Diamods are forever

Maharaj Yadvinder Singh of Patiala wearing the famous Patiala necklace designed by Cartier

It's strange that of late there seems to be an unintentional theme running through the movies that I watch. A few weeks back it was China when I saw 'The Last Emperor' and 'Kundun' and now my DVD rental company send me movies from my queue which are based in Africa. I saw 'Blood Diamonds' today and I still have the DVD of 'The last king of Scotland' with me. So here I am sititng writing this post playing the CD 'Africa Calling - Live 8 at Eden' which forms the perfect background to the thoughts in my head. I remember watching a story on CNN a few months back covering the trail of Blood Diamonds from Sierra Leone to Liberia and finally to the markets in the west. It was really disturbing and quite an eye opener.
And while I was thinking about it all I also remembered the most beautiful jewelery collection that I have ever seen. It is the "Jewels of the Nizams". Before diamonds were discovered in Africa most of the diamonds came from India and Golconda in Southern state of Hyderabad (now Andhra Pradesh) was the major mining area. Many large and famous diamonds like the 182 carat Darya-e-Nur, 105 carat Kohinoor (now a part of the Crown Jewels), 140 carats Regent Diamond are believed to have been excavated from these mines. I have also seen a documentary on the history of some of these famous diamonds and how they are believed to bring bad luck!!

A Sarpech (turban ornament) from the Nizam Jewel Collection

Indian princely states were know for the excesses and many famous jewelers like Cartier made some outstanding pieces of jewelery for them. One of the Prince who was notoriously famous was Maharaja Bhupinder Singh of Patiala who was known for his antics like his motorcade of 20 Rolls Royce and many exquisite pieces of jewelery like the famous Patiala necklace made by Cartier. He was banned from coming to Simla (the summer capital of the Britishers in India) because he once tried to elope with a British lady at the point now known as the Scandal point. Later he formed his own summer retreat at a new hill station called Chail.
But no one was as famous and rich as the Nizam of Hyderabad who was on the cover of Time in February 1937 when he was declared the Richest man in the world. The Nizam had to surrender his state when he was attacked by the Indian Union after Independence. Mukkaram Jah, the grandson of the last Nizam moved to Perth and later to Turkey. The famous Jewels of the Nizam which are believed to be a fraction of the Nizam's actual wealth were bought by the Indian Government for a sum of US $70 million in 1967 and consists of the 185 carat Jacob Diamond, 25,000 diamonds weighing over 12,000 carats, 2000 emeralds weighing over 10,000 carats and innumerable pearls, rubies etc. The present worth of the collection is valued at about US $ 6 billion.

The eldest son of the last Nizam in all his royal regalia

I agree that the monarchy has it's share of problems but at the time it served the purpose well and it gave birth to and formed the patrons of most art forms like architecture, music, literature, crafts and jewelery etc. The study of the erstwhile princely states is a wonderful trip into the glorious days gone by.

Photo Credit : Kalle Anka