July 3, 1757. The mutilated body of the last independent nawab of Bengal was paraded around Murshidabad town on the back of his favourite elephant. Siraj-ud-Daulah had been executed the day before, having lost the Battle of Plassey to the British on June 23, 1757.
The ones who engineered Siraj’s deposition and death did not live long to enjoy the spoils of their conspiratorial win. All of them suffered terrible fates, much like the legendary Curse of Tutankhamun.
Archaeologist Howard Carter and his team had made history by entering the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, the boy king of ancient Egypt, in 1922. But the triumph was followed by a series of bizarre happenings. James Henry Breasted, a member of Carter’s team, returned home to find a cobra inside his pet canary’s cage — the dead bird in its mouth. Depictions of Egyptian Pharaohs often show a rearing cobra — known as the Uraeus — emblazoned on their crowns as a symbol of the king’s protection from his enemies.
Such was the impact of the Curse of Tutankhamun that Benito Mussolini ordered the removal of a mummy from Palazo Chigi he had received as a gift. Even today, a century later, the curious case of Tutankhamun’s mummy remains a hotly debated topic.
Closer home, the “curse of Nawab Siraj-ud-Daulah” wreaked no less havoc.
June 23, 1757, remains a black day in the history of India when the East India Company took the first step towards becoming an oppressive ruler. It was on this day that the massive army of Siraj-ud-Daullah was vanquished despite being almost 15 times the size of the opposition. The Nawab’s downfall was brought about by acts of betrayal by some of his closest generals and aides.
The young and hot-headed ruler, spoiled from childhood by his indulgent grandfather Nawab Alivardi, lacked the acumen and maturity necessary to rule what was then the subcontinent’s richest province.
Soon after ascending the throne, Siraj promoted men close to him like Mir Madan and Mohanlal, earning the ire of old-timers from Alivardi’s time like Rai Durlabh and Mir Jafar. The richest businessman of the time was Jagat Seth (world banker) Mehtab Chand. Siraj slapped him in front of a packed court, antagonising the man whose wealth was more than that of most Indian kings. He continued making enemies at every step, possibly the most dangerous of them being his aunt Ghaseti Begum. Siraj had ordered the confiscation of Ghaseti’s palace and wealth and repeatedly insulted her, leaving her determined to seek revenge.
This was exactly the opportunity that Robert Clive was waiting for. Realising the chink in the Nawab’s armour, Clive set to work. His chief conspirator was the rich Punjabi merchant Oomichand, who had excellent contacts in the Murshidabad court. With Oomichand and Ghaseti Begum pulling the strings, a dangerous conspiracy was plotted as veteran generals like Rai Durlabh, Mir Jafar and Yaar Latif Khan agreed to remain inert during the Battle of Plassey. As a result, the Nawab’s forces were routed despite the bravery of Mir Madan and Mohanlal.
The meeting of Lord Robert Clive with Mir Jafar, after the Battle of Plassey, 1757 Hulton Archive/Getty Images
The era of Company Raj was born in India and Mir Jafar was made the Nawab of Bengal. It was Mir Jafar’s son, Mir Miran, who ordered Mohammadi Beg, once a close friend of Siraj, to kill the former nawab. When Siraj begged his old friend to allow him to recite his last namaz, Beg refused, brutally stabbing Siraj multiple times. He also murdered Siraj’s mother and younger brother. Shortly after, Beg became raving mad and ended his life by jumping into a well.
One by one, all the traitors suffered gruesome ends. Yaar Latif Khan, the general who betrayed Siraj on the battlefield, vanished without a trace just a few days later after the Battle of Plassey. It is suspected that the Company had ordered his murder.
The chief conspirator, Ghaseti Begum, was imprisoned by Miran in a palace in Dacca. One night, she was taken on a boat to the middle of the river, where the boat sank with the begum on board. It is said that people living near the banks of the river were left traumatised by her shrieks piercing the silence of the night.
Ghaseti Begum’s main partner in the conspiracy, Oomichand, met with an equally tragic fate. He had been promised 25% share of the Nawab’s treasury by the Company, but the document turned out to be forged. When he realised that he had been duped, Oomichand became mentally unstable. Legend has it that he roamed the streets penniless.
The chief sponsor of the conspiracy against Siraj, Jagat Seth Mehtab Chand, fell foul of Mir Qasim, who took over the throne from his father-in-law Mir Jafar in 1760. The new nawab had Mehtab Chand and his nephew Swarup thrown to their death from the walls of Monghyr (Munger) fort. Mir Qasim also ordered the Diwan of Dacca Raj Ballabh, another key face of the conspiracy, to be thrown into the Ganga with a sandbag tied around his neck.
Lord Robert Clive TT Archives
Mir Miran also accused Rai Durlabh of fraud and passed a death order against the disgraced general. Durlabh fled to Calcutta and lived his last days in penury. Miran, whose cruelty knew no bounds, died in 1760 while on a campaign in Bihar, his tent burnt to ashes by a lightning strike (although some suspect it was foul play by the East India Company).
Mir Jafar, whose name became synonymous with treachery and betrayal, was no more than a puppet in the Company’s hands and was eventually replaced by Mir Qasim. Mir Jafar was afflicted by leprosy and died in 1765, shunned by everyone.
The man who scripted it all, whose rise to glory began with Siraj’s defeat, Lord Robert Clive, sailed back home laden with immense wealth and returned to India in 1765, before leaving permanently two years later. Legal proceedings were started against him in 1772, for large-scale corruption and amassing wealth illegally while in India. Although he was eventually cleared of the charges in the court of law, Clive committed suicide on November 22, 1774. He was only 49.