Treaty with The East India Company

In spite of the turbulent times the eighteenth century in the history of Marwar is significant because it witnessed a strong revival of Hindu culture; somewhat neglected in the Mughal age; a mini renaissance, as it were.The rulers, Maharajas Abhaya Singh (1724–49), Bakhta Singh (1751–52), Bijaya Singh (1752–93) and Maan Singh (1803–43), none as powerful as Jodha and Maldev or as influential as Jaswant Singh I and Ajit Singh, were acutely conscious of this and patronised the arts and culture enthusiastically. Music, poetry, literature and formal debate flourished and theological study was encouraged. The Pustak Prakash, a historical library which still exists in Mehrangarh, was established; the Marwar School of Miniature Painting matured and Jodhpur was lavished with exquisite architecture. That this cultural flowering took place at all is remarkable because politically it was not the most stable of times.

Indeed, the power vacuum in Delhi with the fall of the Mughals was filled not by the Rajputs but by the Marathas from the south and the British from their base Calcutta in the east. The Rajput clans exhausted themselves in petty internecine warfare and were powerless against the crippling Maratha raids. Within the Rathore clan itself there was much dissent, with many of Marwar's principal Thakurs defying the Maharaja in open rebellion. Things came to such a pass in the second decade of the nineteenth century that Maharaja Maan Singh was forced to feign madness in his own citadel to protect himself. Finally, in desperation, he endorsed a treaty with The East India Company in Januaruy,1818. The Treaty forged what was clearly a subordinate alliance but did not intrude on the internal sovereignty of the Maharaja. But even this the martial Rathores squandered with their petty infighting.

Maharaja Maan Singh resisted British incursions for many years but in 1839 they occupied Mehrangarh and Jodhpur for five months and left behind a Resident Political Agent. Their actions were clearly in violation of the Treaty but the Rathores, bitterly divided, were not in any position to fight.

Two threads in the economic, social and political development of Marwar emerge after Maharaja Takhat Singh's (Maan Singh's successor) accession in 1843. The first of these was the gradual erosion of the Rathore's sovereignty, their further emasculation, and with it the ascendancy of the British, reflected in the growing influence of the Resident. The second was the positive aspect of Britain's rule in India; the stream of progress that brought to Marwar unprecedented peace and prosperity. Even the events of 1857, the Great Indian Uprising, failed to deflect this desert kingdom from her march to modernity.

Faithful to the Treaty, Takhat Singh sent soldiers to protect British garrisons and magnanimously afforded sanctuary to British women and children in Mehrangarh. It was not merely enlightened self-interest. As Takhat Singh himself said, " Rajputs, when they have sworn friendship with anybody, will not desert him to the last breath of their life".