Hridayshah

Raja Hridayshah Lodhi, also called Hirde Shah Lodi, was played an important part in the Bundela, Gond and Lodhi Uprising of 1842. His ancestors had established their kingdom in present-day Damoh (district in Madhya Pradesh) which was then under the Gond rulers. He ruled the northern region of present-day Narsinghpur, Madhya Pradesh.

The uprising was eventually brought to a halt by a combination of military engagement, payment of ransoms and offers of conciliation. Raja Hirde Singh was handed over to the British by the Rajah of Shahgurgh (a Bundela Rajput) at Hirapur on the borders of Sagar district in December, 1843.

Reign

The sacrifices made by Lodhi warrior Hirdeshah and his family in the freedom struggle of India. Raja Hirdeshah was the main hero of the Bundelkhand Revolt of 1842. Although this rebellion was suppressed by the Company government, Hirdeshah again played a sacrificial role in the summer of 1857, in which his entire family was martyred. In the rebellion of 1842 against the British and in the summer of 1857, Raja Hirdeshah was supported by other Lodhi kings, talukdars, jagirdars and subjects of his fraternity and Gond kings and their subjects. British documents consider Raja Hirdeshah as the main culprit of the rebellion of 1842 and the mutiny of 1857, but his sacrifices and sacrifices are deliberately ignored by prejudiced Indian writers and historians.

In the Revolt of 1857, all the Lodhi people of Central Province had joined the war against the British (R.V. Russell-1916). Dr. Suresh Mishra writes on page 11 in his book 'Ramgarh ki Rani Avantibai' that “The Lodhi jagirdars actively participated in the rebellion that took place in the Sagar-Narmada region during the Bundela rebellion of 1842. Hirdeshah of Hirapur in Narsinghpur district and Madhukar Shah of Sagar district were prominent among them. This legacy of Lodhi resistance to British rule became more pronounced in 1857 and was led by Rani Avantibai of Ramgarh. While in fact Hirdeshah was the main historical source of inspiration for the Independence Summer-1857 of Central Province.

Legacy

The fact to be noted here is that the Lodhi and Gaur people of Bundelkhand had declared criminal tendency in 1843 itself by the Company Government for not seeking pardon from the Governor General. After this, in 1857, the Lodhis and the Gaudas again launched an armed rebellion against the British rule. After rebelling for more than a generation and not seeking pardon from Queen Victoria of Britain after the failed Independence Summer, they were considered hereditary criminals and were declared as born criminals under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871.