Indian History - The Facts by Ashish Joshi

In 1568, during the reign of Udai Singh II, Chittor was conquered by the Mughal Emperor Akbar after the third Jauhar at Chittor. However, Udai Singh and the royal family of Mewar escaped before the capture of the fort and moved to the foothills of the Aravalli Range where Udai Singh founded the city of Udaipur. Rana Udai Singh wanted Jagmal, his favourite son, to succeed him but his senior nobles wanted Pratap, the eldest son, to be their king as was customary. During the coronation ceremony, Jagmal was physically moved out of the palace by the Chundawat Chief and Tomar Ramshah and Pratap was made the King, the Rana of Mewar. Folklore has it that Pratap did not want to go against the wishes of his father but Rajput nobles convinced him that Jagmal was not fit to rule in the troubled times of the day; but it is quite possible that what occurred was a bitterly contested struggle for succession: something characteristic of most South Asian kingdoms of the age. Though the chief reas...

                          { Sitting Lt Gen Aurora, Lt Gen Niazi  ; Standing from right Maj General Jacob & Lt Gen Sagat Singh : Niazi -Pak Army East Pakistan signing instrument of surrender on 16-12-1971 } On 16 th December 1971 Pakistan lost half of its country. It had to publicly surrender to India at Dhaka. The India – Pakistan war of 1971 came to be known as a landmark in the history of warfare. In just 12 days, the Indian Army brought Pakistani army to its knees. It took 93,000 Pakistani prisoners  and gave people of Bangladesh their independence.   1971 war was planned and executed by Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw   and his team   . The Eastern Command of Indian Army was led by Lieutenant General JS Aurora & his Chief of Staff Maj General JFR Jacob.  It was Lieutenant General Sagat Singh, General Officer Commanding of 4 Corps that led the charge and c...

In part 1, I had detailed the sequence of events and the main actors involved, leading to accession of Jammu & Kashmir with India.   It needs to be understood that India adopted the British Parliamentary system and Cabinet system.   All the decisions taken by the Government of India after independence were a collective responsibility of the Cabinet. When J&K acceded to India     Jawaharlal Nehru was the Prime Minister and Sardar Patel was Deputy Prime Minister and the Home Minister of India.   Late V.P. Menon in his book, “The Story of Integration of Indian States”(1956) gave the official version of what happened during that period. The other book written by him is “Transfer of Power in India”   (1957). V.P. Menon was a close associate of Sardar Patel.   Menon was handling constitutional reforms since 1917, he was Viceroy's Constitution Advisor from 1942, he was also the Chairman of the three-man Committee which drafted the Indian Inde...

Nehru,Kashmir & Historical circumstances {Part-1} ********************************************************* The role of Nehru has been repeatedly questioned for the Kashmir problem. In order to understand whether this proposition is right or wrong, we need to understand the events in J&K before and after partition in 1947 . It is also important to discuss the events after the partition as these have been distorted by people. During partition, Jammu and Kashmir was ruled by Maharaja Hari Singh. It was called the Dogra kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir. The Dogras got the rights of Kashmir Valley under Treaty of Amritsar after paying lump-sum amount to British Government in 1846. In 1931, a campaign was started against the Maharaja's rule from Lahore, in neighboring Punjab by the Press. They led a campaign that North Pakistan - Islamabad area was in danger from the Maharaja . During this time, there were a handful of educated Kashmiri Muslims, one of them being Sheikh A...

Incongruity of 'Veer' epithet with Vinayak Damodar Savarkar ******************************** Savarkar was chargesheeted in the assassination of Gandhi but exonerated, largely because no corroborative evidence of his involvement was furnished. Next month on May 28, India will commemorate birth anniversary of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, who was born on this day in 1883. How veer, or brave, was Veer Savarkar? Savarkar died in 1966. During his 83 years, he was involved in the political murder of three British officials. From the nationalist perspective, these murders have been cited as examples of Savarkar’s revolutionary zeal to violently uproot British rule, unmindful of the consequences. Savarkar was also chargesheeted in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi but was subsequently exonerated, largely because no corroborative evidence of his involvement was furnished. It has helped perpetuate the myth of Savarkar the brave. But this myth has been shattered becau...

The Petitions of Bhagat Singh & Savarkar to the British -- Read, to know the difference *********************** "Shaheed Bhagat Singh’s Last Petition Lahore Jail, 1931 To: The Punjab Governor Sir, With due respect we beg to bring to your kind notice the following:That we were sentenced to death on 7th October 1930 by a British Court, L.C.C Tribunal, constituted under the Sp. Lahore Conspiracy Case Ordinance, promulgated by the H.E. The Viceroy, the Head of the British Government of India, and that the main charge against us was that of having waged war against H.M. King George, the King of England. The above-mentioned finding of the Court pre-supposed two things: Firstly, that there exists a state of war between the British Nation and the Indian Nation and, secondly, that we had actually participated in that war and were therefore war prisoners. The second pre-supposition seems to be a little bit flattering, but nevertheless it is too tempting to resist...