The First Republic and Amin Didi.

On 1 January 1953 the Maldives became a republic for the first time. The sultanate — an institution eight hundred years old, reaching back to the conversion of 1153 — was abolished, and Mohamed Amin Didi, the dominant reformer of the previous two decades, was sworn in as the country's first president.

Amin Didi had already reshaped the country from within the old order: he nationalised the dried-fish export trade that was the economy's backbone, drove mass education and the first girls' schooling, and led the country's first political party. As president he pressed further and faster.

The republic lasted months. Post-war shortages, unpopular austerity, a ban on tobacco, and resistance from an elite he had sidelined combined against him. While Amin was abroad for medical treatment, Malé rose against him; on his return he was attacked by a mob, injured, and detained. He died in early 1954 on the island of Vihamanaafushi — later Kurumba, the country's first resort. A national referendum then restored the sultanate under Muhammad Fareed Didi.

The First Republic failed, but it was the dress rehearsal for the modern state. Fifteen years later the sultanate was abolished again — this time for good — and much of what Amin Didi had begun, from women's suffrage to a secular civil service, became permanent.