On 29th April 1914, Prince Sidkeong Tulku succeeded his father
Thotub Namgyal as the 10th ruler of Sikkim. He had the benefit of
sound modern education. He was an undergraduate at Pembroke College, in Oxford.
Alexandra David Neel, who met Sidkeong Namgyal during her research, writes that
the King would speak English more fluently than Tibetan and could also speak a fluent Hindi and a bit of
Chinese. During his stay in Oxford, he had been exposed to the revolutionary
ideas of the West. With the Political Officer J.C. White, he travelled around
in India as well as in the neighbouring countries.
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| His Highness the Xth Maharaja of Sikkim Sidkeong Tulku Pic: Tempa Trans Himalayan Arts |
After his
homecoming from Oxford in 1908, Sidkeong had been assigned with the charges of
Forest, Monasteries, and Schools. Even before assuming the power of a de facto ruler Sidkeong was at the helm
of affairs that is evident from his important deals he made in 1913 AD as a Maharajkumar. The first important
dealing was abolition of imprisonment as a penalty for non payment of debts and
another was the record in the Council Proceedings on the ban of settlement of
plain-men. Immediately after his accession, Sidkeong made negotiations with
Messrs Burn and Company, Calcutta for concession to cut and sell timber, for
manufacture of bamboo pulp, for hydro electric project and wire ropeways and
that was satisfactorily concluded on 30th April 1913. It was due to
his affectionate relationship with the British, even the Tibetan elites like Panchen
Lama requested Sidkeong to inform the British for the arrangement of a meeting
at Delhi. This exhibits him as a brilliant diplomat apart from an excellent and
placid ruler who eliminated all the prior policies adopted by his predecessors
and established good relations with the British India. It appears that, during his reign,
the Tibetan Government had donated some tracts of land to Sikkim. Therefore,
Sidkeong at this point can be regarded as an intermediary between Tibet and
British.
Enlightened
with the Western Education, Sidkeong Tulku attempted to bring the monasteries towards
their social obligation. However, the monks were hesitant to convert his ideas
into practice. This was a revolutionary sacrilege coming from the ruler who was
supposed to preserve their interests. Taking a budge ahead, Sidkeong had raised
his voice of opposition, against the privileges enjoyed by the feudal
aristocracy who had an imperative role in decision making in the earlier
period. The writings of Ms. Neel provide a testimonial that even the condition
of the Clergies, who too happened to be the peasants, were not economically
prosperous. She writes:
“The peasant clergies
of these forests are generally poor and ill fed, and it is difficult for them
to suppress a thrill of delight when death of a rich villager promises them
several days’ feast”.
The
pathetic condition of the peasants forced them to send several complaints to
the Durbar regarding the method of assessment of taxes by their respective
landlords. Similarly, there were also other cases of migration of the peasants to
Bhutan and Darjeeling due to the lopsided and oppressive taxation system. The
hidden transcripts of the Sikkimese peasantry now thus started to come out in
the form of petition and prayers to the Maharaja
against the injustice they were subjected to at the hands of their landlords. In
order to curb the selfish interests of the landlords, Sidkeong Tulku abolished
the discriminatory taxation rates among the Bhutia-Lepcha and Nepali peasants
and reverted to the old system of Koot
or Kut. Possibly, taking the matters
of harassment and exploitation into consideration, Sidkeong Tulku proposed to
liquidate landlordism that was indeed a matter of relief to the subjugated
peasants of Sikkim. On the contrary, by his reformist zeal, he not only had exasperated
the feudal landlords, but also Claude White’s successor in the Political
Office, Charles Bell.
In
a very short period of hardly ten months, Sidkeong did some remarkable tasks,
for the development of Sikkim. His reign witnessed opening of several schools for
the propagation of western education. There were two secondary schools at
Gangtok, 25 primary and village schools, 16 missionary schools and 6 schools at
the landlords’ estates. Likewise, few other schools were opening in the remote
villages. Auxiliary, he made certain amendments in the prevailing laws and
encouraged his subjects for plantation of trees in waste lands. Reserved
forests were categorized into two ranges namely Eastern and Western and they
were kept in charge of the Foresters. It is noteworthy to mention here that,
these forests were to be managed by the landlords as Forest Officers of their
respective Elakhas. Strict rules and
laws were adopted to abolish corruption from the forest resources and if a
Forest Officer failed to execute his responsibilities accordingly were dealt
with a heavier hand. 13 Landlords were fined by the Durbar due to their
negligence and casualness towards their duties that include the Bermiok Kazi who was occupying a higher position
in the State Council. The evidence is ample enough to argue that Sidkeong Tulku
was an austere, a devoted, and a peasant adoring Maharaja who was keen to eliminate corruption from every level of
administration including monastery. He also encouraged his subjects to live a
clean and hygienic life and established a hospital and a dispensary at Gangtok.
However, his zeal and enthusiasm to provide a healthy administration in Sikkim
did not last long. His heterodoxy and revolutionary ideas became a major cause of
his death. In December 1914, Sidkeong was taken ill. It is believed that the
King died due to a heart failure caused by jaundice due to a severe chill.
However, it is also said that, a British physician from Bengal made a heavy
transfusion of brandy, put him under a number of blankets, and burnt charcoal near
his bed. Thus, Sidkeong died due to suffocationin suspicious circumstances at a
very early stage.
References:
Administration Report
of the Sikkim State for 1913-14
Administration Report of the Sikkim State for 1914-15
Unnamed Document, Year 1914, Palace Document, Namgyal Institute of Tibetology, Deorali, Gangtok.
Letter to Sidkeong Tulku from Panchen Lama dated
1909-1913, Palace Document, Namgyal Institute of Tibetology,
Deorali, Gangtok.
Letter from Sidkeong Tulku to the Tibetan
Government, Palace Document, Namgyal Institute of Tibetology,
Deorali, Gangtok
Basnett,
Lal Bahadur, (1974) Sikkim- A short Political
History, S. Chand & Co. (Pvt.) Ltd. New Delhi
Neel, Alexandra David (1931) With Mystics and Magicians in Tibet, Penguin Books, London
Kotturan, George, (1983), The Himalayan Gateway- History and Culture of Sikkim, Sterling Publishers Pvt. Ltd. New Delhi,
Sikkim- A Concise Chronicle
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