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Nana Saheb Peshwa II

Nana Saheb Peshwa II (19 May 1824 – after 1857), born as Dhondu Pant, was an Indian aristocrat and fighter, who led the rebellion in Cawnpore (Kanpur) during the 1857 rebellion against the East India Company. As the adopted son of the exiled Maratha Peshwa Baji Rao II, Nana Saheb believed that he was entitled to a pension from the Company, but as he was denied recognition under Lord Dalhousie's doctrine of lapse, he initiated a rebellion. He forced the British garrison in Kanpur to surrender, then murdered the survivors, gaining control of the city for a few days. After a British force recaptured Kanpur, Nana Saheb disappeared, with multiple conflicting accounts existing of his further life and death.

Not to be confused with Nanasaheb Peshwa or Nana Fadnavis.

Nana Saheb Peshwa II

Dhondu Pant

(1824-05-19)May 19, 1824
Bithur, Cawnpore, Ceded Provinces, Company India
(present-day Bithoor, Kanpur Nagar district, Uttar Pradesh, India)

(1859-09-24)September 24, 1859 (aged 35) (disputed)
Kathmandu, Nepal

Narayan Bhat (father)
Ganga Bai (mother)

Early life[edit]

Nana was born on 18 May 1824 as Nana Govind Dhondu Pant, to Narayan Bhat and Ganga Bai. After the Maratha defeat in the Third Anglo-Maratha War, the East India Company had exiled Peshwa Baji Rao II to Bithur (near Kanpur), but the Company allowed him to maintain a large establishment paid for in part out of a British pension. Nana's father, a well-educated Deccani Brahmin, had travelled with his family from the Western Ghats to become a court official of the former Peshwa at Bithoor. He had married the sister of one of the Peshwa's wives, who bore him two sons.


Lacking sons of his own, Baji Rao adopted Nana Saheb and his younger brother Bala Saheb in 1827. Nana Saheb's childhood associates included Tatya Tope, Azimullah Khan and Manikarnika Tambe. Tatya Tope, Nana Saheb's fencing master, was the son of Pandurang Rao Tope, an important noble at the Peshwa's court, who had followed his sovereign into exile. Azimullah Khan later became Nana Saheb's secretary and dewan.

Nana Sahib, a drama in verse by with incidental music by Jules Massenet, opened on 20 December 1883 at the Théâtre de la Porte Saint-Martin in Paris.[25]

Jean Richepin

Nana Sahib (based on ) is the principal character of the 1975 Soviet film Captain Nemo, his role is played by Vladislav Dvorzhetsky. He is also seen in Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties as Nanib Sahir.

Captain Nemo

's novel The End of Nana Saheb (also published under the name "The Steam House"), taking place in India ten years after the 1857 events, is based on these rumours, and not historically accurate - for example, the novel claims Nana Saheb had been married to Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi.

Jules Verne

In , Manohar Malgonkar gives a sympathetic reconstruction of Nana Saheb's life before, during and after the mutiny as told in his own words.[26]

The Devil's Wind

Another novel Recalcitrance published in 2008 the 150th anniversary year of the and written by Anurag Kumar shows a character similar to Sahib receiving blessings from an Indian sage who also gives him a special boon connected to his life and the rebellion of 1857.

Indian Rebellion of 1857

The character of Surat Khan in the 1936 film seems to be loosely based on Nana Saheb.

The Charge of the Light Brigade

A novel by Donald Cirulli titled The Devil's Wind was published in 2018 described, among other things, the siege of Wheeler's Entrenchment at Cawnpore and the British attack of Delhi (both in 1857).

The character of Nana Saheb is portrayed by in the DD National TV series 1857 Kranti.

Bhupinder Singh

In character of Nana Saheb was portrayed Anang Desai.

Bharat Ek Khoj

In 's Feluda novel Bombaiyer Bombete, a necklace belonging to Nana Saheb from Kathmandu is smuggled into India.

Satyajit Ray

List of people who disappeared

Ethnic communities in Kanpur

Nana Fadnavis

Gupta, Pratul Chandra (1963). Nana Sahib and the Rising at Cawnpore. Oxford University Press.  0-19-821523-1.

ISBN

Shastitko, Petr Mikhaĭlovich; Savitri Shahani (1980). Nana Sahib: An Account of the People's Revolt in India, 1857–1859. Shubhada-Saraswat Publications.