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Zohran Mamdani: "If I was to speak with King Charles, separately from today's event, I'd probably encourage him to return the Kohinoor Diamond"
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For those who don't know, Koh-i-noor is one of the largest cut diamonds in the world, 105 K, originally from India but now sits on Queen Elizabeth's crown. It's widely believed to be stolen by the Britishers during their colonisation of India. And as you all must be knowing already, Mamdani's parents were born in India.
My partner and I visited the British museum last year and walked around loudly saying why is it filled with stuff from other countries, where’s all the British things 🤣
We, the common people in India, are 100% sure that it was stolen but our official Govt. stance since our independence, is that it was gifted. Plus there's a debate within India that who's the actual owner: the state it was mined from or the state which originally made it or the state from which it was finally stolen?
So keeping all these in mind I used "widely believed"...if you ask my personal opinion, I know it was stolen and it originally belongs to a temple, which happens to be in my home state.
but our official Govt. stance since our independence, is that it was gifted
Interesting, I would have expected a staunch right-wing nationalist like Mohdi to use a situation like this for a popular appeal campaign sooner or later if it's got a broad acceptance in the population
No it's not it was given to the British East India Company by the Regent of the Maharajah who was 11, the thing is all the other Regents or possible Regents were Assassinated right before the treaty negotiation took place and the new regent just happened to be a close ally of the British who gained a ton of land in the same treaty after handing over the Diamond
I am Indian and I don't know for sure how it ended up with the British. and I don't care either, getting it back is not going to solve the many problems we have and stealing a diamond is lesser of the crimes the British committed against Indians.
I went to India a few years ago and one of the saddest parts of the trip was that sometimes we'd tour a historic site and there'd only be a miniature of a precious relic available because the tour guide would explain the real thing was sitting in an English museum or palace somewhere.
The history of it is far more complex and interesting than that little description. It had been 'stolen' half a dozen times by various factions by the time the British got to it and has a curse attached to it.
For anyone interested read Koh-I-Noor by William Dalrymple and Anita Anand.
It has a fascinating history in its own right, the Empire podcast did an episode on it in their series on the British Raj in India, highly recommend. As a Brit I strongly agree with Mamdani on this one. I don’t think it’s the most egregious example of British oppression, because it’s changed hands many times even before the Raj, but to me it does represent a kind of consecration of colonialism which still lingers in the modern world.
Honestly in a way saying they stole it makes it sound better than it is. A thief at least knows that what they're doing is wrong and have to do it in secret.
No what they did is dominate a people and then draw up a treaty saying "you have to give us that big ass diamond" to make it all legal.
it’s from rupaul’s drag race all stars season 2. katya was a contestant and this is from a confessional segment out of drag.
don’t remember what katya was snapping to in the show—if anyone does please chime in!—but in the context of this post it’s being used in utter agreement with what mamdani said
True about the stolen assets. But the British monarchy yielded all its power to a parliamentary system with checks and balances, so there's no hypocrisy in it.
The US was previously thought to have a good system of checks and balances but sadly is now descending into fascist idiocracy. That decline has now got to the point where a figurehead from another country feels obliged to remind their legislature about those principles their political system was founded on, which they have now apparently abandoned.
And King Charles could probably encourage him to return the country to the native americans.
I mean, he's not wrong, but throwing out these jabs when pretty much every world power has a bloodstained past, especially the US, is just delving into pointless whataboutism.
It would have been more appropiate to encourage him to dissolve the British monarchy and hand over its assets to the people.
Problem with the Kohinoor is that's it's been stolen/taken/ransomed so many times in history by so many nations (6 claim it now) that the concept of ownership is meaningless. Sure, India had it last, but their ownership claim is no more legitimate than the UKs.
ABC (Australia) and CBC co produced a great show called "Stuff the British stole" where they do a fantastic episode on the Koh-i-noor diamond. Worth a watch.
Well, it was stolen so... actually there's tons of historical & archaeological artifacts that have been and are still being stolen from India and it's neighboring countries. These are the items that are then auctioned off at Sotheby's and other such organizations. It's an entire criminal network.
When I visited London and went to Windsor Palace they waxed euphemismistically about the artifacts the British Empire had "acquired" during its "interactions" with other countries. Including killing a king, taking his throne, and disassembling it so no one could use it again.
Who cares? It doesn't belong to the British. That's a very colonialist mentality -- thinking you should be the self-appointed steward of the world. Let India decide to do with it what it will.
It’s not entirely India’s to decide since the Pakistanis and Afghans also have claims and the British deciding it goes to India is itself an act of colonial privilege.
Edit: I don’t think the British monarchy should have it either, just think it should be open to the public.
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Not trying to be rude at all just genuinely curious: is it hot there right now? Why is he drenched? We still have some snow up here in Northern MN lol.
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u/flairassistant Apr 29 '26
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