Nābha State

History (taken from the Imperial Gazetteer of India, volume 18, p.263)

Coinage

A Rupee of the Rajas of Nabha - a rejoinder Dr P. L. Gupta (extract from ONSNL 134, 1992)

This rejomder is prompted by the notes entitled A rupee of the Rajas of Nabha' published in ONS Newsletter no 131 (November 1991 - January 1992) But before the coin mentioned in the note is dismissed, it needs to be pointed out what is beheved or said today about the coinage of the princely states of the Punjab, often called the Cis Sutlej states, is based on an article by R C Temple of a hundred years ago (Indian Antiquary, Bombay, XVIII (1889), pp 321-2) Whilst he was successful in focusing our attention on these coins, what he said about them now needs careful scrutiny m the hght of present day historical knowledge In his paper. Temple stated that "in the year AH 1164 or AD 1751, being tlie fourth year of his reign, the famous Shah Durrani (Abdali) [i e Ahmad Shah] made a raid into the Punjab and over ran the greater part of it and it is a common historical statement (italics mine) that in that year, he granted to the chiefs of Patiala, Nabha Jhindh and Malerkotla, the right to coins within their respective states " Unfortunately Temple provided no evidence to support his statement On the other hand, the chronicle Husain Shahi, written only about 50 years after Ahmad Shah's invasion in 1798 AD simply mentions that "the coins of Ahmad Shah are current m tlie family of Amar Singh, the Raja of Patiala " It does not say a single word about the minting of such coins by Nabha and other Cis Sutlej states Had there been any such historical tradition as Temple mentioned, the author of Husain Shahi would surely have heard about it and would not have failed to mention it It IS a well established historical fact that the rulers of Patiala had presented themselves and submitted to the Mughal emperor and the Afghan invader Ahmad Shah, had accepted their suzereignty and offered gifts, had become their vassals and paid annual tnbute to them In 1761 AD when Ahmad Shah reached Sahrmd (Sarhind), Ala Singh, the ruler of Patiala, attended him in person, offered him gifts and promised to pay him annual tnbute Ahmad Shah received hmi warmly and gave him khilat (a robe of honour) When Ahmad Shah came to Sarhind again in 1767, after receiving tributes from the Patiala ruler Amar Singh, the successor of Ala Singh, he bestowed upon him the subedan (governorship) of Sarhind and the grandiloquent title ol Raja i Rajagan (king of kings) He was also authorised to mint coins from Sarhind in the name of the Durrani sovereign Hence for Üns reason we have coins of Patiala with the legend of Ahmad Shah's Durrani coins with the mint name Sarhind On the other hand, we have no evidence to say that Ahmad Shah had at any time any contact with the Nabha rulers and had treated them at par with the Patiala family It is known that the Nabha rulers were collaterals of the Patiala family but that they never maintained good relations between themselves, they were always feuding Besides the family quarrels, the two did not belong to the same camp Patiala, as mentioned earlier, had alhances with the Mughals and the Afghan invaders, Nabha rulers, on the other hand, followed the mam stream of the Sikhs i e Dal Khalsa The Dal Khalsa never bowed before the tyranny of the Mughals and Afghans They tried always to maintain their independence and issued their own coins in the name of their Gurus Nanak and Gobind Singh In view of these historical realities, it is unrealistic to think that Nabha rulers would ever have issued coins that imitated tlie coins of Patiala, using a Durrani legend and the mint name Sahrmd of their rival, Patiala If there are some such coins that have a Durrani legend with dates like those that are seen on later Nabha coins, that does not necessarily mean that those coins were issued by Nabha They could well be the coins of Patiala The reasons for such dating could well be something else that needs to be researched in the Patiala records Likewise, if the Nabha rulers had established their own mint and issued coins as a sign of their royalty and to equate themselves with the house of Patiala, there could be no reason for them not to use the name of their own mint If we do not have their earlier coins, that does not necessarily mean that the Nabha rulers had no earlier coins It is not beyond possibility that we have so far failed to get hold of them There may also be another reason for not having come across the early Nabha coins The chief assembly of the Sikhs, Sharlbat Khalsa had issued an injunction m 1761 AD that no coin would be issued in any personal name other than those having the names of their Gurus Nanak and Gobind Singh As adherents to the Dal Khalsa, the Nabha rulers might have issued their coins on the pattern of the coins of the Dal Khalsa, as we see on their later coins, and retrained from putting on them the name of their own mint, as this could have been interpreted as them seeking to assert their personal identity, a thing disapproved of by the Sharbat Khalsa If they did so, their coins might be intermingled with the Dal Khalsa coins bearing the mint name Amritsar, which we cannot distinguish for the present In any case, it is certain that no Nabha coins had a Durrani legend, and the piece published in the ONS NL cannot be taken as a genuine Nabha issue If it has the reverse of Nabha coins, it can only mean that the two dies imprinted on it do not belong to one and the same pair This is also clear from the calligraphy of the legends The obverse is close to the calligraphic form that we have on the Patiala coins, likewise, the reverse is the same as that of the later Nabha coins It is simply a fantasy created from two different dies of two different pairs Evidently, it is a product of the period when the minting of Patiala and Nabha coins had ceased and dies were discarded Some one must have laid his hands on them and struck this fantasy This piece therefore has no importance

Editor's Note: Dr Gupta has kindly provided photographs of some Nabha rupees where the mint name Nabha is clearly inscnbed These are reproduced below He says that he has seen 5 gold and 15 silver coins of Nabha with the Sikh legend on the obverse and the mint name Nabha on the reverse followed by another, undeciphered word These coins are in the Sheeshmahal Museum, Patiala Two of the coins were illustrated in Dr Gupta's book The Coins of Dal Khalsa and Lahore Darbar which was published by the Punjab government, but, because of poor production quality, not released It is a great pity that the fruit of Dr Gupta's research in this area has not been made available to the numismatic world and it is hoped that the Punjab government will either release the book as it is or arrange for a properly produced reprint