nationalism and responsible government. In June 11, 1939 the leadership attended a special session of the Muslim conference attended by 176 delegates representing all districts of Jammu and Kashmir. The resolution which had been adopted by the working committee on 28 th June 1938 was moved in the open session and henceforth the All J&K Muslim Conference became the All Jammu and Kashmir National Conference. 240 The leadership intended to present the conference as an organization of the down-trodden classes. Its flag, for instance, was red in color with a white plough in center, representing socialist revolution for the Kashmiri peasantry. 241

The Muslim Conference, and then the National Conference could not prevent tensions among their members and that seriously affected the working of the organizations. However, instead focusing on the political tussle which fallowed after Muslim Conference, was replaced by National Conference; here the focus will be on the role of the National Conference with regard to the economic reconstruction of the Jammu and Kashmir. Its role in ‘resolving’ the mass economic discontent further widens the relevance of our hypothesis, that the root cause of the struggle for freedom was economic in nature. Among the first things enunciated by the National Conference, soon after the change in the nomenclature, was the ratification of the earlier passed resolution commonly know n as the ‘National Demand’ . This policy, which served as the key stone of its programme throughout the world war second, called for responsible government subject to the general control of the maharaja, and legislature entirely elected by elected suffrage, with reserved seats for minorities. The legislature was to control all revenue and expenditure with the exception of the part allotted to Maharaja’s Privy Purse and the army. 242 The Conference apparently developed leftist and socially radical tendencies, and moving steadily closer to left wing nationalists in the congress. 243 In his presidential remarks Abdullah would usually claim that the organization tried to unify all the poor and exploited the unemployed and all suffering people of the whole state with a view to

240 Ibid., pp. 163-4. 241 Hussnain, Freedom Struggle in Kashmir , p. 103. 242 Breacher, The Struggle for Kashmir , p. 11. 243 Bose, Kashmir Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace , p. 21. 179 reaching the goal of an administration which is fully answerable to the people. Needful of attention was given to the economic rehabilitation of the state. 244

Secondly, the main political resolution passed in this session affirmed that, ‘no scheme of responsible government would be acceptable in which the tillers of the soil are not allowed to enjoy the fullest fruits of their labour, for this there can be no other way than this viz, those alone own the land who till it. 245 Concessions were demanded for the tenants to alleviate the prevailing distress, and the attention of the Conference was focused on the existing rural indebtedness. A clear demand was made that in case a debtor pays back the principal in the form of interest, the debt should be cancelled out. At the same time debtors were promised cancellation of all debts whenever an elected responsible government came to power in the state. 246 The reward for all these populist appeals was that, by 1942, the National Conference was said to enjoy the support of 75% valley’s population and Abdullah’s party was considered the best organized and supported in the valley. 247

The defining traits —the charismatic leader, the solid organizational network of talented and committed young men, the assertion of a proud regional patriotism rooted in a shared Muslim identity and the promise of progressive social change-were a beacon of hope for an impoverished, politically disenfranchised population. 248 In 1944, the National Conference adopted a manifesto entitled ‘Naya Kashmir ’ for Jammu and Kashmir’s regeneration. its blueprint for the regeneration of the state: heavily infused with socialist jargon.

The manifesto declared that the National Conference ‘fights for the poor, against those who exploit them, for the toiling people of our beautiful homeland; against the heartless ranks of the socially privileged. The history of freedom movements had only one lesson to teach that freedom from all forms of economic exploitation is the only true

244 N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres , p. 112. 245 Ibid., p. 116. 246 Bazaz , Inside Kashmir , pp. 328-9. 247 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 279. 248 Bose, Kashmir Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace , pp. 24-5. 180 guarantee of political democracy’. 249 It was a charter of socio economic independence. In the formation of Naya Kashmir, the experiences of the Soviet Union were the main inspiration. New Kashmir had been drafted in Lahore by a group of communists including B.P.L. Bedi, Freda Bedi, Qurban Ali, Danial Latifi and Kashi Nath Bamzai. Abdullah was convinced that the soviet , ‘ Soviet Russia had demonstrated not merely theoretically but in her actual day to day life and development that real freedom takes birth only from economic emancipation’. 250

In his foreword to the manifesto, Abdullah attempted to reclaim his status and the status of his organization as the leader of the Kashmiri masses, both of which were willing to incur sacrifices for their uplift: 251

‘Progress is a continuous struggle -a tempestuous struggle…the National Conference has been fighting the battle since the inception of the freedom movement…this struggle of ours is the struggle of the workers against the stone hearted exploiters who as a class of discriminators have lost the sense of humanism…in our new Kashmir we shall build again the men and women of our state who have been dwarfed for centuries of servitude, and create a people worthy of our glorious motherland’.

The Naya Kashmir document was divided into three sections. The draft’s basic law provided for a constitutional monarchy with democratic political procedures; its economic blueprint emphasized national planning along socialist and cooperative lines. Section first lays out the part y’s conception of states future constitutional framework. At the apex, it visualizes a representative legislature called the National Assembly and a Cabinet government. It calls for decentralized governance based on devolution of powers making administrative responsibilities to districts, tehsils, towns and villages. It placed for the total abolition of feudal order in Kashmir and giving the people of Kashmir a democratic system. Recognizing the multi lingual character of Jammu and Kashmir-the

249 Josef Korbel , Danger in Kashmir , Princeton, 1954, p. 203. 250 ‘New Kashmir, Constitution and Outline Economic Plan for the State of Jammu & Kashmir including Ladakh and Frontier Regions and the Poonch and Chinani Ilaqas , Introduction by Sheikh Abdullah, New Delhi, 1944, p. 5. 251 Ibid. 181 manifesto designates Urdu as the official lingua franca. All other languages like Dogri, Kashmiri, Hindi, Balti and Dardi would be given the status of national languages. 252

The second section, of the manifesto dealing with the economy was heavily socialist in tone. Communist sympathizers such as G.M. Sadiq, the party’s main ideologue, were at that time prominent in National Conference leadership and they put their whole effort to make the document to their tune. There was a heavy rhetorical emphasis on state led planned industrialization. The more significant content of this section given the reality of a predominantly peasant society relates to the agrarian economy. The document presupposes liquidation of all types of parasitism in agriculture, thorough implementation of the policy of land to tiller, and cancellation of all debt burdens of the peasantry. 253 The third section elaborates social and educational schemes for various ‘downtrodden’ sections of Kashmir’s population, including a charter of rights for women. The wom en’s charter proclaimed complete equality of women with men ensuring them equal rights in administration and political bodies, equal pay for equal work, maternity benefits etc. 254

The manifesto in sum, emphasizing on the reorgansation of the economic and the political structure was to catch the imagination of the Kashmiri people as it provided them a conception of a new Kashmir a Kashmir purged of its miserable past reminiscent of its political subjugation, economic oppression and social backwardness. 255

