Ivory Throne
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Throughout all her disputations with Kowdiar Palace, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi had always carefully insulated her children, never letting her own tribulations affect them. ‘We barely knew what was happening,’ Princess Indira recalls, ‘and the little bit that we did hear were whispers from aunts. Mother never uttered a word about these things, not then and not later.’7 Even the quarrel over the Sripadam, perhaps the Maharani’s most exacting trial, was kept away from her daughters, who lived in the happy cocoon that was Vellayini. ‘It was all so malicious but she didn’t want to pass any of that to her children. She always thought that at least they could lead their lives in peace, without worry.’8 That said even Sethu Lakshmi Bayi never expected the authorities to be so inconsiderate as to the extent of trying to drain her finances and cutting even the supply of kitchen vegetables, with a pregnant princess awaiting confinement in the palace. The Valiya Koil Tampuran was, of course, not remotely shocked.
As the time for certain critical prenatal ceremonies approached, the Maharani despatched a personal appeal to the Maharajah asking for their commencement. In return Chithira Tirunal wrote how pleased he was to hear of the good news, and that arrangements for the ceremonies would be made on the receipt of ‘the usual formal communication’ from the Sripadam.9 Sethu Lakshmi Bayi, accordingly, asked her manager to forward the traditional notification. But it was merely another handle to prosecute the dispute, for she was told that since her manager was not recognised by Kowdiar Palace, a communiqué sent under his sign and seal was not acceptable. Only a note from the manager the Maharajah had appointed could be received. ‘I fail to see how the arrangements for the Princess’ confinement,’ cried a crestfallen Maharani, ‘should be made to depend upon my recognition of the Palace nominee.’10 It appeared to her that not only were she and Rama Varma out of favour with the Maharajah, but hostility extended even to her daughters who had little to do with these quarrels other than being her natural heirs and family.
Nevertheless, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi remained stoically hopeful that Chithira Tirunal would have a change of heart and relax the siege on her and her children. The latest auspicious day to conduct the relevant ceremonies was 15 December but as the days passed, it became patent that the Maharajah would not make any arrangements at all for the rites to be performed. Somehow, then, ‘at the eleventh hour,’ wrote the Maharani, ‘I had to conduct them quietly, without the customary pomp or pageantry’.11 Where the senior male member of the family was meant to preside, owing to the deaf ear turned by the Maharajah, it was her sister Kutty Amma’s son who stood in and performed the duty. It was a substantial breach of custom to perform a ceremony of this nature, normally a state affair, privately, but there was no option at the time other than giving in to the Maharajah vis-à-vis the Sripadam dispute.
When on 15 February 1940 Princess Lalitha went into labour and gave birth to a baby girl, the Maharani was overjoyed. And by this time the Sripadam issue had also been settled in favour of the Maharajah. She informed the Resident about the news, who in turn noted, however, that the official notification that was usual at such times had not oddly arrived yet.12 This was because, it turned out, the Maharajah had not ‘recognised’ the birth, since he had not given his consent to the prenatal rituals during the pregnancy! In other words, since Princess Lalitha’s pregnancy had not received his blessings during the Sripadam dispute, the advent of her daughter was also treated as a non-event. As far as Chithira Tirunal was concerned, nothing of import had occurred that month.13 Weary of such bizarre turns, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi offered to implement whatever the Maharajah desired by way of redress so that six months later, at what was meant to be the naming ceremony of the newborn, Princess Lalitha found herself again, for official purposes and in order to satisfy the Maharajah, ‘pregnant’. Laughing about it now, the controversial baby in question tells,
I was wrapped up in lotus leaves, which served as a make-believe womb, and held against mother’s stomach. I presume our priests recommended this peculiar ‘remedy’ to the problem that I was born but wasn’t supposed to be born without permission! Anyway, I was packaged like that, and the Maharajah performed the ceremonies he was meant to do months before my birth. And then the leaves were opened and I was laid on the ground. The maids and women there were all instructed to come forth with these joyous ululations and loud exclamations, and so there was a great hoo-ha about my so-called ‘birth’. Then the Maharajah ‘recognised’ me and proceeded to the naming rituals. To her dying day mother couldn’t stop laughing when she told us this story, though on that day itself she was firmly instructed not to betray any emotion lest offence be taken.14
What did not, however, amuse Princess Lalitha was that she did not have the permission to name her own baby. As per tradition the head of the royal family chose the name and the senior male member performed the naming ceremony. Since Sethu Lakshmi Bayi as the matriarch and head had no remaining powers, it was the Junior Maharani who named all the children through her son.15 And in this instance the Gazette Extraordinary issued that day announced the official name of the baby as Her Highness Bharani Tirunal Rukmini Bayi Tampuran, Fourth Princess of Travancore. For all the tribulations, whether it was the difficulties her grandmother faced during her mother’s pregnancy, or her stunned mother having to put up with an unofficial and apparently official process of childbirth, not to speak of being unable to name her ‘Sharada’ as she had hoped, Princess Rukmini was born at a time astrologers deemed beautifully exotic. It was at 4:30 in the morning, known as the brahma muhurtam, that she arrived into this tumultuous world of palaces and politics, of temperamental princes and princesses, and of eccentric rituals and ceremonies, on kumbha bharani, the festive day of the celebrated goddess Bhagavathi.
