When I was growing up, the Raj was equated with maharajahs and elephants and gold and glamour, men in pressed shirts and pith helmets, normally saving the day," she reflects. "There is an appetite to know the stories behind the headlines, and the headlines I think have been hitherto quite misleading. It was among the many motivations behind her other joint endeavour with William Dalrymple, the hugely successful 'Empire' podcast series that covers the history of British colonialism starting with India. "It is a real testament to a sensitivity that exists now here in Great Britain to learn a little bit more about the truth of the Raj and colonialism… There is a real disparity of what people know about the Kohinoor diamond and what it represents, because I think the Kohinoor has become this hard, cold prism through which we can now look at colonialism and what it meant both to the colonised and those who were colonising," she said.Īs someone who was born and brought up in the UK, the school curriculum not covering the history of Britain's colonial past was a palpable omission. "The decision not to use it reflects this new reality that we're in, where people are looking back at colonialism and what colonialism meant both to Great Britain, but also to the countries that were colonised," Anand said in an interview with PTI.
Traditionally, the diamond has featured at coronations in the crown of the monarch's consort – last worn by Elizabeth, later the Queen Mother of Queen Elizabeth II, at the coronation of King George VI in May 1937. Anita Anand, who co-authored 'Koh-i-Noor: The History of the World's Most Infamous Diamond' with historian-author William Dalrymple, said Queen Camilla's decision to use the Queen Mary Crown without the Kohinoor at her Westminster Abbey crowning is a direct result of the sensitivity that exists around colonialism in modern-day Britain. The conspicuous absence of the Kohinoor, claimed by India, from the historic Coronation ceremony of King Charles here in London on April 29 reflects a new reality of looking back at Britain's colonial past and to learn more about the truth of the Raj, feels the British Indian co-author behind a definitive book on the infamous diamond.
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