By the time the struggle for achieving the goals set in New Kashmir could come to fruition, quick developments had taken place on the world political scene and the programme was not produced in a high tide of mass upsurge. 256 It was at the same time that the world war second had come with the defeat of Fascist forces. Labour party had come to power in England. They had declared the policy of granting independence to India. As a result on 12 May 1946, the Cabinet Mission sent to India declared that when the British left India, its paramountcy would lapse and the rights of the princely states

252 Jyoti Bhusan Das Gupta, Jammu and Kashmir , Martinus nijhoff/ The Hague, 1968, p. 66-7. 253 New Kashmir, Constitution and Outline Economic Plan for the State of Jammu & Kashmir , pp. 17-9. 254 Ibid., p. 20. 255 Rekha Chowdhary and V. Nagendra Rao, ‘ National Conference of J&K: From Hegemonic to Competitive Politics , Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.39, No 14/15 (April 3-16) 2004, p. 1521. 256 N.N. Raina, Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvres , p.121. 182 would return to them. This announcement of an imminently independent, Dogra state of Jammu and Kashmir sent Abdullah into flurry of political alliance making. He was keen to consolidate as wide a popular base as possible to pre-empt a continuation of Dogra autocracy after the departure of the British. 257

On May, 20 1946 Abdullah launched the ‘Quit Kashmir’ movement described the Treaty of Amritsar as ‘Sale Deed’ , challenged its val idity and demanded that ‘the wrong of sale to the Dogra House’ be righted and that full responsibility be granted immediately. 258 This conception of popular sovereignty is perfectly understandable in the context of struggle against a narrowly based autocratic system which sympathetically denied the most basic rights and representation to a vast majority of people. It is also democratic in that it reflects a genuine, broadly based popular movement for a more inclusive and responsive system of government. 259 R.P. Dutt states that ‘struggles against the feudal autocracy in the states have begun and are met with the most intense repression by the princes backed by the British political department, the high watermark being reached with the struggle of the people of Kashmir against the autocracy of the Dogra dynasty under the clear and categorical slogan —‘Quit Kashmir.’ 260

The National Conference regime attempted to implement the economic reforms laid out in its 1944 Naya Kashmir manifesto. The events which followed t he ‘Quit Kashmir’ movement, the dethronement of Maharaja Hari Singh, and the power was transferred to Sheikh Abdullah as the head of the emergency administration, and then made Prime Minister on 5, March 1948. 261

Soon after the replacement of the autocratic rule by Abdullah led interim government the state took its first concrete steps towards agrarian reforms. In 1948 the various types of land grants like jagirs, muafi and mukarri grants were abolished and the realization of all debts from the peasants were postponed for twelve months protecting tenants from arbitrary eviction without court procedure. These measures were followed

257 The Times of India , June 12, 194; Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , p. 281. 258 Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad, (eds.) Kashmir Today: Through Foreign Eyes , Bombay, 1946, pp. 134-6. 259 Bose, Kashmir Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace , p. 27. 260 R. Palme Dutt, India Today , p. 452. 261 New Kashmir, Constitution and Outline Economic Plan for the State of Jammu & Kashmir , p. 240. 183 by the Distressed Debtors Relief Act of 1950 seeking to alleviate the agrarian indebtedness and creating cancellation Boards. The debtor was supposed to prove that he had already repaid the principle plus 50% in the form of interest, and then the debt was automatically discharged, and any amount in excess of 150% of the principle would be refunded to the debtor. 262

In the July 1950, at the 9 th anniversary of the Martyr ’s Day, the new government made the historic decision of transferring land to the tiller, and on the 17 th October 1950, was passed the Big Landed Estates Abolition Act, the Magna Carta of the peasants, which has revolutionized the whole organization of the state in a big experiment in moulding the whole structure of village life on new formation of social and economic relativity. 263 The tenancy reforms benefited nearly three-fifths of the peasantry, cultivating about 700,000 acres out of the total of 2.2 million acres of cultivatable land in the state. Acclaimed by the peasantry as their ‘ Magna Carta ’ the reforms which were given affect under the act abolishing big landed estates, have revolutionized the whole agrarian system of the state.

The number of jagirdars and muafidars in the state prior to the reforms was 396 and they used to appropriate about Rs 5,56,318 annually of the land revenue. The Mukararidars numbered 2,347 and received Rs 1,77,921 by way of cash grants. In fact, the resumption of assignments and the abolition of feudal privileges not only saved the state about Rs 7 lakhs annually but also relieved the peasants of the crushing burden of payment in kind to the extent of Rs 3,25,000 and released 4,250 acres of land granted by way of self-cultivation and residual units to the jagirdars in favour of cultivators of the soil.

In case of religious assignments the practice of recovery in cash alone was recognized as lawful. The pockets of subsisting feudal elements within the state, called ‘jurisdictional jagirs’ were liquidat ed and a population of about 2,50,000 was freed from

262 Land Reforms, A Review of the working of the Land Reforms with special reference to Big Landed Estates Abolition Act for the period ending July, 1952, in the Jammu and Kashmir state , 1952, Srinagar State Archives, p. 3. 263 Ibid. 184 subjection and medieval autocracy. 264 Under the Big Landed Estates Abolition Act, a proprietor could retain only 22-3/4 acres of land, besides orchards, grass farms and fuel reserves and the right of ownership in land in excess of this unit was extinguished and transferred to the tillers to the extent of their actual cultivating possession during September October 1950.

The tiller was liable to pay land revenue and other dues for the time being in force and also a special land development cess at the rate of annas four per rupees of land revenue. The cess was earmarked for being utilized to rehabilitate the cultivators and to improve the land that passes on to them. 265 All land of which the right of ownership was extinguished and which were not in the cultivating possession of any tiller, were vested in the state and were made available for settlement of landless peasants and field labourers. The law also applied to lands owned by evacuees and to those which belonged to enemy agents and have since been forfeited to the state. Mr. Raina, the states land reforms officer who submitted a review of the Act to the government of Jammu and Kashmir, said that it was his feeling that the tiller was economically better off than in 1950 before and was putting in substantial hard work to get the maximum produce from his small holding. 266

Daniel Thorner an agrarian historian and economist during his visit in 1950 to Kashmir records that despite some ‘defects in implementat ion and the maximum limit of 22 ¾ acres on the holdings of land owners couldn’t remain as was officially pounce d, to evade resumptions was breaking up joint families, thereby entitling each adult male to the limit of 22 ¾ acres. As per the provisions of the Act orchards were exempt from appropriation which paved the way for big land holders to escape the ceiling by converting cereal acreage into orchards. So by retaining their orchards as well as converting some of their cereal acreage, the bigger landlords of Kashmir, whose ranks included Pandits (about whom it is said that 30% of the land belonged to them prior to the reforms) reserved some of their losses by entering into highly profitable world of

