Mannujan Khanam (1717-1803) zamindar and philanthropist. Her real name was Mariam Khanam. She successfully managed the Hughli or Sayedpur Zamindari through the difficult years of the pre and post permanent settlement periods and contributed towards the spread of education.

In the revenue settlement for the fiscal year 1770-71, Sayedpur Zamindari extending over an area of 678 sq km was registered in the name of Mannujan with a rental of Rs 8,42,681, annas 5 and paisa 1. Mannujan inherited a huge property left by her father Aga Mutahar and husband Mirza Salahuddin that was scattered over the districts of Hughli, Murshidabad, Nadia, Jessore and Khulna.

When her father died in 1729, she was only 12. The task of management of the zamindari affairs fell on her mother Zainab Khanam who soon married Haji Faizullah, the naib of Aga Mutahar. This wedlock resulted in the birth of the celebrated haji muhammad mohsin.

Following the tradition of the noble families, Mannujan and her half-brother Mohsin were given education at home. Mannujan learnt the art of music, especially playing on the Sitar from Ustad Bholanath. While Mohsin went to Murshidabad for higher education and then took to travelling, Mannujan, after the death of her mother and step-father, got involved in the management of the vast property she had inherited. At this critical juncture of her life Mannujan, a lady of exquisite beauty, was married to Mirza Salahuddin, the naib-faujdar (deputy military governor) of Hughli.

A portion of Mirza Salahuddin's Jagir situated near Calcutta passed on to the English east india company as a grant of land from the nawab. The loss of the land was however compensated by the addition of the 4-anna (one-fourth) share of the Chanchra (or Yussoufpur) zamindari in 1758. Since the major portion of the 4-anna share was within Syedpur pargana, it came to be known as the Sayedpur zamindari.

After the untimely death of her husband, Mannujan, devoted herself to the management of the vast estate and clad in a light veil attended the kachari everyday looking after the details of administration. She braved all the threats on her life by those, who either wanted to marry her or grab her property. Depending on the devoted services of naib Krishnaram Bose, she saved her zamindari during the experimental years of the Company's revenue administration. As in the case of other zamindaris, the loss sustained by the great famine of 1769-70 took a considerable time to recover and Mannujan found it difficult to meet the increased demands of hastings' Five-Year Settlement. Her zamindari was threatened to be sold to pay off the arrears in 1776, but she pleaded her case forcefully, which led to the change of the Company's decision to sell her lands to recover the dues.

Again, during the critical time following the Permanent Settlement, when almost all the great zamindars found it difficult to pay their fixed revenue on time, Mannujan was never a defaulter, nor did she have to sell her land to meet the enhanced dues. Much to her credit, the Collectors did not make any complaint against her of underassessment or abuse of power by false rent-free grants of lands. Like her father and husband, she spent generously on mosques and other religious institutions, wells, tanks, hats and bazars as well as on the welfare of the people of Hughli.

In her advancing years, childless Mannujan strongly desired haji muhammad mohsin to look after the estate. Her entreating letters to Mohsin persuaded the ascetic man to return home after 27 long years of travel. There would have been no Hughli Madrasa, hughli mohsin college or the Mohsin Trust Fund, which played a vital role in the spread of education specially among the Muslims of Bengal, if Mannujan had not bequeathed her well-managed estate to Mohsin before her death in 1803. [Shirin Akhtar]