In the years that followed the birth of her eldest child, Princess Lalitha had three more girls, all of them princesses and successors to the ancient lineage of the Attingal Rani. Though the absence of a male heir delayed any chance of a member from Sethu Lakshmi Bayi’s branch of the royal house succeeding to the throne, the Maharani is said to have been relieved at the onset of her granddaughters. ‘It was generally remarked in those days that the Junior Maharani was anxious to keep the title in her branch of the family,’ tells a relative, ‘and frightening rumours abounded that the doctors had been given clear instructions that if a male child were born to the Second Princess, it should not survive birth.’16 This was most probably sensational nonsense, for the Resident, who had vigilant eyes and ears everywhere, would have smelled out any such sinister plot. Either way, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi and her family welcomed a number of girls at Satelmond Palace. Towards the end of 1941 arrived Princess Uma, followed in 1943 by Princess Parvathi, and in 1946 by Princess Lakshmi.17 Each time, the babies were wrapped in silks and presented on silver trays to the Maharajah who would visit specifically for the purpose and return after inspecting the infants.
Kowdiar Palace too saw the birth of more children, and in 1942 and 1945 two princesses were born there.18 However, tragedy struck in 1944 when the only grandson of the Junior Maharani died of heart failure. The Maharajah and his mother were in Bombay on account of some medical treatment the latter was undergoing, but chartered a plane back to Trivandrum. The whole state was palled in official mourning. The young prince was unhealthy for all of his six years, but his sudden passing came as a shock, and the Resident reported that ‘the Maharajah has taken the death of his little nephew terribly to heart—as indeed have the whole family. Apart from the personal bereavement the death, of course, reopens,’ he added, always conscious of political implications, ‘the possibility of the [throne] passing over to the Senior Maharani’s family, as her two daughters may be able to produce a son before the bereaved daughter of the Junior Maharani can replace the dead heir presumptive.’19
At the time of the death the weddings of both Princess Indira and the Junior Maharani’s younger son had been planned for later that year. Now, due to a prolonged period of state mourning, they were postponed by twelve months. On
9 May 1945, then, Princess Indira was married to her father’s nephew, Rama Varma, who was lovingly known as Kuttan.20 Coming as it did only a year following the demise of a prince, celebrations were not as splendid as in 1938, though The Indian Express was still able to report how the ‘entire route was thronged by spectators and the procession was a very imposing one. Her Highness the Third Princess was seated in a palanquin followed by her consort seated in a golden howdah on a gaily caparisoned elephant.’21 The wedding of the Junior Maharani’s younger son was a less spectacular affair, since marital alliances of male members were immaterial to the dynasty, and their brides were not formally welcomed into the royal house or received at court. On 9 September, in the presence of the Senior and Junior Maharanis as well as the Dewan and senior government officials, the Elayarajah married Radha Devi, a Nair woman of extraordinary beauty, and an adopted daughter of Lt Col K.G. Pandalai, a legendary military man who was ‘one of the best surgeons in Madras’.22 In keeping with custom she was never destined to be a ‘Highness’.
