The Princely States and the Great Game: Rumours, Anti-Colonial Resistance and Imperial Anxieties, 1858-1900

This PhD project examines the role of Indian princely rulers in anti-colonial resistance after the Revolt of 1857 and within the broader geopolitical rivalry between the British and Russian Empires, known as the ‘Great Game’. It asks how Indian princes sought to engage Russia as a potential ally against British rule, what these contacts meant for their position within the British imperial hierarchy, and how they intersected with British fears of a renewed uprising in India and a Russian invasion of British India. Figures such as Duleep Singh, the last ruler of the Sikh Empire, who sought Russian support for military action against the British, provide a particularly revealing entry point for examining how Indian princely rulers shaped the dynamics of the British-Russian rivalry. Methodologically, the project approaches rumours as historical sources, drawing on their potentially disruptive nature in colonial contexts and their connection to imperial anxieties.