Colonial History of India

[acharya]

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Class Subject Topic and Audio Link Language Duration Producer
IX & X

History of Indian Independence


Advent of East India Company
1857 Revolution
Rise of Indian Nationalism
Gandhiji in Champaran
Jallianwala Bag Massacre
Khilafat & Non-Cooperation
Revolutionary Movement
Towards Independence
Civil Disobedience
Quit India Movement
Azad Hind Fauz
Patriotic Songs

[acharya]

Eevery body please listen to the 1857 revolt in the above as well
as the Gandhi in Champaran

[Guest]

How this audio missed Leftist sweet cutting and twisting?
They have used Hindi Cinema style dialogue; they should have used language based on period.

[Guest]

Islam’s Other Victims: India
By Serge Trifkovic


The fundamental leftist and anti-American claim about our ongoing conflict with political Islam is this: whatever has happened or does happen, it’s our fault. We provoked them into it by being dirty Yankee imperialists and by unkindly refusing to allow them to destroy Israel. But two things make crystal clear that this is not so:

1. The political arm of Islam has been waging terroristic holy war on the rest of the world for centuries.

2. It has waged this war against civilizations that have nothing to do with the West, let alone America.

This is why the case of Moslem aggression against India proves so much. Let’s look at the historical record.

India prior to the Moslem invasions was one of the world’s great civilizations. Tenth century Hindustan matched its contemporaries in the East and the West in the realms of philosophy, mathematics, and natural science. Indian mathematicians discovered the number zero (not to mention other things, like algebra, that were later transmitted to a Moslem world which mistaken has received credit for them.) Medieval India, before the Moslem invasion, was a richly imaginative culture, one of the half-dozen most advanced civilizations of all time. Its sculptures were vigorous and sensual, its architecture ornate and spellbinding. And these were indigenous achievements and not, as in the case of many of the more celebrated high-points of Moslem culture, relics of pre-Moslem civilizations that Moslems had overrun.

Moslem invaders began entering India in the early 8th century, on the orders of Hajjaj, the governor of what is now Iraq. (Sound familiar?) Starting in 712 the raiders, commanded by Muhammad Qasim, demolished temples, shattered sculptures, plundered palaces, killed vast numbers of men — it took three whole days to slaughter the inhabitants of the city of Debal — and carried off their women and children to slavery, some of it sexual. After the initial wave of violence, however, Qasim tried to establish law and order in the newly-conquered lands, and to that end he even allowed a degree of religious tolerance. but upon hearing of such humane practices, his superior Hajjaj, objected:

"It appears from your letter that all the rules made by you for the comfort and convenience of your men are strictly in accordance with religious law. But the way of granting pardon prescribed by the law is different from the one adopted by you, for you go on giving pardon to everybody, high or low, without any discretion between a friend and a foe. The great God says in the Koran [47.4]: "0 True believers, when you encounter the unbelievers, strike off their heads." The above command of the Great God is a great command and must be respected and followed. You should not be so fond of showing mercy, as to nullify the virtue of the act. Henceforth grant pardon to no one of the enemy and spare none of them, or else all will consider you a weak-minded man."

In a subsequent communication, Hajjaj reiterated that all able-bodied men were to be killed, and that their underage sons and daughters were to be imprisoned and retained as hostages. Qasim obeyed, and on his arrival at the town of Brahminabad massacred between 6,000 and 16,000 men.

The significance of these events lies not just in the horrible numbers involved, but in the fact that the perpetrators of these massacres were not military thugs disobeying the ethical teachings of their religion, as the European crusaders in the Holy Land were, but were actually doing precisely what their religion taught. (And one may note that Christianity has grown up and no longer preaches crusades. Islam has not. As has been well-documented, jihad has been preached from the official centers of Islam, not just the lunatic fringe.)

Qasim’s early exploits were continued in the early eleventh century, when Mahmud of Ghazni, "passed through India like a whirlwind, destroying, pillaging, and massacring," zealously following the Koranic injunction to kill idolaters, whom he had vowed to chastise every year of his life.

In the course of seventeen invasions, in the words of Alberuni, the scholar brought by Mahmud to India,

"Mahmud utterly ruined the prosperity of the country, and performed there wonderful exploits, by which the Hindus became like atoms of dust scattered in all directions, and like a tale of old in the mouth of the people. Their scattered remains cherish, of course, the most inveterate aversion toward all Moslems."

Does one wonder why? To this day, the citizens of Bombay and New Delhi, Calcutta and Bangalore, live in fear of a politically-unstable and nuclear-armed Pakistan that unlike India (but like every other Moslem country) has not managed to maintain democracy since independence.

Mathura, holy city of the god Krishna, was the next victim:

"In the middle of the city there was a temple larger and finer than the rest, which can neither be described nor painted." The Sultan [Mahmud] was of the opinion that 200 years would have been required to build it. The idols included "five of red gold, each five yards high," with eyes formed of priceless jewels. "The Sultan gave orders that all the temples should be burnt with naphtha and fire, and leveled with the ground."

In the aftermath of the invasion, in the ancient cities of Varanasi, Mathura, Ujjain, Maheshwar, Jwalamukhi, and Dwarka, not one temple survived whole and intact. This is the equivalent of an army marching into Paris and Rome, Florence and Oxford, and razing their architectural treasures to the ground. It is an act beyond nihilism; it is outright negativism, a hatred of what is cultured and civilized.

In his book The Story of Civilization, famous historian Will Durant lamented the results of what he termed "probably the bloodiest story in history." He called it "a discouraging tale, for its evident moral is that civilization is a precious good, whose delicate complex order and freedom can at any moment be overthrown by barbarians invading from without and multiplying from within."

Moslem invaders "broke and burned everything beautiful they came across in Hindustan," displaying, as an Indian commentator put it, the resentment of the less developed warriors who felt intimidated in the encounter with "a more refined culture." The Moslem Sultans built mosques at the sites of torn down temples, and many Hindus were sold into slavery. As far as they were concerned, Hindus were kafirs, heathens, par excellence. They, and to a lesser extent the peaceful Buddhists, were, unlike Christians and Jews, not "of the book" but at the receiving end of Muhammad’s injunction against pagans: "Kill those who join other gods with God wherever you may find them." (Not that being "of the book" has much helped Jewish and Christian victims of other Moslem aggressions, but that’s another article.)

The mountainous northwestern approaches to India are to this day called the Hindu Kush, "the Slaughter of the Hindu," a reminder of the days when Hindu slaves from Indian subcontinent died in harsh Afghan mountains while being transported to Moslem courts of Central Asia. The slaughter in Somnath, the site of a celebrated Hindu temple, where 50,000 Hindus were slain on Mahmud’s orders, set the tone for centuries.

The gentle Buddhists were the next to be subjected to mass slaughter in 1193, when Muhammad Khilji also burned their famous library. By the end of the 12th century, following the Moslem conquest of their stronghold in Bihar, they were no longer a significant presence in India. The survivors retreated into Nepal and Tibet, or escaped to the south of the Subcontinent. The remnants of their culture lingered on even as far west as Turkestan. Left to the tender mercies of Moslem conquerors and their heirs they were systematically destroyed, sometimes—as was the case with the four giant statues of Buddha in Afghanistan in March 2001—up to the present day.

That cultivated disposition and developed sensibility can go hand in hand with bigotry and cruelty is evidenced by the example of Firuz Shah, who became the ruler of northern India in 1351. This educated yet tyrannical Moslem ruler of northern India once surprised a village where a Hindu religious festival was celebrated, and ordered all present to be slain. He proudly related that, upon completing the slaughter, he destroyed the temples and in their place built mosques.

The Mogul emperor Akbar is remembered as tolerant, at least by the standards of Moslems in India: only one major massacre was recorded during his long reign (1542-1605), when he ordered that about 30,000 captured Rajput Hindus be slain on February 24, 1568, after the battle for Chitod. But Akbar’s acceptance of other religions and toleration of their public worship, his abolition of poll-tax on non-Moslems, and his interest in other faiths were not a reflection of his Moslem spirit of tolerance. Quite the contrary, they indicated a propensity for free-thinking in the realm of religion that finally led him to complete apostasy. Its high points were the formal declaration of his own infallibility in all matters of religious doctrine, his promulgation of a new creed, and his adoption of Hindu and Zoroastrian festivals and practices. This is a pattern one sees again and again in Moslem history, down to the present day: whenever one finds a reasonable, enlightened, tolerant Moslem, upon closer examination this turns out to be someone who started out as a Moslem but then progressively wandered away from the orthodox faith. That is to say: the best Moslems are generally the least Moslem (a pattern which does not seem to be the case with other religions.)

Things were back to normal under Shah Jahan (1593-1666), the fifth Mogul Emperor and a grandson of Akbar the Great. Most Westerners remember him as the builder of the Taj Mahal and have no idea that he was a cruel warmonger who initiated forty-eight military campaigns against non-Moslems in less than thirty years. Taking his cue from his Ottoman co-religionists, on coming to the throne in 1628 he killed all his male relations except one who escaped to Persia. Shah Jahan had 5,000 concubines in his harem, but nevertheless indulged in incestuous sex with his daughters Chamani and Jahanara. During his reign in Benares alone 76 Hindu temples were destroyed, as well as Christian churches at Agra and Lahore. At the end of the siege of Hugh, a Portuguese enclave near Calcutta, that lasted three months, he had ten thousand inhabitants "blown up with powder, drowned in water or burnt by fire." Four thousand were taken captive to Agra where they were offered Islam or death. Most refused and were killed, except for the younger women, who went into harems.

These massacres perpetrated by Moslems in India are unparalleled in history. In sheer numbers, they are bigger than the Jewish Holocaust, the Soviet Terror, the Japanese massacres of the Chinese during WWII, Mao’s devastations of the Chinese peasantry, the massacres of the Armenians by the Turks, or any of the other famous crimes against humanity of the 20th Century. But sadly, they are almost unknown outside India.

There are several reasons for this. In the days when they ruled India, the British, pursuing a policy of divide-and-rule, whitewashed the record of the Moslems so that they could set them up as a counterbalance to the more numerous Hindus. During the struggle for independence, Gandhi and Nehru downplayed historic Moslem atrocities so that they could pretend a facade of Hindu-Moslem unity against the British. (Naturally, this façade dissolved immediately after independence and several million people were killed in the religious violence attendant on splitting British India into India and Pakistan.) After independence, Marxist Indian writers, blinkered by ideology, suppressed the truth about the Moslem record because it did not fit into the Marxist theory of history. Nowadays, the Indian equivalent of political correctness downplays Moslem misdeeds because Moslems are an "oppressed minority" in majority-Hindu India. And Indian leftist intellectuals always blame India first and hate their own Hindu civilization, just their equivalents at Berkeley blame America and the West.

Unlike Germany, which has apologized to its Jewish and Eastern European victims, and Japan, which has at least behaved itself since WWII, and even America, which has gone into paroxysms of guilt over what it did to the infinitely smaller numbers of Red Indians, the Moslem aggressors against India and their successors have not even stopped trying to finish the job they started. To this day, militant Islam sees India as "unfinished business" and it remains high on the agenda of oil-rich Moslem countries such as Saudi Arabia, which are spending millions every year trying to convert Hindus to Islam.

One may take some small satisfaction in the fact that they find it rather slow going.

Serge Trifkovic received his PhD from the University of Southampton in England and pursued postdoctoral research at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. His past journalistic outlets have included the BBC World Service, the Voice of America, CNN International, MSNBC, U.S. News & World Report, The Washington Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, The Times of London, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer. He is foreign affairs editor of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture. This article was adapted for Front Page Magazine by Robert Locke.

[acharya]

THE HISTORY MAN: Rehmat Ali’s impossible dream —Ihsan Aslam

Jinnah had become disillusioned and had lost hope for India when Rehmat Ali started his youthful agitation for Pakistan. Rehmat Ali discussed the Pakistan idea with Jinnah in the spring of 1933

When Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah bid farewell to Delhi and arrived in Karachi on August 7, 1947, he confessed to his ADC, “Do you know, I never expected to see Pakistan in my lifetime.” Pakistan was a dream — a Cambridge student’s dream at that. When the idea was first proposed it was labelled “chimerical and impracticable”. Student follies, however, have a habit of sometimes becoming reality. Pakistan was one “student’s scheme”.

