File 1290/1905 'Mesopotamia: Oudh Bequest' [‎33r] (70/260)

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a great opportunity of being a benefactor to your co-religionists. I am by no
means sure that some of the more powerful men in Nedjef and Karbala will
not have some sympathy for your views : and if you can organise an influential
committee to manage the money you will have made a good start.
No. 596-G., dated Fort AVilliam, the 9th March 1909.
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17 ^
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From-
-The Deputy Secretary to the Government of India in the Foreign
Department,
To— Lieutenant-Colonel J. Ramsay, C.I.E., Political Resident A senior ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul General) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Residency. in Turkish
Arabia and His Britannic Majesty’s Consul-General, Baghdad.
In reply to your letter No. 153, dated the 13th February 1909, on the sub
ject of the Oudh Bequest, I am directed to inform you that the Govern
ment of India see no objection to the terms of the letter addressed by you to
Syed Ahmad of Lucknow, and the original has accordingly been forwarded
to the addressee, as desired.
No. 170, dated Baghdad, the 17th February 1909.
From— Lieutenant-Colonel J. Ramsay, C.I.E., Political Resident A senior ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul General) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Residency. in Turkish
Arabia and His Britannic Majesty’s Consul-General, Baghdad,
To—The Secretary to the Government of India in the Foreign Department.
In continuation of the correspondence ending with your letter No. 142-
G., dated the 14th January 1909, I have the honour to forward a memorial
signed by a large number of the Indian residents of Karbala and Nedjef, com
plaining of the present system of distributing the Oudh Bequest.
2. In the first paragraph of the memorial the petitioners raise the old
question as to whether the money should, according to the terms of the Will,
be paid to the Mujtahids alone, or to the Mujtahids and Mujawars. This
question was discussed at great length in the correspondence ending with
Foreign Department letter No. 1074-1., dated the 7th March 1891, and
decided in favour of the interpretation, Mujtahids only. I, therefore, asked
the Vice-Consul at Karbala to call upon the petitioners to state the source
from which they had made their quotation. He informs me that the memorial
was drawn up in India by Lawyers acting under the instructions of a man
described as Majtahid Radhi-ud-Din of Murshidabad.
3. The succeeding paragraphs of the memorial, up to paragraph 12,
amount to nothing more than complaints against the Mujtahids, over whom
we have no control. The money is made over to them unconditionally in ac
cordance with the Will.
4. Paragraph 13 of the memorial suggests as a remedy that a Committee
of three Mujtahids should be appointed to properly manage the Bequest
money. The suggestion no doubt seems a very simple one to the Indian
Lawyers who drafted it, but it cannot be carried out in Turkish Arabia A term used by the British officials to describe the territory roughly corresponding to, but not coextensive with, modern-day Iraq under the control of the Ottoman Empire. ,
because three suitable Mujtahids are not forthcoming. I directed the Vice-
Consul to see the chief petitioners and to ask them to suggest the names of
the three Mujtahids whom they would like to sit on their proposed Committee,
and they replied that the Mujtahids should be chosen by the Government.
To—His Excellency the Viceroy and Governor-General of India in Council.
The humble memorial of the poor Indian residents of Nedjef
and Kerbala in Turkish Arabia A term used by the British officials to describe the territory roughly corresponding to, but not coextensive with, modern-day Iraq under the control of the Ottoman Empire. .
Most humbly and respectfully showeth,
The distribution of Mobarak Mahal Bequest Fund was formerly entrusted
to the learned men of the Shia sect, at Nedjef and Kerbala, who carried it on
for about sixty years; but in consequence of certain complaints against those