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Bhaiji and Bended with Billy after her day at college, 1950.
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Ram Chandra Kak was the final Pandit Prime Minister of the princely state of Kashmir and was arrested by Maharaja Hari Singh as a result of he resigned his put up on the eve of Independence. In an e-mail interview, Siddharth Kak of ‘Surabhi’ fame, talks about Love, Exile, Redemption: The Saga of Kashmir’s Final Pandit Prime Minister and his English Spouse, a biographical memoir he co-authored with Lila Kak Bhan. The English spouse is Margaret Mary Allcock (often known as Bended), mom of Lila Kak Bhan, and step grandmother of Siddharth Kak. RCK, or Bhaiji, and Kak’s grandfather, might have been the Prime Minister, however is a forgotten determine, and the authors wrote the e-book, after researching her letters, diaries and his unpublished memoirs, to maintain alive his reminiscence. Edited excerpts:
Siddharth Kak
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How is it that Ram Chandra Kak’s title is unparalleled in Indian historical past and we all know solely about Maharaja Hari Singh?
My grandfather, Pandit Ram Chandra Kak, recognized to us as Bhaiji, was not politically inclined. He was a really non-public particular person. He didn’t be part of any caucus or palace politics to additional his profession. A Sanskrit and Persian scholar and archaeologist by career, he didn’t search publicity. As Lila Kak Bhan reiterates, Bhaiji all the time believed that he had nothing to show.
In any case, Maharaja Hari Singh was the pinnacle of the princely state of Jammu & Kashmir and all motion was taken in his title, even comparatively minor issues of transfers and promotions.
On Bhaiji’s return to Kashmir in 1959, the scenario was not as conducive politically because it was within the Nehruvian period.
Bhaiji on one in every of his meditative walks, Seventies.
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Why have been your grandfather’s memoirs by no means revealed?
As soon as my grandfather was exiled and subsequently returned after a few years to his beloved Kashmir, he constructed his life anew as a gentleman farmer. As kids we spent the perfect years of our lives within the magical hill stations of Kasauli and Kashmir with our every day walks collectively. My grandfather’s homestead within the foothills surrounding the Dal Lake had a verdant spring of its personal, which nonetheless flows. It gave my grandparents nice happiness to work together with the folks of Kashmir.
Bhaiji was not fascinated with publishing his memoirs, not solely as a result of he was not politically inclined, but additionally as a result of he was involved that his kids and household shouldn’t be victimised, because the occasions weren’t beneficial.
Bhaiji and Bended exterior the Pink Home, Seventies.
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Within the e-book, you say the princely states had a unique method to the exit of the British Empire within the subcontinent; some sought the creation of an Indian empire with Lahore as its capital. Did this embody princely states in South India too?
I can not communicate for the southern states, neither is there any indication of any such alliance in Bhaiji’s memoirs. The idea of an Indian state with Lahore as its capital was a dream of Maharaja Hari Singh and his spouse, egged on by palace intrigues, together with the Rasputin-like determine of Swami Sant Dev, who led Maharaja Hari Singh to imagine that he was destined to reign over an prolonged state, referred to as Dogristan, which might prolong from Lahore to the Kangra Valley and embody the prevailing Jammu and Kashmir areas.
The waterfall on the backside of the backyard from the Dara spring, which was used for bathing, frolicking and washing garments.
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What was your grandfather’s tackle Maharaja Hari Singh’s ambition to grow to be ‘emperor’ after independence?
I feel ‘emperor’ is an exaggerated designation. Maybe the Maharaja noticed himself as a ruler of an prolonged area. Bhaiji was astonished on the Maharaja’s naivete in believing that the remainder of India would capitulate so simply to his ambitions. My grandfather didn’t imagine that these accelerating the British withdrawal from India would enable one other occupation of the land.
Bhaiji drew the Maharaja apart and tried to clarify to him the implications of his actions, however the Maharaja was satisfied of his future. He sacrificed his sincere Prime Minister for this imagined future. Positive sufficient, removed from changing into the nice ruler he imagined he can be, he was compelled to flee Kashmir completely. As a result of his ill-advised actions, as an alternative of probably persevering with as head of the State of Jammu and Kashmir, he was rendered homeless some months later and ended his life in exile.
Did the dominion of Kashmir embody Buddhists, and was Ladakh part of it below Maharaja Hari Singh?
Ladakh was part of Maharaja Hari Singh’s kingdom, and Bhaiji mentions the Buddhists in his memoirs, which being fairly in depth have been edited, retaining in thoughts that the narrative focus was private and never historic.
Love, Exile, Redemption: The Saga of Kashmir’s Final Pandit Prime Minister and his English Spouse; Siddharth Kak, Lila Kak Bhan, Rupa, ₹695.
The interviewer is a author and poet.
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