Chaudhary Rehmat Ali, a Cambridge University law student, initiated the movement for Pakistan by issuing the pamphlet Now or Never, or the Pakistan Declaration, on January 28, 1933 from 3 Humberstone Road, Cambridge. To make the claim more representative he had the document signed by three other students, none of whom were at Cambridge.

Calling Rehmat Ali “a historical figure and a seminal thinker”, Pakistan’s eminent historian KK Aziz acknowledges in Rehmat Ali: A Biography: “He was the first to think of a sovereign status for the Muslims of India, to prepare a well-defined plan for this, to organise a movement for advancing the cause, and to mount a proper campaign for preaching to the unconverted.” And in addition he also came up with the anagram “Pakistan”.

Jinnah’s biographer, Stanley Wolpert, has written that Rehmat Ali issued a “massive quantity of strange religio-political pamphlets and letters.” According to Aziz Beg, another biographer of Jinnah, Rehmat Ali’s ideas stirred the young and inspired the “growth of Muslim political consciousness throughout India”. Wolpert says that Jinnah chose to ignore Rehmat Ali, but “He (Jinnah) would not, however, be able much longer to ignore the political demand of Rehmat Ali’s obviously well-funded movement sponsored from the heart of Cambridge.”

Both Jinnah and Rehmat Ali arrived in the UK in November 1930. Jinnah, the brilliant lawyer from Bombay, soon bought a house in Hampstead and pursued his legal career and attempted, without much luck, to enter parliament. The young Rehmat Ali went to Cambridge and commenced his bar-at-law in London. In 1933, when Now or Never was issued, Jinnah was aged 57, while Rehmat Ali was 36.

Jinnah had become disillusioned and had lost hope for India when Rehmat Ali started his youthful agitation for Pakistan. When Rehmat Ali discussed the Pakistan idea with Jinnah in the spring of 1933, Jinnah called it an “impossible dream”. When things didn’t work out as he expected in London or perhaps he simply got bored leading the life of an English gentleman, Jinnah returned to India in 1934 to take up the leadership of the All-India Muslim League.

By 1940 the League had got nearer to the Pakistan idea by adopting the famous Lahore Resolution. However, it did not mention the word Pakistan. Jinnah himself did not use the word Pakistan until the early 1940s. Once Jinnah took up a case, it was a certainty that he’d win. (only when the British back him covertly) As far as Pakistan was concerned, Jinnah was a late starter. But once the single-minded barrister had picked up the Pakistan file, it was only a matter of time before the country would be established. August 14, 1947 came soon enough. For Jinnah it was a case of “Better a moth-eaten Pakistan than no Pakistan”. Rehmat Ali, the visionary, found this difficult to accept.

Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre write in Freedom at Midnight, “The man who had first articulated the impossible dream of Pakistan spent the day of 14 August alone in his cottage at 3 Humberstone Road [he was actually there only as a student in the academic year 1932/33]... His dream belonged to another man now, the man who scorned it when Rehmat Ali had first begged him to become its champion.”

Ihsan Aslam is exploring public history at Ruskin College, Oxford. He can be contacted at: timeshistoryman@yahoo.co.uk or visited at: http://www.pakistanhistory.com

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Price of Neglect – Early Southern Revolts Against the Christian British</b>
P R J Pradeep

When independent India celebrates the heroes who fought the British the earliest uprisings against the British in South India are not given their due place. Velu Thambi and Paliath Achan in Travancore – Cochin (1805-09), Pazhassi Raja in Malabar (1785-1805) and Kattabomman in Thirunelveli, Tamilnadu ( 1795-99) were
most important among these. Despite being an Islamic tyrant Tippu Sultan of Mysore ( 1795-99) also fought the imperial British.

Most of the historians consider the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 as the first major opposition to British rule in India. This is an anomaly in history as the stratagems the British used and the role of Christian faith in that remains unaccounted for. For one and a half centuries after 1800, India, what was the richest country in the
world, came under  organized loot. What indirectly continues.

Post-colonial India had accepted secularism, a product of the Christian west,
as state policy. It was now immoral and such debates were tabooed. To add on to this was the North- Indian bias in Indian history. How India continued to commit the same mistakes and the Indian state took a soft approach to Christianity and the west with calamitous effects. Impact of this neo-colonisation is still not fully
realized.

It is not a coincidence that the famous `Kundara Vilambaram' a proclamation by Velu Thambi on January 11, 1809 calls on the Hindus to be aware of the designs of the Christian British and defeat them. He categorically states that `they will put crosses on temples' and 'dishonour the faith and the Brahmins'. Thambi was
instrumental in attacking the British forces and the Syrian Christians of Kerala who supported them. Once refugees to Kerala given shelter by the Hindu kings they plotted for a Christian kingdom. Many Christian priests were killed in the Hindu uprising and sunk in the back waters. A major population of the Christians from
Kollam, once capital of Venad, fled from the place. But at the end of the day Christians won the game and today the same Christians have come to  rule Kerala. Legendary Malabar, Kerala now, has become the world capital of suicides. The ecosystem is devastated. Rich and clever Syrian Christians have captured most of the Kerala lands. The temples are indeed under the Christian rulers, what Velu Thambi predicted with uncanny precision. Paliathachan of Cochin also
joined Thambi and gave a call to the `Nayars and Theeyas' to fight the
British. Whole of south- central Kerala rose in revolt. British called in troupes from other regions and they were surrounded.

Travancore kings also gave a call to arrest Velu Thambi and send forces. How
they remained as the insiders thereafter. After a heroic resistance Velu Thambi committed suicide at a goddess temple at Mannady in 1809 as British historians later told. Dead body of Velu Thambi was brought to Kannammoola at Thiruvananthapuram and insulted, where a Christian monastery, United Theological Seminary, now stands in all majesty.

The game plans and lessons the British learned in this phase is of crucial importance in the later history of India. A company from a far off little island called Britain who came to trade in spices became the rulers of India with the help of crude tactics and Christianity. Where the faith and the local Christians
played a central role. In Kerala having been here for long they knew the values of the local people, what came handy for the Europeans. How Tippu Sultan also targeted the local Christians whom he called `spies of the British'. In Travancore it was a triangle of faiths that clashed, Hinduism, Islam and Christianity.

When Tippu Sultan and his father Hyder Ali tried to forcibly convert people, what all other Islamic rulers of the time did in India, the Hindu kings of Travancore sought British help. Initially the British did not help as promised but Travancore defeated Tippu. Later the British asked for `protection money and expenses of war', impossible sums from the small kingdom. They trapped Travancore in
debt and took over the rule. Not paying back `debt' was painful for the
values of the place. They created that `debt' and made the rulers feel guilty. It was a clear psychological device, later versions of history tell that the British took bribes from Tippu as well. These officers were put under punishment and a famous English novel has this story as its theme.

Now the process of conversions to Christianity began, efforts to neutralize the Hindu faith were also under way. Community owned temples were taken over and brought under the British government, what continues to this day. Temple rituals were altered by `laws'. Famous temple centred Kalari culture of the martial
people Nayars, where decentralized armies were part of Kerala, was dissolved. What kept the place impossible to colonise so far.

Christian institutions of justice replaced the local ones, where the local Christians were pushed in by state orders. They spread exaggerated stories of upper caste oppression and got the lower castes converted. Converts stood by them. Obviously the caste Brahmin phase had created severe caste divisions and these were cleverly used by the missionaries. The refugee population of Syrian Christians and the new converts were given many privileges. Exorbitant rates of taxation, to pay the British, broke the local economy. Fleecing tax was entrusted to the old nobility Nayars who had to face punishment if the quotas were not met. Obviously they became enemies of the ordinary people. Conversions gave tax exemptions and people flocked to Christianity.

Many of the British officers went back to Britain and became leaders at the Christian support missions for conversions in India like the Church Mission Society. It was a long term political plan more than faith.

In Malabar where Pazhassi Raja rose in revolt the scene was very similar, on one side was the threat of Muslim rulers from Mysore whose cruelty to the `kafirs' was beyond description. Younger one of the ruling family in Kottayam, which extended from Tellicherry to Kudaku including the tribal belts of Wynad, Pazhassi Raja too sought the help of the British to fight the Muslims. Had to repent this later and here again faith was central. He wrote to Ayilyath Nambiar, a Nayar chiefton around 1800, `the whites have desecrated Manathana, the abode of Perumal and Bhagawathy (God and the Goddess) and firings have taken place there, I have decided to oppose them'. The early clashes of Pazhassy Raja were also related to faith and heavy taxation. Emboldened by the presence of Tippu and the
British the local Muslims started building places of worship at Kottayam bazaar
without taking permission from the Raja. Pazhassi ordered its demolition and this angered the British now assuming sovereignty.

They plotted to make the small kings to fight each other and made them pay huge taxes. Unable to pay the unbearable taxes many farmers abandoned their villages. Where Pazhassy, who swore by Porkali Bhagawathy, the family deity, took up armed struggle.

The Nayar chieftons, local Nambiar families and the warlike tribals like Kurichiar and Kurumbar stood by him. It was one of the longest revolts that the British had to face in India and lasted for around ten years. Large number of British soldiers and  officers had to pay with their lives and the Raja and his tribal warriors
had the forest tracks of Wynad to their advantage. The British plotted giving
various advantages to the local kings and made them enemies of each
other, Pazhassi Raja refused to oblige despite offers of peace. He stood his ground and demanded that the taxes be waived. Later phases of the clash saw the Raja going to the old enemy Tippu himself for alliance. The Moppila Muslims of Malabar, mainly descendants of the Arabian traders and those converted to Islam, now
supported Pazhassi Raja. They realized the British motives and forgot the
differences.

But the British defeated and killed Tippu at Sreerangapatnam in 1799. Pazhassi Raja was their next target. The British famous for their planning was buying time and making preparations in the region for a final assault. Their positions in Sreerangapatnam was reinforced and the plan was to attack from different directions what  they did with Velu Thambi in Travancore as well. The small kings had valour but did not have the broad frame of operation in India as the
British had.

The British officers, called Collectors, since their main job was collecting taxes, took several steps like waving the oppressive taxes from selected people and winning them over. But majority of the people stood with Pazhassi. As a reminder of the colonized minds fossils of the `Collectors' still remain in India.

When the final war came they offered prices for catching the leaders of the `rebels'. The rates were Pazhassi Raja, and his two nephews - Pagoda 5000 (around Rs. 15000/), four people from the Edachena Nayar family - Pagoda 2000. Kurichiar tribals, Palloor, Ittikombath, Mundottil Nayar families were also associated with the revolt and offered prices for heads. Pazhassi called on the
people to fight in the name of the hill deities of Wynad and the final
assault was planned based at the Seethadevi temple at Pulpalli. But at last they
were defeated by a team under the Collector T H Babar and Pazhassi Raja was killed on 30 Nov. 1805. It was Babar who also captured Thalaykkal Chanthu a Kurichia tribal leader. When killed Pazhassi had his wife from the Avinjat Nayar family with him.

Getting the reward money kept Babar plotting again and he reported that
only a gold dagger and waist band was all that he could put hands on. Pazhassi's dead body was given due honors by Babar who wrote about the great man with respect. Perhaps they had learned the lessons after Velu Thambi's dead body was subjected to insult. Soon the British promoted their own people in the region and made all efforts to keep the war like tribals in control, the forests where they could
hide were made British reserves and white officers put in charge.

Settlements of  Christian in Wynad, mainly the Syrian Christians  begins from the
south, begins after this phase. As a British officer himself wrote ` the traditional social controls have broken down, any one can loot anything here'. Today Wynad and the hill areas are almost totally under the Syrian Christians and the tribals are thrown out of their own lands. The old Nayar families have been made
laborers of the Christians in most places. With the state ruled by a Christian Muslim
coalition they flex their muscles and have also destroyed the rain forest ecosystem. Pulppally is a mafia center of the Christian eco- criminals who remain out of the law enforcement mechanisms. Poaching and cultivation of Indian hemp, Gunja, is the core activity here. Where the Christian politicians in the capital have
their stakes.

