It was on April 19 in the year 1854, that a tragic turn came into the already tough life of a boy who had become a king at the age of six. Duleep Singh was deceived and taken away from his country forever to England, to another life, another world. The boy-king was under the impression, as his guardian — Dr John login — had told him, that he would be back soon after completing his education and would settle down in a landed estate in Dehradun, free to spend his summers in Mussoorie. But this journey took him away forever. Earlier, there were plans for him to settle in “Dhoon” (Dehradun).
In his historical novel “The Exile”, author and diplomat Navtej Sarna, in his fictionalised historical account of the life of Duleep Singh writes, “Duleep Singh was separated from his mother and his people, taken under British guardianship and converted to Christianity. At 16, he was transported to England to live the life of a country squire — an exile that he had been schooled to seek himself.” Mussoorie can never forget its close association with the iconic figure — this last Maharaja of Punjab, who spent some part of his childhood at the Castle Hill Estate in landour before being taken away to England.
His is a tragic tale which has been handed down from one generation to the next by the people of Mussoorie who are proud of the hill town’s relationship with the traumatic life of the last kind of Punjab, son of the great Maharaja Ranjit Singh. The heartrending stories which surround the life of Duleep Singh have been told by many a historian and many an author .
Duleep Singh was born on September 4, 1838 to the beautiful Maharani Jindan, a minor queen of the great Sikh monarch, Ranjit Singh. After Ranjit Singh’s death, his powerful kingdom was plunged into a decade of chaos and bloodshed. After the two Anglo-Sikh wars, the Punjab was ready for annexation by the British. The child king, Duleep Singh, had to sign away his kingdom and wealth, including the famous Koh-i-noor diamond, to the Governor General of India, lord Dalhousie. His mother was sent into exile and Duleep Singh was taken in hand by Dr John login, a Presbyterian army surgeon.
Duleep lived under login’s close watch away from the Punjab, in Fatehgarh, a small settlement on the banks of the Ganges and soon became a Christian. But before he left for England, the Maharaja reached Mussoorie in 1852 after an incognito visit to Hardwar and a short stay in the Doon valley. He also spent some time in Mussoorie in 1853. He was kept at the Castle Hill Estate near landour Bazaar in Mussoorie. There has been a longstanding demand that the government should make a Maharaja Duleep Singh Museum at Castle Hill which is now with the Survey of India.
As the hope of recovering the legendary Koh-i-noor from Britain is rather bleak, stories associated with this amazingly beautiful diamond, a symbol of the glorious past of our country, will always fascinate people and it is rather difficult to think of the Koh-i-noor without thinking of Duleep Singh and vice-versa. “Koh-i-noor” means “Mountain of light” in Persian. It is believed that the name was first used by Nader Shah who took possession of the diamond in 1739. Prior to this date, the name Kohinoor was not used.
In 1849, on September 5, John login wrote a letter to his wife lena (from lahore) saying, “Yesterday was the birthday of the little Maharaja; he is now eleven...I had the great pleasure of presenting to the Maharaja, on the morning of his birthday, a lakh of rupees worth of his own jewels from the toshakhana he appeared dressed most splendidly. When I congratulated him on his appearance, he innocently remarked that on his last birthday he had worn the Koh-i-noor on his arm!” This was part of his tragedy...he was being gifted things on his birthday from the very treasure which had been his own in the first place!