In the realm of politics, the role of gifting fruits or any other specialty of the country as a goodwill gesture acts as a strong tool in maintaining healthy political relations. These seemingly simple items hold the power to bridge cultural gaps, foster goodwill, and symbolize peace between nations. Mr. Syed Abdul Azeez was the Education Minister of Bihar between 1934 to 1937. He was famous for organizing a lot of social gatherings in Patna, the capital city during his tenure. He had provided a free eye check-up camp along with organizing an exhibition of different varieties of mangoes in Patna.
One such incident is shared by Professor Iqbal Hussain, the principal of Patna College and the former director of Khuda Baksh Library. He exclaimed that a similar exhibition of mangoes from different parts of Bihar was organized in Patna’s Anjuman Islamia Hall. The people loved this exhibit and not only the local residents but even the foreigners residing there attended the exhibition and took with them wide varieties of good mangoes back home.
After the exhibition concluded adorned in two beautiful boxes 12 varieties of mangoes were put and thus prepared a ‘Baksa-bashindgaan-e-Bihar’ that is a gift from the people of Bihar to the Viceroy Earl of Willingdon was sent. This gift was accepted by the Viceroy with utmost gratitude.
However, a similar box was sent to King George V with the help of the government of India as a gift and was returned back to India on the pretext of the protocol that the King cannot accept a gift sent by any Minister.
The gesture of presenting mangoes, a revered fruit in Indian culture, to King George V was intended as a symbol of respect and friendship by the Education Minister of Bihar. However, the King’s refusal to accept the gift was not a mere rejection of fruit but rather a reflection of the hierarchical structures and colonial attitudes prevalent at the time.
This news spread like wildfire in Bihar as soon as the box was returned to India. The people of Bihar were angry and they believed that this box was ‘Baksa-bashindgaan-e-Bihar’ and the protocol was in no relation to it.
Professor Iqbal added that he himself was a part of this exhibition with Mukhtar Khaleel Ahmed, who himself had so many mango fields.
Ultimately, the refusal to accept the mangoes symbolized more than a simple act of declining fruit; it underscored the complexities of colonial relationships and the challenges of navigating diplomacy in a context of unequal power dynamics.
The people of Patna, Bihar felt humiliated, the refusal wasn’t a polite one, it was laced with classicism and the superiority complex of the king towards the state.
This historical anecdote invites reflection on the complexities of cross-cultural communication, the symbolism of gift-giving in diplomacy, and the enduring effect of colonial classicism in India that fuelled the fire for complete independence later conceptualized in 1947.
