"تقارير إدارية ١٩٠٥-١٩١٠" [و‎‎١‎٣‎٠] (٦١٦/٢٦٤)

A1P1
AND THE MASKAT POLITICAL AGENCY FOR THE YEAR 1907-1908.
CHAPTER IV.
ADMINISTEATION REPORT OP THE KERMAN CONSULATE
EOR THE YEAR 1907-1908.
The personnel of the British Consulate was unchanged during the year. British con-
The Russian Consulate was strengthened in October 1907 by the arrival Russian con-
of Mr. Petroff as Secretary to the Consul. Before his arrival he was frequently sulate *
referred to as the coming Vice-Consul but on arrival was introduced in his
proper capacity of Secretary, the first grade of their Consular service.
The experiment of leaving a boy of nineteen to govern the Kerman Local poiitica.
district with practically nothing behind him resulted as was only to be
expected. He exercised a nominal rule in Kerman itself for some months,
while in the districts his rule was not even nominal, the districts after the
departure of the Perman Eerma going steadily to pieces.
In Kerman itself one Mohamad Husain, the Nazim-ut-Tujjar, with a
Naib of Earrashes named Haji Ibrahim started a popular propaganda with an
agitation for the immediate election of the local Majlis. When they first
started the agitation the Tehran Parliament had not passed the necessary Acts,
and when the Acts were passed they did not meet with the approval of the
Nazim and the Naib. Their following being almost entirely composed of the
rifP-raff of the town and the artisans, they objected to the other five classes
having the same number of representatives each on the Majlis, and claimed
that as the labouring classes formed half ot the population of the town they
should ^ elect six members out of the twelve and the other five classes the
remaining six between them. Relations between them and the Governor
soon became strained, and they were soon both enjoying the hospitality of the
British Telegraph Office under the peculiarly Persian institution of bast."
Erom this safe position they pressed the point strongly against the Governor,
and with true Persian egotism even wired to the Tehran Parliament to
amend the Act with reference to Kerman. The Parliament not unnaturally
refused to do this and telegraphed to the Governor to ibeize the Nazim and
send him up to Tehran.
The Governor brought the telegram to me and asked my advice. I told
him that I considered any attempt to seize the Nazim alone would be fatal
and even if he could seize both the Nazim and the INaib it would be very
risky. All the telegrams to him had come over the Persian wires and ^vere
therefore distrusted by the people. I advised him to bring the point to a
€lear issue between the Parliament and the Nazim and Naib and to get his orders
over the British wires, so that the people should not be able to accuse him of
tampering with them but would clearly understand that the Nazim and Naib
were defying the Central Government and not the local Governor. The
Governor, however, went his own way, and managing to lure the Nazim out of
" bast" seized him and hurried him out of the town.
Ihe Naib immediately gathered the whole following, closed the bazars and
organised an attack on the palace. The small force in the palace shut the gates
and fired on the mob killing five and wounding several more. The Naib and
the mob then paraded at the British Telegraph Office with the victims and all
went into " bast." The next morning the victims were a>ain paraded before
the Russian Consulate and a certain amount of violent language used to the
Russian Consul, they were then again taken to the Telegraph Office and
photographed.
At this point the other current joined in and the stream became too
strong for the young Governor and swept him out of Kerman. The Mirza of
the Russian Consulate, the Amin-ul-Islam, had a private grudge against the
Prince because the Eerman Eerma had treated him as the low-caste individual
that he is and refused to accept his position in the Russian Consulate as any
claim to social recognition in the palace. The Sheikhi Khans had been pressed
by the Governor to open up their stores of wheat and sell it at a price which
represented an actual loss to them, and they had been long waiting for their
revenge on the Deputy-Governor—the Adil-es-Saltaneh—ior the anti-Sheikhi