264 Land Reforms in the State of Jammu and Kashmir State, J &K Information Department, pp.1-5; Beg, Golden Harvests , p. 52; The Times of India , September 20, 1952, p. 4. 265 Ibid. 266 Ibid. 185 horticultural exports. 267 But according to Throner due to the passing of the Act many tillers became land owners and some land went even to the landless. The peasantry of the valley was not long ago fearful and submissive. No one who has spent time with Kashmiri villagers will say the same today. 268 Wolf Ladjensky another expert observed that, ‘whereas vir tually all land reforms in India lay stress on elimination of zamindari [large estates] system with compensation or rent reduction and security of tenure [for tillers] the Kashmir reforms call for distribution of land among tenants without compensation to the erstwhile proprietors… and whereas land reform enforcement in most of india is not so effective, in Kashmir enforcement is unmistakably rigorous’. 269

In sum, the chapter has brought to fore the increasing disillusionment of the people of Kashmir in the context of denial of basic economic rights to them owing to their outright exclusion from the political and economic structures, resulting in the eventual alienation. This irreoncible contradiction that emerged between the Dogra might and the junior ally the local elite on the one hand and the bulk of the people of Kashmir including the middle class, the working class and the peasantry on the other hand laid the seeds of the struggle for ‘national liberation’. The leadership with their emergence on the scene brought a gradual and deep understanding of the complex economic structure of the Dogra Darbar in Kashmir―a n understanding they derived by taking in the entire range of economic issues and studying them in their totality within the framework of economic development and opposed all the important economic policies, based on their system with an alternative of the framework;…the framing of the economic policies like National Demand and Naya Kashmir testifies this. One can say without doubt that National Conference leadership got much popularity and success due to the redress of the economic grievances than the political issues. Though, it is hard to believe that only a single cause can lead to a multi cause outburst but keeping in view the dominant trend of the single cause i.e. economic, the present hypothesis holds the argument that the root cause of the awakening in Kashmir was socio-economic…a determination on the part of the people to win for themselves a prominent position in

267 Rai, Hindu Rulers Muslim Subjects , pp. 283-4. 268 Daniel Thorner, The Agrarian Prospect in India , Bombay, 1976, p. 50. 269 Wolf Landjensky, ‘Land Reform: Observations in Kashmir’, in L.J. Walinsky, (eds.), Agrarian Reforms as Unfinished Business , Oxford, 1977, pp. 179-80. 186

Kashmiri society. The prover bial economic backwardness stultifying all progress…this stultifying nature put the whole economic spectrum in disorder, with the absence of any kind of growth whether social, economic or political which resulted in largely the stagnation of the society. This stagnation which was mainly economic in character helped to a great extent in the emergence of political awakening in Kashmir. The people of Jammu and Kashmir deprived of all sources, above the barest subsistence, and at times below it, the decline of shawl trade, the failure to develop the basis of heavy industry, essential for integrated economic development all this worked for a closed economy and this closed economic setup which prepared the mass psyche of Kashmiri people for resistance against the Dogra rule for which the atmosphere was quite congenial because the dawn of the twentieth century brought awakening and political consciousness to Jammu and Kashmir as it brought in the rest of the Indian subcontinent. The economic exploitation, social adjustment and political domination gave rise to a vigorous battle for self-identification of the people suffering under an imposed political system which had rendered them sullen and submissive. 187

