Mystery Of Kohinoor : In 1854, when India was under British Colonial rule, the then Governor General Lord Dalhousie sent a 15-year-old child from Punjab to England. Lord Dalhousie believed that the mother of this child was a threat and had a bad character and so it was important to take him away from the mother. In England, this child converts to Christianity, and becomes fast friends with Queen Victoria’s son Edward VII.
The responsibility of this child was given to the British Crown, and an annual stipend was paid to him of £50,000. If you adjust it for inflation today, it would amount to ₹650 million per year. This child wasn’t an ordinary boy, he was Prince Duleep Singh. Known as Maharaja Duleep Singh as well. The last ruler of the Sikh Empire in India.
Interestingly, 4 years before he was sent to England, in 1849, when the British defeated the Sikhs in the battle, Lord Dalhousie had ordered the 11-year-old Duleep to surrender a diamond to Queen Victoria. This was the Kohinoor Diamond. That year, it travelled 6,700 km on a ship, to go to London. A legend attached to the Kohinoor diamond states that, “He who owns this diamond, will own the world; But will also know all its misfortunes”.
