Weakness & Suppression of Revolt of 1857

Weakness of Revolt of 1857:

1. Limited spread
• did not spread to South India & most of Western India because these regions had repeatedly rebelled earlier
• Madras, Bombay, Bengal & Western Punjab remained undisturbed
2. Most rulers & zamindars refused to join due to selfish & fearful reasons and helped in suppressing the revolt
• Sindhia of Gwalior
• Holkar of Indore
• Nizam of Hydrabad
• Raja of Jodhpur & other Rajput rulers
• Nawab of Bengal
• Rulers of Patiala, Nabha, Jind & other Sikh chieftains of Punjab
• Maharaja of Kashmir
• Ranas of Nepal
• many other ruling chiefs, big zamindars
3. Other people were hostile to Revolt:
• Middle & upper classes
• money-lenders who were attacked by rebels
• merchants who were subjected to heavy taxation by rebels to finance the revolt
• zamindars of Bengal remained loyal to British
• merchants of Bombay,  Calcutta & Madras supported British because their profits came from foreign trade & economic connections with British merchants
• modern educated Indians were repelled by rebel's appeals to superstitions & their opposition to progressive social measures
4. Lack of weapons, sound leadership, coordination & poor strategy
• short of modern weapons & other materials for war
• used ancient weapons as pikes & swords
• troops were poorly organized, brave & selfless but indisciplined
• rebel units did not have common plans of military action or authoritative heads or centralized leadership
• uprising in different parts of country were uncoordinated
• leaders were joined together by common feeling of hatred against British 
• they were suspicious & jealous of one another & often indulged in suicidal quarrels
5. Lack of understanding of current state & future scenarios
• leaders did not know what sort of political power or institution to create in its place
• peasantry having destroyed books & overthrown money-lenders & new zamindars became passive and did not know what to do
• movement had little understanding of colonialism & modern world
• lacked a forward-looking program, coherent ideology, a political perspective or a vision of the future society & economy

Positive outcomes of Revolt of 1857:

1. created new type of organization: court of administrators at Delhi, consisting of 10 members - 6 armymen & 4 civilians - which took all military & administrative decisions in the name of Emperor
2. brought the Indian people together & imparted to them the consciousness of belonging to one country

Suppression of Revolt of 1857

1. British imperialism to strong for Revolt
• with a developing capitalist economy & at he height of its power the world over
• supported by most of the Indian princes & chiefs
• poured immense supplies of men, money & arms
2. Captured Delhi on 20th Sept 1857
• captured Delhi after prolonged & bitter fighting
• Bahadur Shah taken prisoner, tried & exiled to Rangoon where he died in 1862
• Royal Princes were captured & butchered on the spot
3. British defeated rebel leaders:
• Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansidied on field of battle on 17 June 1858
• Nana Sahib defeated at Kanpur, escaped to Nepal in 1859
• Tantia Tope escaped into jungles of Central India from where he carried on guerrilla warfare until April, 1859 when he was betrayed by a zamindar friend & captured & put to death after hurried trail on 15th April 1859
• By 1859 - Kunwar Singh, Bakht Khan, Khan Bahadur Khan of Bareilly, Rao Sahib & Maulavi Ahmadullah were all dead
• Begum of Awadh was compelled to hide in Nepal
4.