Conclusion

The present study spans more than a century. The key processes that continue to form the subject matter in the state took shape during this period. The establishment of the Dogra rule was not merely a political change but a comprehensive transformation of the very character of the political structure. The new rulers did not arise from any established social setup of Kashmir. They were ‘strangers’ and with a military background having a mercenary character, whereas Kashmir was more or less a purely agricultural society. Being ‘outsiders’ the new regime initiated policies and followed principles of governance that upset the established agrarian order as never before. Like any other regime in the past the new rule was dependent on the taxation of agricultural production. However, it was also com mitted to ‘protect’ the industry and trade, which was beginning to play a major supporting role in the economy. With the further consolidation of their rule, inequalities grew and Kashmir’ s economy was transformed into a virtual slave economy. The central fact was the built-in tendency of the entire system against significant advances in productive technology and organization. It made the economic activity dependent on a very distant and unknown foreign market through a formidable chain of intermediaries. As a result the cultivating class of Kashmir was repeatedly made to bear the burden of widely fluctuating revenue system. However, what remained largely absent was any structural need to invest in direct agricultural production. There was little incentive to technological innovation given the existence of a numerous rural proletariat rendered abjectly dependent by a combination of pressures and indebtedness. Consolidation of feudal land relations was, therefore, the hallmark of the Dogra regime on the agrarian scene of Kashmir, where without investing anything in land and industry the landlord grabbed the lion ’s share. It is to these social relations in agriculture that the thesis has attempted to go into in order to lay bare the driving forces behind the agrarian crisis. The Dogra structure as a whole, to quote Daniel Throner, constituted a ‘built in depressor’ for Kashmir’s agrarian economy. Kashmir became a victim of the ‘unholy trinity’—to borrow a term from Sundra Patel —which consisted of ‘subjugation, ruralization, and retardation’. The Dogra Maharajas’ purchased notion of Kashmir 188 induced a forced and uncontrollable mechanism of tax collection and ensured a speedy destruction of the handicrafts. In fact, rural labour and rural poverty represented a process of politically induced economic impedance in a region otherwise capable for industrialization and economic growth as per the findings of the various committees revealed in chapter four. This study has ventured to share a dialogue with the social structure without necessarily sharing an ideology. The previous studies on the selected theme have explored the economic cause, but have treated it superficially. Consequently, it was yet to be explored in its profundity to produce a consistent story that can accommodate the central tendencies as well as the variations within the economic structure to lay bare its consequences. There was a general absence of the institutions with the means to enforce rules or create an incentive structure that could encourage individuals to take certain action in preference to others. Growth begetting rules reduce uncertainty, transaction costs and encourage market exchange. Bad rules do the opposite. In a society where there are legal safeguards against fraud and these are enforced properly, institutions encourage more stable and mutually profitable economic exchange. However, the cycle of extraction of surplus value intensifies class struggle, which in turn threatens to destabilize the system. The dominating trend during the period was total extraction of the surplus which led to what Andre Gunder Frank has called the ‘development of underdevelopment’—explaining the persistence of, and the origins of underdevelopment in terms of transfer of surplus. In fact, the Dogra regime used their political control to subordinate both agrarian and non-agrarian economy of Kashmir to the needs of the minuscule population of their ‘own’. Special codes were formulated like the Pratap Code and the usage of the variety of different modes of exploitation through taxation, unequal employment distribution and the irrational use of the resources of Kashmir. The collective monopoly of resources which became a striking feature of the industrial and commercial life of particularly the urban economy of Kashmir led to a strangulated economy. The people of the state began the search to find a way out of the impasse. By the turn of the twentieth century the Kashmiris were hit hard by rising prices, diminishing employment opportunities in government services or professions and restrictions on sale 189 and mortgage of land. This helped to create a curious amalgam of radicalism and social inhibitions which formed the basis for the understanding of nationalism in Kashmir. The struggle for freedom was basically the result of a fundamental contradiction between the interests of the people of Kashmir and that of the Dogra autocratic regime. Kashmir during the period was economically regressed. The freedom struggle, thus, was a struggle for economic emancipation. With the launch of the freedom struggle the people of Kashmir marched from the ‘realm of necessity to the realm of freedom’ ; 1931 was the culmination of that. The year marked a turning point in Kashmir politics breaking the past submissive approach of the masses of Kashmir to whatever was forced upon them. Despite all the slide-backs, limitations and contradictions, which at all, this amounted to was the irreversible historical fact of the entry of the masses of Kashmir into active political life. The year 1931 marked the transition point. The diminishing returns crisis in rural Kashmir broke out from the time of great depression. It was too powerful a phenomenon to be offset by the better performance of industry in the post 1931 Kashmir. The preceding decade had seen a rise in the tax rate in agrarian sector, marked by acute grain crisis and the artisan classes were hard hit by the slow growth and cheap marketing facilities, facing a large deflation, the already indebted classes and absence of rise of real wages squeezed the marginal peasantry hard. It was too powerful as the peasantry got exhausted and a rural crisis was about to break out. The previous year’s saw a strengthening of the four conditions that made the 1931’s such a setback - exhaustion of opportunities in agriculture, weakening of marketing incentives, relatively small growth of non- agricultural activities and demographic transition. All this entails a rather different narrative from what the mainstream historiography of the freedom movement in Kashmir has usually described in relation to the national awakening of Jammu and Kashmir. The vision of the ‘National Movement’ in Kashmir, that the economy was to be developed along independent and self-reliant lines was combined with pro-poor, radical, socio-economic orientation that enabled the movement to base itself on the politically awakened and active people and to acq uire the character of a popular people’s movement. It was the greater involvement of the middle class and merchant classes with the national 190 movement, along with the rise of the new leadership that the movement achieved the character of a mass movement with fairly clear economic roots. An integrated analysis of the themes of agrarian and non-agrarian structures makes possible an assessment of their role as determinants of the people’s movement in Jammu and Kashmir. The state, in general, and Kashmir valley, in particular, underwent substantial change in the twentieth century largely as a result of human agency in the form of state interventions. Fluctuations in the economic system cast a stronger influence on the regional agrarian economy than movements of population. Peasants who had resorted to single crop economy were especially vulnerable to downturns and periodic crisis keeping in view the unregulated economic system. In the third decade of the twentieth century population increase generally provided a positive impulse to innovation in agricultural techniques but was blocked or aborted by social and political obstacles embedded in the complex layers of property and possessory rights to the land which underpinned the agrarian power structure. The major types of social organization of production identified in this thesis did not display a remarkable degree of adaptability and resilience. The Dogra state concerned themselves with the stability of revenue receipts, armed the renter landlords with considerable legal powers of extra-economic coercion which laid the foundation of revenue and rent offensive. In the long run it facilitated the process of twisting agrarian economy and society to an export orientation. Two processes were particularly active: fragmentation of land and changes in occupation, a mix that drove a large number of general rural labourers into dependence of agricultural labour. Peasants turned into wage labourers on a large scale. Artisans lost livelihood and crowded into agriculture, adding to landlessness. That many artisans did lose their traditional living is beyond question. There can be two meanings attached to this trend: a quantitative one of a large decline and a qualitative one of a destruction of the potentialities to industrialize. Silk weavers, shawl bafs, English educated and religious class all discovered a convergence of interest in fighting the regime out. The decline in the economic activities of these classes had far- reaching consequences on the evolution of the social and political landscape of late nineteenth and early twentieth century Kashmir which the study has amply brought out. 211

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Korbel, Josef , Danger in Kashmir , Princeton University Press, 1954. Kumar, Dharma and Chaudhuri, Tapan Ray (eds.), The Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. 2, Cambridge University Press, 2008. L.J., Walinsky, (ed.), Agrarian Reforms as unfinished Business , Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1977. Lakhanpal, P.L., Essential Documents on Kashmir Dispute, 2nd Edition, International Books, Delhi, 1965. Lamb, Alastair, Incomplete Partition: The Genesis of the Kashmir Dispute 1947-1948, Roxford Books, Hertingfordbury, 1997. ————, Kashmir a Disputed Legacy, 1846-1990, Oxford University Press, Karachi, 1993. Lavan, Spencer, The Ahmadiyah Movement: A History and Perspective , Manohar, Delhi, 1974. Low, D. A., (eds.), The Political Inheritance of Pakistan , Palgrave Macmillan, London, 1991. Mitra A., Notes On the Arts and Industries in Kashmir, Honorary Curator, Sri Pratap Singh Museum, Srinagar, 1906. Mukherjee, Mridula, Peasants in India’s Non -Violent Revolution: Practice and Theory , Sage Publications, New Delhi, 2004. Munawwar, Nagi and Shauq, Shafi, Kashur Adabuk Tawrikh , (Kashmiri), Kashmiri Department, University of Kashmir, 1978. Nagris, N.D., Tarikh-i- Dogra Desh, Chand Publishing House, Jammu, 1967. Pampori, Mohammad Sultan Kashmir in Chains, 1819-1992, Pampori Publishing House, Srinagar, 1992. Pannikar, K.M., The Founding of the Kashmir State , Martin Hopkinson, London, 1930. Parvez, Ahmad, Economy and Society of Kashmir, A Study in Change and Continuity (1885-1925), Oriental Publishing House, Srinagar, 2007. Pearce, Gervis This is Kashmir, Cassell and Company Ltd., London, 1954.

