Course: Pakistan Studies Core

Topic: British Colonial Policy

Towards India
Presented To:
Presented By: Kanwal Hassan
Major : International Relations
Semester: 2
Date:16th February 2010
India and Pakistan were under British colonial rule for nearly 200
years.

In the early 16th century, Portuguese rule was established on the

West coast of India at Goa. But the Portuguese did not succeed in
moving deep into the country, their domination remained confined to
the coastal periphery. It was only the British who managed to take on
the mantle of administering the country from the Mughals.

After several attempts to open trade with a powerful ruler of India

failed in the earliest years of the 1600s, King James I of England sent
a personal envoy, Sir Thomas Roe, to the court of the Mogul emperor
Jahangir in 1614.
The emperor was incredibly wealthy and lived in an opulent palace.
And he was not interested in trade with Britain as he couldn't imagine
the British had anything he wanted.

Roe, recognizing that other approaches had been too subservient, was
deliberately difficult to deal with at first. He correctly sensed that
earlier envoys, by being too accommodating, had not gained the
emperor's respect. Roe's stratagem worked, and the East India
Company was able to establish operations in India.

But the British ascendency which began with the battle of Plassey in
1757, did represent the beginning of the end of feudalism in India. The
century from 1757 to 1857 was the transitory stage from feudalism to
the modern era. Thus in Hindustan, the decline of feudalism did not
entirely come about due to its internal decay it was largely mediated
through the intervention of European colonialism.

But the decline of feudalism was facilitated by the general confusion

that prevailed in the country after the eclipse of the Mughal empire
as the executive authority of the country. Though the Mughal Empire
did survive till 1857, its heyday can be considered to have come to an
end in 1707, with the death of Aurangzeb.
The Mogul Empire was in a state of collapse by the 1720s. Other
European powers were competing for control in India, and sought
alliances with the shaky states that inherited the Mogul territories.

The East India Company established its own army in India, which was
composed of British troops as well as native soldiers called sepoys.

The British interests in India, under the leadership of Robert Clive,

gained military victories from the 1740s onward, and with the Battle
of Plessey in 1757 were able to establish dominance.

The East India Company gradually strengthened its hold, even

instituting a court system. British citizens began building an
"Anglo-Indian" society within India, and English customs were
adapted to the climate of India.
The British rule in India became known as "The Raj," which was derived
from the Sanskrit term raja meaning king. The term did not have
official meaning until after 1858, but it was in popular usage many
years before that.

Incidentally, a number of other terms came into English usage during

The Raj: bangle, dungaree, khaki, pundit, seersucker, jodhpurs, cushy,
pajamas, and many more.

British merchants could make a fortune in India and would then

return home, often to be derided by those in British high society as
"nabobs," the title for an official under the Moguls.

Tales of life in India fascinated the British public, and exotic Indian
scenes, such as a drawing of an elephant fight, appeared in books
published in London in the 1820s.
The Indian Rebellion of 1857, which was also called the Indian Mutiny,
or the Sepoy Mutiny, was a turning point in the history of Britain in
India.
The traditional story is that Indian troops, called sepoys, mutinied
against their British commanders because newly issued rifle
cartridges were greased with pig and cow fat, thus making them
unacceptable for both Hindu and Muslim soldiers. There is some truth
to that, but there were a number of other underlying causes for the
rebellion.

Resentment toward the British had been building for some time, and
new policies which allowed the British to annex some areas of India
exacerbated tensions. By early 1857 things had reached a breaking
point.
The Indian Mutiny erupted in May 1857, when sepoys rose up against
the British in Meerut and then massacred all the British they could
find in Delhi.
Uprisings spread throughout British India. It was estimated that less
than 8,000 of nearly 140,000 sepoys remained loyal to the British. The
conflicts of 1857 and 1858 were brutal and bloody, and lurid reports
of massacres and atrocities circulated in newspapers and illustrated
magazines in Britain.

The British dispatched more troops to India and eventually succeeded

in putting down the mutiny, resorting to merciless tactics to restore
order. The large city of Delhi was left in ruins. And many sepoys who
had surrendered were executed by British troops.
Following the Indian Mutiny, the East India Company was abolished
and the British crown assumed full rule of India.
Reforms were instituted, which included tolerance of religion and the
recruitment of Indians into the civil service. While the reforms
sought to avoid further rebellions through conciliation, the British
military in India was also strengthened.