The other uprising in south India, that of Kattabomman  in Thirunelveli was also similar and had in it almost all the ingredients and inhuman taxation was at the core. Unlike Kerala region Tamilnadu did not give refuge to the Syrian Christians and there was no immediate Christian connection here. What was taken care of by the British who send hordes of missionaries to the Tamilnadu villages, what continues to this day. Kattabomman who infuriated the British by shooting down a British official at the residence of the British Collector at Ramnad took to the forests of Pudukottai. The British who helped the Thondaiman kings of Ramnad
against the Muslim invaders took his help and Kattabomman was caught in
the forests by the Raja's forces. Legendary Kattabomman was handed over to the
British by the king Raghunatha Thondaiman and was hanged at Kayathar in the presence of the Palayakkar of Thirunelveli on 17 Oct. 1799. As a warning to those revolting. Thondaiman got a horse and a Khillet for the service rendered and they continued to rule under the British as a principality, like Travancore, till independence.

Where the descendants of Kattabomman and the warlike Thevar community have
succumbed to misery and destitution. The British treated them as a criminal community, later known as the `Maravar', meaning guerilla fighters, this community is now in dire straights.

The early uprisings against the British in the South have important lessons for India though these are least understood even after half a century of the British leaving the Indian shores. The European Christian nations and the Arab Muslims were fighting for the trade supremacy in the Indian ocean. Where Hindu India was
caught in between. Even after freedom the far sighted British had ensured that
the lids remained intact and the Indian union became a member of the
British Common Wealth, a crowd of old colonies owing allegiance to Britain, and continued to be an open forum for Christian missionaries and western loot. Only the devices now came in other names and shapes. If it was the East India Company then it is the World Bank and the WTO now. Indebted India continues to pay off the heavy debts, what if the poor in India have not enough to meet
their daily food expenses. With its colonial hang over India is run by those who are
trained by the west, the successful politicians are those from the London School of Economics. An institution set up during the period of colonization, with its biased theories of the western hegemony.

Indian `Collectors' still haunt people, though they don't collect anything now. Within India the hierarchy of caste and the caste Brahmin supremacy are still intact and in many regions untouchability is widely practiced fuelling Christian conversions.

Interestingly both Velu Thambi and Pazhassi Raja evoked the ' Protection of the
Brahmins' as their major motto. The Hindu – Muslim divide which was broadened by the British eventually lead to the trifurcation of the country but is still alive and helping the western conspiracies. But Indian scholars or the media refuse to look at these central processes of faith as yet, they are afraid. The sagas of Velu Thambi, Pazhassi Raja and Kattabomman are rarely taught to the new
generations in the south leave alone the North. Where historians of independent India have failed.

(From 'Udayor' newsletter from www.nairs.org August
15, 2005 )<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[acharya]

The Raj and the famines of good governance

P. Sainath

Between 24 million and 29 million Indians died in famines in the era of British good governance. In fact, barring the scale, it all sounds depressingly like the present. In terms of ideology and principle at least.

NO OTHER country in the world was quite as fortunate as ours, a Times of India editorial gushed in 1841. Talk of luck. Not only were we ruled by White Gentleman, the Times pointed out, we were ruled by White English Gentlemen. (It could have been the Dutch, you know.)

So committed were these Gentlemen to the governance of this heathen land, they "would do the utmost to protect our independence... " And this was not "superhuman or romantic.' After all, our rulers merely "act[ed] like English gentlemen of good common sense."

For the enslaved to choose between colonialisms is for the chicken to choose the sauce it prefers to be cooked in. Yet, some still cling to the notion that British colonialism was more benign than others.

This week we mark our escape from good English common sense. As smart a time as any to review its legacy. When the Times (then called the Bombay Times and Journal of Commerce) ran that edit in 1841, it was, after all, owned by other White English gents. When brown Indian gentlemen echo those views 164 years later, it is worth revisiting. When the Prime Minister does not "entirely reject" British claims to good governance, it becomes pressing.

That governance was certainly good for the British. Tax collections rose even as millions died of man-made famines. Like Bengal of 1770-72. The East India Company's own report put it simply. The famine in that province "exceeds all description." Close to ten million people had died, as Rajni Palme-Dutt pointed out in his remarkable book, India Today. The Company noted that more than a third of the populace had perished in the province of Purnea. "And in other parts the misery is equal."

Yet, Warren Hastings wrote to the directors of the East India Company in 1772: "Notwithstanding the loss of at least one-third of the inhabitants of this province, and the consequent decrease in cultivation, the net collections of the year 1771 exceeded even those of [pre-famine] 1768." Hastings was clear on why and how this was achieved. It was "owing to [tax collection] being violently kept up to its former standard."

The Company itself, as Palme Dutt observed, was smug about this. It noted that despite "the severity of the late famine and the great reduction of people thereby, some increase has been made" in the collections.

Between 24 million and 29 million Indians, maybe more, died in famines in the era of British good governance. Many of these famines were policy-driven. Millions died of callous and wilful neglect. The victims of Malthusian rulers. Over 6 million humans perished in just 1876 — when Madras was a hell. Many others had their lives shortened by ruthless exploitation and plunder. Well before the Great Bengal Famine, the report of that province's Director for Health for 1927-28 made grisly reading. It noted that "the present peasantry of Bengal are in a very large proportion taking to a dietary on which even rats could not live for more than five weeks." By 1931, life expectancy in India was sharply down. It was now 23.2 and 22.8 years for men and women. Less than half that of those living in England and Wales. (Palme-Dutt.)

Mike Davis' stunning book, Late Victorian Holocausts, also ought to be required reading in every Indian school. Davis gives us a scathing account, for instance, of the Viceroy Lord Lytton. Lytton was the most ardent free-marketeer of his time — and Queen Victoria's favourite poet. He "vehemently opposed efforts ... to stockpile grain or otherwise interfere with market forces. All through the autumn of 1876, while the kharif crop was withering in the fields of southern India, Lytton had been absorbed in organising the immense Imperial Assemblage in Delhi to proclaim Victoria Empress of India." The weeklong feast for 68,000 guests, points out Davis, was an orgy of excess. It proved to be "the most colossal and expensive meal in world history." Through the same week as this spectacular durbar, "100,000 of the Queen Empress' subjects starved to death in Madras and Mysore" alone.

In fact, barring the scale, it all sounds depressingly like the present. In terms of ideology and principle at least. The Raj nostalgia of today's neo-liberals is quite heart-felt. Thousands of farmers have killed themselves as the agrarian crisis deepens. Tens of millions have seen their livelihoods destroyed. They now hotfoot it to the cities in hope of succour. Massive amounts of grain were exported during the National Democratic Alliance rule. Even as grain per Indian in 2002-03 fell to the levels of the great Bengal famine. And with all the misery in the countryside, the elite orgy of excess goes on. Lytton would have approved.

In his time, Lytton ordered that "there is to be no interference of any kind on the part of government with the object of reducing the price of food." Leave alone the Times of India of 1841. Lytton could surely land the editorship of most Indian daily newspapers in 2005. Imagine the edits his "sensitive and poetical mind" might have thrown up on the idea of guaranteeing employment. Lytton's era saw huge amounts of grain exported to Europe from here while millions of Indians starved to death. Even as he scorned the Indian populace for its "tendency to increase more rapidly than the food it raises from its soil." (Davis: Late Victorian Holocausts.)

The neo-liberals of the present have not achieved the scale of death their White English forbearers excelled at. This is surely due to hundreds of millions of brown Indian men and women of good common sense. Blessed with an unpleasant habit of voting now and then. (And, oh yes, the Brits set up roadblocks to stop the rural hungry from pouring into Bombay and Poona. Police threw out tens of thousands of famine refugees. Sounds familiar? How well it sits with the brutal crackdown on slum dwellers in Mumbai.)

It's a good thing the great uprising of 1857 might be back for a bit on the agenda thanks to a Bollywood film. But it's also worth recalling that the then elites of cities like Bombay held meetings to pray for the success of the British troops. Not for Mangal Pandey and his comrades. Their descendents now plan on how to rid Mumbai of the poor. And would be happy to send Indian troops (mostly from poor rural families) to fight alongside the White English Gentlemen now floundering in Iraq.

Cannon fodder

Yes, there's that, too. British good governance killed more than those tens of millions in famines. Countless numbers of Indians died in wars waged for, by, and against the British. Over 8,000 died in the single battle around Kut in Iraq in 1916. London used them as canon fodder in its desperate search for a success against the Turks after the rout at Gallipoli. When there were no Indians around, the British sacrificed other captive peoples. "Waste the Irish" was the term used by an English officer when sending out troops on a suicidal mission.

In his book Global Capitalism and India, C.T. Kurien gives us a stark example of British-led globalisation from the 1860s. The civil war in America had hurt the flow of cheap, slave-labour cotton to Britain. So the Raj forced the growing of that crop here on a much larger scale than before. "From then on, commercialisation of agriculture continued to gain momentum. Between the last decade of the 19th century and the middle of the twentieth, when food production in India declined by 7 per cent, that of commercial crops increased by 85 per cent. Widespread and regular famines became a recurring feature during this period."

The collapse of the purchasing power of the poor was a big feature of British rule. (Sounds a bit like the present?) The policies, bungling, neglect and corruption of Good White English Gentlemen had much to do with the death of perhaps 4 million people in the Great Bengal Famine of 1942-43. As Amartya Sen points out, this appalling event was never officially declared as a famine. It was only in October 1943, when much of the damage had been done, that the famine was "acknowledged officially in Parliament by the Secretary of State for India... "

The Statesman of Calcutta, notes Prof. Sen, raised the issue after the government coyly confessed to the great disaster. The paper wondered why there was "no direct admission of grave misjudgement on the higher authorities' part." How did this square, the paper sought to know, with earlier claims "that there existed virtually no food problems in India."

Again, while the scale is wholly different, the parallels are odd. In June this year, we could see Montek Singh Ahluwalia speaking solemnly of problems, even a crisis in agriculture. (Gee! I wonder who told him.) These headaches, he feels, go to back to the mid-1990s. No mention of who was shaping the ghoulish policies of that — and the present — period. And no questions asked about it in the media. There's good governance for you. Welcome back, Lytton. All is forgiven, come home.

[Guest]

Pioneer
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Truth, the soul of our history </b>
Jagmohan
History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors," wrote TS Eliot in Gerontion. Was our Prime Minister, Mr Manmohan Singh, taken in by such 'cunning passages' and walked through 'contrived corridors', while addressing Oxford University early last month? Or are his critics relying upon their own 'cunning passages' and taking us to their 'contrived corridors'?

If truth is to be the soul of history and if history has to serve as our guiding star for walking on the right path in the present as well as in the future, we have to look at it with clinical precision and objectivity. Passions, prejudices and predilections have no place in authentic and instructive history.

There is concrete evidence to show that, in many respects, the British Raj in India proved a blessing in disguise. Take, for example, archaeology, history and literature. <b>These areas were served by such dedicated stalwarts as Alexander Cunningham, James Burgess, John Marshall, Sir Mortimer Wheeler. Their historic and pioneering work, coupled with equally historic and pioneering work of Asiatic Society of Bengal, in discovering and translating Indian classics and deciphering inscriptions, such as those on Ashokan pillars and rocks, resulted in the great past of India being dug out from the debris of its decadence.</b>

The process began in the late 18th century. Dr Samuel Johnson, having understood the importance of the subject, advocated that the past of India should be systematically investigated. Warren Hastings, the then Governor-General, was no less keen. About the intrinsic worth of the ancient Indian thoughts, he had observed: "These would survive when the British dominion in India shall have long ceased to exist." He described the translation of the Bhagavad Gita as "the gain of humanity".

A series of solid measures, however, were taken when Sir William Jones arrived on the scene. In September 1783, he was appointed as a judge in the Calcutta Supreme Court. He gathered around him a band of dedicated scholars, and founded, on January 15, 1784, the Asiatic Society of Bengal. With its establishment, a number of scholarly works were undertaken.