Philips, C.H., (ed.) The Evolution of India and Pakistan, 1858-1947: Selected Documents , Macmillan & Co., London, 1962. 225

Rai, Mridu, Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects, Islam Rights and the History of Kashmir, Permanent Black, Delhi, 2004. Raina, A.N. Geography of Jammu and Kashmir , 3rd rev. Ed. National Book Trust, New Delhi, 1981. Raina, N.N., Kashmir Politics and Imperialist Manoeuvers , Patriot Publishers, Delhi, 1988. Ramusack, Barbara N., The Princes of India in the Twilight of Empire; Dissolution of a Patron-Client System , 1914-1939, State University Press, Ohio, 1978. Ramusack, Barbara N., The Indian princes and their States , Cambridge University Press, 2004. Rao, Aparna (ed.), The Valley of Kashmir in The Making and Unmaking of a Composite Culture , Manohar Publications, New Delhi, 2008. Roy, Tirthankar, Rethinking Economic Change in India Labour and Livelihood , Routledge, 2005. ————, The Economic History of India, (1857-1947), Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2000. Sarkar, Sumit, Modern India (1885-1947), Macmillan, Chennai, 1983. Schofield, Victoria, Kashmir in Conflict – India, Pakistan and the Unending War , I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd., New York & London, 2003 Sharma D.C., Kashmir Agriculture and Land Revenue System under Sikh Rule 1819- 1846, Rima Publishing House, Delhi, 1986. Sharma, Diwan Chand, Kashmir under Sikhs, Reema Publishing House, Delhi, 1986. Singh, Bawa Satinder, The Jammu Fox: A Biography of Maharaja Gulab Singh of Kashmir (1792-1857), Heritage Publishers, New Delhi, 1988. Snedden, Christopher, Kashmir, the Unwritten History , HarperCollins, Noida, 2013. Steven Grosby, Nationalism: A Very Short Introduction , Oxford University Press, New York, 2005. Sufi, G.M.D., Kashir: Being a History of Kashmir From Earliest Times to our Own, Vol. 2, Light and Life Publications, Delhi, 1974. Throner, Daniel, The Agrarian Prospect in India , Allied Publishers, Bombay, 1976. Vaikuntham, Y., (ed.) People’s Movements in Princely States , Manohar, Delhi, 2004. 226

Wani, Dr. Gull, Kashmir Identity Autonomy and Self Rule, Wattan Publications, Srinagar, 2011. Yasin Mohammad and Rafiqi, A.Qaiyum, (eds.), History of the freedom struggle in Jammu and Kashmir , Light and Life publishers, New Delhi, 1980. Zutshi, Chitralekha, Languages of Belonging – Islam, Regional Identity and the Making of Kashmir , Permanent Black, Ranikhet, 2003. Zutshi, U.K., Emergence of Political Awakening in Kashmir , Manohar Publications, New Delhi, 1986. b. Articles

Berend, T., Ivan, Budapest, ‘The Indivisibility of the Social and Economic Factors of Economic Growth― a Methodology Study’, Proceedings of the Seventh Intentional Economic History Congress, University Press Edinburgh , 1978. Chandra, Prakash, ‘The N ational Question in Kashmir’ , Social Scientist , Vol. 13, No. 6, January, 1985. Chowdhary Rekha and Rao, V. Nagendra, ‘National Conference of J&K: From Hegemonic to Competitive Politics ’, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 39, No. 14/15, 2004. Copland, Ian, ‘Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, 1931 -34’, Pacific Affairs, Vol. 54, No. 2, Summer, 1981. Dhanagare, D.N., ‘Agrarian Conflict, Religion and Politics: The Moplah Rebellions in Malabar in the Nineteenth Century and Early Twentieth Century’ , Present and Past: A journal of Historical Studies , No. 74, February, 1977. Habib, Irfan, ‘Civil Disobedience 1930 -31’, Social Scientist , Vol. 25, No. 9/10, Sep. – Oct., 1997. Harry, Vanden E., ‘Marxism and the Peasantry in Latin America: Marginalization or Mobilization? ’, Latin American Perspectives , Vol. 9, No. 4, Autumn, 1982. Hangloo, R. L., ‘The Magnitude of Land Revenue Demand in Kashmir (1846 -1900)’, Social Scientist , Vol. 12, No. 6, 1884. Kaiwar, Vasant, ‘The Colonial State, Capital and the Peasantry in Bombay Presidency ’, Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 28, No. 4, Oct. 1994. 227

Kaul, Gaush Lal, ‘The Freedom Struggle of Kashmir’, Studies of Kashmir Council of Research , Vol. III, Special Number, Srinagar, November, 1978. Khan, M. Ishaq ‘Some Aspects of Corvee (begar ) in Kashmir (833-1858 A.D)’, Research Biannual Jammu & Kashmir State, Vol. 1, No. 2, 1976. Leonid Borodkin and Mikhail, Svishchev, ‘Pre-Collectivization Peasantry Social Dynamics Retroprognosis: Application of Alternative Models ’, Historical Social Research / Historic Social Forschung , Vol. 16, No. 2 (58), 1991. Mukherjee, Mridula ‘Peasant Resistance and Peasant Consciousness in Colonial India: Subaltern and beyond ’, Economic and political weekly , Vol. 23, No. 42, 1988. Rasool, P.G., ‘Amritsar March 3 1846: The Treaty of Dispossession’ , Conveyor, March, Srinagar, 2010. Pir, Ali Mohd, ‘Kashmir and the Defence of the British Indian Empire: The Gilgit Agency’, Central India Journal of Historical and Archaeological Research, Vol. 2, No. 7, 2013. Pir, Ali Mohd. & Shiekh, Ab. Rashid, ‘Formation of the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir: The Historical Perspectives’, Susugular: Journal of History Education and Historical Studies , Volume 1, No. 2, 2013. Raina, N. N., ‘ Hegemony of the working people: A specific feature of our Freedom Movement ,’ Studies of Kashmir Council of Research , Srinagar, Special No. Vol. III, Nov. 1978. Shiekh, Ab Rashid, ‘ Institution of Begar in Kashmir (1846-1947)’, Central India Journal of Historical and Archaeological Research , Vol. 2, July-September, 2013. Singh, Bawa Satinder, ‘Raja Gulab Singh’s Role in the First Anglo -Sikh War’, Modern Asian Studies , Vol. 5, No. 1, 1971. Thakur, Sudhair, K., ‘ Fundamental Economic Structure & Structural Change in the Regional Economies: A Methodological Approach ’, Region et Development, Vol. 33, 2011. Thorner, Alice, ‘The issues in Kashmir’, Far Eastern Survey, Vol. 17 No. 15, 1948.

228

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Aziz, Javeed-ul, Economic History of Modern Kashmir with Special Reference to Agriculture (1947-1989), Ph.D. thesis, the University of Kashmir, 2010. Lone, Suhail R., Indian National Movement and the Freedom Struggle of Jammu and Kashmir (1931-1947 A.D.), M.Phil. Dissertation, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, 2013. Pir, Ali Mohd, British Policy Towards Jammu & Kashmir (1846-1947), Ph.D Thesis, Aligarh Muslim University, 2013. Sender, Henriette M., The Kashmiri Brahmans (Pandits) up to 1930: Cultural Change in the Cities of Northern India , Ph.D. thesis, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1981. Wani, Ali Mohammad, Agrarian Structure of Kashmir (A.D. 1846-1947), Ph.D. thesis, the University of Kashmir, 1994. 191

