I don't know if I am I doing it right, but I decided to take a shot at writing a timeline based upon the British Raj, especially Company rule. I am not an expert, and I would appreciate honest criticism so that I can make it better. Anyway, the timeline is post-Second Anglo-Sikh War right now, but will skip to 1856 in the first chapter, and as you know what happened in 1857, some real rumbling is going to happen in Empire
PROLOGUE
Fategarh, 1850, Unknown date
Sir John Login could not imagine the change the boy had had since the annexation of Punjab. Never mind the fact that the boy was clearly a follower of Christ now, all but in name. The greatest change was in his stance towards Empire. He was no longer the boy who was torn between loyalty to the state (the very state which had murdered his uncle in front of him), his mother (the very woman who had lost him his throne), and the British (the very people who had taken him away from his family). Login was still not sure of the morality of the annexation, as wasn't Lawrence, but such questions were but moot to Dalhousie, that great man. But such were not the fears of Sir John Login. The greatest fear, of course, was the jewel, the symbol of Punjab, the very essence of the sovereignty of the Sikh state. It would have been easier if the Brahmins had been able to take it to Jagganath after Ranjit Singh's death, but that treasurer ended up keeping it for the state, and as it was, the state was now Britain. The jewel, therefore, should have been British, but for a small hitch. A 10-year old boy can hardly sign a treaty and voluntarily sign over a diamond to another sovereign. The betrayals that the former Maharaja faced, would have turned whoever it was who had created the chakravarti doctrine, to blush with shame. He knew there was going to come a time when Duleep would ask questions, and he was afraid, that when he did, there was nothing stopping the rest of India from asking questions too. And India, as it was, was the Company, and the Company was the Empire. The Empire had been built on treaties and trade deals, fickle un-Christian objects, but commerce was not concerned of such. It was concerned about diamonds and rubies, Mughal gems and crystals, and the betrayals of humanity.