Rajrana Zalim Singh Jhala receiving his son Madho Singh
Kotah or Jhalawar, circa 1820 or later
gouache and gold on paper, red border, nagari inscription in left-hand border
245 x 295 mm.
Footnotes:
Provenance
Formerly in the Heil Collection, Berlin, pre-1991-2016.

The inscription in the left-hand border reads:rāje jālam sīghjī mādo sīghjī.

The artist has been bold and has enlivened his formal subject by placing the base of the large hookah outside the picture plane where it sits on the red border, while its pipe winds attractively up to Zalim Singh.

Zalim Singh Jhala (1739-1824) was for many years the chief minister of Kotah under his maternal nephew Maharao Umed Singh (b. 1761, reg. 1771-1819), who seems to have preferred cultural and religious pursuits to governance. He is sometimes depicted hunting with his young nephew (Welch et al., nos. 45 & 49). In 1819 Umed Singh signed a treaty of alliance with the East India Company that guaranteed the continuation of this political and administrative subordination of the Maharao of Kotah to Zalim Singh and his heirs. Umed Singh's successor Maharao Kishor Singh (reg. 1819-28) refused to accept this state of affairs and fought a battle with the forces of Zalim Singh at Mangrol in 1821, but was soundly beaten and fled to the sanctuary of Srinathji at Nathdwara. He eventually returned to Kotah when Zalim Singh's son Madho Singh (1773-1834) became regent in his turn in 1824. This subordination of the Maharaos to the Jhalas was not ended formally until 1838 under Maharao Ram Singh II (b. 1808, reg. 1828-66). Kotah was divided and the Jhala estate in south-east Kotah became the new state of Jhalawar with its capital at Jhalrapatan: the first Rajrana was Madho Singh's son Madan Singh (b. 1808, reg. 1838-45).

For a survey of this period, see J. Bautze, 'The History of Kotah in an Art-Historical Context' in S. C. Welch, et al, Gods, Kings and Tigers: the art of Kotah, New York 1997, pp. 51-55.

Zalim Singh was well over eighty years old when he died, much older than his appearance here, so the painting would have to be based on one done about 1800, when the eldest son Madho Singh would have been aged about twenty-seven and the two youngsters seated beside Zalim Singh would be the latter's younger sons Kumar Madan Singh and Kumar Prithviraj Singh. Seated next to Madho Singh is his daughter, Ajab Kanwar Bai Sahib, who married Maharaja Bishan Singh of Bundi in 1792. Clearly all the participants in the painting could not be all at the right age to be portrayed thus, so various charbas must have used to create this family portrait. The identity of the young child next to Zalim Singhji is not clear, but is possibly one of Zalim's sons by his second wife, a Muslim woman.