Appendix I Did Gulab Singh pay for Kashmir?* According to the third article of the Treaty of Amritsar, Gulab Singh was required to pay the stipulated sum of seventy-five lakhs of rupees in two installments, “fifty lacs… on ratification of this treaty, and twenty-five lacs on or before the 1 st of October of the current year, A.D. 1846.” Some sources, like the anonymous author of Kashmir-ke-Halaat, have stated that the sale was a hoax, and that the British never really collected the required sum form the Dogra ruler. 1 Such gossip continues to be heard occasionally on the Indian subcontinent till this day. However, there is substantial evidence that, though late, Gulab Singh did pay the amount in full. In a letter dated May 12, 1846, Hardinge informed Ellenborough, that the Maharaja “has paid his first installment of 50 lacs.” 2 The Governor-General communicated similar information to the Secret Committee in September. 3 Even more important, however, is the following table of payments prepared on October 10, 1848, by the Company’s financial department at Calcutta, which clearly indicates that by the end of July 1848 Gulab Singh had paid most of his debt: In 1845/46 497,204-4-9 In 1846-47 5,619,581-10-0 In 1847-48 858,541-12-8 May 97,997-13-0 June 48,156-7-6 July 146,154-4-6 ——————— 7,121,481-15-11 Balance due to the British Government on the 31 st July 1848 378,518-0-14 The rest of the amount, totaling less than four lakhs of rupees, was paid by the end of march 1850, and a copy of “The Final Rece ipt for the purchase of Kashmir ” signed by the members of the Board of Administration of Punjab, is on exhibition at the Punjab Record Office Museum in Lahore. 5

1 Kashmir-ke-Halaat (Qadian: 1931), cited in Bawa, Jammu Fox, p. 235, fn. 1. 2 Ellenborough Papers, re. 30/12/21, no. 7, cited in Ibid., fn. 2. 3 Governor General’s letter dated Se pt. 3, 1846, cited in Ibid., fn. 3. 4 Dalhousie Papers, ref. 45/254, MSS in the Scottish Record Office, Edinburgh, cited in Ibid, pp. 235-6. 5 A.N. Sapru, The Building of the Jammu and Kashmir State―Being the Achievement of Maharaja Gulab Singh , Lahore, 1931, cited in Ibid, pp. 236, fn. 5.

* This Appendix is reproduced from Bawa Satinder Singh, Jammu Fox, p. 192. 192

Appendix II

Dastur-ul-Amal *

Issued by Maharaja Ranbir Singh (1857-1885) on 6 th October, 1857 (translated from Persian).

The Dastur starts with the following rulings:

‘This state has been created by my honoured father, the late Maharaja Sahib Bahadur (Gulab Singh Ji), which is confirmed by the Treaty of 16 th March, 1846, (Treaty of Amritsar) in our possession, without anybody else having claim on it, and which State by the grace of Shri Narain Ji, is progressing day by day, it appears necessary to enact a Dastur-ul-Amal for my heirs and successors so that they may live in peace.’

The Dastur speaks as,

‘We are deeply concerned in the welfare of subjects and pray for God’s graciousness, accordingly from the beginning of the current year; we promulgate the fallowing revised schedule of taxes to be collected from our subjects, in particular from zamindars and others. ’

Article I

‘All revenue as assessed shall be collected year by year by honest and well intentioned kardars without levying any extortionate demands since it distressed already impoverished zamindars. ’

Article-II

We order reductions in the cost of shali and other grains in the following manner:

a) Shali supplied by zamindars willingly; cost per kharwar Rs. 1/10/-annas , reduction of one anna . b) Mung cost per kharwar rupees six, reduction of rupee two, c) Edible oil, cost per paji Rs. 1/9/3, reduction for kamraz Rs. 4, for Maraz Rs. -/3/. d) Cotton to be supplied as assessed.

Article-III

Extra money etc., charged and called Malba on innovation which caused a great distress to the zamindars, be remitted forthwith according to the following schedule:

* Source: General Department (PR), File No. 423 of Samvat 1939, Jammu and Kashmir State Archives, Jammu. 193

Tax on pattoo , ghee, houses, trakees, nazaran’s (as shagun at the time of weighing and counting walnuts, and cesses on account of weighmen) cesses on account of officers of villages paying a revenue above rupees five hundred, to be charged only rupees two every year and all extra levies too are remitted.

Article- 1V

The traditional surcharges made by kardars and sahibkars from times immemorial on ninety one thousand kharwars supposed a taccavi from the zamindars is remitted with immediate effect.

Article-V

Those zamindars who will or have already brought under the plough barren lands shall receive remission of five percents of revenue for a period of three years, thereafter for another period of three years they shall get remission of one half of revenues, thereafter after ten years the normal prevalent assessment shall be charged for them. This procedure shall be charged from them. This procedure shall be recorded in their payment books ( Attawardar ) to be supplied to each zamindar for his record and reference.

Article VI

The Pandit community and the Sayyids of Kashmir shall take to ploughing and cultivation by themselves. They shall in the first instance pay only one fifth revenue and thereafter, only one half of the specified revenue; but they shall be totally exempted from payment of any traks .

Article VII

Those who may not belong to agricultural community, if they take to cultivation of land, one half of their revenue shall be remitted.

Article VIII

Potters who supply earthen pots for use of government; they shall be exempted from tax.

Article IX

We have ordered increase in the salaries of shiqdars , sazawols, etc. On the revenue of rupees three thousand, they shall receive rupees twenty one plus additional allowance of rupees fifteen (total rupees thirty six). 194

Article X

The zamindars belonging to villages paying rupees five thousand as revenue, shall be liable to the following surcharges:

(a) For shiqdars and (b) for chrohri .

Article XI

No shady trees like Chinars (standing in the fields or on road side) shall be cut down by anybody, much less a zamindar or a sepoy.

Article XII

No subject, high class, or low class, shall personally deal in or allow any sale of women in their localities.

Article XIII

We order that no rassad of grain or grass etc. shall be demanded by or supplied to officials of government, subject to this extent: Grass = one bustle Wood for fuel = one bundle Article XIV The sepoy engaged by Tahsildars in connection with collection of revenue etc. shall be supplied rassad of the following descriptions:

S. No. Name Per head Quantity 1. Rice —do — 2 ¾ paw seer 2. Dal —do — ½ seer 3. Salt —do — ½ paw 4. Ghee —do — 1 paw

195

Article XV

As the state has been conferred to us by the British, it is incumbent on us to afford all help in men and material to them whenever they ask for it. All the kardars are bound to comply with these commands of 16 Katik , 1914. 196

Appendix III*

‘The report states that the situation in Kashmir forms an important topic nowadays in the Muslim press. The Kashmir state authorities are vehemently criticized on the grounds that those in charge of the administration, instead of sympathetically viewing the situation are trying to understand the real political forces behind the movement, are acting in a clumsy way and trying to represent the struggle for political emancipation as a communal move having for its main object a sort of attack on Hindu officers. The papers point out that this false representation is being made simply because 95% of the population are Muslims and the majority of those who are fighting for the cause of political liberty are Musalmans by persuasions.’ The strength of the Muslim community in Kashmir is so large that any movement sponsored by the Muslims of the state must be regarded as really national in the fullest sense of the term. It is argued that the Muslims of the state are really the nation in Kashmir and those officials in the state who say that movement as really communal, not only betray their shortsightedness but are themselves communal in outlook. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah the leader of the movement has since dropped the designation of Muslim conference and has given the movement a national tinge to this organization. As a result of this change of name, it is alleged that the liberal minded and progressive members of the Hindu community have joined this national organization. The opposing factor is the Kashmiri Pandits of the state, who have the monopoly of chief offices of the state and are naturally apprehensive that the establishment of a national government will destroy their monopoly and put an end to their interests. The leaders of the movement represent that the object of the upheaval and present agitation is the establishment in Kashmir of a responsible system of government under the aegis of his Highness the maharaja. He demanded that the administration of the state should be placed in the hands of people of the state, and threatened that, if this was not done, an unprecedented agitation would be started.’

