Lord Auckland and Sindh

Lord Auckland, who became the Governor-General in 1836, looked at Sindh from the perspective of saving India from a possible Russian invasion and wished to obtain a counteracting influence over the Afghans. Ranjit Singh in Punjab was strong enough to resist coercion in this regard, but the Amirs were not. Thus the English view was that they had to consolidate their position in Sindh as a necessary first step for their plans on Afghanistan. They got an opportunity when Ranjit Singh captured a frontier town of Sindh, Rojhan, and Pottinger was sent to Hyderabad to sign a new treaty with the Amirs. The treaty offered protection to the Amirs on the condition that the Company troops would be kept in the capital at the Amir’s expense or alternatively the English would be given suitable concessions in return. The Amirs initially refused but later agreed reluctantly to sign the treaty in 1838 when the possibility of Ranjit Singh getting help from others was pointed out to them. The treaty permitted the English to intervene in the disputes between the Amirs and the Sikhs as also to establish the presence of a British resident who could go anywhere he liked escorted by English troops. Thus Sindh was turned into a British protectorate in 1838.

Tripartite Treaty of 1838 To address the Afghan problem (as the British imagined it) the Company resorted to further duplicity. Firstly, they persuaded Ranjit Singh to sign a tripartite treaty in June 1838 agreeing to British mediation in his disputes with the Amirs, and then made

View

Under Auckland and his cabinet of secretaries British policy in India had fallen to a lower level of unscrupulousness than ever before and the plain fact is that the treatment of Sindh from this time onward, however expedient politically, was morally indefensible.

—P.E. Roberts

Emperor Shah Shuja give up his sovereign rights on Sindh, provided the arrears of tribute were paid. The exact amount of the tribute was to be determined by the English whose main objective was to obtain finances for the Afghan adventure and obtain so much of the Amirs’ territory as would secure a line of operation against Afghanistan through Sindh. Sindh Accepts Subsidiary Alliance (1839) The Company intended to persuade or compel the Amirs to pay the money and also to consent to the abrogation of that article in the treaty of 1832 which prohibited the movement of English troops in Sindh by land or by river. B.L. Grover writes: “Under threat of superior force, the Amirs accepted a treaty in February 1839 by which a British subsidiary force had to be stationed at Shikarpur and Bukkar and the Amirs of Sindh were to pay Rs 3 lakh annually for the maintenance of the Company’s troops”. Henceforth, the Amirs were debarred from having any negotiations with foreign states without the knowledge of the Company. Further, they were to provide store-room at Karachi for the Company’s military supplies, besides abolishing all tolls on the Indus, and furnishing an auxiliary force for the Afghan war if called upon

to do so.

Capitulation of Sindh The first Anglo-Afghan War (1839-42), fought on the soil of Sindh, was never liked by the Amirs of Sindh; neither did they like the presence of the British troops in their region. However, under the treaty they were asked to pay for all this, which they did. They were not rewarded or thanked for their services, but were charged with hostility and disaffection against the British government. The Amirs were charged with treasonable activities against the British, and Ellenborough, placed in a precarious position due to the Afghan war reverses, sent Outram to Sindh to negotiate a new treaty. Under this treaty, the Amirs were required to cede important provinces as the price of their past transgressions, to supply fuel to the Company’s steamers plying on the Indus, and to stop minting coins. Furthermore, in a succession dispute, the English intervened through Napier, and started a war when the Amirs rose in revolt. The whole of Sindh capitulated within a short time, and the Amirs

Views

We have no right to seize Sindh, yet we shall do so, and a very advantageous, useful, humane piece of rascality it will be.

—Charles Napier

...to remove such brutal tyrants (the Amirs) was worthy of England’s greatness. The conquest of Sindh is therefore no iniquity...

—Charles Napier

I am sick of your policy; I will not say yours is the best, but it is undoubtedly the shortest, that of the sword...

—James Outram, Deputy of Napier at the time of annexation of Sindh.

were made captives and banished from Sindh. In 1843, under Governor-General Ellenborough, Sindh was merged into the British Empire and Charles Napier was appointed its first governor.

Criticisms of the Conquest of Sindh Historians generally condemn the acquisition of Sindh by the British in strong words. The causes for annexation were deliberately manufactured. Like many episodes in the British conquest of India, the Afghan war is also a tale of bullying tactics and deceit. However, in the instance of the First Afghan War, the English suffered terribly at the hands of the Afghans with a corresponding loss of prestige. To compensate for this, they annexed Sindh which prompted Elphinstone to comment: “Coming from Afghanistan it put one in mind of a bully who has been knocked in the street and went home to beat his wife in revenge.”