On a dusty track with a man extraordinary
Himmat Singh Gill

Rambles & Recollections of an Indian Official
by Sir W. H. Sleeman. Rupa. Pages 800. Rs 595.

HE rose to the rank of Major General, with a K. C. B. and a Sir prefixed to his name. Soldier-turned-colonial-Administrator (1809-1856), Assistant-cum-Resident to the British administration in much of Central India in far-off places like Sagar, Nerbudda, Jabalpur (Jubbulpore), Lucknow and most of Oude, and General Superintendent for the Suppression of Thuggee in India, 'Thuggee Sleeman', as he came to be known, has become the perfect example of an extraordinary man who, living through extraordinary times, achieved so much for his country and King. His rambles and recollections, in a revised annotated edition by Vincent A. Smith, are a rich treasury of history, travel, folklore, social conditions and life in India, at a time when intrigue governed the land, and rulers sympathetic to the Indians were an exception more than a rule. Sleeman was one such exception, and it is our fortune that as he rode the dusty tracks from Jabalpur to Meerut, he kept a journal of the events that took place during the long march. This journal today forms a memoir, which in spite of its size is simply too good to not be read from cover to cover.

Sleeman has very candidly said what an average Britisher could possibly say about Indians and their way of life, often steeped in myth, superstition, caste prejudices and ignorance. Writing about the time when the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata (Purana) were written, he says, "It is now pretty clear that all these works are of comparatively recent date, that the great poem of the Mahabharata could not have been written before the year 786 of the Christian era, and was probably written so late as A. D. 1157; that Krishna, if born at all, must have been born on the 7th of August, A. D. 600, but was most likely a mere creation of the imagination to serve the purpose of the brahmans of Ujjain, in whom the fiction originated." About Lord Krishna, Sleeman says, "In the Mahabharata Krishna is described as fighting in the same army with Yudhishthira and his four brothers. Yudhishthira was a real person, who ascended the throne at Delhi 575 B. C., or 1175 years before the birth of Krishna." Writing of a "Suttee" on the banks of the Nerbudda river, Sleeman says he could not avert the incident since the old lady whose husband had died a few days earlier was bent on joining him — "why have they kept me five days from thee, my husband." The final moments of the lady are described very poignantly, "She then walked up deliberately and steadily to the brink, and leaning back in the midst as if reposing upon a couch, was consumed without uttering a shriek or betraying one sign of agony."

From the working of the thuggee system to the story of the Kohinoor diamond and the gates of New Delhi or Shahjahanabad, it is all there in this very readable account. The Jamaldehi gang of thugs killed innocent travellers on the road with their handkerchiefs: "All being ready, one of the four, in a low undertone, give the 'jhirni' (signal), the handkerchiefs were thrown over their necks, and in a few moments all three — the Mogul and his servants — were dead, and lying in the grave in the usual manner, the head of one at the feet of the one below him." How the Mountain of Light, the Kohinoor, was wrested by Maharaja Ranjit Singh when the Afghan Sultan Shuja journeyed to seek asylum with the "Honourable Company" at the frontier station of "Ludiana" on the banks of the "Hyphasis", is described thus: "On their way through the territories of the Sikh chief, Ranjit Singh, Shuja was discovered to have this great diamond, the Mountain of Light, about his person; and he was, by a little torture skillfully applied to the mind and body, made to surrender it to his generous host." Accounts of the kingdoms of Gwalior, and Dholpur, the Jats and the fiery Sikhs, Akbar, Fatehpur-Sikri, the marriage of a tank with a plantain tree, Bharartpur and the young Begam Sumroo, are all there in this rare account by a man who travelled extensively and jotted down what he saw, something that few Indians do even when they get a chance.

Sleeman makes some pertinent observations on the working of the police. He describes how very often the native police officer could not discover the real culprits of a crime: "When they cannot find them, the native officers either seize innocent persons, and frighten them into confession, or else they try to conceal the crime, and in this they are seconded by the sufferers in the robbery, who will always avoid, if they can, a prosecution in our courts, and by their neighbours, who dread being summoned to give evidence as a serious calamity". This comes close to what happens very often even today in various parts of the country.

Sleeman retired from service in 1856, and died the same year while making his way back to Britain on a long sea voyage. His book should be an eye-opener for our bureaucracy today, where few write anything of any consequence, of their experiences and times.

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