This evening, in a hall filled to capacity, we had the opportunity to witness an encounter between two distant worlds – Poland and India. Their histories intertwine with the fate of hundreds of Polish children, mostly war orphans evacuated during the Second World War from the Soviet Union, who unexpectedly found refuge in the princely state of Nawanagar in northwestern India.
The stories of these Polish children and Maharaja Jam Saheb, who welcomed them into his kingdom, were brought to life in an extraordinary way by the evening’s guests: Monika Kowaleczko-Szumowska, author and producer of the interactive web documentary The Maharaja’s Children (Dzieci Maharadży), and Apeksha Niranjan, an Indian dancer with Polish roots.
One of the children who found rescue was Wiesław Ostypuła, who, after being deported with his mother and brother, was placed in a diet dom (a state-run children’s institution).
“Diet dom is a children’s home only in name – in reality, it was a place where street children and petty offenders were held. Polish children were there as well,” said Monika Kowaleczko-Szumowska. “Wiesio and all the young Poles who ended up there believed this was where their lives would end. The Polish government-in-exile knew exactly what was happening and sent delegates to search for these children. Wiesio was evacuated from the diet dom, and his journey to India began. That journey would never have begun without Maharaja Jam Saheb, the ruler of Nawanagar, who understood the Polish situation very well. No one else at the time offered any place for the Poles. The British refused assistance because they feared the presence of Poles in India due to the strong independence movement. The Maharaja said: ‘I do not need your permission, because I am inviting them as my guests.’”
Jam Saheb, known in history as the “Good Maharaja,” welcomed the Polish children at the railway station in Nawanagar with the words: “You are no longer orphans, because I am the father of all the inhabitants of Nawanagar, and therefore I am also your father.” He kept his word and frequently visited the settlement where several hundred Polish orphans lived.
The Polish state honoured the Maharaja by awarding him, posthumously, the Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland and by naming a square in Warsaw after him (the Good Maharaja Square). These initiatives were led by Krzysztof Iwanek, PhD, of the University of Białystok, in cooperation with the Centre for Poland–Asia Studies.
Wanda Nowicka also lived in such a settlement. It was there that she found the love of her life, Vasantrao Kashikar, whom she married against all odds – against tradition, caste norms, social customs, the Polish settlement authorities, and Vasantrao’s family. They were eighteen years old when they found themselves completely on their own, abandoned by everyone. The situation changed when Wanda gave birth to her first son, and then four more. In time, she became the beloved daughter-in-law. Wanda Nowicka became Indian, yet she never forgot her Polish heritage and passed it on so deeply that it remains evident in the lives of her children and grandchildren.
Apeksha Niranjan, Wanda Nowicka’s granddaughter, presented a remarkable performance of the classical Indian dance Bharatanatyam, telling the story of the “Good Maharaja.” Through dance, she expressed her remembrance of her ancestors from Poland. Although India and Poland are separated by thousands of kilometres, tonight our histories felt especially close.
