While Ranjit Singh was alive, both sides had sufficient regard for each other’s capabilities to avoid a head-on clash. But after his death, the Sikh kingdom was plunged into chaos. He had too many wives and too many successors, and as rival court factions sought support for their preferred candidates, the authority drained back to the army. The British saw their chance and the inevitable collision took place late in 1845. The first Sikh war began with two ferocious battles in the vicinity of Ferozepur. Helped by the treachery of the Sikh courtiers and commanders, who betrayed their own army, the British grabbed a victory from the jaws of defeat in Sobraon, a costly battle in which the Sikhs lost 10,000 men and the British, 2400.
It was sobering result. The British ruled out a more expensive bid for Lahore and opted for a peace package consisting of indemnity, partial annexation, a reduction in the Sikh army, and other safeguards. The annexation brought them some territory in the Punjab and their frontier moved from the Sutlej to the Beas River. Since the Sikhs could not pay the full indemnity, they got Kashmir instead and the vast Himalayan country between the Beas and the Indus rivers. Foolishly, they sold it to Gulab Singh, the Dogra Raja of Jammu, who had been one of Ranjit Singh’s feudatories, and who now became a vassal of the British. Thus, the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir was created, and this would descend through the Hindu king’s successors until 1947 and become a source of contention between India and Pakistan. No one at the time gave a single thought to the fact that a Hindu king would rule over a predominantly Muslim people. It was commonplace for Muslim nawabs to rule over Hindu populations in Awadh, Hyderabad, and elsewhere. But Kashmir would go on to enjoy a century of peace and prosperity that it seldom saw before or after.
After the first Sikh war, the British left behind an active and unusual Resident, Henry Lawrence, with a small staff and some British troops. His job was to uphold and direct the Regency Council, which would now operate in the name of Dalip Singh, Ranjit Singh’s minor son. The Resident was to see to it that the Sikh court and council would hold their own against the restless Sikh army and especially the disgruntled troops, who had been betrayed by their leaders and then laid off by the treaty. In 1848, the Maharaja’s garrison in the southern city of Multan mutinied and killed two Englishmen. This was precisely the opportunity that Lord Dalhousie, the new Governor-General, needed. As the mutiny spread among the Sikh troops to the rest of the Punjab, a large British army crossed the Sutlej once again from Ferozepur, passed the Ravi and the Chenab, and fought a major battle at Chillanwalla on the Jhelum. The Sikhs hailed it a victory, but the British pretended otherwise—even though they had lost 3000 men. However, the British came back a month later and decisively won the battle of Gujarat and with it the prize of the Punjab. On 29 March 1849, Maharaja Dalip Singh held his court for the last time in his life. He signed the document of annexation in Roman letters to become a pensioner of the British. ‘The majestic fabric raised by Maharaja Ranjit Singh was a thing of the past.’4
This is the historic background of my play. After writing two acts, I discovered that the Theatre Group in Bombay had announced a playwriting contest with a Rs 10,000 prize (which was a lot of money in 1968) and an offer to perform the winning play. This was just the incentive that I needed to finish the play. I entered it for the competition and fidgeted for three months. Larins Sahib won from around eighty entries, many of them from established authors. Theatre Group’s production opened in 1969 in Bombay, directed by Deryck Jefferies with Zul Vellani as Lawrence and Roger Pereira as Sher Singh. Many productions followed including one at Lawrence School, Sanawar, directed by Feroza Das. My favourite was the one in 1990 by Rahul da Cunha with Tom Alter as Lawrence, Rajat Kapur as Sher Shah, and Nisha Singh as Rani Jindan. I think it worked well because the director allowed the actors to improvise and turn some of the lines of the Sikhs into Punjabi or a Punjabized English. Thus, it got over some of the problems of performing in English. The audiences in Bombay loved it, and the company travelled with it to the Edinburgh festival. I learned from watching this production that English theatre, if it has to work on the stage in India, needs to be in an Indian English idiom with which the audiences are familiar. It doesn’t mean that
