The Four Witnesses to the Text
Four witnesses to the text of Diwan-e-Chanda exist. Three are manuscripts. One is a print edition. Their relationship to each other is the central question this edition answers.
Location: British Library, London (IO Islamic 2768)
Actual ghazal count: 97 (reported as 118 in all secondary literature)
Nature: Presentation copy
This manuscript was gifted by Mah Laqa Bai herself to Capt Sir John Malcolm, the British Resident, during a performance in 1799. It is a presentation copy — prepared for a specific recipient on a specific occasion. The hand is an old calligraphic nastaliq. Kaf and gaf are not distinguished, and the retroflex ta is written with four dots. The text is fully Dakhni throughout.
Both this manuscript and TO 1811 contain a Persian dibacha (preface) written by Syed Naseeruddin Khan Qudrat, identifying Raja Rao Ranbha Bahadur as the patron. This preface has never previously been published in full.
View Catalogue Entry ↗Location: Telangana Oriental Manuscript Library, Hyderabad (MS 228)
Actual ghazal count: 98
Nature: Circle copy
Identified by its colophon as a copy produced within Mah Laqa's own literary circle. A working copy — the text of daily literary life. Its readings align almost completely with BL 1799. Together BL and TO form the early recension of the diwan, representing it as it existed in the first decade of the nineteenth century.
View Catalogue Entry ↗Location: Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad
Actual ghazal count: 125 (reported as 123 in all secondary literature)
Nature: Historical monument. Base text of this edition.
Appended to the Tarikh-e-Dil-Afroz, a history of Hyderabad commissioned by Mah Laqa Bai herself. This is the last document prepared under authorial supervision, intended as her permanent historical record. The text is fully Dakhni throughout — consistent with BL 1799 and TO 1811 across nineteen years.
View Catalogue Entry ↗Published: Hyderabad, 1906
Ghazal count: 125
Nature: Lithograph print edition. Direct derivative of SJ 1818. Rejected as base text.
The basis of every subsequent edition for 120 years. Systematic collation demonstrates that GM 1906 is a direct derivative of SJ 1818 (proven by Lachmannian shared errors). GM then systematically altered what it derived from SJ to enforce early 20th-century linguistic purity.
Read / Download Archive ↗