Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 5.djvu/168

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

HYAT OOLLA KHAN.
(262)

SHAH ZADA JUMBOOE.
(263)

THE course of the Afghan kingdom will be briefly sketched in Articles Nos. 265 and 266, and the positions of the rival families or clans, the Barukzyes and Suddoozyes, explained. The former, in the person of the Ameer Shere Ali, of Kabool, is now possessed of regal power, while the chiefs of the latter are exiles, pensioners, or supporting themselves by trade. Thus many of the Snddoozye clan are found in the frontier, residing in the large towns, or attached to local chiefs of tribes, who are able and willing to afford them protection and support. The Suddoozyes in Afghanistan are now a helpless and depressed clan, and the attempt made by the British Government to restore Shah Shoojah, who was the head of the tribe, to the throne, was successful only as long as it had the support of an English force. After the retirement of the English troops from Kabool, the murder of Shah Shoojah followed, and his son, though acknowledged as his successor by the partizans of the family, was unable to hold his ground against the Barukzyes, who expelled him from the country. Shah Zada, or Prince, Jumboor, is of the Suddoozye royal family, and his family, as Nawabs of Tauk and Dehra Ismael Khan, were originally viceroys of that portion of the Kabool territory. The Sikhs deprived them of power; but they hold considerable jahgeers, or estates, under the British Government. Hyat Oolla Khan is a person of rank in the clan. Both are now exiles, and reside within the British territories. Unless an extraordinary revolution should occur in Kabool, and the Barukzye family be dethroned, there is no chance of the Suddoozyes recovering their position in Afghanistan. In India, and on the frontier, the clan has no pretension either to position or distinction. The Suddoozyes are Soonnee Mahomedans. The prince, it will be observed, has the strong Jewish features so common to many Afghans, that their descent from a Jewish tribe, nay, that they are actually one of the lost tribes of Israel, has been gravely argued and believed.