After studying at the Government School in Aligarh, Raja Mahendra Pratap went to the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College in Aligarh, which later became known as the Aligarh Muslim University.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said two years later that Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh was not recognized because of him donating land to the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), and promised to build a university in the same city in his name. Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of the university on Tuesday (September 14).
Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh was a freedom fighter, revolutionary, writer, social reformer and internationalist who entered the Lok Sabha as an independent candidate from Mathura in 1957, with Bharatiya Jana Sangh’s Atal Bihari Vajpayee coming fourth.
Mahendra Pratap established the “Provisional Government of India” in Kabul in 1915 in the middle of World War I and, as the British government targeted him for his activities, located himself in Japan. In 1932, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Raja finally returned to India a year before independence, and immediately began working with Mahatma Gandhi. In independent India he diligently followed his ideal of Panchayati Raj.
Why is the Jat leader seen by his family and admirers as a much-needed symbol of peace in present times? What is their contribution in promoting education? What was the nature and basis of his leftist leanings? And why is he and his legacy being used before the assembly elections in UP in 2022.
“He was not a political figure. He was a reformer who promoted education. He gave his place of residence to establish the country’s first technical school. He was fluent in eight different languages, practiced different religions, founded the World Federation, was nominated for a Nobel Prize, established a provisional government of India in Afghanistan, but still, very Few people know about them. Charat Pratap Singh, great-grandson of Mahendra Pratap. Charat Pratap Singh said that he is the manager of the late Raja’s property and his affairs in Hathras.
“Now that the government has decided to set up a university after him, the legacy of grandfather will be known to the people. They would like to know about him and his contribution,” Charat Pratap told The Indian Express on Tuesday morning.
Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh was born in 1886 in the ruling Jat family of Mursan Estate in Hathras. In 1907, the young king went on a world tour with his wife, who was a Sikh.
On his return, Raja left his residence in Mathura to convert into a technical school called Prem Mahavidyalaya in 1909. It is said that it was the first polytechnic in the country.
After studying at the Government School in Aligarh, Raja Mahendra Pratap went to the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College in Aligarh, which later became known as the Aligarh Muslim University.
Although he was unable to complete his graduation from the institute, Raja Mahendra Pratap’s name is counted among the prominent alumni of the university.
As prominent people of the region, Mahendra Pratap’s father and grandfather were close to Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, the founding educationist and reformer of Aligarh Muslim University.
Like many others in the region, the family contributed to Sir Syed’s efforts to establish the university. The family is said to have given land to AMU, some parts of which were donated, while other parts were given on lease. Raja Mahendra Pratap also gave land to various educational institutions.
Charat Pratap Singh said, “The family never wanted AMU to be named after him, only that his legacy should be publicized and widely known.”
He said that AMU has agreed to name its city school after Mahendra Pratap. Charat Pratap said that the land for the school was given on lease by his family in 1929.
Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh is said to have left his property in 1914 to join the struggle for India.
Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh is said to have left his property in 1914 to plunge into India’s struggle for independence. On December 1, 1915, he announced the first provisional government of India outside India at the historic Bagh-e-Babur in Kabul. He declared himself the President, and his fierce fellow revolutionary Maulana Barkatullah of Bhopal, the Prime Minister of the Provisional Government.
Mahendra Pratap later traveled to different countries to support the revolutionaries fighting for independence in India. He went to Germany, Japan and Russia and met political leaders of those countries. He is said to have met Vladimir Lenin in 1919, two years after the Bolshevik Revolution.
In 1929, Mahendra Pratap started the World Federation in Berlin. He was nominated for the 1932 Nobel Peace Prize by Swedish doctor N. A. Nilsson, who was a member of the Commission for the Permanent International Peace Bureau.
The nomination described Raja as a “Hindu patriot”, “editor of the world federation” and “the unofficial envoy of Afghanistan”. Read the inspiration for the nomination:
“Pratap left his property for educational purposes, and he established a technical college in Brindaban. In 1913 he participated in Gandhi’s campaign in South Africa. He traveled around the world to create awareness about the situation in Afghanistan and India. In 1925 he went on a mission to Tibet and met the Dalai Lama. He was mainly on an informal economic mission on behalf of Afghanistan, but he also wanted to expose British brutalities in India. He called himself a servant of the powerless and weak. “
Charat Pratap Singh stated that it was “mainly due to his (Mahendra Pratap’s) contribution in the field of education and launching the World Federation which later became the force behind the United Nations, which nominated him for the Nobel Prize.” Was”.
After nearly 32 years of exile, Mahendra Pratap Singh finally returned to India in 1946.
In 1957, Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh contested the Lok Sabha election from Mathura, and was elected Member of Parliament, defeating Congress’ Jat leaders Chaudhary Digambar Singh and Yuva Vajpayee. Mahendra Pratap Singh got more than 40 percent of the votes in that election.
With elections just months away, Mahendra Pratap Singh’s family identity as the “Jat Raja” is of interest to the BJP. The party has lost its ground among Jat farmers of western Uttar Pradesh, who have been protesting for a full year against agricultural laws brought in by the central government.
Celebrating the legacy of a respected Jat leader and reformer, the BJP hopes to regain the affection of certain sections of the Jats in the region. The BJP also wants to highlight the manner in which earlier governments “ignored” the creation of the AMU and their contribution to India’s freedom struggle.
Some have argued that the contribution of land by Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh and his son, spread over 1,000 acres of the AMU campus, is not huge. However, as the elections draw closer, such claims and counter-claims can only be expected to intensify.