* ‘Copy of a Secret Report dated the 13 th October, 1938, by Distr ict Central Intelligence Lahore’, Political Department, File No. 129/B-44, 1938, Jammu and Kashmir State Archives, Jammu.

Appendix IV*

Share of Muslims and non-Muslims in the Administration of the State

Number of officials % Share in Nos. Salaries (monthly) % Share in salaries

Non- Non- Non- Non- Department Total Muslims Muslims Total Muslims Muslims Muslims Muslims Muslims Muslims

Revenue 148 113 35 76.36 23.64 28280 22823 5457 80.70 19.30

Finance 201 188 13 93.53 6.47 26199 24674 1525 94.18 5.82

Customs 159 150 09 94.34 5.66 _ _ _ _ _ 197 197 Justice 37 33 04 89.19 10.81 21525 17650 3875 81.99 18.01

Health 220 188 32 85.46 14.54 18172 16421 1751 90.37 9.63

Education 62 56 06 90.32 9.68 22350 17750 4600 79.42 20.58

Police 1465 803 664 54.81 45.19 66200 49854 16346 75.31 24.69

Secretariat 46 42 04 91.30 8.70 31820 30770 1050 96.70 3.30 Jammu

*Source: Malik Fazl-ul-Hussain, Kashmir aur Dogra Raj , 1848-1931 (Urdu), 1st edition 1931, reprint, Gulshan Publishers, Srinagar, 1980, pp. 67-78; Inquilab , Lahore, 02 April 1930, 26 June 1930, 08 July 1930, 19 Oct 1930, 4 Jan 1931, 05 February 1931, 7 February1931, 15 February 1931.

* Source: Malik Fazl-ul-Hussain, Kashmir aur Dogra Raj , 1848-1931 (Urdu), 1 st edition 1931, reprint, Gulshan Publishers, Srinagar, 1980, pp. 67-78; Inquilab , Lahore, 02 April 1930, 26 June 1930, 08 July 1930, 19 Oct 1930, 4 Jan 1931, 05 February 1931, 7 February1931, 15 February 1931. 198

Appendix V*

The population of Jammu and Kashmir and its composition community wise according to the census 1941 stood as follows: Muslims - 31,01,247; Hindus - 8,09,165; Sikhs - 65,903; Others - 45,301. The share of these communities in different government departments was as follows:

Total Gazetted, Non-Gazetted and Menials

Muslims Hindus Sikhs Others Total Gazetted 163 361 23 11 558 Non-Gazetted 4943 9281 769 436 15429 Menials 2090 2156 268 155 5669 Total 7196 11798 1060 602 20656

Gazetted Officers

Muslims Hindus Sikhs Others Ministry of 22 46 2 1 development Ministry of law 12 24 2 — Information & 6 5 — — Broadcasting Secretariat of the — 1 — — Dewan Finance 11 29 2 1 Secretariat J & K University 2 — — — Ministry of Home 16 37 3 1 Affairs Ministry of 35 85 4 2 education Ministry of 38 67 1 — Revenue Ministry of 6 20 3 — Supplies Ministry of 12 42 6 6 Health General Deptt. S.S. Board & 3 5 — — affairs

*‘Facts about Kashmir (Pamphlet)’, File No. 8(25)-K/49, 1949, NAI. 199

Non-Gazetted Officers

Ministry of 663 1334 136 17 Development Ministry of Law 70 216 6 2 Information & 54 58 4 — Broadcasting Secretariat of the — 1 — — Dewan Finance 206 744 26 13 secretariat Jammu & Kashmir 7 10 — — University Ministry of Home 1766 2307 380 283 Affairs Ministry of 1279 2095 124 85 Education Ministry of 626 1617 53 21 Revenue Ministry of 48 129 8 — Supplies Ministry of 204 727 30 15 Health General Department (S.S. 20 42 2 — Board and External Affairs) Total 4943 9280 769 436

200

Menials

Ministry of 554 423 77 33 Development Ministry of Law 79 125 12 8 Information & 20 12 2 — Broadcasting Secretariat of the — 2 — — Dewan Ministry of Home 203 149 29 11 Affairs Ministry of 265 382 17 10 Education Finance 37 52 8 — Secretariat Ministry of 612 546 67 25 Revenue Ministry of 16 41 5 1 Supplies Ministry of 304 424 51 67 Health Total 2090 2156 268 155

Ministry of Development

Gazetted 22 46 2 1 71 Non Gazetted 663 1334 136 17 2150 Menials 554 423 77 33 1087 Total 1239 1803 215 51 3308

Ministry of Law

Gazetted 12 24 2 — 38 Non Gazetted 70 216 6 2 294 Menials 79 125 12 8 224 Total 161 365 20 10 556

201

General Department External Affairs S.S. Board Anti-Corruption Trade Commissioner and Private Secretary

Gazetted 3 5 — — 8 Non-Gazetted 20 42 2 — 64

Information and Broadcasting Department

Gazetted 4 5 — — 9 Non-Gazetted 54 58 4 — 116 Menials 20 12 2 — 34 Total 78 75 6 — 159

Finance Secretariat

Gazetted 11 29 2 1 43 Non-Gazetted 206 744 26 13 989 Menials 37 52 8 — 97

Jammu and Kashmir University

Gazetted 2 — — — 2 Non-Gazetted 7 10 — — 17 Total 9 10 — — 19

Ministry of Health

Gazetted 12 42 6 6 66 Non-Gazetted 204 727 30 15 962 Menials 304 424 51 67 846 Total 520 1193 87 88 1874

Ministry of Supplies

Gazetted 6 20 3 — 29 Non-Gazetted 48 129 8 — 185 Menials 16 41 5 1 63 Total 70 190 16 1 277

202

Ministry of Home Affairs

Gazetted 16 37 3 1 57 Non-Gazetted 1766 2307 380 283 4736 Menials 203 149 29 11 329 Total 1985 2493 412 295 5185

Ministry of Education

Gazetted 35 85 4 2 126 Non-Gazetted 1279 2095 124 85 3583 Menials 265 382 17 10 674 Total 1579 2562 145 97 4383

203

Appendix VI*

Joint Resignation of Twelve Members of the Praja Sabha of the Muslim Conference Party

To

The Honorable the President,

J & K Legislature, Srinagar.

