The British Raj 8 – The Indian Mutiny

So what did the British do very clever move. They abolished the Persian language as the language of administration. They replaced it with Urdu and Hindi. And they did this as a deliberate move to take away 600 years, if not 800 years of hard work of the Muslims, they took it in one stroke.

So I was talking about the mutiny, it is called the Indian Mutiny or the greater rebellion or the War of Independence, depending on the perspective, it happened in 1857. I was explaining earlier, it was caused by a number of factors. And if I was to simplify it, and put it in short terms, it was caused by a feeling of lack of satisfaction on the part of these soldiers who rebelled against the officers. The pays were bad, they were they weren't paid good. They were being discriminated against, there was racism among British officers. And most importantly, the religion was being insulted the Hindus as well as the Muslims, as I explained earlier, they used cartilages that

contained pig and cow fat. And this is what really triggered the rebellion, feelings are already high. Muslims and Hindus are already not happy with the way the British are ruling. From the year 1803. You can see what the pattern was of the East India Company, taking more and more territory causing more and more entries, taking on more and more local principalities. If you did not toe the line, they will remove you they will cause conspiracies against you or they will conspire with other powers against you and they will remove your power. So if you toe the line, if you listen to the end, accompany and follow the foreign policy. So what did they say to these local principalities

that you can rule yourselves, you can raise taxes, you can remain kings and princes and Queens. But the foreign policy will be defined by us, we will dictate the foreign policy, your foreign negotiations, you cannot negotiate with us. And you will have to have one of our political agents in your court present at all time. And then he has to be aware of all the business you're doing. So basically, they would plant one of the agents at every single Indian court for this agent to watch all the political maneuvering within the court so that he can report back to the Governor General in Calcutta and then they will take appropriate action when necessary. This is why to Bhutan was

attacked. This is why the Murata has are later on attacked. This is why the Nizam in Hyderabad continued in his position as all his descendants, his descendants continued as the Nawab so does his arms and his arm was the ruling title. Okay, they continued as his arms because they told the line, they never challenged the British on anything. They said okay, let us rule let us govern. And you know, so that's why those principalities that remained in power up to the year 1947. When the British left India, those powers remained in power because they toed the line. So those who did not draw the line, like the Sikhs, for example, were also removed as I mentioned earlier, the Sikhs and

taken a lot of territory in the Punjab, and in 1799, a young adventurer called Maharaja Ranjit Singh came to power in the Punjab and eventually took territory from Bhutan to be shower. You may be shocked now to hear this, but let me tell you that for 40 years, this man called Maharaja Ranjit Singh ruled territory in current day Pakistan, and within India as well, in eastern Punjab, he ruled territory stretching from Himalayas and the North. From the shower, let's say to Milton, all basically the best part of the Punjab it was an Empire it was a Sikh Empire. And the British after taking Delhi in 1803, had the eyes on the Sikh Empire to they want one after another. They were

going for every single strong principality and removing them from power so that they can have their hands in the pie, as they say, you know, they don't didn't want anyone else taking any share and it was all about all about money in India was a cash cow.

As far as the East India Company, and then the British Raj after 1857 were concerned, India was a cash cow. India was simply there to provide for

the needs of the British elite, so to say. So that's why India

and merchants were taxed heavily. The industries are completely destroyed to raise businesses in Britain, where India was supplying cloth to the world in the 18th century, it came down to by 1896 by the year 1896, it came down to India not even being able to supply cloth within India

only 8% of the cloth was produced within India for the Indians Indians started to import clot from other places most importantly Britain. So, the British East India Company systematically okay caused Indian economy to collapse. It took 200 years for the Indian economy to collapse India from being one of the richest countries in the world became one of the poorest countries in the world okay to use an Indian author's words. India basically the subcontinent collectively became the poster child of poverty in the world, right because of the British rule in India. So, after 1803 When they took Delhi they had the eyes on the Punjab they wanted the Punjab to write but in the Punjab there was a

very strong Sikh army ruled by a very shrewd Sikh ruler, Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who was taking a lot of Muslim territory as well. And he was fought by the Muslims no doubt in the mountains in the in the Kashmir Valley, the Muslims including my ancestors again, okay, my this is this is part of my family history. That's why I'm so fascinated by it my one of my ancestors. He was directly involved in fighting Sikh armies when they came to take territory in the region of current day after birth in Pakistan, right.

