Quite to my surprise, I came across these lines published in the northeast section of the March 24, 2006 edition of The Telegraph: ‘The Poignant Tale of Tripura’s Last King a Surprise Bestseller’, and someone called Sekhar Dutta had captioned it, Love in the Time of Heartbreak. I read with astonishment and delight the news that someone called Pannalal Roy, a historian, had written a book called The Other Bir Bikram that had become a bestseller. I was interested to learn that, ‘The star-crossed King Bir Bikram Kishore Manikya was denied the hand of his beloved, the Manipuri Princess, Anandi Devi.’ I was surprised and intrigued. I wanted to know who this Manipuri princess, Anandi Devi, was. It further said that since Shillong was a regular destination of Bir Bikram, the last king of Tripura, he met the Manipuri princess Anandi Devi there and fell in love with her. So this Anandi Devi then turned out to be none other than the daughter of my sovereign father Maharaja Churachand and Maharani Dhanamanjuri the Lady of Ngangbam.
The article in The Telegraph was delightfully fanciful but terribly wrong and I suspected that the man from Tripura called Sekhar Dutta had made it up. But whether the newspaper article was right or wrong, it appealed to me greatly. This was because, as I have mentioned a little before, when I was a child I saw, knew and understood that a proposal had come for the hand of my elder sister, the beautiful Tombiyaima (also known as Tombisana) from a prince of Tripura.
And so it occurs to me now that, even though it may be late, it is important to include this lovely, deeply hidden story in this intimate memoir called The Maharaja’s Household. Like the writer Sekhar Dutta’s inaccurate account, I seem to have come to know of this episode quite inaccurately as well, and when I realized I was getting it wrong, I immediately sent a letter to the author Pannalal Roy who had written The Other Bir Bikram. This was not a book I had known about before. But recently, a few months ago, five women had gone as Leikol’s representatives on a literary trip to Tripura and had been given the book by some persons to give to me. Although I did not read the book very carefully I did come across several mistakes in it. Therefore when I wrote to Pannalal, I said, ‘The princess of Manipur that you have written about in this book is called Tomalmanjuri (her Meitei name being Tombiyaima or Tombisana). She was my older sister. Tomalmanjuri was the third of the five daughters that king and the maharani the Lady Ngangbam had and I am the youngest one.’
Because there were many years between us, I did not get to know my older sister very well, but even so, I adored her. And so I have also written about her earlier without knowing very much at all. How happy I am today that I am about to get the opportunity to write clearly the story of her connection to the monarch of Tripura called Bir Bikram. I felt the urge to cry out with happiness, I have found it, I have found it, I have found a lovely story! And one I thought I could now tell as part of The Maharaja’s Household, as one of its loveliest stories.
When I wrote to Pannalal Roy I said, ‘You did not mention in the book you have written, who came with the proposal for my sister whom the monarch of Tripura had looked upon with favour. I know who it was; I know it well. I saw her face. The person who brought the proposal for my sister’s hand in marriage was known as the Rani of Dhaka. She was the maharani of our monarch Radha Kishore’. So why was she called the Rani of Dhaka? It intrigued me even in those days. But I came to know later that Her Highness, this great-grandmother of mine, was Ratnamanjuri, born of the royal blood of Manipur and the daughter of Manipur’s Maharaja Debendra, who was known as ‘The Dhaka Settler’. There is actually a nice historical story to this episode.
After the death of Maharaja Narasingh, his younger brother Debendra claimed the throne. At the time, upon the death of a king, the custom in Manipur allowed succession by a younger brother as well as by a son. And so no one could stop Debendra when he stepped forward to claim the throne after his older brother Narasingh died. As an interesting aside to the stream of history, I want to mention at this point that even though the populace did not say anything or obstruct him, the children of his older brother, such as Bhubonsingh, did not support their uncle. And who was it that they supported? They stood up for the child king Chandrakirti, whom his royal mother, the Maharani the Lady Meisnam, Embracer of the Shans, had strapped on to her back and spirited away out of the country on horseback90. And so Debendra did not reign for very long in Manipur. After about a year, he fled the country in defeat and sought asylum in Dhaka. That is why he was known as the Dhaka Settler king. And surely also why his daughter, our royal great-grandmother Ratnamanjuri was known as the Rani of Dhaka as she was called that by the people of Tripura.
Our royal great-grandmother Ratnamanjuri, the Rani of Dhaka, did not have any children. And so, they say, she adopted a child called Birendra Kishore born to another step-wife, a Manipur maiden. Since the maharani had officially adopted him, Birendra Kishore triumphed over the contenders in the race for the throne of Tripura and became king. Bir Bikram, the king who desired my older sister Tombiyaima can, therefore, be said to be the grandson of our royal great-grandmother, the Rani of Dhaka. And so I heard that Bir Bikram’s royal father the maharaja was very fond of our great-grandmother, the Rani of Dhaka. This was because his father Birendra Kishore was able to ascend to the throne of Tripura on account of her. I do not know how many errors there are in this story I relate. My mother, the Lady Ngangbam told it to me later. What is interesting is that I did not know much back then nor did I look into it any further. Nor did I ever hear this story from the lips of my older sister Tombiyaima. I do not know why she never mentioned this matter. As I said earlier, when I was a young girl studying in college in Shillong, a certain woman from Nepal who had ties with Tripura invited me, even though I was just a girl, to a wedding reception at the Shillong Club. As aunt Subhashini, the wife of uncle Paramananda, was also the daughter of Kaminikumar Singh, the former minister of Tripura, my uncle took me and I attended the reception. It was then that I met our monarch Bir Bikram. He called me over and sat me down next to him. And in good Manipuri, he teased me, saying laughing, ‘Today, you are about to eat with us. Won’t they say you have been polluted?’ And slapped me on my back fondly. Flustered and uncomprehending, I was embarrassed. I have mentioned this anecdote at some other point also. But today I recollect it even more clearly. Back then I did not know very well the handsome young man who teased me. It was the same man who had met, seen and desired my older sister. And today at this late juncture, this late piece of news has stirred me. I cannot say why but I suddenly feel closer and love Bir Bikram, our monarch. I feel the urge to find out more; to know more. Why did he want my older sister so? I have found out and come to know only now, that our monarch Bir Bikram died on May 17, 1947. And my older sister Tombiyaima died around 1945. I do not know any more, but I am writing this story, having decided to tell whatever little I know, right or wrong.