Friday, July 26, 2013

The New Born British Royalty and the Indian Connection!


Even after the decline of the Monarchies we are so enamored with Royalties to this very day. Millions awaited with much eagerness and bated breath not in Great Britain alone but all over the world the birth of the British Royalty with much interest and respect. The new born now would be addressed in the Royal Tradition as “His Royal Highness Prince George of Cambridge”and the name he would be called by would be Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge.

The christening  did not take much time unlike for his father which took almost a month and the baby was without a name for as much time. The name has one the most popular names of his ancestors. George and Louis.

There already have been 6 Royal British Monarchs named as George, the last being Queen’s Father George the 6th. Louis happens also to be a popular name amongst the British Royalties. One of them was India’s Last Viceroy and the 1st Governor General of Independent Union of India, Admiral of the Fleet Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma. It is here where the Indian Connection reveals itself as these names are associated with the names of the Kings who witnessed the strong Indian Connection during their reign.

It all began when the British Crown took over India undivided from the British East India Company in 1858 after the India’s First War of Independence or also known as the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 and the dissolution of the Company itself. On 1st of May 1876 the Queen Victoria became the Empress of India and was proclaimed such in the Delhi Durbar of 1877.

When Victoria the Empress of India died her son Edward VII ascended the throne as “Emperor of India”. The title continued after India became independent on 15 August 1947 and was not formally abandoned until 22 June 1948 under George VI, although the British monarch continued to be the King of India until it became a republic in 1950.

The Emperors and Empress of India until India’s independence from The British were as under:


Incidentally 'The Emperor of India' was a Title the Last Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah II used after 1857 as given by the sepoys who thought to over through the reign of East India Company. They proclaimed hi the Badishah-e-Hind, or Emperor of India. The Mughals, who ruled very massive area of India, but never called themselves as Emperors. They used the title Badishah which meant Great King or King of Kings which was similar to Emperor and since the Geographical Demarcation of their dominion wasn’t obvious hence the titles never indicated the area of their suzerainty.

In an obvious  emulation of every thing grand which the Mughals did the British Royal Family folowed. So did they follow the naming of themselves.

One of the theories of naming of Queen Victoria as the 'Empress of India' was due to her princess daughter was to become the Empress of Germany with her husband ascending the German Imperial throne. Thus she would have been outranked by her daughter a mere Queen. 

The idea for such a creation of Title is credited to the then Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli and of course Disraeli was rewarded with making him the 'Earl of Beaconsfield'