After the Battle of Plassey, the Begums

[Fiction]

After the battle was won and lost, after the victors had plundered the Nawab’s palace in Murshidabad, Amina Begum, the mother of the fallen Nawab Siraj ud-Daulah, and her older sister Meharunnisa Begum were exiled to Qasr-i-Jazirah, or Jinjira Palace, near Dhaka. Ravaged by deep grief and resentment against each other, the two women were compelled to live under the same roof and contemplate their fate.

Last night, I woke up at the sound of sitar music. Someone was playing the stringed instrument like a maestro. For a moment, I thought I was back in my palace at Motijheel. It seemed like one of the nights when Panna Bai played and sang. I waited breathlessly for her euphonious voice, but the music slowly faded. All I could hear was the water burbling in the river. Who would have thought even five years ago that things would come to this?

Meharunnisa stares listlessly into the darkness of her room. Qasr-i-Jazirah is a far cry from her palace in Murshidabad where she reigned like a queen. She thinks of her young nephew Siraj murdered at Traitor’s Gate. Remorse still weighs heavy in her heart as she imagines various renditions of his death. It was almost three years ago that her most trusted personal maid brought the news, gleaned from a fisherman by the riverbank.

She gets up from her bed and walks to the window. In the dead of night, she can only see the twinkling lights of the fortified gateway which also houses the guards. The darkness beyond is inescapable—tight and pitch black. Her own life does not seem much different. She had always wanted to be at the center of things, but fate had pushed her to the sidelines. Not accepting the place designated for a woman has its repercussions. Don’t the Sufis say that one’s soul can cross the barriers of time? But Meharunnisa is sure that they did not think of women.

What a sorry mother I am! There is no mother as helpless as the one who cannot lift a finger to save her son. I had three sons and Fate has taken two. I don’t even know where my Mahdi is. Have they killed him, too—like Siraj? Almighty Allah, have mercy on me. Why didn’t I die when the Afghans killed my husband? Abba, life has been pitiless since you left. And that woman in the other room! Is that really my sister? How did she turn into this hideous fiend? To think that I gave my Ikram to her to raise as her own! Oh my sons, my sons.

Politics is the worst when it takes hold in the family. Yet, there was a time when the three sisters loved and cared for each other. Meharunnisa, the eldest, managed the household expenses and Maymuna, the middle one, helped their mother with keeping house. Their youngest sister Amina was into embroidery, and one evening, she surprised everybody by presenting them with a pair of exquisite shawls which she herself had made. Her sisters hugged and thanked her. At dinner that evening, the two older sisters discussed the troubles their father faced rising up the ranks in the Nawab’s court. He would eventually become the formidable Nawab Alivardi Khan.

Amina did not understand or care about power or politics. She dreamed of a kind husband and a tranquil home. She was to be married, as her father wished, to her cousin Zainuddin and bore him three sons. A loving wife and doting mother, her life in those years seemed perfect and full of sunshine. In later years, she often thought that if only she had had a brother, she and her sons would not have been embroiled in the palace intrigues of succession.

Nothing hurts like being betrayed by loved ones. Abba, why did you turn away? Because I was not a boy? But when I was born, you were happy enough to accept me as a gift of the Almighty. If you had wished, I could have been the first woman Nawab of Bengal! And my dear Amina, you have forgotten the bond we shared as sisters. You had no kind words for me when your son Siraj imprisoned me in my own home. I see now that allowing me to adopt Ikram was a kind of insurance. In case Siraj had not become the Nawab, it would have been Ikram. You just wanted to be the mother of the Nawab, one way or the other.

People said that Meharunnisa’s husband Nawazish doted on her. He had amassed a vast fortune as the Naib Nazim of Deccan and Governor of Dhaka and built a stone palace for his beloved wife by Pearl Lake, also known as Motijheel. Magnificent beyond compare, their estate was where the richest and the most powerful in Murshidabad would meet and mingle. Meharunnisa took pride in their luxurious palace, the lavish gardens, and the lake that was shaped like a horseshoe. She was happy until she learned that she would never bear children.

“Ikram!” The boy turned to look at his adoptive mother without any affection. Meharunnisa’s eyes reflected her displeasure. She was clearly disappointed when she saw that his swordsmanship was only average. “Is that how you fence?” she sneered. “Even the lowest of the sepoys can do it better than you.” Her husband laughed and patted the boy’s shoulders. “He’ll improve,” he said. Meharunnisa sighed and wondered why she got a half-baked prince who was clearly not suitable to become the next Nawab.

