For the first time in independent India, Maharaja Hari Singh, the last Dogra monarch is being celebrated, as Jammu and Kashmir's administration declared the Maharaja's birth anniversary on Friday as a public holiday.
In Jammu, fireworks lit up sky as BJP leaders, Rajput groups and Maharaja Hari Singh's family participated in celebrations to mark the first public holiday in his honour.
Home Minister Amit Shah extended his wishes for the celebration. "I bow to the symbol of nationalism Maharaja Hari Singh on his birth anniversary. Prime Minister Modi has paid a true tribute to him by declaring his birth anniversary as a state holiday to commemorate his efforts to make Jammu and Kashmir an integral part of India and to keep the country's integrity intact," he said.
Last week, Jammu and Kashmir's Lt Governor Manoj Sinha declared Hari Singh's birth anniversary on September 23 as a public holiday. He said that his decision was taken in view of the contributions of the late Maharaja.
Among the 562 Princely states that acceded and integrated with Union of India in 1947, Jammu and Kashmir is the first where its erstwhile ruler is now officially celebrated.
When the British formally left on August 15, 1947, Maharaja Hari Singh, who was a Hindu ruler of a Muslim-majority state, wanted his state to remain independent and thus had a standstill agreement with both India and Pakistan.
However, in the wake of an invasion by tribal raiders backed by Pakistan, Hari Singh fled Kashmir and signed an Instrument of Accession with India on October 26, 1947.
Maharaja Hari Singh later lived in exile in Mumbai, where he died in 1961.
Even after the accession, the state had its own constitution, flag and the penal code, Ranbir Penal Code (ROC), named after one of Hari Singh's predecessors, Ranbir Singh.
The state subject law, which defined permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir and barred outsiders from owning land, was another defining legacy of Maharaja Hari Singh. All this was abolished when Article 370 was revoked in August 2019.
Ironically, while a monarch is now officially celebrated, the public holiday on the birth anniversary of first democratically elected leader of Jammu and Kashmir, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah was dropped from public holiday list in 2019.
Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah had not only rejected the two-nation theory and chose a secular India over Islamic Pakistan, it was under his leadership that his supporters rose against Pakistani raiders and prevented their advances till the Indian Army arrived in Srinagar on October 27, 1947.
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