The hidden treasures were spotted one by one. <b>Sir William Jones himself translated Kalidasa's Shakuntala. He also unfolded the history of Chandragupta Maurya by synchronising it with a stage of Greek history. Cole Brooke translated the Vedas and Wilkins the Bhagavad Gita. At the time the Society was set up, "little was known of India and that little was superficial and inaccurate". But within a span of half a century, the Sanskrit language and literature became known all over and its range and richness dazzled the world.</b>

Equally spectacular were the developments in the field of archaeology. <b>James Prinsep deciphered the Asokan inscriptions and solved the tangle of Kharoshthi and Brahmi scripts. His epigraphic and numismatic techniques produced remarkable results. Charles Wilkins laid the foundation for epigraphical studies. Captain E Fell discovered the Sanchi Stupa and Erskine brought to light the excellence of Ajanta caves and their paintings</b>.

With the appointment of Alexander Cunningham as the first Archaeological Surveyor of India in 1861, a great upswing in exploration was witnessed and many historic cities and sites, <b>like Taxila and fortress of Sangala, associated with the invasion of Alexander the Great, were identified</b>. His successor, Dr James Burgess, made a significant contribution in the form of many publications. For Lord Curzon, preservation of the archaeological treasures was a passion: <b>"As a pilgrim at the shrine of beauty I have visited them, but as a priest in the temple of duty have I charged myself with their reverent custody and their studious repair."</b>

John Marshall, who was appointed as Director-General of Archaeological Survey of India in 1902, was as passionate a lover of Indian Archaeology as Lord Curzon. He remained at his post till 1928. During these 26 years, a large number of sites, including<b> Nalanda, Vaishali, Pataliputra, Taxila and prehistoric towns of Mohenjodaro and Harappa, were unearthed, resulting in a revolutionary change in the entire perspective of Indian history</b>. About Marshall's contribution, it has been appropriately remarked: <b>"He left India about 3000 years older than he had found it."</b>

No less remarkable was the contribution made by the members of Indian Civil Service. Vincent Smith, who served as Chief Secretary in the United Provinces, produced outstanding works of history, such as the Early History of India (1904) and the Oxford History of India (1919). Earlier, Mount Stuart Elphinstone, with his publication of History of India (1841) had made his mark as a historian. His eminence can be judged from the fact that he was called the Tacitus of Modern History.

Brian Houghton Hodgson did pioneering work in exploring the natural history of the Himalayan region and studying Buddhist religion, customs and language. AO Hume, who earned the name of Pope of Ornithology, carried out his classic research on Asiatic birds. There were many other monumental works in diverse fields of religion/ linguistics, economics and rural life.

All these discoveries acted as a tonic on the Indian mind, jolted the sleeping giant, injecting new confidence in him and making him think about the great products of his past and his potential for the future. Activated further by the contact with Western liberalism and scientific spirit, the Indian mind created new social and cultural forces which brought about the great renaissance of the later 19th century and early 20th century.

In view of the above acts, it would be churlish to deny that in enabling India to rediscover the greatness of its past and create a new mindscape, the British scholars and civil servants played a significant part. To all of them, India owes a deep debt.

We should also not forget the miserable conditions of India when the East India Company started establishing its hegemony over the affairs of the country. Jadu Nath Sarkar, the noted historian, has observed: "The country could not defend itself; royalty was hopelessly depraved or imbecile; the nobles were selfish and short-sighted; corruption, inefficiency and treachery disgraced all branches of the public service. In the midst of this decay and confusion, our literature, art and even true religion had perished."

<b>The degeneration had gone on to such an extent that Nadir Shah in 1739 and Ahmed Shah in 1757 were able to plunder Delhi with impunity and take away practically its entire wealth. The former slaughtered about 20,000 innocent Delhi citizens in a single day</b>.

After the initial period of maladministration, which was passionately denounced by humanists like Edmund Burke, the British built a steel-frame of governance, the control mechanism of which rested with the Indian Civil Service - a service which justifiably earned for itself the reputation of being best in the world. It provided complete peace and unified the country through a vast network of roads, railways, post offices. Most members of the ICS displayed an enlightened attitude and dispensed even handed justice. They came to be looked upon as ma-baap of the common folk.

Their work was not, as is commonly believed, confined merely to law and order. It extended to development. For example, the irrigation schemes woven around the Chenab and Jhelum rivers, and setting up of a number of canal colonies, were remarkable projects of development which were carried out speedily and efficiently under the outstanding leadership of civil servants like Sir Alfred and James Lyall and Sir Malcolm Hailey. Their contribution led to what has appropriately been called the blossoming of the wilderness.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

<b>400 YEARS OF THE EAST INDIA COMPANY. </b>
by Huw V. Bowen


Huw V. Bowen asks whether the East India Company was one of the `most powerful engines' of state and empire in British history.

THE YEAR 2000 MARKS THE 400th anniversary of the founding of the English East India Company, the trading organisation that acted as the vehicle for British commercial and imperial expansion in Asia. For over two hundred years, the Company stood like a colossus over trade, commerce and empire, and contemporaries could only marvel at its influence, resources, strength and wealth. Writing at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the political economist David Macpherson was unequivocal in his assessment that the Company was `the most illustrious and most flourishing commercial association that ever existed in any age or country.'

Today even the most powerful firm pales by comparison in terms of longevity and wide-ranging economic, political and cultural influence. In an era before fast travel and instant communication, the East India Company established a far-flung empire and then set about governing, controlling and exploiting it from a great distance in London. It managed to do this until it was finally rendered obsolete by the tumultuous events surrounding the Indian Mutiny in 1857.

The Company was granted its first charter by Elizabeth I on the last day of 1600, and it had to survive an uncertain first century or so as it sought access to Asian markets and commodities. At home, it was restructured several times, notably between 1698 and 1708 when an `old' and `new' East India Company co-existed before merging to form the United Company of Merchants Trading to the East Indies. In the East, the Company came under such pressure from its Dutch rivals during the mid-seventeenth century that it was obliged to shift the main focus of its activities from the Malay archipelago and the Spice Islands to South Asia. Over time, it managed to establish a commercial presence in India centred upon three `presidencies' established at Madras, Bombay and Calcutta. These tenuous footholds were fortified and defended by the Company as it sought to consolidate its position in an often hostile commercial and political world. This in turn gave rise to the growth of a small private army that was eventually to rival the regular British army in terms of size and manpower. The Company's role in India was thus defined by both commercial activity and a military presence: it was considered legitimate to use force in support of trade, and the overseas personnel were organised and deployed accordingly. In the words of one contemporary, it was a `fighting company'.

By the mid-eighteenth century, the Company had begun to assert itself over rival European companies and Indian powers alike, and this placed it in a position from which it could begin to carve out an extended territorial and commercial empire for itself. The actions of men such as Robert Clive (1725-74), Warren Hastings (1732-1818) and Charles Cornwallis (1738-1805) helped to transform the Company from trader to sovereign, so that during the second half of the eighteenth century millions of Indians were brought under British rule. As William Playfair put it in 1799:


<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--> From a limited body of merchants, the India Company have become the  Arbiters of the East. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

The Company created the British Raj, and as such it has left a deep and permanent imprint on the history and historiography of India. The story, once almost universally described as the `rise of British India', not so long ago formed part of the staple reading diet of British schoolchildren and students. In the post-colonial era, when imperial history has ceased to be fashionable, the legacies of British India are still hotly debated and contested. It is within this context that the history of the East India Company remains to the fore. Rather less obvious, perhaps, is the part played by the East India Company in the domestic development of Britain. Indeed, today's casual observer finds few signs of the leading role it once played in the nation's business, commercial, cultural and political life. In terms of architecture, for example, there is little surviving evidence in London of the Company's once-extensive property empire. The London docklands, home to the East India dock complex, has been reshaped. Although Commercial Road and East India Dock Road -- the purpose-built link with the City -- survive, the docks themselves have been filled in and redeveloped, leaving only a few poignant reminders of the Company's once formidable presence in the area. To the West, the great fortress-like warehouses built by the Company at Cutler Street were partially demolished and refurbished in controversial circumstances during the late 1970s. There is no trace remaining whatsoever of the Company's headquarters in Leadenhall Street. Charles Dickens once described the `rich' East India House `teeming with suggestions' of eastern delights, but it was unceremoniously pulled down in the 1860s, and in its place today stands the new Lloyd's Building, also a monument to commercial capitalism, but displaying rather different architectural qualities. In recent years, the only obvious local clue to the Indian connection was provided by the East India Arms, a tavern in nearby Lime Street, but that too has now fallen victim to the modern re-naming and re-branding process. As a result, the East India Company is now out of sight and out of mind.

It was not always like this. During the late eighteenth century, the Company played a key role in London's economy, employing several thousand labourers, warehousemen and clerks. Returning fleets of East Indiamen moored in Blackwall Reach, before their Indian and Chinese cargoes were transferred via hoys and carts to enormous warehouses where they awaited distribution and sale in Britain's burgeoning consumer markets. The profile of the Company in London was always high and the eyes of many were on Leadenhall Street. Political infighting at East India House regularly captured the attention of the metropolitan chattering classes. The Company itself was repeatedly subjected to inquiry by a Parliament uneasy about the turn being taken by events in the East.

The Company's domestic tentacles extended well beyond London, however, and its influences were widely felt across the south of England. Provincial outposts were established in the form of the agencies in ports such as Deal, Falmouth, Plymouth and Portsmouth. Over the years the Company maintained camps for its military recruits at Newport in the Isle of White, Warley in Essex and at Chatham in Kent. Educational establishments were set up for the purpose of preparing those destined for service overseas. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the East India College at Haileybury in Hertfordshire educated boys for the civil service, while Addis-combe Military Seminary near Croydon trained military cadets.

More generally, the Company touched many sectors of British society and the economy, as some contemporaries acknowledged. In 1813, for example, a friend to the Company, Thomas William Plummer, set about identifying what `proportion of the community' had a connection with the Company. Without mentioning several million purchasers of tea, spices, silks, muslins and other Asian commodities, he listed investors, Company employees of many types, tradesmen, manufacturers, shipbuilders, dealers, private merchants, military personnel and ship crews, before concluding that:


<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Scarcely any part of the British community is distinct from some personal  or collateral interest in the welfare of the East India Company.  <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

There was more than a grain of truth in what Plummer wrote, and by the beginning of the nineteenth century many interests across the country had been tied closely to the Company. This was particularly the case with the several thousand or so well-to-do individuals who chose to invest in Company stocks and bonds. For much of the eighteenth century East India stock was the most attractive investment available in the nascent stock market, not least because it always paid out an annual dividend of more than 5 per cent. The India bonds that provided the Company with its short-term working capital were also highly prized, with one early stock market analyst describing them as `the most convenient and profitable security a person can be possessed of'. The fortunes of Company and nation had become so tightly intertwined that they had begun to move in tandem with one another as those who took a broad view of political and economic matters were able to see. When the Company flourished, the nation flourished. Equally, as Edmund Burke put it, `to say the Company was in a state of distress was neither more nor less than to say the country was in a state of distress'. Such logic dictated that the effects of any crisis or catastrophe experienced by the Company in India would be deeply felt in Britain and the wider British Empire, and this was well understood by close observers of the imperial scene. One pamphleteer wrote in 1773 that the loss of India would occasion a `national bankruptcy' while the imperial theorist Thomas Pownall suggested that such an event would cause `the ruin of the whole edifice of the British Empire'. These concerns lay behind the increased levels of government anxiety about Company adventurism, misrule, and mismanagement in India that became evident after 1760.

Late eighteenth-century concerns about events in the East reflected the fact that the East India Company was no longer an ordinary trading company. It had evolved into an immensely powerful hybrid commercial and imperial agency, and after the conquest of Bengal it fundamentally reshaped its traditional commercial policy based upon the exchange of exported British goods and bullion for Asian commodities. Instead, the Company concentrated its efforts on the collection of territorial and customs revenues in northeast India. The right to collect these revenues had been granted by the Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II in 1765, an event which both confirmed British military supremacy in the region and served to elevate the Company to the position of de facto sovereign in Bengal and the neighbouring provinces of Bihar and Orissa. Thereafter, trade was used to facilitate the transfer of `tribute' from Asia to London as surplus revenue was ploughed into the purchase of Indian and Chinese commodities for export to Britain. As Edmund Burke later remarked, this marked a `revolution' in the Company's commercial affairs.

