Malik Sahib Khan Tiwana CSI (died 1879) was a Punjabi

Muslim Rajput Muslim Rajputs are the descendants of Rajputs of Northern regions of the Indian subcontinent who are followers of Islam. They converted from Hinduism to Islam from the medieval period in India onwards, retaining historically Hindu surnames suc ...

landowner during the

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...

Biography

Sahib Khan was born into the

Rajput Rajput (from Sanskrit ''raja-putra'' 'son of a king') is a large multi-component cluster of castes, kin bodies, and local groups, sharing social status and ideology of genealogical descent originating from the Indian subcontinent. The term Ra ...

Tiwana family of Shahpur The Tiwana family of Shahpur is a Muslim Rajput family. They are one of the largest landowning families in the Punjab and have played an influential role in Punjabi politics since the seventeenth century. Background Origins Mir Ali Khan, the founde ...

, the son of Ahmad Yar Khan Tiwana . On hearing news of the

Indian Rebellion of 1857 The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was a major uprising in India in 1857–58 against the rule of the British East India Company, which functioned as a sovereign power on behalf of the British Crown. The rebellion began on 10 May 1857 in the fo ...

, he requested and received permission to raise two hundred men of his clan for the service of the Government. He assisted in disarming the mutiny in Jhelum and was present at the destruction of the 26th Native Infantry. He thereafter marched to Hindustan where he assisted at Calpi. So impressed were the British by his Tiwana irregulars, that the a detachment was incorporated into the 2nd Mahratta Horse at

Gwalior Gwalior() is a major city in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh; it lies in northern part of Madhya Pradesh and is one of the Counter-magnet cities. Located south of Delhi, the capital city of India, from Agra and from Bhopal, the s ...

. As a reward for he received a land grant of nearly nine thousand acres in

Kalpi Kalpi is a historical city and municipal board in Jalaun district in Uttar Pradesh, India. It is on the right bank of the Yamuna. Once Kalpi was more important Than Orai It is situated 78 kilometres south-west of Kanpur from which it is conn ...

, a life jagir worth 1,200 rupees and the title Khan Bahadur. In 1863 he built the first privately built canal on state leased land in the

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

. His control of both land and water generated immense political and economic influence over his tenants.Tan Tai Yong, The Garrison State: Military, Government and Society in Colonial Punjab, 1849-1947, SAGE, 1 May 2005, p.129 He died in 1879 when his son

Malik Umar Hayat Khan Major General Nawab Sir Umar Hayat Khan Tiwana (5 October 1874 – 24 March 1944), was soldier of the Indian Empire, one of the largest landholders in the Punjab, and an elected member of the Council of State of India. Background and early li ...

was still a minor. Malik Sahib Khan Towana served in military service as well as in administrative positions. Malik Sahib Khan Towana was three times the administrator of Lucky Marwat, which is now a district headquarters of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. The grave of Malik Sahib Khan Tawana is in Kalra village of Sargodha district.

References

{{reflist 1879 deaths History of Punjab Punjabi people People from British India