Article Title: Rani Lakshmi Bai
19-11-2022
History & Art and Culture Prelims Plus
Why is in news? PM remembers Rani Lakshmibai on her Jayanti
Lakshmi Bai was born on November 19, 1835, in Kashi, India. She was brought up in the household of the Peshwa (ruler) Baji Rao II
She was married the Maharaja of Jhansi, Gangadhar Rao, but was widowed without bearing a surviving heir to the throne.
The Maharaja adopted a boy as his heir just before his death. Lord Dalhousie, the British governor-general of India, refused to recognize the adopted heir and annexed Jhansi in accordance with the Doctrine of Lapse.
Uprising against the British:
She refused to cede Jhansi to the British. Shortly after the beginning of the mutiny in 1857, which broke out in Meerut.
She offered stiff resistance to the invading forces and the rescuing army of Tantia Tope, another rebel leader, was defeated at the Battle of Betwa.
Lakshmi bai fought bravely against the British and gave a tough fight to Sir Hugh Rose so as to save her empire from annexation.
She died fighting on the battlefield on June 17, 1858.
When the Indian National Army started its first female unit (in 1943), it was named after the valiant queen of Jhansi.
Doctrine of Lapse:
It was an annexation policy followed widely by Lord Dalhousie when he was India's Governor-General from 1848 to 1856.
According to this, any princely state that was under the direct or indirect control of the East India Company where the ruler did not have a legal male heir would be annexed by the company.
It was enforced in the cases of Satara (1848), Jaitpur and Sambalpur (1849), Baghat (1850), Chota Udaipur (1852), Jhansi (1853), and Nagpur (1854)
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