While all these marriages were occurring in the family, it had, in the meantime, become a matter of public gossip why the Maharajah had not taken a consort. He ‘ought to marry’, reported the Resident, ‘and have a home of his own’. During a discussion with Sir CP, the latter asserted that despite ‘unkind rumour that charges Mother and Dewan with an unholy pact to discourage’ marriage so as to keep Chithira Tirunal under their thumb, the truth according to Sir CP was that the Junior Maharani was ‘always urging the Maharajah to marry’ and had even, reportedly, ‘threatened to leave the Palace and go and live alone if he persisted in his bachelordom’. Apparently, the ‘trouble was that the Maharajah disliked the matriarchal system; the idea of his wife being only the consort and his children being excluded from the privileges of his dynasty were most repugnant to him’.23 Several marriage proposals were, at various points in the past, from 1932 until 1944, considered, even though none came to actual fruition.24
Politically, however, it appeared that Chithira Tirunal was really still very much subordinate to his mother and minister. As the Resident, Mr H.J. Todd stated:
He is now 32 and still unmarried, living with his pervasive and capable mother, the Junior Maharani, his brother, and sister. Impresses one as shy, rather lacking in confidence, and still quite over-powered by his mother. Very pleasant manners, an easy facility in light conversation, kindly, would certainly flinch from, and probably abhor, association with grievous misrule or injustice, although his masterful and jealous mother might easily persuade him to countenance any safe strategy to preserve the succession in his own family. Having to function at the temple every day, he seems reluctant to take much part in other public functions although under his mother’s tutelage he carries out his public duties with a certain simple dignity. With such a purposeful mother and such an all-powerful and all-absorbing Dewan, he has no chance whatever of developing a personality, already timid by nature.25
There is no doubt that he was personally very popular, with a tremendous effect on all who encountered him, much like Sethu Lakshmi Bayi during her years in power. Describing him in 1939 one traveller noted: ‘The graceful face of this twenty-seven year old Ruler of five million souls was a study in itself. Sweetness and quiet dignity radiated on his countenance. Seldom have I seen such a winsome face in all India. The man himself is a darling and the more I looked at him, the more I felt a great affection for this talented and wise young man, the qualities of whose head and heart could be elaborately written in a thousand printed pages.’26 John Paton Davies’s review was that the Maharajah was ‘a handsome, strong-looking fellow’ and seemed thoroughly imposing as he led a temple procession.27 His own family members in the future, however, would go a step further to sustain the image of Chithira Tirunal as a pratyaksha Padmanabha or god incarnate, which to this day many in Trivandrum reverentially believe because of his matchless (some said eccentric) devotion for his dynastic deity.28 But these were all impressions of the man as a devout Hindu and religious functionary in a great temple. As a ruler, his political superiors in Delhi entertained a completely different view, far from one of awed admiration. For them the real monarch of Travancore was not this amiable, disarmingly charming, even if exceedingly reticent, prince. The real power here was his domineering minister: Sir CP.
