1892 Tobacco Rebellion

The Tobacco Rebellion of 1891-2 was the culmination of a series of government actions which the common Persian citizens saw as the exploitation of their lucrative national rights to foreign interests.

A quote from the book The Strangling of Persia by Morgan Shuster best captures the mood at the time:

During the past generation the most striking evidence of the power and desire of the Persian people to have even a small voice in their public affairs was the remarkable prohibition on the use of tobacco proclaimed by the Islamic clergy and immediately obeyed by the people when, in 1891, the famous Tobacco Concession was actually put into force. The previous year Nasiru'd-Din Shah Qajar had granted to a British corporation in London a monopolistic concession for the entire handling buying and selling of all tobacco raised in Persia. The corporation was capitalized at £650,000, and was expected to make an annual profit of about £500,000. One quarter of the profits was to go to the Persian government, which meant to the Shah and his ministers and court. Even the long-suffering Persians had grown tired of this wholesale selling of their rights and industries, and in December, 1891, as a result of a religious decree, all the tobacco-shops closed their doors, the people destroyed or put away their waterpipes, and in a marvelously short time the use of tobacco practically ceased. This agitation did not stop until the Shah had been forced to rescind the Concession, after agreeing to pay the British corporation an indemnity of £500,000, which was borrowed by the Persian Government at 6%o, thus arbitrarily fastening upon the people an annual interest charge of £30,000, for which they received no tangible return.