Democratic South Asian politics has from the first shown a trend towards dynastic rule – whether the Nehru-Gandhi legacy in India, the Bhutto family in Pakistan, the Zia regime in Bangladesh or the Bandranaike government in Sri Lanka. Zenana women, as representatives of traditional leadership, have similarly impacted upon democratic politics in post-Independence India. The postcolonial period witnessed the rise of the princely politician, the ‘Rajvanshi’, and former Zenana women have emerged as prominent political personalities, such as Rajmata Gayatri Devi of Jaipur and Rajmata Vijaya Raje Scindia of Gwalior. Relying principally on their memoirs as sources, this chapter demonstrates the influence of Zenana women in nationalist India.

From 1947 to 1949, India witnessed the most rapid and peaceful ‘republican’ revolution of modern history. Within a two-year span, the nearly six hundred semi-autonomous princely states were merged with the new republic. It was a virtually bloodless transition from monarchies to a united democratic nation state. Through the mid-twentieth century, the princes had been far from impotent rulers. Under British paramountcy, they held internal sovereignty, and were denied only control over foreign policy, defence and communications. In 1921, the British inaugurated an entity specifically for the native rulers, The Chamber of Princes. Under the 1935 Government of India Act, which projected a ‘future federation’, representatives of the Indian princely states would counterpoise elected officials of the British Indian provinces. As David Cannadine notes, their wealth and power was of real significance: they had never been so rich, they spent fortunes on palaces and jewellery, and (in more enlightened cases) on their subjects’ welfare: pearls and rubies from Cartier in Paris and London, and hospitals and universities in Hyderabad. Far from being the bearers and wearers of hollow crowns, they were still considered by the British as the ‘natural leaders of Indian society’. The period of integration thus was a critical historical moment for princely rule and legitimacy, based on birth, was abruptly replaced by parliamentary government and the authority of democracy.