The Company's empire had now become self-financing to the point that further military expansion could be sustained, but it was also believed that generous payments could be made to domestic stockholders and the British government alike. This proved to be a vain hope, but the transfer of tribute helped to define the essential characteristics of the late-eighteenth-century state-Company relationship. Successive ministers declared the state's `right' to a share of the Bengal revenues, but in return for the promise of annual payments into the public treasury they allowed the Company to continue in its role as the administrator, defender and revenue collector of Bengal. This brought the British government the benefits of empire without any expensive administrative or military responsibilities. It was a welcome and convenient arrangement at a time when the national debt was spiralling ever-upwards and parts of the Empire, most notably North America, were proving increasingly difficult to control and subdue.

By the 1770s the Company thus found itself as something akin to a semi-privatised imperial wing of the Hanoverian state, with its operations being defined by the dual pursuit of both private and public interest. It was charged with the protection, cultivation, and exploitation of one of Britain's most important national assets, and contemporary observers described its new role accordingly. In 1773 the prime minister, Lord North, declared that the Company was acting as `[tax] farmers to the publick', while a late-century pamphleteer suggested that the Company had become `stewards to the state'. In this scheme of things, there was a greater need for the Company to become more accountable, efficient, and reliable, and this desire lay behind the reforms embodied in North's Regulating Act of 1773 and Pitt's India Act of 1784.

The Company's importance to the British state was not, however, simply to be assessed in terms of its role as the licensed agent through which metropolitan administrative, fiscal and military influences were brought to bear upon the Indian empire. The Company had been present at the birth of the eighteenth-century state during the troubled period following the `Glorious Revolution' of 1688-89. As a hard-pressed nation struggled to cope with the demands of the Nine Years' War, ministers had drawn heavily on the financial resources of the `new' East India Company that had received its charter in 1698. This meant that when the United Company was established in 1709 it was already deeply embedded in both the public finances and the City of London where, together with the Bank of England, it formed part of the `monied interest'.

The financial relationship between state and Company took several different forms, all of which were a variation on a theme that saw the Company's monopoly privileges periodically confirmed or extended by the Crown in return for loans or payments made to the public purse. Indeed, by the 1720s the entire paid-up share capital of the Company, almost 3.2 [pounds sterling] million, was on longterm loan to the state at 5 per cent interest. This sizeable advance was extended to 4.2 [pounds sterling] million before prime minister and chancellor Henry Pelham's restructuring of the national debt in 1749-50 saw the reduction of interest payments to 3 per cent and the creation of the East India annuities. This extensive underwriting of the post-settlement regime was such that a Chairman of the Company, Jacob Bosanquet, was later to borrow a phrase from Adam Smith and declare that the Company, together with the Bank of England, had become one of the `most powerful engines of the state'. As Chairman of a company under great pressure from critics by 1799, Bosanquet was hardly likely to say anything else, but his comments were not altogether inaccurate. His organisation had established itself as a cornerstone of the City of London, and as such it had played a key role in supporting the state and public credit.

By the end of the eighteenth century, apologists were thus arguing that the Company formed part of the very foundations of Britain's state and empire, yet within sixty years it had ceased to exist at all. What happened to make the great `engine' run out of steam so rapidly?

There are a great many answers to this question but the most basic one is undoubtedly the most important. Quite simply, in economic terms the Company failed to deliver what it had promised since the 1760s. As the military and administrative costs of empire multiplied, the Company proved itself unable to generate a revenue surplus for transfer to Britain. A great many attempts were made to remodel the Company's fiscal and commercial operations but successes in one area were always off-set by failures and setbacks elsewhere. Only the striking growth of the China tea trade offered the Company any prospect of success, but that in itself was not enough to satisfy the demands of profit-hungry stockholders and ministers. Indeed, the annual flow of `tribute' to the state Treasury promised by the Company in 1767 had dried up almost at once. By 1772 the Company was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy, having failed to master the complexities of its new role in India, and a degree of desperation forced it into the measures that ultimately led to the Boston Tea Party the following year. Thereafter, the Company staggered from crisis to crisis, requiring government loans to enable it to continue functioning. In effect, this meant that roles had been reversed, and the Company had become dependent upon the state for financial support.

A dose of economic reality, coupled with widespread metropolitan unease about `despotic' Company government in India, caused many commentators rapidly to reassess their views of Britain's eastern empire. Nowhere was this more evident than with Edmund Burke who became one of the Company's harshest critics and campaigned long and hard for reform and the punishment of British misdemeanours in India. Initially, though, Burke had been as captivated as any observer by the prospect of Britain gaining very real material advantage from the Company's successes in Bengal. He had outlined the economic potential of India to the House of Commons in 1769 before concluding that `The Orient sun never laid more glorious expectations before us.' This type of view was commonplace during the 1760s, but it was replaced by much gloomier assessments of the situation in the decades that followed. Commentators soon tired of hearing about the promise of Indian wealth being used to the advantage of the metropolis, and began instead to expose the flaws that were evident in the Company's calculations and methods. The figures did not seem to add up, leaving one MP, George Tierney, to complain that `Our Indian prosperity is always in the future tense'.

Criticism such as this only strengthened the case of those in Britain who were campaigning vigorously for the East India trade to be opened up to free competition. Just as the utility of the Company to the nation began to be discussed, old mercantilist assumptions about the organisation of trade were being called into question. Taking a lead from Adam Smith, who had condemned chartered companies as being `nuisances in every respect', critics exposed the Company to searching analyses of its methods and practices.

Under such attack, the Company proved unable, indeed almost unwilling, to answer the charges levelled against it. Although it began to emphasise the contribution it made to intellectual and scientific life in Britain, it failed to argue convincingly that it alone offered the best way forward for the further development of the Anglo-Asian connection. Part of the reason for this was that the Company believed it had already taken the organisation of its commercial and financial affairs to the highest possible level. It proved to be remarkably complacent and, together with a deep-rooted institutional conservatism, this meant that any change was regarded with the deepest suspicion. As one director of the Company put it, `Innovations in an established system are at all times dangerous'. Few friends of the Company could see any need to alter an organisation that was thought to be beyond improvement, and this case was restated time and again. Most would have agreed with Thomas Mortimer who argued during the 1760s that the Company had `brought the commerce and mercantile credit of Great Britain to such a degree of perfection, as no age or country can equal.' To alter anything would be to invite trouble. Sustained failure and. disappointing performance, however, flew in the face of such opinion, and this ensured that pressure for change continued to grow from outside the Company.

In the end, the Company's failure was essentially two-fold as far as many of those in the metropolis were concerned. It failed to deliver to Britain the great financial windfall that had been anticipated after the conquest of Bengal; and because of this it was unable to sustain much beyond 1760 its position as one of the major institutional and financial props of the Hanoverian state. When charges related to misrule, despotism, unfair monopoly practices and a host of other complaints were added to the scales, they served eventually to tip the balance of political opinion.

The immediate and outright abolition of the Company, however, was never an option because the state did not possess the resources, skills or will necessary to govern a large empire in India. Instead, successive breaches were made in the Company's commercial position. Trade with the East was opened up to a limited degree in 1793; the Indian monopoly was ended in 1813; and the exclusive trade with China was abolished in 1833. The Company survived for another twenty-five years as Britain's administrative and military representative in India, but by then it was a trading company in name only. The Company had achieved the full transition from trader to sovereign, amply fulfilling Adam Smith's prediction that trade and government were incompatible within a 'company of merchants'.

The Company ended its days in the aftermath of the Indian Mutiny when no case at all could be advanced for its survival in any form. Its powerful legacy endured in India for many more years in the form of the Indian army and civil service, but sight was soon lost of the importance of its contribution to the development of the metropolitan state and to imperial Britain itself. Today the Company has been almost entirely removed from the geographical and historical landscape and it has been more or less erased from our national consciousness. As the 400th anniversary of the founding of the Company approaches, this make it all the more necessary for us to reflect on the deep, but now hidden, impression left on British history by this quite extraordinary institution.

FOR FURTHER READING

H.V. Bowen, 'Investment and Empire in the Later Eighteenth Century: East India Stockholding, 1756-1791', Economic History Review (1989); K.N. Chaudhuri, The English East India Company: The Study of an Early Joint-Stock Company (Cass, 1965); John Keay, The Honourable Company: The History of the English East India Company (Harper Collins, 1991); Philip Lawson, The East India Company: A History (Macmillan, 1993); Martin Moir, A General Guide to the India Office Records (British Library, 1996); Jean Sutton, Lords of the East: The East India Company and its Ships (Conway Maritime Press, 1981). Information about the records of the East India Company can be found on the British Library's website http://www.bl.uk (follow the links to the Oriental and India Office collections).

Huw Bowen is Senior Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Leicester and the author of War and British Society 1688-1815 (Cambridge UP, 1998).

[ramana]

Jagmohan's second article from the Statesman, 2 Sept., 2005

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->  
 
INDIA’S PAST-II

Bright And Dark Sides Of The British Coin

By JAGMOHAN

Bright And Dark Sides Of The British Coin While the impact of British rule was salutary, in some respects, its negative fallout was deep and widespread. <b>During the 17th and 18th centuries, India was the agriculture mother of Asia and the industrial workshop of the world. John M Hobson, in his recent publication, The Eastern Origin of Western Civilisation, has significantly observed: “The two major industries of the British industrial revolution were cotton and iron/ steel. What is particularly striking here is that in both these industries, India led the way up to the 18th, if not the 19th century. India was well known for its production of Wootz steel which was exported to Persia, where it provided the foundation for the famous Damascus (Damask) steel”. </b>All this was destroyed by the British policy of “planned underdevelopment”.

Western materialism

The acquisitive and exploitative instincts, inherent in western materialism, propelled the British rulers to set up a mechanism by way of which Britain could become rich and powerful at the expense of Indian peasants and artisans. The raw material from India was taken away at cheap rates and the English industrial goods dumped here. India’s cottage industry was ruined. Her agriculture was oriented towards cotton, jute, oil seeds etc, which the British industry needed at home.
<b>India was badly impoverished. According to the research carried out by Radha Kamal Mukerjee with regard to the movement of the real wages between 1600 and 1900, the unskilled worker’s wage in Northern India was Rs 52 in 1850 and Rs 43 in 1903, taking year 1600 as a base. Another study showed that average per capita income in India, at 1948-49 prices, was Rs 169 in 1857. It rose to Rs 210 in 1876 and then declined to Rs 188 in 1900. The country was also visited by recurring famines. The British records themselves show that one million Indians died of famine between 1800 and 1825; four million between 1825 and 1850; five million between 1850 and 1875; and 15 million between 1875 and 1900. Thus, 25 million Indians died in one hundred years. </b>

There was quite a few other black spots on the canvas of the British regime. One such spot, for example, was the infamous incident that occurred on 13 April 1919, when Brig-General O’Dwyer ordered firing, without provocation, on an unarmed crowd, killing 379 persons and wounding another 1200. The firing just lasted 10 minutes. But in “those ten minutes, General Dyer had destroyed the trust in British justice and fairplay that had been built up over one and a half centuries. He shattered the myth of benevolent paternalism which had allowed a <b>tiny group of barely 1000 civil servants, backed up by sometimes as few as 15,000 British soldiers, to govern over 400 million Indians”. </b>

Communal quota

The unkindest cut of the British regime was the introduction of the principle of communal representation in the public services and legislature. From 1922, the practice of nominating In-dians from minority communities, who were unsuccessful at the examinations, was introduced. This development had the effect not only of undermining the purity and fairness of the selection process but also introduced a new loyalty — loyalty to one’s own community — in the machinery of governance. It was on account of this factor that by the mid-30s and early 40s, the ICS and other services had virtually got divided into two broad camps — sympathisers of the Congress and the sympathisers of the Muslim League. “By the autumn of 1946, all Indians in central government were either Congress, more or less, or League, more or less”. The Muslim members of the civil services were far more active; they extended covert, and sometimes overt, support to the idea of Pakistan. Some of them developed a close rapport with senior Muslim League leaders like Liquat Ali Khan and Sir Feroz Khan Noon.
It was mainly because of these unfavourable developments that the Indian Civil Service failed miserably in curbing the 1946-47 riots. In the circumstances then prevailing, no administration could have, perhaps, stopped the riots from occurring or killings taking place. But the extent to which the riots spread and the extent to which the killings, kidnappings, arson and looting were resorted to, exposed the rot that had set in the spaces within the “steel frame”. In no time, the machinery fell to pieces. As a young boy, I was myself a witness, in a small town of Hafizabad, to the horrible violence and massacre and of total collapse of every organ of the British Indian Administration.
Another abysmal failure of the governance machinery in the last phase of the British Raj in India was the Great Bengal Famine of 1942-44 which resulted in the death of two to four million people. A series of mis-judgments and inept handling by a complacent administration caused a grim human tragedy which reached its peak in 1943 when, ironically, Bengal was producing the largest rice crop in history. Even the official Famine Inquiry Commission (1945), which was rather soft on the authorities and understated the death toll, “indicted the Bengal government for administrative bungling and the Government of India for its failure to evolve an integrated food policy for the country as a whole”.

Historic lapses

The last years of the British governance in India were tragically inglorious. These were the years of blunders, miscalculations and lapses of truly historic proportion. The political and administrative governors of the time, by their acts of commission and omission, created chaos, confusion and human tragedies which have few parallels in the annals of mankind. These were the years in which the steel frame degenerated to the form of a moth-eaten bamboo structure.

<b>Clearly, the coin of the British Raj in India has two sides — one bright and the other dark. Truths of history demand that both these sides should be seen dispassionately and in depth. If we allow ourselves to be led astray by the “cunning passages” and “contrived corridors”, we would not only be doing violence to the purity of history’s soul but also running the risk of repeating all those mistakes which brought us slavery, economic ruin and division of the country. We would also be missing the opportunity of understanding the fundamental forces that cause good or bad governance.</b>

(Concluded)

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[ramana]

It just struck me that 2000 is the 400th anniversary of the East India Company. Link: East India Company

Also major resources on Indian history : MANAS resources on Indian History

[ramana]

jagmohan's first part from Statesman, Sept.,1, 2005
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->INDIA’S PAST-I Let Truth Be The Soul Of Our History

“History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors”, wrote TS Eliot in his celebrated poem, Gerontion. Has Dr Manmohan Singh been taken in by such “cunning passages” and walked through “contrived corridors”, while addressing Oxford University on 8 July 2005, or are his critics relying upon their own “cunning passages” and taking us to their “contrived corridors”?
If truth is to be the soul of history and if history has to serve as our guiding star for walking on the right path in the present as well as in the future, we have to look at it with clinical precision and objectivity. Passions, prejudices and predilections have no place in authentic and instructive history.
There is concrete evidence to show that, in many respects, the British Raj in India proved a blessing in disguise. Take, for example, the area of archaeology, history and literature. This area was served by such dedicated British stalwarts as Alexander Cunningham, James Burgess, John Marshall, Sir Mortimer Wheeler.

Asiatic Society
Their historic and pioneering work, coupled with equally historic and pioneering work of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, in discovering and translating Indian classics and deciphering inscriptions, such as those on Asokan pillars and rocks, resulted in the great past of India being dug out from the huge debris of its decadence.
The process began in the late 18th century. Dr Samuel Johnson, having understood the importance of the subject, advocated that the past of India should be systematically investigated. Warren Hastings, the then Governor-General, was no less keen. About the intrinsic worth of the ancient Indian thoughts, he had observed: “These would survive when the British dominion in India shall have long ceased to exist”. He described the translation of Bhagavad Gita as “the gain of humanity”.
A series of solid measures were, however, taken when Sir William Jones arrived on the scene. In September 1783, he was appointed a judge of the Calcutta Supreme Court. He gathered around him a band of dedicated scholars, and founded, on 15 January 1784, the Asiatic Society of Bengal. With the establishment of this society, a number of scholarly works were undertaken.
The hidden treasures were spotted, one by one. Sir William Jones himself translated Kalidasa’s Shakuntala. He also unfolded the history of Chandragupta Maurya by synchronising it with a stage of Greek history. Cole Brooke translated the Vedas and Wilkins the Bhagavad Gita. At the time the Society was set up, “little was known of India and that little was superficial and inaccurate”. But within a span of half a century, the Sanskrit language and literature became known all over and its range and richness dazzled the world.
Equally spectacular were the developments in the field of archaeology. James Prinsep deciphered the Asokan inscriptions and solved the tangle of Kharoshthi and Brahmi scripts. His epigraphic and numismatic techniques produced remarkable results. Charles Wilkins laid the foundation for epigraphical studies. Captain E Fell discovered the Sanchi Stupa and Erskine brought to light the excellence of Ajanta caves and their paintings.

Archaeological treasures
With the appointment of Alexander Cunningham as the first Archaeological Surveyor of India in 1861, a great upswing in exploration was witnessed and many historic cities and sites, like Taxila and fortress of Sangala, associated with the invasion of Alexander the Great, were identified. His successor, Dr James Burgess, made a significant contribution in the form of many publications. For Lord Curzon, preservation of the archaeological treasures was a passion: “As a pilgrim at the shrine of beauty I have visited them, but as a priest in the temple of duty have I charged myself with their reverent custody and their studied repair”.
John Marshall, who was appointed Director-General of Archaeological Survey of India in 1902, was as passionate a lover of Indian Archaeology as Lord Curzon. He remained in his post till 1928. During these 26 years, a large number of sites, including Nalanda, Vaishali, Pataliputra, Taxila and pre-historic towns of Mohanjodaro and Harappa, were unearthed, resulting in a revolutionary change in the entire perspective of Indian history. About Marshall’s contribution, it has been appropriately remarked: “He left India about 3,000 years older than he had found it”.
No less remarkable was the contribution made by members of the Indian Civil Service. Vincent Smith, who served as chief secretary, in the United Provinces, produced outstanding works of history, such as the Early History of India (1904) and the Oxford History of India (1919). Earlier, Mount Stuart Elphinstone, with his publication of History of India (1841) had made his mark as a historian. His eminence can be judged from the fact that he was called the Tacitus of Modern History. Brian Houghton Hodgson did pioneering work in exploring the natural history of the Himalayan region and studying Buddhist religion, customs and language. AO Hume, who earned the name of Pope of Ornithology, carried out his classic research on Asiatic birds. There were many other monumental works in diverse fields of religion, linguistics, economics and rural life.
All these discoveries acted as a tonic on the Indian mind, jolted the sleeping giant, injecting new confidence in him and making him think about the great products of his past and his potential for the future. Activated further by the contact with Western liberalism and scientific spirit, the Indian mind created new social and cultural forces which brought about the great Renaissance of the later 19th century and early 20th century.
In view of these facts, it would be churlish to deny that in enabling India to rediscover the greatness of her past and create a new mindscape, the British scholars and civil servants played a significant part. To all of them, India owes a deep debt.
We should also not forget the miserable conditions of India when the East India Company started establishing its hegemony over the affairs of the country. Jadunath Sarkar, the noted historian, has observed: “The country could not defend itself; royalty was hopelessly depraved or imbecile; the nobles were selfish and short-sighted; corruption, inefficiency and treachery disgraced all branches of the public service. In the midst of this decay and confusion, our literature, art and even true religion had perished”.

Plunder of Delhi
The degeneration had gone on to such an extent that Nadir Shah in 1739 and Ahmed Shah in 1757 were able to plunder Delhi with impunity and take away practically its entire wealth. The former slaughtered about 20,000 innocent Delhi citizens in a single day.
After the initial period of maladministration which was passionately denounced by the humanists like Edmund Burke, the British rulers built a steel frame of governance, the control mechanism of which rested with the Indian Civil Service — a service which justifiably earned for itself the reputation of being best in the world. It provided complete peace and unified the country through a vast network of roads, railways, post offices. Most members of the service displayed an enlightened attitude, and dispensed evenhanded justice. They came to be looked upon as ma-baap of the common folk.
Their work was not, as is commonly believed, confined merely to law and order. It extended to development. For example, the irrigation schemes, woven around the Chenab and Jhelum rivers, and setting up of a number of canal colonies, were remarkable projects of development which were carried out speedily and efficiently under the outstanding leadership of civil servants like Sir Alfred and James Lyall and Sir Malcolm Hailey. Their contribution led to what has appropriately been called the blossoming of the wilderness.

(To be concluded)



The author is a former Union minister
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Not to mention Sir Aurtur Cotton in Andhra. Question is Sri Jag Mohan not aware of the origins of the canal projects in Punjab?

[ramana]

From Pioneer, 12 September 2005
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Gandhi, Jinnah were mere pawns

Arendra Singh Sarila is a former diplomat and heir to the princely state of Sarila


<b>What are the hidden facts that your book The Untold Story of India's Partition talks about?  </b> 

* My book delves into the deep secrets that historians and political analysts failed to unearth. It talks of the crucial link between India's Partition and the fears of the British about the erstwhile USSR gaining control of the oil wells of the Middle East. It is on how when the British realised that Indian leaders would not join them in their game against the Soviet Union that they used those who were willing to do so. The British used Islam as a political tool to fulfil their objectives and partitioned India.

<b>So you believe that it wasn't the political leaders but the British who called for the Partition? </b>
* Absolutely. All our leaders, be it Gandhi or Jinnah, were merely pawns. They could not look through the real motive of the British who had sown the seed of division in 1906 by establishing separate electorates. Our leaders just played into their hands. Why else should an ardent nationalist like Jinnah turn communal and why should Gandhi who believed in Independence through cooperation start the non-cooperation movement? My book talks about all this.

<b>Where did you find the details?</b>

* All this is well documented. I have both British and American documents that have come up during my research over the years.

<b>As the ADC of Lord Mountbatten did you have access to extra  information?</b>

* I was too young at that point. But yes, I remember meeting leaders at that time and that helped me form perceptions regarding their personalities. Also, after Mountbatten retired, I often visited his home where we sat and discussed issues. That gave me a lot of insight. Such information is not easily available to others.

Tavishi Paitandy
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[acharya]

http://www.asiaticsocietycal.com/history/index.htm

WHEN THE ASIATIC SOCIETY was established on 15 January 1784, its founder Sir William Jones (1746-1794) began his work with a dream, that visualised a centre for Asian studies including almost everything concerning man and nature within the geographical limits of the continent. Most of the mysteries of this vast land, like its old inscriptions in Brahmi, were still undeciphered, and Comparative Philology as a discipline or science was not yet born.

In the early days of the Asiatic Society, William Jones for all his efforts could not procure even a slice of land wherein to house his dream. The Society which in no time was to be regarded as the first and best of its kind in the whole world had no permanent address, no fixed place for holding its meetings and, which was most disconcerting, no funds.

Sir William Jones, an outstanding scholar from Oxford, arrived in Calcutta on 25 September 1783 as a Puisne Judge of the Old Supreme Court. While still on board of the frigate Crococlile carrying him from England to India, he prepared a memorandum detailing his plan of study. This included “the laws of the Hindus and Mahomedans; the history of the ancient world; proofs and illustrations of scripture; traditions concerning the deluge; modern politics and geography of Hindusthan; Arithmatic and Geometry and mixed sciences of Asiaticks; Medicine, Chemistry, Surgery and Anatomy of the Indians; natural products of India; poetry, rhetoric and morality of Asia; music of the Eastern nations; the best accounts of Tibet and Kashmir; trade, manufactures, agriculture and commerce of India: Mughal constitution, Marhatta constitution etc." This memorandum could easily be regarded as an early draft of the memorandum of the Asiatic Society itself. The Society which was still in the imagination of Jones was actually founded within four months of his arrival in India.

William Jones was, however, not the earliest among the Orientalists of the East India Company to arrive in India. About a decade earlier came Charles Wilkins (1770), Nathaniel Brassey Halhed (1772) and Jonathan Duncan (1772):Warren Hastings's "bright young men",who had paved the way for the two future institutions- The Asiatic Society and the College at Fort William. All the Orientalists who became famous in history clustered around either the Society or the College or both. The Society, of course, was the pioneer and first in the field.

While others were thinking in terms of individual study and research, Sir William Jones was the first man to think in terms of a permanent organisation for Oriental studies and researches on a grand scale in this country. He took the initiative and in January 1784 sent out a circular letter to selected persons of the elite with a view to establishing a Society for this purpose. In response to his letter, thirty European gentlemen of Calcutta including Mr. Justice John Hyde, John Carnac, Henry Vansittart, John Shore, Charles Wilkins, Francis Gladwin, Jonathan Duncan and others gathered on 15 January 1784 in the Grand Jury Room of the old Supreme Court of Calcutta. The Chief Justice Sir Robert Chambers presided at the first meeting and Jones delivered his first discourse in which he put forward his plans for the Society.

