Dina Nath: The man who silently ruled Punjab

If you face the historic mosque of Wazir Khan inside Lahore’s Delhi Gate, to the left is a lane that leads to the ‘haveli’ of Raja Dina Nath. To your right you will see an old well which is still known as ‘Dina Nath da Khoo’ – the well of Dina Nath.

Who was Dina Nath? Well … he was the most important man in the Sikh era who quietly behind the scenes controlled all the money collected in the reign of Maharajah Ranjit Singh, and later till Sikh rule ended in 1849. He designed the revenue collection system of Punjab, which it must be said even the British studied and applied when imposing their codified rules. In this piece we will talk about the man, his role in the rule of Lahore, and about his disputed legacy.

Dina Nath Madan was born in 1795 in the Chowdhary Bagh area of Rainawari Mohallah in Srinagar. He belonged to a family of Kashmiri pandits and his family used the name ‘Razdan’ when writing. The Razdan pandits in pre-Partition Lahore were among the leading families of the city. In 1815 following the Dogra massacres he moved from Srinagar to Delhi and worked as a finance and accountancy person. Dina Nath was related to Diwan Ganga Ram Raina, the head of military accounts of the Lahore Darbar, and he introduced the young Dina Nath to the maharaja who appointed him a ‘mutsaddi’, or final writer of accounts. The accuracy and clarity of his work soon became well known and when Diwan Ganga Ram died in 1826, the 31-year old Dina Nath was made head of military accounts.

Eight years later when Diwan Bhavani Das, the head of civil accounts, died, Dina Nath took over as head of both military and civil accounts. His command over his work led him to be made a Diwan in 1838. By then British intelligence records tell of Diwan Dina Nath not only being a ‘silent operator’ but also being the most powerful man in the Sikh State of Punjab. When Maharaja Ranjit Singh died in 1839, he was by far the most influential man of the country. Amazingly he is said, a rather unbelievable claim, to have no enemies, and when the gruesome and savage struggle for power followed he refused to take anyone’s side. In a way he was the “ideal bureaucrat”, or as he said himself: “one must always be friendly and also be trusted by all on your word, even the enemy. For that being honest is critical. Only then are you feared”.

When the British won the First Sikh War in 1846, Diwan Dina Nath was made head of the Governance Council by the British. He was, therefore, the ‘de facto’ ruler of Punjab and all money matters, as well as political decisions, came under his preview. Practically speaking though he was exceptionally loyal to the country of Punjab, yet after the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh he increasingly became the most important person in the western part of the sub-continent. As Sikh infighting for power grew between 1839 and 1949, his power was absolute. When the Anglo-Sikh treaty after the First Sikh War was signed, Diwan Dina Nath was the first signatory.

With him as virtually the ruler of Punjab, the Lahore Darbar in November 1847 conferred on him the title of the Raja of Kalanaur with a ‘jagir’ of Rs20,000 annually conferred on him. This was besides the huge pay he drew for a variety of roles he was playing. It was amazing that all the monies that he drew under different heads were officially sanctioned and properly documented. No person could claim that he ever cheated the treasury. Even the best experts in accountancy gave him a clear chit. But we have several accounts of people suspecting him of accumulating more wealth than he had earned. The books spoke otherwise.

But then many Sikh army commanders claimed that Raja Dina Nath was a traitor who secretly informed the British of every move the army of the Lahore Darbar made. But what is stranger, and which is what makes the character of Raja Dina Nath a mystery, is that British records of those years also constantly claim of him misinforming the British to help the Sikh cause. One account even claims that till the end he secretly helped the Sikh cause. One British commander even goes to the extent of suggesting that Dina Nath was the person who stood between a total British victory and the Lahore Darbar.

The ‘secret’ warning that Raja Dina Nath gave to top Sikh commanders after the Battle of Chillianwala was that it was best for them to surrender and pledge loyalty to the East India Company army. “If you surrender now you will be the gainers and the Khalsa Army will be saved for a future fight” is what the message allegedly said. This he reasoned by claiming that any further battles would decimate the Sikhs at this time. “Look to the future” he suggested. It is unclear whether he meant that in the military sense.

That is why his suggestion must be seen in the light of the final defeat at Gujrat. Was he a ‘patriot’ or a ‘traitor’ is the vexing question that just cannot be answered? But then his advice was wise to say the least given what transpired.

In his lifetime he built considerable properties. His property in Kalanaur, near Gurdaspur, was originally under the control of the Kanhaiya Misl in the middle of the 18th century. In 1812 when Ranjit Singh captured Kalanaur he handed over the ‘jagir’ to his son Kharak Singh as he was married to a Kanhaiya princess Chand Kaur. Once the Sikhs had been defeated in Kalanaur it was given by the British to Diwan Dina Nath who was made a Raja to suit the ‘jagir’. When Dina Nath died in 1857 just as the First War of Independence – also called the Sepoys Mutiny - was beginning, on his death the British took back the ‘jagir’ and amalgamated it into British Punjab.

During his life he built three ‘havelis’ inside the walled city, as also a beautiful garden near Mughalpura just to the West of the ‘samadhi’ of Maharajah Sher Singh in Kot Khawaja Saeed. That garden, which after 1947 has been heavily encroached upon by influential land-grabbers, was where he had a small ‘haveli’ and in that died Raja Dina Nath. The ancestors of Raja Dina Nath retain their original name of ‘Madan’ and still use the pen name of ‘Razdan’. My journalist friend, Deepak Razdan who once worked for ‘The Hindustan Times’, those elders migrated in 1947 from Lahore, is from the same family. He once told me of a saying in Kalanaur which he attributes to Raja Dina Nath: “If you have not seen Lahore, then you have not seen anything, but then go and see Kalanaur”.