Fall of the Ain od-Dowleh government

In the summer of 1915 the government of Persia fell. Since the turn of April and May it had been headed by the aged Prince Abdolmajid Mirza, known by the title Ain od-Dowleh. The British chronology of the war records his resignation only under 17 August, the day before his successor was appointed. Persian sources and the Encyclopaedia Iranica indicate, however, that the cabinet had already resigned in July. Persian lists of governments end his term on 29 Tir 1294 of the Iranian calendar, that is, 21 July 1915, and we place this article under that date. For the following weeks the country waited for a new government.

The minister the British wanted

Ain od-Dowleh, a former opponent of the Constitutional Revolution, took office after the fall of the Moshir od-Dowleh cabinet, forced by Russia and Britain. He tried to compose the government so as to satisfy all sides, but one of his decisions proved fatal for him. The minister of the interior, largely under British pressure, was Prince Abdol-Hossein Mirza Farmanfarma, a member of the Qajar dynasty. According to the Encyclopaedia Iranica, for most of the war he was closely tied to the British and received generous subsidies from them, and in Tehran Britain had few influential friends at the time.

For the Democrats in the Majlis, the Persian parliament, Farmanfarma was unacceptable. Sympathy for Germany was growing among Persian nationalists at the time, and many of them hoped that the Germans and Turks would help Persia free itself from Russian and British tutelage. The Encyclopaedia Iranica writes that the minister made a political mistake by showing hostility towards the Turks, and the deputies came out against him. Ain od-Dowleh did not sacrifice his minister and took his side. The Majlis then summoned the prime minister himself for interpellation, and he had to resign together with the whole cabinet.

A country adrift

The government fell at a time when Persia was slipping ever further out of Tehran’s control. In the south German agents were stirring up the tribes, and on 12 July the Tangestani tribes attacked the British Residency at Bushehr. Russian troops stood in the north, and Ottoman detachments were operating in the west. German missions were also making their way east through neutral Persia, seeking to persuade the Emir of Afghanistan to go to war with the British. The country was also afflicted by famine. According to the Encyclopaedia Iranica, Ain od-Dowleh then had bread baked in Tehran from wheat from his own estates and handed out free to the needy.

According to Persian sources, Shah Ahmad only at the beginning of August entrusted the task of forming a government to Mostowfi ol-Mamalek, who had already headed the government until March 1915. Ain od-Dowleh returned as prime minister once more, in November 1917, but even then governed for only two months.