A Begum & A Rani

A Begum & A Rani
Author: Rudrangshu Mukherjee
Publisher: Penguin Random House India Private Limited
Total Pages: 188
Release: 2021-07-30
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9354920160
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Exploring the lives of two remarkable women who chose to enter a field of activity which, in the middle of the nineteenth century, was seen a male domain, this book brings to light how unusual circumstances catapulted Begum Hazrat Mahal of Awadh and Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi into the rebellion of 1857. Both of them sacrificed their lives trying to overthrow the British rule, which they considered to be alien and oppressive. Their resistance and their deaths are heroic and poignant. The book captures the different trajectories of their lives and their struggles. In different but adjacent geographies these two women, both married into royal houses, decided to uphold traditions of ruling and culture that their husbands had established. These traditions had been subverted by the policies of Lord Dalhousie who had annexed both Awadh and Jhansi. While noting these similarities, it should be highlighted that Awadh was a large and sprawling kingdom with a long history whereas Jhansi was a small principality. The rani and the begum never met, even though they were embroiled in the same struggle. It is the rebellion of 1857-58 that provides the context, which makes these two outstanding women feature in the same narrative. This book tells the story of two women in a rebellion. The afterlives of the begum and the rani took on very different hues. The rani was made a nationalist icon: a woman on horseback with a raised sword, who died in battle. The begum was a relatively forgotten figure who did not get her due place in the roll call of honour. Revisiting the revolt of 1857 from a unique perspective and looking at their afterlives, the myths, this book attempts to set the record straight. Looking at the revolt of 1857 from a different perspective, A Begum & A Rani is an act of retrieval.

A Begum and a Rani

A Begum and a Rani
Author: Rudrangshu Mukherjee
Publisher: India Allen Lane
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2021-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780670090662
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Rani Laxmibai

Rani Laxmibai
Author: Pratibha Ranade
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2019-01-25
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9353026059
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RANI LAXMIBAI was a capable ruler, an intelligent communicator, and defender of the faith. She was sagacious when it came to her people and astute in dealing with her enemies. The widowed Queen had to repeatedly face gruelling challenges but drew strength from adversity, relying on her sense of justice, her dignity, and her magnanimity. She never surrendered to destiny, choosing instead to shape her own life. The British annexed Rani Laxmibai's kingdom, took away her political rights, and humiliated her. But she valiantly fought the foreign power and died a hero. Written after extensive research, this book portrays the making of a remarkable queen. Rani Laxmibai, the brave warrior-queen, remains a source of inspiration to us all.

In the City of Gold and Silver

In the City of Gold and Silver
Author: Kenize Mourad
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2014
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9781609452278
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Here is the long-forgotten story of Begum Hazrat Mahal, queen of Awadh and the soul of the Indian revolt against the British, brought to vivid life by a writer whose own story reads like a novel. Begum was an orphan and a poetess who captured the attentions of King Waiid Ali Shah of Awadh and became his fourth wife. As his wife, she incited and led a popular uprising that would eventually prove to be the first step toward Indian independence. Begum was the very incarnation of resistance: as chief of the army and the government in Lucknow, she fought battles on the field for two years; she was a freedom fighter, a misunderstood mother, and an illicit lover. A remarkable woman who risked everything only to face the greatest betrayal of all. Begum is a fitting subject for Keniz Mourad, whose mother was a Turkish princess and father an Indian Raj. When Mourad's mother moved to Paris in the company of a eunuch and died shortly after, the eunuch entrusted the child to the care of Catholic nuns. The nuns hid Mourad from her father, not wanting the child to be raised Muslim. Mourad only discovered her true identity and her parents' tragic fate in her twenties. Her story is the subject of an autobiographical novel, Regards from the Dead Princess, to be published by Europa in 2015.

The Ranee Of Jhansi

The Ranee Of Jhansi
Author: D.V. Tahmankar
Publisher:
Total Pages: 124
Release: 2007-01-09
Genre: India
ISBN: 9788129112330
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Born on the banks of the Ganges at Benares, little Manakarnika was a charged and precocious girl and she was destined to be etched in history as the towering queen of the Revolt of 1857. A touching yet accurate portrait of this Indian Boadicea, The Ranee of Jhansi as a biography also puts the events of the mutiny and the actual role of Lakshmibai in it, into perspective. The writer takes you on a journey through the plains and hills of central India which in 1857 could have but such is the fatalism of history turned around India s future forever. It makes for a breathless reading from beginning to end through the circumstances that led to the revolt and through the vivid scenes of the glorious battle at Jhansi. A woman of the strongest Mahratta mettle, Lakshmibai had an intuitive grasp of warfare, astute judgement of the enemy s power and an indomitable will that made her fight even in the face of defeat. And being a young Brahmin widow of thirty who led a whole army, she inadvertently created one of the greatest ironies in Indian history, when she was declared the best man on the rebel side !

Rani of Jhansi

Rani of Jhansi
Author: Bhawan Singh Rana
Publisher: Diamond Pocket Books Pvt Ltd
Total Pages: 180
Release: 2016-10-14
Genre: Young Adult Nonfiction
ISBN: 9350830035
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The brave woman, Maharani Lakshmibai, is a grand personality and inspiring chapter of Indian history. Even today her name inspires a new zeal in the hearts of all those who are struggling against injustice and cruelties. Her life was a strange combination of rise and fall. A seven-year-old innocuous madonna, the daughter of Moropant Tambe, a very ordinary common man, by quirk of circumstances, became the queen of nearly middle aged Raja Gangadhar Rao?Maharani Lakshmibai. She became a widow at the tender age of nineteen years. And from here began her life of struggles. At the time of merger of her state in the British empire, she thundered, ?I?ll not give my Jhansi.

