The Sanyasi Rebellion. The three-year famine of 1769-71. The war cry of “Jai Bhawani”. All themes from the classic Anandamath, written by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, published in 1882. A novel, no doubt, but what no one knows is that it did refer to India’s first war of Independence. Not the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, but one waged almost a hundred years earlier. The name of its hero missing in that story is Fateh Bahadur Sahi.

Sahi was the 99th raja of Huseypur, situated in Gopalganj district in northwest Bihar, that once also spanned Siwan, Saran and Champaran, and extended into Gorakhpur in Awadh and probably into Nepal as well. The title of Sahi, and Maharaja Bahadur, had been conferred on the 87th Hathwa raja by the emperor Jahangir. Featured by historians G.N. Dutt and D.N. Dutt in the first formal historical accounts of the Hathwa dynasty, published respectively, in 1905 and 1909, Fateh Sahi, nevertheless, has largely remained invisible to academia. Pieced together from folklore, historical remnants and artefacts, this finely researched book actually resurrects his story and this forgotten chapter of our national history. India’s first war of Independence was fought in 1767.

In 1750, seven years before the Battle of Plassey, Fateh Sahi ascended the throne of Huseypur. In the end of 1767, the collector of Siwan sent his revenue officers to Sahi. Outraged, the raja immediately rebelled, held his ground, but was dislodged after a fierce fight. He beat a retreat to the Bhagjogni jungles in Gorakhpur. The British took over his estate and appointed his cousin Babu Basant Sahi as their representative. And Fateh Sahi began his three-decade guerrilla war.

In 1775, Fateh Sahi swooped in with a cavalry of 1,000 horsemen on a camp near Husseypur and in a face-to-face fight killed revenue farmer Mir Jamal and Basant Sahi, sending Basant’s head to his widow as a message who, with 13 of his aides, committed self-immolation. An annual fair is held on this spot today. Sahi’s repeated incursions crippled revenue collection in the region and after many successes, he marched on to the East India Company’s barrack with his relative, Chait Singh of Benaras, who had rebelled in 1781. The duo took over the barrack. In response, the British destroyed Sahi’s fort. But they noted that Sahi caused even more problems for them than the Peshwas of Maharashtra, setting off copycat rebellions like that of Rani Sarveshwari Devi in Santal Parganas and inspiring the Lalgola zamindars in Murshidabad who are said to have carried the Fateh saga to Bankimchandra.

Eventually, Sahi set up the Tamkuhi raj, crowned his successor and renounced his rule and family to become an ascetic in 1808. The Hathwa court went on to pioneer the Bhojpuri folk theatre form, nautanki.

Two shadowy figures permeate the legend of Fateh Sahi. Begum Samru and her husband Walter Reinhardt Sombre played a role in the Battle of Buxar in 1764 in which Sahi participated. Ahilyabai Holkar, too, knew of the zamindar who, when he became a fakir and left for Nasik, was perhaps looking to mobilise the Marathas, the author speculates. Well, what an engrossing story!

The Raja, the Rebel, the Monk

By J.N. Sinha

Penguin

pp. 240; Rs 599