Sir,

‘Sad is the experience of the representatives of the people in the Legislative Assembly, and sadder still has it has been rendered by the unsympathetic attitude of both the government and the official president. It is no wonder, therefore, that the defective constitution under which we have been working for the last two years should have so soon exposed its hollowness not only to us but to the world outside also. It will be remembered that Sir B.J. Glancy who presided over the Constitutional Reforms Commission had clearly recommended a House with elected majority. But when the recommendations were worked out and the constitution shaped and Assembly with thirty three elected members against forty two nominated councilors and officials including was instituted. Our experience shows that bitter results could have been avoided by the genuine desire to improve things, a show of generosity and at times even by tactfulness, on the part of both the president, and the government. But absence of all this, as it appeared ever since we cooperated, has brought about the inevitable rupture.

The attention of the government was over and again drawn to the woes and worries of the people, to their abject poverty and their miserable plight. Expenditure was asked for providing educational facilities in the rural areas, construction of canals for the agriculturists, establishment of Hospitals and dispensaries, starting and encouraging cottage industries, construction of roads and relief to peasants who suffered from heavy loss of cattle mortality. But these proposals were met by evasive answers, promises to attend to, ‘no funds’ or were positively turned down by the majority of the nominated votes. Two or three resolutions which were somehow passed by the Assembly were rejected by the council. Even the educational institutions mainly started on public charity have not been given adequate aid by the government. The Poonch representatives also told their woeful tale and asked to look into the agrarian indebtedness which is increasing by leaps and bounds and to which their pointed attention was drawn.

* Political Department, Bloc E, File No. 152/A-7, 1936, Jammu and Kashmir State Archives, Jammu. 204

Under these circumstances prayer was made to His Highness the Maharaja Bahadur signed by nearly all the Hindu, Muslim and the Sikh elected members for revising the constitution and introducing responsible form of government.

Having been too frequently disappointed by the government reply viz; ‘no funds’ and finding that the nation building departments were starved, we continuously and incessantly suggested the much needed reduction in the top heavy administration. Resolutions regarding retrenchment and reduction in the forest department personnel and pays, the salaries of Rs 200 per month and reduction in salaries of rupees five hundred per month and above are some of the important ones. But they met the expected fate at the hands of the government and were ruthlessly turned down or rejected by the president and the top heavy administration not only continues as before but becomes heavier and heavier day by day.

As many as thirty one representatives of the people boycotted the budget sittings this year and absolutely refrained from participating in the budget discussions as a protest against the government attitude with regard to the reduction in the top heavy administration; but even this didn’t move the government. The leader of the liberal group at the close of the budget discussions rose to make a statement in the house on behalf of the walkers out. But the honorable president didn’t permit him and sent to him he will forward it to the government. No wo nder that he has subsequently refused to submit the statement to His Highness the maharaja Bahadur.

People of this land, as everybody knows, suffer immensely under the heavy burden of intolerable taxes. Attention of the government drew to this by asking questions and moving resolutions regarding the reduction in land revenue, toll, income tax, customs duty, road toll, water rate, sanitation cess, etc. … but it was a cry in the wilderness. Kachhari is a tax too well known for its being a dead weight on the poor peasant. Number of times the government was asked to raise it and they didn’t hesitate to make unequivocal promise to introduce a kachhari Bill in this Assembly and give the House full opportunity to deal with it in order to amend and alter any clause movers of resolution regarding kachhari were therefore, made to withdraw their resolutions on this assurance. But when ultimately the promise bill came it was referred to a select committee, which immediately after it met for deliberations was adjourned sine die, as the government found that the majority of the Committee Report withdrew the Bill from the House in the present session, in spite of the fact that it was pointed out to the Honorable president that as 205 no ‘Bill’ was the House then, it was meaningless to ask the House for leave to withdraw the ‘Bill’.

The Honorable president’s attitude all the time has been not a whit encouraging. It was often found that a when a number rose to ask a question he met with a rebuff from the chair. May a bill sent by the members were rejected on most flimsy grounds by the Honorable President or without any reason whatever. Permission to introduce Mr. Mohammad Amin’s Municipal Reforms Bill was refused to him thr ice over, on one excuse or other. Mian Ahmedyar’s one Bill was refused to him thrice over, on one excuse or other. Mian’s Bill was rejected by the Honorable President and He was informed that he could approach the council against the Honourable President’s decision. The council funnily enough, informed the member that the Honourable President was the proper authority. Mr. M.A. Be g’s town area Regulation Amendment Bill which proposed to increase the elected element in the town’s committees was treated as a m oney Bill by the Honourable President and it was not admitted. The same member gave also notice of the Kashmir valley Food Control Regulation Amendment Bill which being in time and order was admitted by the Honourable President and entered in the list of the Assembly business. But a few days before it could be moved, the Honourable President reserved his previous order and withdrew the permission granted. M A Beg, against this decision submitted a letter to the Honourable Prime Minister though, the Honourable President. Strangely enough, the letter ordered that his ruling was final and the member couldn’t move a vote of censure against him, though, be it said by the way, there was no mention of moving a vote of censure against the Honourable president at that time. We believe that Mr. Beg’s letter must have been forwarded to the Honourable Prime Minister as under, section of the regulation No. 1 of 1991 it is the decision of the council and not that of the council and not that of the Honourable President that is final.

Assembly Proceedings Reports will fully bear out the fact that members who now and then oppose the government with the forensic force of their logic were interrupted and stopped and a nominated member who supported the government had free license to say whatever he liked.

In this brief statement we have only been able to note down a few of the numerous reasons which have compelled us finally to disassociate us from this Assembly. But we suppose that it will give a fair idea of the nature of those reasons to anybody interested. 206

We, the undersigned, therefore, hereby tender out resignations from our respective seats in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly.

Dated 2 nd November 1936,

We have the honour to be Sir, Your most obediently servants,

Sd/, Ahmad Yar, M.A. Beg, G.M. Sadiq, Ali Mohammed, Mohammed Amin, Qurban Ahmad, Gulam Hussain, Ahmedullah Shahdad, Hassan Shah Jalali, Fateh Mohammed, S. Khan Mohammed Khan, Akber Dar 207

Courtesy: Conveyor Magazine, Srinagar 208

Kashmiri Shawl weavers at work Courtesy: Conveyor Magazine, Srinagar

209

The Martyrs of 1931 Courtesy: Conveyor Magazine, Srinagar 210

Women ’s participation in 1931 public gatherings Courtesy: Conveyor Magazine, Srinagar