The Begum and the Dastan

The Begum and the Dastan
Author: Tarana Husain Khan
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2023-02-20
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9393701644
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Lined with grandeur, tragedy and fantasy, Tarana Husain Khan's odyssey maps the social, political and religious contours of 1897 Sherpur with the fascinating and strong-willed Feroza Begum at the centre of the storm. On an evening not too many evenings ago, the blue-eyed Feroza, flouting her family's orders, attended Nawab Shams Ali Khan's sawani celebrations at the Benazir Palace. Tragedy coloured the night when she found herself kidnapped and withheld in the Nawab's harem - bustling, tantalizing and rife with sinister power play. As tyranny and repression tightened their hold inside the royal walls, at the Bazaar Chowk, dastangoi Kallan Mirza enchanted his listeners with the legend of sorcerer Tareek Jaan and his chimeric city, the Tilism-e-Azam, where women were confined in underground basements. Misfortune and subjugation link eras when Ameera, Feroza's great-granddaughter, is restricted to her house and finds solace in her Dadi's retelling of Feroza's tragedy. When Ameera's circumstances begin mirroring the strife and indignities pervasive in 1897 Sherpur, she must reflect if society has shifted enough for women and their choices. Written with careful flamboyance and striking evocativeness, The Begum and the Dastan is a world imbued with love, splendour and heartbreak, only saved by the women who refuse to play by the rule book.

Royals and Rebels

Royals and Rebels
Author: Priya Atwal
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 326
Release: 2021-01-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 0197566944
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In late-eighteenth-century India, the glory of the Mughal emperors was fading, and ambitious newcomers seized power, changing the political map forever. Enter the legendary Maharajah Ranjit Singh, whose Sikh Empire stretched throughout northwestern India into Afghanistan and Tibet. Priya Atwal shines fresh light on this long-lost kingdom, looking beyond its founding father to restore the queens and princes to the story of this empire's spectacular rise and fall. She brings to life a self-made ruling family, inventively fusing Sikh, Mughal and European ideas of power, but eventually succumbing to gendered family politics, as the Sikh Empire fell to its great rival in the new India: the British. Royals and Rebels is a fascinating tale of family, royalty and the fluidity of power, set in a dramatic global era when new stars rose and upstart empires clashed.

The Women Who Ruled India

The Women Who Ruled India
Author: Archana Garodia Gupta
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2019-04-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 9351951537
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‘People say that I am a quarrelsome woman...’ TARABAI, MARATHA QUEEN (1675–1761) The history of India, more often than not, is a history of the men who were in charge. Largely forgotten are the women who, even centuries earlier, shaped the fates of entire kingdoms. In The Women Who Ruled India, writer and researcher Archana Garodia Gupta revives 20 such powerful figures from the archives, offering us a glimpse of their fascinating lives. Among them are Begum Samru, a courtesan who went on to become the head of a mercenary army and the ruler of Sardhana; Didda of Kashmir, known for her keen political instinct and a ruthlessness that spared no one; Rani Abbakka of Ullal, the fearless queen who took on Portuguese colonizers in their heyday; and Rani Mangammal of Madurai, the famed administrator who built alliances at a time when going to war was the order of the day. These women and others like them built roads, instituted laws and were generous patrons of the arts and sciences. Their stories of valour and diplomacy, leadership and wit continue to inspire today. Peppered with anecdotes that showcase little-known facets of their personalities, the accounts in this book celebrate heroic rulers who – ‘quarrelsome’ though they might have been – were iconoclasts: unafraid to forge new paths.

The Last Prince of Bengal

The Last Prince of Bengal
Author: Lyn Innes
Publisher: Saqi Books
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2022-04-05
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1908906472
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The Nawab Nazim was born into one of India's most powerful royal families. Three times the size of Great Britain, his kingdom ranged from the soaring Himalayas to the Bay of Bengal. However, the Nawab was seen as a threat by the British authorities, who forced him to abdicate in 1880 and permanently abolished his titles. The Nawab's change in fortune marked the end of an era in India and left his secret English family abandoned. The Last Prince of Bengal tells the true story of the Nawab Nazim and his family as they sought by turns to befriend, settle in and eventually escape Britain. From glamourous receptions with Queen Victoria to a scandalous Muslim marriage with an English chambermaid; and from Bengal tiger hunts to sheep farming in the harsh Australian outback, Lyn Innes recounts her ancestors' extraordinary journey from royalty to relative anonymity. This compelling account visits the extremes of British rule in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, exposing complex prejudices regarding race, class and gender. It is the intimate story of one family and their place in defining moments of recent Indian, British and Australian history. 'I was captivated and surprised by this bitter-sweet history as it twists and turns down three generations, through many astonishing changes of fame and fortune, from a glittering Bengal palace to an Australian sheep farm. Lovingly researched and meticulously told, The Last Prince of Bengal is notable for its candid revelations of British colonial attitudes and hypocrisies across two centuries. A rich, delightful and unexpectedly thought-provoking saga.' -- Richard Holmes Lyn Innes explores her ancestors' history in moving detail, capturing the tragic story of the dethroned princes of Bengal who had to make their lives in foreign lands, marked forever by the harsh legacy of Empire.'-- Shrabani Basu, author of Victoria and Abdul: The Extraordinary True Story of the Queen's Closest Confidant