Begum Hazrat Mahal

Begum Hazrat Mahal took Lucknow back after her husband was deposed, held it for nearly a year, and refused an amnesty that would have let her come home. She was born Muhammadi Khanum to a poor family in Faizabad, entered the royal household as a courtesan, and became a junior wife of Wajid Ali Shah with the title Hazrat Mahal. When he was deposed in 1856 and taken to Calcutta she stayed behind. In the rising of 1857 she had her young son Birjis Qadr proclaimed ruler of Awadh, and became the effective head of a government that ran the city and its revenue for months while the British garrison held out in the residency. She was one of very few leaders of 1857 with an administration rather than only an army, and she wrote a public reply to Queen Victoria's proclamation of 1858 rejecting its promises point by point, particularly on religion and on the annexation itself. When Colin Campbell retook the province she withdrew into Nepal, refused the pardon offered on condition of surrender, and was given asylum by Jung Bahadur Rana. She died in Kathmandu and is buried there. Her reply to the royal proclamation was printed and circulated in Awadh and is one of the few sustained political documents produced by the rebel side in 1857; it points out that a government that had just annexed a kingdom in peacetime was in a poor position to promise respect for treaties. She held a council with talukdars and maintained the revenue system rather than simply requisitioning. Nana Sahib was in Nepal at the same period. India issued a stamp in her honour in 1984, and no likeness of her from life is known, which is why this entry has no portrait. A memorial stands in the Old Victoria Park in Lucknow.

MyHistorian
A causal knowledge graph of history