In 1938, the All-Travancore Joint Political Congress had dissolved to form the Travancore State Congress, their declared objective being the attainment of responsible rule. ‘We all knew,’ wrote the Resident, ‘that the victory of the [Indian National] Congress in 7 of the Provinces of British India would have “repercussions” in the more advanced Indian States, and these came last spring in Travancore.’29 He was referring to the new policy of the Government of India to inaugurate elected Indian-run governments in territories under their control, subject, of course to the authority of British Governors. Naturally, the Maharajahs were under public pressure to concede similar schemes to their people as well. In Mysore ‘the rather weak policy’ of its Dewan, Sir Mirza Ismail, had committed that state to responsible government, while closer home, Cochin ‘introduced a mild form of “diarchy” last January’. The visit of a former Undersecretary of State from London, Lord Lothian, added fat to the fire, when he declared that Indian princes would have to surrender power to the elected representatives of their people. This ‘encouraged the politically-minded in Travancore still more’.30
The State Congress understood that Sir CP was the principal adversary in the realisation of their aspirations. But the man was ‘too clever and experienced a politician and too forceful a personality to lie down’ and let a group of what were perceived as ‘second-rate place hunters and demagogues ride roughshod over him. Moreover,’ it was added, ‘the strong-minded and ambitious Junior Maharani whose word is law at the Palace, has no intention of letting her son’s powers be curtailed.’31 Accordingly, the Maharajah stood firmly behind his Dewan, whose term of office was extended by five years. ‘The idea is, as Sir CP puts it,’ recorded the Resident, ‘to stabilise the position and obviate ill-directed manoeuvres and agitation’ and the ‘announcement is a clear indication to the popular party [i.e., the State Congress] that His Highness is behind his Dewan in his disapproval of this movement’.32
The agitation continued but was not destined to last. With the Junior Maharani and Sir CP presenting a ‘strong combination’ against them, the Congress ‘found their campaign not going at all the same way as in Mysore and certain other States further north’.33 Later that year, with Gandhi’s blessings a disastrous civil disobedience campaign also began in Travancore. Mr Skrine termed it a rebellion, ‘For that’s what it has been—a rebellion against CP and the Maharani he serves.’34 Leaders of the Congress were arrested and imprisoned wholesale and at certain places the agitation even turned violent, with clashes between the police and demonstrators. In Alleppey a general strike of factory workers paralysed the region, while in Neyyattinkara police opened fire and killed an agitator. By October the police again came down heavily on a ‘mammoth public meeting’.35 In a private letter, the Resident who was no fan of popular movements wrote:
They [the Congress] started agitating on thoroughly seditious lines among the more inflammable masses in certain districts, held meetings in defiance of the Government, put up speakers who volunteered for jail and told the villagers and workmen that the Government was afraid of them, the police weak and cowardly, and the troops undisciplined and armed only with blank ammunition. The result was that at four different points in one week, the mobs incited by the State Congress leaders attacked the police with stones and brickbats and when the troops were sent to overawe them, attacked the troops too!36
Though the Congress was originally an organisation of Christian, Ezhava and Muslim sections of the population, it had won support from a number of prominent Nairs as well. The principal leadership of the Nairs, however, formed a rival Travancore National Congress with Sir CP’s backing, though when they tried to visit Gandhi
for his blessings they found ‘The Mahatma was good at separating sheep from goats’ and only ‘gave them polite words’.37 With the government retaliating with equal violence, an appeal was made to the Paramount Power from ‘All Subjects of Travancore’ through a long memorial. Its primary demand was the immediate removal of Sir CP ‘so that peace, security, and communal harmony may be rehabilitated in Travancore, which is today considerably disturbed on account of gross misrule and repression by the Dewan’. They called it a regime of ‘personal absolutism’ stating how the Maharajah’s man had no ‘scruples or hesitation to ride rough-shod over the rights and liberties of the people’. He was nothing more than a power-hungry despot who, owing to his old connections with the Maharajah, took advantage of a friendly, generous monarch to impose his own rule on the people. He had ‘special relations’ with Kowdiar Palace and great influence over the Junior Maharani. ‘The mother’s influence over the young Maharajah and Sir C.P. Ramaswami Iyer’s influence over the Maharani are notorious,’ the memorialists alleged.38
Testimony from Congress workers that reached Gandhi disconcerted him. The account of a doctor who was imprisoned at the height of the campaign revealed that the police were authorised to inflict even torture. ‘I was told that I would be released,’ he claimed, ‘if I resigned from the State Congress.’ He alleged that while in custody he and his compatriots, were all beaten up ruthlessly till he had to be hospitalised.39 ‘The problem now facing us in Travancore,’ declared G. Ramachandran (or ‘GR’), a leading Congressman, ‘is far more fundamental than political reform. The question is whether peaceful citizens are to be persecuted for the exercise of fundamental rights by organised hooliganism.’40 Evidently, a right-wing organisation called the Hindu Loyalist League was involved in the violence, siding with the government, and Sir CP even defended them in a telegram to Gandhi. The claim of ‘no provocation [from the Congress was] not accurate’, he insisted, adding that the ‘Travancore Government have no desire to interfere with legitimate political activities’.41