I will always remember the day when my son—my Siraj—became the Nawab of Bengal. He promised me that he would do everything in his power to fulfill the wishes of his grandfather, the great Nawab Alivardi Khan. Siraj was brave and undaunted. But he was also young and untrained, barely 23 when he ascended the throne. I warned him about Mir Zafar, but that sweet-talker climbed his way to be his general. My biggest mistake, though, was not to notice the snake at home. I never imagined that my own elder sister would fund their conspiracy. And how they pandered to those British merchants!

Waiting in drawing room for Miran, son of the new Nawab Mir Zafar, Amina recalls the time when the two boys first met. She herself had introduced them. “Come, Siraj, meet your cousin Miran. When you become the Nawab, he will be your ally.” Her son, who was slightly older, quipped, “Can he wield a sword? If not, he can be my page.” He walked away as the other boy stared expressionlessly at the receding figure. “Don’t mind him,” Amina had said laughing. “He’s your older brother and the next Nawab.”

Life in the dilapidated Qasr-i-Jazirah by the Buriganga river is nightmarish. Yet suddenly, Amina feels hopeful. The new Nawab is remorseful, she had heard. After all, Siraj was the grandson of his wife’s half-brother. Amina’s misgivings about meeting Miran, the betrayer of her slain son Siraj, gives way to anticipation. She will beg if necessary—kiss the hands of her son’s murderers—to at least release Siraj’s widow Lutfunnisa and their little girl. If the new Nawab allows, she herself would lead them out of this land forever.

I shudder as I gaze at the lithe young man before me: Miran. It was he who issued the final order to have his cousin killed. Neither his father nor the British wanted to taint their hands with the blood of young Siraj, the rightful heir. But Miran did so willingly. His thin lips move and I hear him speak: “Abba wants both of you to return to Murshidabad.” Sensing my distrust, he smiles slightly. “Believe me, you’re the last person I want there. But it’s my father the Nawab’s decision.” He’s so unlike Siraj. Little wonder that the widowed Lutfunnisa spurned his suit. “You’ll travel by boat,” he says. “My trusted servant, old white-eyed Bakr, will see you to safety.”

The two sisters finally meet at dusk by the jetty. Even as months turned into years of imprisonment in Qasr-i-Jazirah, they had managed to avoid each other. But now they are to travel by the same boat to Murshidabad where they have been summoned by the new Nawab. Meharunnisa glances surreptitiously at her primly attired younger sister who has done her best to appear dignified. Yet she does not fail to notice Amina’s sunken eyes and hollow cheeks before the latter draws the veil over her face.

In the end, I couldn’t bring myself to kowtow to a mere boy younger than my son. It would have been an insult to his memory. But I asked if he could arrange a separate boat for me. He did not raise his eyes to meet mine. “Please understand that our coffers are dry after Plassey—we had to pay the British a pretty penny,” he said. His tone was placatory. “I can only offer one boat. But I assure you this will be the last time you’ll have to see her.” So here we are even though I can barely look at her. No wonder Allah didn’t bless her with children. Ah, the setting sun! Why are those hawks here? I’ve never seen them at sunset before.

I know you do not want to claim me as your kin, but history will call us sisters. Yes, you can blame me as much as you wish, but did you ever see my pain, Amina? But how can you, who gave birth to three sons, understand the sorrows of a childless woman? Everyone only talks of male heirs. I even tried to adopt a son, but Ikram succumbed to illness. If Siraj had respected me, I might have helped him become a great nawab. See how those men are terrified of this beggared, powerless woman! Captain Clive sat and ate at my table and promised me high honors, but after victory he turned a blind eye to my fate.

As the boat sets off, a deep despondency takes over Meharunnisa. Since meeting Miran, she has been thinking of Nawab Sarfaraz Khan who her father Alivardi had cunningly dethroned. A pious man, Sarfaraz was betrayed and killed by those who claimed to be his friends and vassals. She wonders if young Siraj had paid for his grandfather’s sins. But isn’t that how dynasties rise and fall? A shrewd politician, Meharunnisa had already intuited the purpose of this journey the day Miran came to see her. She whispers a quick prayer for a swift and painless ending.

It is said that when the stately houseboat carrying the two begums went down, several hawks were seen circling above. But the boat capsized in the middle of the night, and who could have seen those birds? Rumor and hearsay soon become history and myth. The sole survivor was an old fellow with white eyes. It was rumored that he secured a handsome reward for carrying out a successful mission, even though he failed to deliver the Nawab’s guests to their promised abode.

Sohana Manzoor is a Bangladeshi writer and academic, and the editor of Our Many Longings: Contemporary Short Fiction from Bangladesh. Her work has appeared in many journals and anthologies in South and Southeast Asia, and received a special mention in the Best Asian Short Stories 2020. She holds a PhD in English from Southern Illinois University Carbondale, and teaches English and creative writing at the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh.