User talk:Rustyshackelford

'Sir'

You're quite correct that Companions (of whichever order) were not 'Sir', but it was very common for a CIE or CSI to be later knighted (as a knight bachelor), as with Sir V. Bhashyam Aiyangar or Sir C. Sankaran Nair or Sir C. Madhavan Nair or Sir P. Anandacharlu- in fact, as best I can tell, more common than KCSI or KCIE ever were. Plenty of the most famous 'Sirs' weren't in any order, as with Sir C. V. Kumaraswami Sastri or Sir V. C. Desikachariar or the Tatas, etc. I haven't checked the gazettes; do you know specifically that no Mysore ministers were knights bachelor? Hölderlin2019 (talk) 04:25, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

To answer your question first, many dewans of Mysore (and of course the many, many Indians in British India and even foreigners) were, indeed, first made Companions and then knighted (either at least as Knight Bachelors or other knighthoods--in addition to being decorated with some order later on). This includes A.R. Mudaliar, A.R. Banerjee, M. Visvesvaraya, amongst others. However, that is not the case with C.V. Rungacharulu, T. Ananda Rao, V.P. Madhava Rao, who were all Companions of some order or the other but never knighted (at least from the lack of their mention in London Gazettes which was the normal venue for notification of this sort of things). This is probably likely because before they could be knighted, and in all probability they would have been given their merits and accomplishments, they died.

tldr;

As a side note, if I had to guess the reason for Companions' (CIE/CSI/others) being addressed 'Sir' more frequently than Knights (KCSI/KCIE/others), or others, statistically speaking, Companionships, being of lower class, were awarded more often than the higher ones, and Companions were naturally subsequently given knighthoods of no particular order. Incidentally, the common man in those days would have had difficulty distinguishing the classes, let alone the differences between Companionship and knighthood. But that is merely my non-scholarly guess. As it stands, Wikipedia itself has incorrectly affixed 'Sir' to many individuals similar to this.

To take your own example, the reason C. V. Kumaraswami Sastri and V. C. Desikachariar are 'Sir's and weren't yet in any order is because they were knighted Knight Bachelor--an orderless decoration. Another cause for confusion. Rustyshackelford (talk) 12:56, 27 March 2024 (UTC)