Mir Jafar

Mir Jafar (born 1691?—died February 5, 1765, Bengal, India) was the first nawab, or ruler, of Bengal (1757–60; 1763–65) under British influence, which he had helped bring about by working for the defeat of the previous nawab, Siraj al-Dawlah. He is notorious for his collusion with East India Company forces during the Battle of Plassey, betraying Siraj al-Dawlah, whose army Mir Jafar commanded. His defection helped establish British political ascendancy and commercial dominance in India.

Early career and disaffection

An Arab by birth, Mir Jafar helped his brother-in-law, Ali Vardi Khan, seize the government of Bengal in 1740 from Sarfaraz Khan, grandson of the first nawab of the region, Murshid Quli Khan. However, Mir Jafar fell out of favor after retreating from an advancing Maratha army in 1747, resulting in his dismissal by Ali Vardi Khan. In 1756 Siraj al-Dawlah succeeded to the throne on the death of his grandfather Ali Vardi Khan. Discontented, Mir Jafar conspired with others to depose Siraj al-Dawlah, who opposed the East India Company’s increasing commercial and political activity in Bengal and had captured Fort William (the British fortifications at Calcutta [now Kolkata]) in 1756. In early 1757 Calcutta was retaken by Robert Clive, British governor of Madras (now Chennai), and Adm. Charles Watson.

Conspiracy against Siraj al-Dawlah

Clive began negotiating with Mir Jafar, who agreed to enter into an alliance with the British to exclude the French from Bengal, He additionally agreed to pay £500,000 to the East India Company and £250,000 to the European inhabitants of Calcutta to compensate them for the loss of the city to Siraj al-Dawlah’s forces the previous year, provided that the British support his bid to be ruler of Bengal. He also promised large gratuities to British military and naval forces and to the Calcutta city council members. Mir Jafar’s claim to the throne of Bengal was backed by the Jagat Seth family, powerful local financiers, who played a prominent role in the plot against Siraj al-Dawlah along with several merchants, zamindars, and malcontents from the nawab’s court.

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The Battle of Plassey

The Battle of Plassey took place on June 23, 1757, at Palashi, a village near Siraj al-Dawlah’s capital of Murshidabad. Even though the nawab’s forces, numbering 50,000, greatly outnumbered Clive’s army of 3,000, the British victory was secured by Mir Jafar and his fellow conspirators. Much of Siraj al-Dawlah’s army, commanded by Mir Jafar, did not participate in the battle, and the nawab was swiftly defeated and deposed and was later executed. Afterward, Mir Jafar was installed as the new nawab of Bengal.

Nawab of Bengal and downfall

Mir Jafar found the Bengal treasury unexpectedly small, but he undertook the fulfillment of his financial promises and issued free passes for the private trade of the British merchants, policies that led to the state’s financial ruin and a demoralization of the East India Company’s servants that marked the early years of British rule. After Clive’s departure in 1760, Mir Jafar was deposed in favor of his son-in-law Mir Qasim. Reinstated in 1763 on the outbreak of war between the British and Mir Qasim, he made concessions to the British that led to his financial and political downfall. At his death in 1765 he was addicted to opium and suffered from leprosy.