Members of royal families across India have condemned Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s for insulting their ancestors in his recently published editorial and termed the accusations “baseless” and “unacceptable”. They also said Gandhi’s “selective amnesia" made him forget the privileges he enjoyed due to his lineage.
What did Rahul Gandhi say?
In an editorial published in Indian Express, the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha said the royal scions’ ancestors were “pliant Maharajas" who were threatened by the East India Company that ruined India.
“The Company choked India by partnering with, bribing, and threatening our more pliant maharajas and nawabs. It controlled our banking, bureaucratic, and information networks. We didn’t lose our freedom to another nation; we lost it to a monopolistic corporation that ran a coercive apparatus,” Gandhi wrote.
What did the royal family members say?
Union Minister Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia, who belongs to the Scindia family that ruled Gwalior until India’s independence from the United Kingdom in 1947, said India’s legacy doesn’t begin or end with the title “Gandhi”. “Your selective amnesia about your own privilege is a disservice to those truly striving against adversity. Your dissonance only exposes Congress’ agenda further—Rahul Gandhi is no champion of Atmanirbhar Bharat; he is merely a product of an outdated entitlement,” Scindia posted on X.
Rajasthan Deputy Chief Minister Diya Kumari, who is the granddaughter of Man Singh II, the last ruling Maharaja of the princely state of Jaipur during the British Raj in India, described Gandhi’s piece as an “attempt to malign the erstwhile royal families of India".
“The dream of integrated India was only possible because of the utmost sacrifice of the erstwhile royal families of India. Baseless allegations made on the basis of half-baked interpretation of historical facts is completely unacceptable,” she wrote on X.
Chaitanya Raj Singh, a member of the family that ruled the erstwhile Kingdom of Jaisalmer, said these baseless allegations regarding the “erstwhile” royal families are unacceptable. “The valour and selfless services of our families in upholding our dharma can be seen transparently in the love showered to us by the people all over India from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and from Jaisalmer to Tripura,” Singh posted on X.
Vikramaditya Singh, a former Congress leader and the grandson of Maharaja Sir Hari Singh, who was the last ruler of the Indian princely state of Kashmir, and the heir of the Dogra dynasty, called out Rahul Gandhi’s “superficial understanding of history". "The article reflects Mr. Rahul Gandhi's superficial understanding of history. The Maharajas contribution and role can hardly be reduced to simply “pliant” to the East India Company. Many of these Maharajas were not handed over ready-made kingdoms to rule, but rather started from humble origins, as farmers and soldiers, who toiled and fought many battles to create their territories and later states," said Singh.
BJP MP Yaduveer Wadiyar, who is the 27th and current Custodian of the Royal House of Mysore, said Gandhi's lack of knowledge of true history is on constant display. "His latest statement, via an article this morning, reflects his ignorance of the contributions made by the erstwhile princely states towards today’s Bharat, the patronisation of Bharatiya Heritage, without which, we might have lost many of the traditions we hold dear today, and most importantly, the sacrifices they made made towards the formation of a unified India," Wadiyar wrote on X.
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