page_title: Duleep Singh
section_title: Death
hierarchical_section_title: Duleep Singh / Death
caption_attribution_description: English: Statue of Dalip Singh Sukerchakia on Butten Island in Thetford, Norfolk
context_page_description: Maharaja Duleep Singh, also known as His Highness Maharaja Sir Duleep Singh, GCSI, or Sir Dalip Singh and later in life nicknamed the "Black Prince of Perthshire", was the last Maharaja of the Sikh Empire. He was Maharaja Ranjit Singh's youngest son, the only child of Maharani Jind Kaur.
  He was placed in power in September 1843, at the age of five, with his mother ruling on his behalf, and after their defeat in the Sikh Anglo War, under a British Resident. He was subsequently kidnapped by the British Crown, and thereafter exiled to Britain at age 15 where he was befriended by Queen Victoria, who is reported to have written of the Punjabi Maharaja: "Those eyes and those teeth are too beautiful". The Queen was godmother to several of his children. He died young, living most of his final years in the United Kingdom.
  His mother had effectively ruled when he was very young and he managed to meet her again on 16 January 1861 in Calcutta and return with her to the United Kingdom. During the last two years of her life, his mother told the Maharaja about his Sikh heritage and the Empire which once had been his to rule.
context_section_description: Maharaja Duleep Singh died in Paris in 1893 at the age of 55, having seen India after the age of fifteen during only two brief, tightly controlled visits in 1860 (to bring his mother to England) and in 1863 (to cremate his mother's body).
  Maharaja Duleep Singh's wish for his body to be returned to India was not honoured, in fear of unrest, given the symbolic value the funeral of the son of the Lion of the Punjab might have caused and the growing resentment of British rule. His body was brought back to be buried according to Christian rites, under the supervision of the India Office, in Elveden Church beside the grave of his wife Maharani Bamba, and his son Prince Edward Albert Duleep Singh. The graves are located on the west side of the Church.
  A life-size bronze statue of the Maharaja, showing him on a horse, was unveiled by H.R.H. The Prince of Wales in 1999 at Butten Island in Thetford, a town which benefited from his and his sons' generosity.
  In an auction at Bonhams, London, on 19 April 2007, the 74 cm high white marble portrait bust of Maharaja Duleep Singh by Victorian sculptor John Gibson, R.A., in Rome in 1859 fetched £1.7 million (£1.5 million plus premium and tax).
  A film titled Maharaja Duleep Singh: A Monument Of Injustice, was made in 2007, directed by P.S. Narula.
caption: Statue of H.H. Maharaja Maharaja Duleep Singh on Butten Island, Thetford
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