Page 199 - PERSIAN 5 1905_1911

AND THE MASKAT POLITICAL AGENCY FOR THE YEAR 1907 1008. 13
bastinadoed and thrown into prison and depri ved of a considerable
sum of monoy which ho carried, i he precise amount of which
was disputed. The Deputy Governor absolutely refused to
admit the Residency Agent’s intervention or listen to his protests.
Similarly a few days later some Arab passengers, bound fo*
their homo at Shargnh on board one ot the Bombay Persian
Company’s steamers, having had some dispute among themselves,
the Deputy Governor had them taken ot? the ship and exercised
direct jurisdiction over them, again refusing the intervention of
our Agent. At this time the Derva Bcgi was on the Mekran
Coast on an urgent missson and no speedy retribution wfas
therefore possible. On his return, however, he repudiated the
action of his Deputy, and, while stating that he himself had
specific instructions not to admit our intervention in behalf of
Bahreinis in any form, he agreed to sec that justice was done to
Ibrahim bu Khalil and to remove his Deputy from Lingah on
account of his general hostility to our interest*. This ho
proceeded to do, and the case of the Balueini was in a satis­
factory way of settlement in consultation with the Residency at
the close of the year. His Majesty’s Government finding
the juncture inconvenient for exacting satisfaction from the
Central Government and a formal admKsion of our rights to
protect natives of Bahrein, over which principality Persia still
continues to formulate periodically fatuous claims of sovereignty,
this local settlement with the Den a B« gi was the most that
could be c£f< cied. It is obvious, however, that until His Majesty’s
Government are in a position to raise the general issue and see
it to a conclusion, similar incidents, especially if the Parliamentary
Government endures, will from time to time recur.
(c) Both the above incidents may he traced to the evil influence in
Lingah of one Ala-es-Sultan, “ a Young Persian,” pl<ced in the
position ot Director of Customs owing to the insistence of tho
Tehran Majlis on t»«e employment of Persians in the administra­
tion wherever p s*ible. This individual came from the Caspian
Customs with an evil reputation, which he speedily proceeded to
justify, and though he has since been got rid of, a mischievous
Anjuman which he established at 'Lingah, composed of every
anti-British element in the port, is still a source of no little
inconvenience to us. Ala-es-Sultan began by altogether refusing
to take cognizance of any document, written in English, and by
abusing every Persian in British employ who came near him.
After the formation of his Anjuman on which he associated
with himself the Russian Agent, Sadeed-es-Sultanch, and one
or two other kindred spirits, he/ used to use its meetings as a
means for assailing British interests ; commenting, in his lectures,
on all questions of current prominence with which we are
connected, such as the Abu Musa dispute; the visit of the Lapto ng
to Kais; the protection of Bahreinis, ttc., and impressing on
hh ignorant hearers that Abu Musa and Bahrein were really
Persian teiritory filched by the Knglish, that the English had no
right to protect anyone but Englishmen and .natives of India, and
so on ad nauseam. Alter repeated representations to llis
Majesty’s Legation and by them to the Central authorities, .in
which we apparently had the full support of the Belgian Customs
Administration, the Ala-es-Sultan was at last removed from his
post and ordered to leave tho Gulf, but not before he had done
a great deal of harm. The hostile attitude of the Deputy
Governor Snfar Ali Khan is entirely traceable to his having fallen
under the baneful influence of the Ala-cs-Sultan, Sudced-es-
Sultaneh and their associates.
(d) Iu July 1907, tho Sowlot-ul-Mulk, Deputy Governor of Bustek,
visited the Shibkuh part of Moglioo to take iu marriage thd