And then later on, Sikhs were removed in 1849. Maharaja Ranjit Singh died in 1839, and within 10 years after, after his death, his sons could not hold on to power, one after one after the other. They were all killed off right after Maharaja Ranjit Singh came his son cardiac Singh, who was basically a drunkard he died soon after. On the same day of the funeral of cardiac sing his son who succeeded him called noni housing was also assassinated and killed by the Sardars. themselves. Then, another son of Maharaja and Ethan came to power his name was Sher Singh. Okay, who basically ruled for nearly three years he was also assassinated by the sidebars themselves. So these were caught in

twigs that killed off the rulers, right? And I believe partly this happened because of the oppression of the Sikhs. I'm not saying generally all the Sikhs but this particular dynasty, right? It was very oppressive towards Muslims, okay? I'm not saying all Sikhs were involved in this because many Sikhs didn't like him on ideology team as well. Right. So his establishment was extremely oppressive. Now, sometimes people give examples of his,

you know, Prime Minister, for example, he was a Muslim, right? Or his treasurer was also a Muslim, his private physician was a Muslim, right? But that doesn't mean that all the Muslims living in the Muslim territory in the Punjab were happy under the sea crew. They were not clearly not because they were coming to India, in Delhi, complaining to the scholars of Delhi about this oppression, right, what the oppression and the result of this oppression was a group of people rising from the city of Delhi to go and liberate the Muslims of Punjab, and this movement was led by a man called Sayed Ahmed Shaheed Muhammad Ali. Okay. He was one of the students of Sharpton as he is the man mentioned

earlier, the son of showery Allah, so he came from the same school. Same madrasa in Delhi say that much aid he assembled an army or let's say, a private kind of army of consisting of volunteers from all over India, they went to Afghanistan, and they attacked the shower and took a shower from the Sikhs. And then they started to take more territory from the Sikhs. And then unfortunately, they were betrayed by the local tribes, and then they could not go any further. And in 1831, Sher Singh, the son of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, basically massacred them in a battle called the Battle of Bala code, right. This ended that particular movement, but that particular martyrdom of many noble people

who died in Bala code, it gave rise to Islam in India, Islam as an ideology was on the decline due to the British rule in India, but that particular sacrifice in 1831 It woke up the Muslims in India, hold on a second, can this even happen? And it really revived the example of the Sahaba how they gave the sacrifices you know, in the path of Allah subhanaw taala. So, this mu

movement is very important, right? There are books written on it. It is called the Mohammadi movement. It was called the Muhammad movement. Okay. And Shaohua new laws grand son was part of the movement he also was killed in Bala code in current day Pakistan.

In the mountains his name was Shah Ismail Shaheed, who is the author of a very famous book titled taqueria, Toliman taqueria Toliman. Right. So he was also a part of this movement. So why am I telling you all this, I'm telling you this because in you know, the British had caused serious problems and Muslims in particular in India. Muslims are now facing oppression at the hands of the C compiler in the Punjab, and then they were being brutalized by the Murata as as well in those territories well, most easily. So Muslims are completely scattered politically, you know, they were completely divided. So they were really really and on top of that, for some reason, the Muslims are

facing the brunt of the rise of the East India Company in India. In 1830s. The British government abolished the Persian language. You know what happens when you take a language away from people, you lose everything, all the Islamic literature in the Indian subcontinent, as far as the Muslims are concerned, was in the Persian language, the Urdu language was the language of the masses, it was not necessarily a literary language, it was spoken by the masses, it developed in the 18th century, no doubt, some of the best points of the oral language are born in the 18th century. So it's a relatively new language in that sense. It's an old language, but its literary form is a new

language, which was the old language Persian, spoken for nearly 800 years among Indian Muslims, starting from the time of Sultan Muhammad, Allah ghaznavi, all the way up to the year 1800. So all the commentaries on the Quran, on Hadith, poetry, everything books on mathematics on philosophy, you name it, every single subject on medicine, every single subject,

Persian language, all the books are written in Persian language. So the Persian language was the power of the Muslims. And it was so popular and so needed that even the Sikhs and the Hindus had to learn the Persian language to do better in their lives. How do I know that today you pick up Sikh coins minted by Maharaja Ranjit Singh, they are in Persian.

