Sophia Duleep Singh appeared before a magistrate for refusing to pay taxes, protesting women's exclusion from the vote; her horse and diamond-set watch were seized in lieu of payment.
As a prominent tax resister within the suffrage movement, Sophia Duleep Singh repeatedly refused to pay taxes on her dogs, carriage, and property, invoking the principle of 'no taxation without representation' — arguing that since women could not vote, they should not be compelled to fund a government that denied them a political voice. On occasions when she was summoned before magistrates for this refusal, most notably around mid-1911, bailiffs seized her possessions, including a diamond ring and a valuable watch, to be auctioned in lieu of unpaid taxes.
This form of protest was a favoured tactic among members of the Women's Tax Resistance League, of which Sophia was an active member. Her high public profile as an Indian princess and goddaughter of Queen Victoria meant that these confrontations attracted press attention far beyond what an ordinary resister might generate, embarrassing the authorities who were forced to publicly seize property from a woman with royal connections.
Her tax resistance exemplified the suffrage movement's broader strategy of civil disobedience — using legal loopholes and public spectacle to dramatize the injustice of taxation without political representation. It underscored Sophia's willingness to sacrifice her personal wealth and social standing for the cause, reinforcing her reputation as one of the most dedicated and fearless suffragettes of her era, unafraid to publicly defy the Crown to which she was so closely tied by birth and godparentage.