Asia, he said, was the "nurse of sciences" and the "inventress of delightful and useful arts." He proposed to found a Society under the name of The Asiatic Society. All the thirty European gentlemen who had assembled accepted the membership of this Society. The name went through a number of changes like The Asiatic Society (1784-1825), The Asiatic Society (1825-1832), The Asiatic Society of Bengal (1832-1935), The Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal (1936-1951) and The Asiatic Society again since July 1951.

In the first meeting, the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, a scholar and patron of learning, was elected its fist President and Sir William Jones the Vice-President. Warren Hastings greatly sympathized with the aims and objects of the Society. But he declined to continue in this post. On his request and advice Sir William Jones was elected President of the Society on 5 February 1784 and held this post till his death in 1794. The Memorandum of Articles of Society read as follows: "The bounds of its investigations will be the geographical limits of Asia,and within these limits its enquiries will be extended to whatever is performed by MAN or produced by NATURE." Later, in his famous Third Annual Discourse, Jones emphasised the superiority of Sanskrit as a language: "The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure, more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin and more exquisitely refined than either."

The pioneering activity of the Society was praised abroad and even compared with that of the Italian Humanists of the quattrocento. But the first two decades of the Society's existence remained precarious. The original plan of holding meetings every week had to be discarded, and even monthly meetings were not possible. When William Jones died in 1794, till then the Society did not own any premise nor it had any assured funds to defray normal running expenses, not to speak of having in its proud possession, as it has today, an invaluable Asokan rock edict or precious old coins.

Building
In 1805 the Government gifted to the Society a plot of land at the corner of Park Street and Chowringhee, the present site of the Asiatic Society, to which was added later, in 1849, a small portion on the western side. The construction of the Society's own building on the plot was completed in 1808, and the books, papers and records that had accumulated over the years could get a permanent shelter. Years rolled on, and with the expansion of the activities of the Society the problem of accommodation was acutely felt. But no solution was forthcoming till after India's Independence. As late as 1961, with the generous help extended by the Government of India and the Government of West Bengal, the construction of a new building was started in the premises of the Society to solve the problem of space, and the new four-storeyed building was formally opened by Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, the then President of India, on 22 February 1965.

Membership
Membership of the Society for many years remained exclusively European, and only in January 1829, on the suggestion of Dr. Horace Hayman Wilson, Secretary of the Asiatic Society, Indian members were for the first time admitted to the Society. The earliest Indian members of the Society were Prasanna Kumar Tagore, Dwarkanath Tagore, Russamay Dutt and Ram Camul Sen. It was not until December 1832 that Radhakanta Deb was invited to become a member. Rajendra Lal Mitra (1822-1891) assumed responsibility as the first Indian President of the Society in 1885.

Organisation
In the beginning, the Society was very loosely organised and had no real Executive Body. It had only two important functionaries: a President who conducted meetings, and a Secretary who kept the minutes. After Jones's death the interest of the members declined considerably and in 1800 a resolution had to be passed urging members to attend meetings more regularly. Financial conditions were so bad, and there were so many defaulters among the members, that the first Treasurer of the Society, Henry Trail resigned in desperation in 1799. But after the turn of the century things began to look up.


The publication of the Books became assured when Hunter's Hindoostan Press took up its printing responsibility. Ram Comal Sen, the 'native' manager of Hunter's Press, later on became the 'native' Secretary of the Asiatic Society itself. In 1846, two years after Ram Comal Sen's death, Rajendralal Mitra, then a young man, joined the Asiatic Society as its Assistant Librarian. The Indian Renaissance was made possible and in fact was accelerated by the quiet but far-reaching work going on at the corner of Park Street despite all odds and adverse circumstances.

In 1808 two Committees were formed, the Physical Committee and the Library Committee, the former for the promotion of Natural History, Medicine, Physics etc. and the latter for that of Literature, Philosophy, History, Antiquities etc. William Carey, J. Leyden, A. Lockett and W. Hunter were included in both the Committees. Both these Committees went moribund in no time and the Physical Committee had to be revived in 1818 by a resolution. A new chapter of the Society opened when in 1829 its membership was made open to native Indians. Ram Comal Sen, one of the earliest Indian members of the Society and a close friend of Wilson, the then Secretary, recalled his twenty nine years with the Society when he accepted the post of ‘native’ Secretary, and Wilson appointed Ram Comal to his new post only seven days before the Special Meeting of the Society in which he announced his departure for England. At this Special Meeting held on 19 December 1833 the President of the Society, Sir Edward Ryan spoke highly of the services rendered by Wilson to the Society.

In 1837, only four years after Wilson's departure, James Prinsep, the new Secretary of the Society, deciphered the Brahmi Script and was able to read the Asokan Edicts. It was a world event that revolutionised all future Oriental studies and contributed to the growth of Comparative Philology.

The Transactions of the Asiatic Society were first published under the title of Asiatick Researches in 1788, the subsequent four volumes being published in 1790, 1793, 1795 and 1797 respectively. At first the publication was private, undertaken by Manual Cantopher on the condition that each member of the Society would purchase one volume at a price of Rs. 20. Later on, the Society itself undertook the responsibility of the publication. The publication Asiatick Researches was so much in demand in the literary and scholarly world that a pirated edition of the first volume came into circulation in England in 1798, and some of the volumes of the Asiatick Researches were translated into German as well as in French. Through its published Transactions the Society now came in touch with several distinguished scholarly Associations abroad such as the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, the Linnean Society of London, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and the Society of Antiquities of England.


The Society also proved to be a pivotal centre of Oriental studies and research and extended extended its helping hand to the other two major centres of activity that paved the way to the Indian Renaissance, namely, the College at Fort William and the Serampore Mission of William Carey. In 1805 a proposal came to the Asiatic Society from the Serampore Mission to publish classical Sanskrit works with their English translations, and the first book chosen for this was the Sanskrit epic, Ramayana. For this purpose the Society spent from its fund five thousand and five hundred rupees. From 1788 till its cessation in 1839 the journal Asiatic Researches ran into twenty volumes and was superseded by the Journal of the Asiatic Society, henceforth the official organ of the Society. The Society also started in 1905 a new serial entitled the Memoirs which was discontinued in 1933. The nucleus of the Society's own library was formed soon after the building was completed in 1808. The Fort William College which was helped a lot academically by the Society, presented books to the Society from its own collection, and another valuable collection of books came from the Palace Library of Tipu Sultan in 1808.

The Society also started a public museum under its own auspices in 1814 and its first Superintendent was Dr. Nathaniel Wallich. Some of the famous contributions of the Asiatic Society during the first thirty years are as follows:

William Jones's Third Annual Discourse in 1788 on Indo-European Language and Culture;

Charles Wilkins's 'A Royal Grant of Land on a Copper Plate' in 1788;

S. Davis's 'On Astronomical Calculations of the Hindus' in 1795;

H. T. Colebrooke's 'On the Duties of a Faithful Hindu Widow' in 1795;

J. Duncan's 'Discovery of Two Urns in the Vicinity of Benares' in 1797;

H. T. Colebrooke's 'On the Vedas' in 1805;

J. Malcolm's 'Sketch of the Sikhs' in 1810;

F. Wilford's 'On the Ancient Geography of India' in 1815 and

E. Strachey's 'On Early History of Algebra' in 1816.

It may be mentioned that two decades before Ram Mohan Roy's first tract on Sati it was H. T. Colebrooke who proved from the early texts that the practice of Sati was a gross deviation from the authentic tradition. The founding fathers of the Asiatic Society were responsible for the rediscovery of India and her past.

Sir Charles Wilkins (1750-1833) translated the Bhagavadgita into English in 1785, deciphered a number of Sanskrit inscriptions published a translation of Hitopadesa (1787) and a Grammar of the Sanskrit Language. Sir William Jones translated Kalidasa's Abhijnana books (1789), Jayadeva's Gitagovinda (1789) and Manusamhita (1794), and edited Ritusamhara (1792). Jones also translated a Persian work Laila Majnu. The works initiated by Wilkins and Jones were continued by Colebrooke (1765-1837) and Wilson (1786-1860). Colebrooke was the President of the Society from 1806 to 1815 and contributed nineteen papers to the Transactions of the Society. He published an English translation of Jagannath Tarkapanchanan's celebrated work on Hindu law, the Vivadabhangarnava under the title Digest of Hindu Law on Contracts and Successions (1798). He also published a critical edition of the Sanskrit lexicon Amarakosha (1808). Wilson was Secretary of the Asiatic Society from 1811 to 1832 and published Kalidasa's Meghaduta (1813) and translated eighteen principal Puranas into English. He also published an edition of Kalhana's Rajatarangini (1825).Wilson’s work entitled Select specimen of the Theatre of the Hindus published in 3 big volume in 1827 was translated into German and French languages. Sir John Shore (1751-1834) who succeeded William Jones as President of the Society in 1794, published from a Persian version an abridged English translation of the Yoga Vasistha and contributed six papers to the Asiatic Researches. Alexander Csoma de Koros’s Grammar of Tibetan Language was published in 1834. Most of the works of the Society are research-based and research-oriented, and have not been loudly spectacular. But its publication, the Books, consisting of a series of several hundred Oriental texts in Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Bengali, Tibetan and other Asian languages, both in original and translation, has earned the Society a rare reputation among scholars all over the world. Its Monographs were supplemented by several new series such as Public Lectures, Monthly Bulletins, Seminar Proceedings, Memorial Lectures and Memoirs (1905-33). These are in addition to the Society's Journal, Journal of the Asiatic Society, formerly, Asiatic Researches (1788-1849), Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (1832-1904), Proceedings of the Asiatic Society (1865-1904), Journal and the Proceedings of the Asiatic Society (1905-1934), Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (1935-1952) and Journal of the Asiatic Society (since 1953). A cursory glance at the contents of the Books will show how great many historical Monographs and Oriental studies, all fruits of original research, were brought out in them. Archaeological and Geological surveys, census reports, treatises on law and revenue systems, all these prepared the solid basis for all future researches on Asia and the Orient.


COPYRIGHT:© 2004 THE ASIATIC SOCIETY, 1 PARK STREET KOLKATA: 700 016, INDIA ALL RIGHT RESERVED

[acharya]

Chinese Sources of South Asian History in Translation :
Data for Study of India-China Relations through Ages, Vol. I by Haraprasad Roy: Rs: 400.00

The Endangered Earth: Role of India; By A P Mitra : Rs 250.00

Gitagovinda O Bharat-Samskrti(Gitagovinda and Indian Culture): Rs 100.00

History & Doctrines of the Wahhabis by Abdullah :
translated into English by J.O.Kinealy; Rs 180.00

Russian Artists in India: by Ekaterina Zozulya: Rs 720.00

Asia: Land and People, Vol 1 Part-II
ed. by Ajit Kumar Danda, Sunil Kumar munsi, Amitabha Basu, Saradindu Bose; Rs 1500.00

A selection of pioneering research Papers of the Journal of the Asiatic Society on geology and Physics
Complied & edited by Sunil Sen Sarma ; Rs 360.00

Journal of The Asiatic Society

Volume XLV, No 3, 2003 Rs 50.00
Volume XLV, No 4, 2003 Rs 50.00
Volume XLVI, No 1, 2004 Rs 50.00

[acharya]

http://www.asiaticsocietycal.com/research-...ities/index.htm


RESEARCH & ACTIVITIES

Home | Ongoing External Projects | Project Work

BOTH IN HUMANITIES AND SCIENCE, The Asiatic Society took the leadership in initiating genuine researches on western lines. There is no field, which was not touched by the Society, and Transactions and journals of the Society were the mirror of these researches. The pages of these publications speaks eloquently of the range and depth of these studies covering Mathematical and Physical Sciences including Meteorology, tidal observations, laws of storms, Geology both Stratigraphical and Dynamical, Mineralogy, Zoology, Botany including Palaeo-Botany, Geography, Ethnology, Chemistry, etc.

