Word: maharajas
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...never-never land that lies jammed in between China, Tibet and Afghanistan, was a prize which both India and Pakistan had been eying greedily ever since the British left India. As a princely state, it was entitled to choose which new nation it would join. Kashmir's Hindu maharaja, panicked by an invasion of tough Pathan Moslem tribesmen from northwest Pakistan, chose India-despite the fact that 77% of his subjects were Moslems.* There followed a 14-month war in which the Indian army badly mauled both the Pathans and the Pakistani regulars who had come in to give...
...later turned it over to his 22-year-old son Hans, who furnished it with Gobelin tapestries, the finest crystals, magnificent antiques. In the palmy days before and after World War I the Palace became a kind of winter home for the very rich and the very royal. The Maharaja of Hyderabad would arrive with 500 trunks and a personal cook, who sprinkled gold dust on the rice before serving his master's curry. On arriving, the Aga Khan would give Head Porter Chasper $10,000 to be handed out when the Aga Khan needed pocket money; the hotel...
...powerful princes (along with allowances ranging upward to $1,000,000) as a sop to their pride. But even that comes to an end with the realignment of states. As a mere governor, poking along on his privy purse ($520,000) and an annual salary of $13,000, the maharaja would be able to throw no more parties like this. All through the elaborate, ten-day ceremony that marked the twilight of his greatness, farmers and shopkeepers by the thousand poured into the city from every corner of his old realm, standing in patient lines to glimpse his stables...
...lights blazed up all over the city. Elephants with gilded toenails lumbered past the prince. Indian regimentals struggled bravely to keep their Scottish bagpipes skirling, while acrobats wheeled and tumbled. One by one Mysore's distinguished citizens approached the throne holding an offering of gold, and the maharaja, his diamond earrings ajangle, tapped the proffered coin to show that he accepted it, but only symbolically...
...lavish show to signify the end of a lavish era, and
the maharaja made it clear throughout that there would not be another
like it. In the future, the expenditure of rupees in Mysore will be
carefully watched. The maharaja has decreed a tax of 16