This man donated 5000 kg of gold to India government during war with Pakistan in 1965? The truth is..., his name was...
This man donated 5000 kg of gold to India government during war with Pakistan in 1965? The truth is...., his name was...
Stories of royal patriotism have impressed several generations, but some of them are true while others were just fake tales. There was a tale that includes 5,000 kg of gold, a Nizam, who was the world's richest man back then, and a VVIP visit by a prime minister. This story has so many spices that it seems like a script of a Bollywood movie, but it's not. The story is about Hyderabad's Nizam, Mir Osman Ali Khan, who was once the richest man in the world, and how he donated 5,000 kg of gold to help the Indian government during the 1965 India-Pakistan War.
As per the tale, the then Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri visited Hyderabad city to raise funds, and the Nizam, to showcase his patriotism, donated the whopping amount of gold, requesting only that the boxes in which the gold was kept be returned.
This story has impressed generations and has also been celebrated as a symbol of loyalty and a big heart. However, new findings unearthed the fact that this story may be more myth than fact.
According to official records, Nizam Khan only invested 4.25 lakh grams (425 kg) of gold noy 5,000 kg.
He invested the gold in the Defence Gold Scheme which was launched in 1965. Hence, it wasn't a donation but investment offering 5 percent interest per annum.
In a 1965 public address in Hyderabad, reported by The Hindu, Prime Minister Shastri publicly thanked the Nizam for a gold donation. This donation, consisting of antique coins (mohurs), was valued at approximately ₹50 lakh and the government intended to sell them internationally to maximize their value.
The report also details additional substantial donations: 125,000 grams of gold from the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams and ₹800,000 in cash from Telugu film actors. These were outright gifts, unlike the Nizam's interest-bearing deposit.
An RTI to RBI regarding the final beneficiary of the Nizam's investment was rejected under Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, due to privacy policy. One of the Nizam's grandsons, Najaf Ali Khan told The Hindu that he doesn't know who received the eventual payout. He further told that Nizam Khan had made 52 trusts; he did not know which one, if any, had benefited.
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