The Society remained the chief advisory body to the Government of India in matters relating to all kinds of scientific subjects. It was the initial activities of The Asiatic Society in different branches of Science the led to the foundation of the Trigonometrical Survey of India in 1818, the Geological Survey of India in 1851 the Indian Metrological Department in 1875, the Zoological Survey of India in 1911, the Botanical Survey of India in 1912 and so on. Many other distinguished scientific institutions and organizations were possible because of the help of the Society at their inception. Some of these are the Indian Science Congress (estd. 1913), the School of Tropical Medicine, The University of Calcutta ( estd. 1857) whose first Vice-Chancellor was the President of The Asiatic Society, Chief Justice Sir J W Colvile. Even the Indian National Academy of Sciences and its preparation of a national history of Scientific Studies



Year PRESIDENTS SECRETARIES
1784-89 Sir William Jones George Hillarow Harlow , John Herbert Harington
1790 Sir William Jones John Herbert Harrington
1790(end)-1793 Sir William Jones Edmund Morris
1794-95 Sir John Shore Edmund Morris
1796 Sir John Shore Captain Symes
1797 Sir John Shore C E Carrington
1799 Sir J Ansturther Bart W Hunter
1802 Sir J Ansturther Bart R Home
1805 Sir J Ansturther Bart W Hunter
1807 H T Colebrooke W Hunter
1810 H T Colebrooke , Eari of Moira Dr. W Hunter, Dr. H H Wilson
1820 Marquis of Hastings H H Wilson (absent), Capt. A Lockett (Offg.)
1822 Maquis of Hastings H H Wilson
1825 Hon'ble J H Harrington W W Wilson
1828 Sir C E Grey H H Wilson
1832 Hon. Sir E Ryan W H Wilson
1833 Hon. Sir E Ryan James Prinsep, Babu Ramcomal Sen (First Indian Secretary
1834 Hon. Sir E Ryan J Prinsep, Ramcomal Sen
1835-37 Hon. Sir E Ryan Babu Ramcomal Sen
1838 Hon. Sir E Ryan James Prinsep
1839 Hon. Sir E Ryan Dr W B O'Shaughnessy, J C C Sutherland
1840-41 Hon. Sir E Ryan H W Torrens
1842 Hon. H T Prinsep H W Torrens
1843 Hon. H T Prinsep Rt. Hon. W W Bird (from 30th March), H W Torrens,
W Piddington
1844 W W Bird, Hon. Sir Hernry Hardinge (from October) Hon. Sir Henry Hardinge (from October),
H W Torrens, W Piddington
1845 Hon. Sir Henry Hardinge H W Torrens, W Piddington
1846 As in 1844 H W Torrens, Dr W B O'Shanghnessy (appointed in August), Mr J W Laidlay (appointed Co-Secretary in November), Dr Roer as Co-Secy, Oriental Dept.
1847 As in 1844 J W Laidlay
1848-50 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. Dr. W B O'Shanghnessy
1851 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. Capt. F C C C Hayes, Dr A Sprenger (Elected in place of Capt. Hayes in May, in consequence of change made in the organisation of the Council, another election was held in June with the following results :
1852 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. Dr A Sprenger A Grote (Elected Jt. Sec. in April HV Bayley
1853-55 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. A Grote
1856 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. W S Atkinson
1857 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. S S Atkinson, R Mitra
1858 Hon. Sir J W Colvile, Kt. W S Atkinson, W B Cowell
1859-62 A Grote W S Atkinson, W B Cowell
1863 Lt. Col. W L Thuillier (resigned in April)
W S Atkinson (resigned in August)
E C Bayley (elected in September) E B Cowell (resigned in July),
H F Blanford (elected in August)
1864 E C Bayley H F Blanford, W L Heeley, H F Blanford
W L Helley ( in July on resignation of the two secretaries, R Mitra and Dr J Anderson came in.)
1866 E C Bayley H F Blanford
1867 Dr J Fayrer H F Blanford
1868 Dr T Oldham H F Blanford
1869 Dr T Oldham H Blochmann
1870-72 Hon. J B Phear H Blochmann
1873 Dr T Oldham In April, Col. H Hyde resigned as Secy.
Capt. J Waterhouse
1874 In April, Col. H. Hyde was elected President in place of Dr. T Oldham Capt. J Waterhouse
1875 Hon. E C Bayley
In April,Dr. Oldham was elected President In April, Dr. Oldham resigned as he was elected President, Capt. J waterhouse
1876 Dr T Oldham Capt. J waterhouse
1877 Hon. Sir E C Bayley Capt. J waterhouse
1878 W T Blanford Capt. J waterhouse
1879 W T Blanford
H B Medlicott since December H B Medlicott succeeded W T Blanford in December
Capt. J Waterhouse
1880 H B Medlicott J Crawford
1881 Hon. Sir Ashley Eden A Pedder
1882 Hon. Sir Ashley Eden
In May, Hon. H J Reynolds succeeded Sir Eden In May, Hon. H J Reynolds succeeded Sir Eden
Dr H W M'Cann
1883 Hon. J J Reynolds Dr H W M'Cann
1884 H F Blanford L. De Nice'Ville
1885 Dr. Rajendra Lala Mitra (First Indian President) J Wood-Mason
1886-87 E F T Atkinson J Wood-Mason
1888 J Waterhouse J Wood-Mason
1889 J Waterhouse Dr A R Hoernle
1890 F W Beveridge Dr A R Hoernle
1891-92 Sir A W Croft Dr A R Hoernle
1893 Sir C A Elliott G A Grierson
1894 C J Lyall G A Grierson
1895-96 A Pedder G A Grierson
1897 Dr A F R Hoernle Dr G Ranking
1898 Hon'ble H H Risley Dr G Ranking
1899 Hon'ble H H Risley T Bloch
1900-01 Sir John Woodburn T Bloch
1902-03 C W Bolton J Macfarlane
1904 C W Bolton J Macfarlane
1905 Sir A H L Fraser J Macfarlane
1906 Sir A H L Fraser Lt. Col. D. C. Phillott.
1907-08 Justice Asutosh Mukhopadhyay Lt. Col. D. C. Phillott.
1909 Sir Thomas Holland G H Tipper
1910 T H Diggs La Touche G H Tipper
1911-12 G F A Harris G H Tipper
1913 Thomas Daird Baron Carmichael G H Tipper
1914 Thomas Daird Baron Major C L Peart
1915-16 Sir Leonard Rogers F H Gravely
1917-18 H H Hayden F H Gravely
1919-20 Mm Hara Prasad Sastri W A K Christie
1921 Justice Asutosh Mikhopadhyay A H Harley
1922 Justice Asutosh Mikhopadhyay W A K Christie
1923 N Annandale J.van Manen
1924-25 Sir Rajendranath Mookherjee J.van Manen
1926 G H Tipper J.van Manen
1927 W A K Christie J.van Manen
1928-29 Dr. Upendranath Brahmachari J.van Manen
1930-31 R BN Seymour Sewell J.van Manen
1932 Justice C C Ghose J.van Manen
1934-35 L L Fermor J.van Manen
1936 Sir John Anderson J.van Manen
1937 Sir John Anderson Dr B S Guha
1938-39 Sir David Ezra Dr B S Guha
1940 Justice John Lort Williams Dr B S Guha
1941 Dr C S Fox Dr S L Hora
1942-44 Dr Shyamaprasad Mookherjee Dr Kalidas Nag
1945 Dr Meghnad Saha Dr Kalidas Nag
1946 Justice N G A Edgley Dr Kalidas Nag
1947 Dr B C Law Dr K N Bagchi
1948 Dr D West, Justice Ramaprasad Mookherjee Dr K N Bagchi
1949-50 Justice Ramaprasad Mookherjee Dr Niharranjan Ray
1951-53 Prof S K Mitra, F R S Prof J M Sen
1953-55 Prof S K Chatterji Prof J M Sen
1955-57 Dr D M Bose Dr M L Roychaudhury
1957-59 Dr S N Sen Dr J N Banerjea
1959-61 Dr N Dutta Dr J N Banerjea
1961-62 Dr A C Ukil Prof S K Saraswati
1963 Dr U N Ghoshal Dr P C Gupta
1964-65 Dr K N Bagchi Dr P C Gupta
1966 Prof R C Majumdar Prof C Chakraborti
1967 Prof R C Majumdar Dr S K Mitra
1968-69 Prof S N Bose Dr S K Mitra
1970-71 Prof S K Chatterji Prof B N Mukherjee
1972 Prof N K Bose (upto October), M M Basu (upto December), Dr B Mukhberjee (Dec. "72-Jan '73) Dr S K Mitra
1973-74 Dr B Mukherji Dr S K Mitra
1975 Prof . K Saraswati Sri D K Mitra
1976 Prof . K Saraswati Dr B Banerjee
1977-78 Dr Gouri Nath Sastri Prof Dilip Coomer Ghose
1979 Dr D Bose Prof J N Rudra, Dr Amalendu De from 14/11/79
1980 Dr D Bose Dr Amalendu De
1981-82 P C Gupta Dr Amalendu De
1983 S N Sen, Dr R K Pal Dr Chandan Roychaudhuri
1984 Dr R K Pal Dr Chandan Roychaudhuri
1985 Dr Sukumar Sen Dr Chandan Roychaudhuri
1986 Dr Sukumar Sen Dr Jagannath Chakraborty
1987 Dr M M Chakraborty Dr Kalyan Kumar Ganguly
1988-92 (Administrators appointed by Calcutta High Court)
1992-96 (No election held) Dr M M Chakraborty Dr Chandan Raychaudhuri
1997 Prof Dilip Kumar Biswas Prof Amalendun De
1998 Prof Dilip Kumar Biswas Prof Anil Kumar Sarkar
1999 Prof Bhaskar Roychowdhury Prof Anil Kumar Sarkar
2000 Prof Bhaskar Roychowdhury Prof Manabendu Banerji
2001 Prof Biswanath Banerji Prof Manabendu Banerji
2002 Prof Amalendu De Prof Dilip Coomer Ghose
2003 Prof Amalendu De Prof Dilip Coomer Ghose
2004 Prof Biswanath Banerji Prof Dilip Coomer Ghose



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Labor, Governance, and the Information Age

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Before the British came, India was one of the richest countries in the world. When the British left in 1947, India was poor and industrially backward. Indian politicians blamed this on colonial exploitation. They claimed Britain had extracted large surpluses from India, and forced it into a free-trade pattern which obliged India to export commodities and become a dumping ground for British manufactures. Historians estimate that the net transfer of capital from India to Britain averaged 1.5 percent of GNP in the late nineteenth century. The wealth transfer was financed by a persistent trade surplus. India’s export-import ratio was 172.5 percent in 1840-69, 148 percent in 1870-1912, and 133.4 percent in 1913-38. Indian politicians interpreted this to mean that export orientation was a tool of colonial exploitation, and free trade a British ploy to force its manufactures on India and crush domestic industry.
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Any links/reference to the wealth looted from India during the Brits rule? Dadabhai Naoroji had done some writings on this subject, can't seem to find it online.

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Any links/reference to the wealth looted from India during the Brits rule?<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I took lot of pictures in UK and Austria from different museums.

[Guest]

Mudy: We hear reports now and then of how the Brits shamelessly hold exhibitions of diamonds/jewels/statues looted from India without given credit where it's due.

However lot of evidence is annecdotal and not published (at least I didn't find online). I was looking in terms of some sort of economic study or GDP/GNP numbers going back say 300 years - I am not sure if it was even recorded then. I've searched InfinityFoundation essays too and didn't find much.

Couple weeks back I was having a conversation with a friend (American) who's a bit of history buff. While doing a compare/contrast of the Amercian war of independence with our own, he mentioned that Brits valued India as it's crown jewel and were not willing to loose it for US. Seems that they didn't dedicate enough resources to squash the rebellion in US and that was a primary reason bluecoats were able to drive out the redcoats within a decade or so. I don't know as to how true this is, others on the fourm might know more. Would be a good exercise to get the timelines, local battles, events, economic numbers in the period between 1750 to say 1850 and check it out.

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--> I was looking in terms of some sort of economic study or GDP/GNP numbers going back say 300 years -<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Some information are available in "Clash of Civilization by Sam Huntington" and Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World by Mike Davis".

I will try to locate website where some data are available.