Shams Ur Rehman Alavi
On the left is an old issue of Urdu daily Nadeem, one of the oldest newspapers in the country.
It was a special issue and the newspaper had carried the photograph of the last ruler of the erstwhile princely state.
It's the photo of a young Nawab Hamidullah Khan on the front page of the special issue.
It is clear that this is the silver jubilee edition of the newspaper, as it is dated November 20, 1960.
The paper also has an advertisement of Usha and the company's products--sewing machine and fan.
It's a part of the front page--top part. Nawab Hamidullah Khan was the last ruler of the princely state of Bhopal. The princely state was established in the first quarter of eighteenth century i.e. 1715-1720 AD.
Dost Mohammad Khan was the founder of the dynasty. It was in his reign that the constructions began and over the period, Bhopal became a town and later developed into a city--one of the most well-known cities in the era, due to its unique culture. The princely state patronized authors and poets.
Four women ruled the state, three of them in succession, for over a century. After Sultan Jahan Begum, her son Hamidullah ascended the throne. He was the last Nawab. It was in 1949 that the state formally merged into Indian Union. Nawab Hamidullah Khan had passed away on February 4, 1960.
