Page 176 - Histories of City and State in the Persian Gulf_Neat

156 Histories of City and State in the Persian Gulf

Lingah as the main regional port on the Iranian coast after the Qajar
government had established a customs administration there in 1900.
The disruption of public order in 1904 and 1923 had far-reaching
repercussions for British policy in Manama at a time when concerns
with the protection of trade and the extension of extraterritorial jurisdic-
tion were paramount. The exile of Shaykh ‘Ali to India in 1905 after the
British Navy bombed his residence irreversibly changed the position of the
Al Khalifah in the town, effectively placing Manama under the control of
12
the agency some years before the establishment of the municipality. It is
significant that al-fidawiyyah of Shaykh ‘Ali survived him and became the
first nucleus of the future municipal police under the supervision of the
agency. Further, the Government of India extended the capitulary regime
by granting semi-official privileges of protection to residents who were not
imperial subjects, particularly Persians. 13 Similarly, the breach of public
order in 1923 raised the vexed issue of the position of the agency as the
protector of Najdi immigrants. The agency questioned the rights claimed
by Shaykh ‘Isa ibn ‘Ali, the ruler of Bahrain, which he had received from
Ibn Sa‘ud in 1913 but which the Sultan of Najd had transferred to the
political agent in 1920 in exchange for political support for his Arabian
campaign. 14
By 1923 the debates on entitlement to British protection combined with
the beginning of reform had revolutionised the political landscape of
Manama. As urban groups rallied around the agency as the new power
broker in town, the large Baharna community started to challenge the
traditional privileges enjoyed by the ruling family. Appealing to their
rights as the ‘indigenous’ inhabitants of Bahrain (al-asliyyin), they
demanded fair taxation and administration of justice led by several of
their notables. 15 It is against the backdrop of these developments that the
confrontation between Persians and Najdis became an integral part of the
formation of modern political identity. During the turbulent 1920s this
unrest was instrumental in the emergence of new ideas of nation and

12
Reports by H. M. S. Fox at Bahrein, 2 March 1905, and by H. M. S. Fox at Bombay,
10 March 1905 in Persian Gulf and Red Sea Naval Reports, 1820–1960, ed. by Anita
Burdett 15 vols. (Slough: Archive Editions, 1993), vol. VII, pp. 492–500.
13
British Resident Bushehr to Foreign Department, Government of India, 17 December
1904, n. 421, L/P&S/10/81 IOR.
14
‘Abd al-‘Aziz Ibn Sa‘ud Rahman al-Faysal al-Sa‘ud to Political Resident Bushehr, 5
Shawwal 1341/22 May 1923; British Residency Bushehr to ‘Abd al-‘Aziz Ibn Sa‘ud
Rahman al-Faysal al-Sa‘ud, 14 June 1923, R/15/1/341 IOR; ‘Note on the Persian
Communities at Bahrein’, 4 November 1929, in Political Agent Bahrain to British
Resident Bushehr, 7 April 1929, L/P&S/10/1045 IOR. al-Tajir, Bahrain 1920–1945,
pp. 22–3.
15
al-Tajir, Bahrain 1920–1945, pp. 60–2.