Flood of Fire by Amitav Ghosh Page B

time. Besides, there were regular increments, with rank: a naik received a basic pay of eight rupees, a havildar ten, a jamadar fifteen, and a subedar thirty. Best of all, the salary was always paid on schedule: never once, in all his years with the Company, had Bhyro Singh known it to be delayed.
    Tell me, Ram Singhji, of which other army in Hindustan can it be said that their soldiers are paid regularly? You know as well as I do that our rajas and nawabs purposely keep their salaries in arrears so they won’t desert. Such things are unheard of in the East India Company’s army.
    And the battas!
    The Company’s allowances were more generous, said Bhyro Singh, than those of any other army: they added up to almost as much again as the basic pay. There was a special batta for marching and another for campaign rations; still another for uniforms. As for booty taken in battle, the splitting of the spoils was always scrupulously fair. Why, after a major battle in Mysore, the English general had kept only half the loot for himself! The rest was divided fairly amongst the various ranks of officers and sepoys.
    But that was still not the best of it, said the havildar. The Company Bahadur was the only employer in all of Hindustan that looked after its men even after they had left service. When they retired they were handed something called a ‘pension’ – a salary, of at least three rupees a month, that was paid to them for the rest of their lives. On top of that they could obtain land grants if they wanted. If wounded, they were provided with free medical care whenever they needed it.
    Do you know of any employer in Hindustan that offers all this, Ram Singhji? Tell me, truthfully.
    Ram Singh’s eyes widened but he parried by asking: What about accommodation? In Delhi they give their soldiers quarters to live. Does the Company do the same?
    Bhyro Singh acknowledged that this was not the case at his own regimental base: instead every sepoy was given a hutting-allowance, to build his own shack.
    But believe me, Ram Singhji, no one minds doing this because that way we can all live as we like, among our own kind.
    Now, with the first seeds of doubt sprouting in his mind, Ram Singh began to voice other, more pressing objections to the Company’s service.
    Say what you like, Bhyro Singhji, he said. But these Angrez firangis are beef-eating Christians. For Rajputs it can only bring shame on our families if we work for them. Isn’t it true that everyone who joins the Company’s paltans must eat unclean and forbidden things? That he must live side by side with men of all sorts, including the lowest?
    The havildar burst out laughing.
    Ram Singhji, he said, you are completely mistaken: the English care more about the dharma of caste than any of our nawabs and rajas ever did. There is not a sepoy in the Bengal Native Infantry who is not a Brahmin or a Rajput. And these are not impostors, trying to pass themselves off as twice-born: every sepoy’s caste is carefully checked, as is his body. As you know, in the old days the armies of Hindustan were like jungles – men went into them to hide, so that they could change their origins. After a few years of fighting ordinary julaha Muslims would pass themselves off as high-class Afghans, and half the men who called themselves Rajputs were just junglees and hill-people. Our badshahs and maharajahs put up with it because they were desperate for recruits. That is how it has been in Hindustan for hundreds of years: everything has become degenerate, people have forgotten the true dharma of caste and they do whatever they find convenient. But now at last things are being put right by the Angrezi Company. The sahibs are stricter about these matters than our rajas and nawabs ever were. They have brought learned men from their country to study our old books. These white pundits know more about our scriptures than we do ourselves. They are making everything pure