All the silver coins are Maharaja Ranjit Singh and but even the hint coins minted by the Murata as Hindu kings in the Persian language, their correspondence was in the Persian language.

I have documents in my private library, my position coming from sheep from the Sikh courts, per your language. So what did the British do very clever move, they abolished the Persian language as the language of administration. They replaced it with Urdu and Hindi. And they did this as a deliberate move to take away 600 years, if not 800 years of hard work of the Muslims, they took it in one stroke 1834 They started to raise these new colleges, they started to attract the Muslims and the Hindus to the new qualities, okay, where they were teaching practical sciences, you know, engineering and medicine. That's when the scholars of Islam in India, they became Hold on a second

what's going on here? They're trying to take away our youth. That's when these modalities came up these schools of thought that were born in India, okay, the School of Durban Barilla, we later on, okay, and then the school of antibodies, these schools came as a reaction to what the British are doing in India at the time, okay, albeit in different places, you know, created by different people, but these were the reactions of the scholars of Islam. And one of the reasons was that Muslims had completely lost the faith

that completely lost any knowledge of Islam and Islamic history. So that's why scholars of Islam, from different schools of thought from different persuasions, they came together and started working to teach theology to Muslims, and specifically designed institutions. Okay, so they were not interested in the English language, specifically on engineering and medicine. They were simply worried about Islamic sciences so that our Muslim youth or Muslim youngsters or future generations are aware of the Islamic sciences. So it really pains me my brothers. It really pains me. When I see different schools of thought from the Indian subcontinent, gunning each other down.

They do not acknowledge each other's

I sacrifices, the other Hadees will turn and say to the deobandis You know what, our guys with a dance. They were doing the war. They were fighting the British the other day, you know, the East India Company they were they were involved in the Indian Mutiny, the deobandis turn around and say no, no, no, you guys are a bunch of traitors. You are a product from the British anyway. Right? We are the ones are scholars went to Malta, and they went to prisons and all of that. Okay, then the breweries come along. And as I know, both of you Bobby's are a bunch of nachos. You know, we are the ones who are scholars, you know, all of these names. This is where you are absolutely lost. You do

injustice to your scholars, and people who sacrifice from his team. Okay, I say anyone who sacrificed out of sincerity out of his love for Allah and His Messenger, no matter what school he comes from, right? If you sacrifice for the sake of Allah leave his sacrifice to Allah. You don't judge. You don't judge? How do you know what Allah is going to do with him on the day of judgment? Okay, start, you know, start respecting each other. start acknowledging this, the sacrifices you know, what Allah if I start telling you about the sacrifice of the School of Allah, Hadith, and the School of the Obon, and some Sufi scholars, you will not believe in?

Okay? The reason why I have sympathy for everyone is because I've seen the sacrifices of every single

school of thought, or people from people from different persuasions, they may not agree with each other at times, they even attacked each other, the scholars, and then they were wrong, they made mistakes, they were mistaken. When they attack each other in these circumstances, they were wrong, we don't have to follow in follow them in that they will not assume they were mistaken. So when the scholars of the Obon were attacking the scholars of Allah, these they were wrong. And vice versa, when the scholars of Allah these were attacking the scholars of the urban, they were wrong.

Okay, let them be

agree to disagree. Let them love the prophet and Allah in their own way. So this is what was happened as a British establishment for using this to their advantage. Right, so they got rid of the Sikhs as well, they annex Punjab in 1839, producing die within 10 years in 1849, having fought two wars against the Sikhs, the Anglo Sikh wars, okay, both of them were lost by the Sikhs and the British to the Punjab. And the last Maharaja, the surviving son orange eating was a, you know, a key. They took him. They sent him to Britain, as an exile as a political exile. So he grew up here his name was deleting. Okay, he grew up in Britain. Later on, he rediscovered he converted to

Christianity. He was converted to Christianity. Later on, he rediscovered his identity and he went back to Sikhism, okay, and then he tried to reassert his power but then his stories are the very sad story, which you have to read about