Unique features of the Hyderabad

Hyderabad: This article is in continuation to the last article focusing on the Nizams and the modernisation of Hyderabad State. Most visitors to the State were struck by the unique feature of general communal amity in Hyderabad. Walter Monckton, a British politician, on his first visit to the city, noticed during a morning ride that […]

Hyderabad: This article is in continuation to the last article focusing on the Nizams and the modernisation of Hyderabad State.

Most visitors to the State were struck by the unique feature of general communal amity in Hyderabad. Walter Monckton, a British politician, on his first visit to the city, noticed during a morning ride that “Muslim mosques and Hindu temples stood side by side and that the devotees of the two creeds seemed to exist together in peace”. The situation was similar even under the Qutb Shahis. It continued and reached its zenith under the sixth and seventh Nizams, Mir Mahbub Ali Khan and Mir Osman Ali Khan. It was not difficult to see how Hindus and Muslims joined so easily in one another’s processions, entering one another’s homes at a happy moment and attacking one another with nothing lethal than garlands of flowers, scent and coloured water.

The life of the average citizen was equally the same. Sarojini Naidu described life in Hyderabad in the following words: “Hyderabad has a way of setting the seal of her special traditions on all her sons and daughters, investing them, irrespective of their communities and beliefs with a special kinship.” This was a land where graceful and beautiful women dressed in gorgeous raiment, carrying filigreed paan boxes in henna tainted hands bristled with sluggishness and serenity away from the storm centers of the world.

Hyderabad under the Asaf Jahis consisted of different communities and classes and never projected itself as a Hindu or Muslim cultural centre. It was a synthesis of all religions built upon a feeling of common nationality and culture for the progress of the state.

Up until the end of the State in 1948, the State administration continued to fund and supervise important Hindu institutions and events, and it publicly proclaimed its role in the face of increasingly communal politics both within and outside the State. In 1943, the state’s Information Bureau put out another publication highlighting photos and brief descriptions of two prominent houses of worship, shrines and religious buildings in Hyderabad. In the city, the temple of Ramchandraji built in the time of the second Nizam by Baba Balak Das is included, with a photo of the cradle donated to the temple by Nizam Ali Khan; the text mentions a jagir gifted to it by the fourth Nizam. The Kishen Bagh temple is included; its jagir of Rs 18,000 per year and its good relations with the ‘Durgah of Kishen Bagh’ are mentioned. The Sitaram Bagh temple is included; its jagir of nearly Rs 50,000 per year, its annual jatra and its government-supervised management committee are mentioned. The temple of Jham Singh in the Kulsampura Karwan Sahu locality is included; its jagir from the third Nizam of Rs 8408 per year, its jatra and its Ecclesiastical Department-supervised management committee are mentioned. Finally, the temple or math (monastery) of Baba Khaim Das is included; its grant of Rs 11,521 per year.

The founding and development of Hindu temples in Hyderabad, with the full support of Muslim rulers and Nizam state, engaged nobles, officials and other key figures in the Nizam administration in the creative construction of a plural society. This plural society shared characteristics with earlier Hindu and Indian Muslim kingdoms in the subcontinent. Similarly, the Nizams of Hyderabad employed Hindu officials and institutions as well as Muslim ones to expand and tame Hyderabad’s urban frontiers. Bansi Raja and the Keshavagiri temple best exemplify the mutually empowering both state and religion. The social relations, development of infrastructure, language and literature, education and learning both on economic and social terms represented the quintessence of cultural traditions of his domain. Much credit goes to Mir Osman Ali Khan for raising the status of Hyderabad State.

Prof. Adapa Satyanarayana

Retired Professor
Department of History, Osmania University
Ph. 9573405551