Historians have noted that the British government never actually

intended to take control of India, but when British interests were
threatened the government had to step in.

The embodiment of the new British rule in India was the office of the
Viceroy.
The importance of India, and the affection the British crown felt for
its colony, was emphasized in 1876 when Prime Minister Benjamin
Disraeli declared Queen Victoria to be "Empress of India."
British control of India would continue, mostly peacefully,
throughout the remainder of the 19th century. It wasn't until Lord
Curzon became Viceroy in 1898, and instituted some very unpopular
policies, that an Indian nationalist movement began to stir.

In the second half of the 19th century, both the direct administration
of India by the British crown and the technological change ushered in
by the industrial revolution, had the effect of closely intertwining
the economies of India and Britain. In fact many of the major changes
in transport and communications (that are typically associated with
Crown Rule of India) had already begun before the Mutiny. Since
Dalhousie had embraced the technological change then rampant in
Britain, India too saw rapid development of all those technologies.
Railways, roads, canals, and bridges were rapidly built in India and
telegraph links equally rapidly established in order that raw
materials, such as cotton, from India's hinterland could be
transported more efficiently to ports, such as Bombay, for
subsequent export to England. Likewise, finished goods from England
were transported back just as efficiently, for sale in the burgeoning
Indian markets. However, unlike Britain itself, where the market
risks for the infrastructure development were borne by private
investors, in India, it was the taxpayers—primarily farmers and
farm-labourers—who endured the risks, which, in the end, amounted
to £50 million. In spite of these costs, very little skilled employment
was created for Indians. By 1920, with the fourth largest railway
network in the world and a history of 60 years of its construction,
only ten per cent of the "superior posts" in the Indian Railways were
held by Indians. The Indian railways system, by 1900, provided India
with social savings of 9% of India's national income (about 1.2 billion
rupees).

The rush of technology was also changing the agricultural economy in

India: by the last decade of the 19th century, a large fraction of some
raw materials—not only cotton, but also some food-grains—were
being exported to faraway markets. Consequently, many small
farmers, dependent on the whims of those markets, lost land, animals,
and equipment to money-lenders.. More tellingly, the latter half of
the 19th century also saw an increase in the number of large-scale
famines in India. Although famines were not new to the subcontinent,
these were particularly severe, with tens of millions dying, and with
many critics, both British and Indian, laying the blame at the
doorsteps of the lumbering colonial administrations.

Taxes in India decreased during the colonial period for most of

India's population; with the land tax revenue claiming 15% of India's
national income during Mogul times compared with 1% at the end of
the colonial period. The percentage of national income for the
village economy increased from 44% during Mogul times to 54% by the
end of colonial period. India's per capita GDP decreased from $550 in
1700 to $520 by 1857, although it had increased to $618 by 1947.

Beginning of Self Government

The first steps were taken toward self-government in British India in

the late 19th century with the appointment of Indian counsellors to
advise the British viceroy and the establishment of provincial
councils with Indian members; the British subsequently widened
participation in legislative councils with the Indian Councils Act of
1892. Municipal Corporations and District Boards were created for
local administration; they included elected Indian members.

The Government of India Act of 1909 — also known as the Morley-

Minto Reforms (John Morley was the secretary of state for India, and
Gilbert Elliot, fourth earl of Minto, was viceroy) — gave Indians
limited roles in the central and provincial legislatures, known as
legislative councils. Indians had previously been appointed to
legislative councils, but after the reforms some were elected to
them. At the centre, the majority of council members continued to be
government-appointed officials, and the viceroy was in no way
responsible to the legislature. At the provincial level, the elected
members, together with unofficial appointees, outnumbered the
appointed officials, but responsibility of the governor to the
legislature was not contemplated. Morley made it clear in
introducing the legislation to the British Parliament that
parliamentary self-government was not the goal of the British
government.

The Morley-Minto Reforms were a milestone. Step by step, the

elective principle was introduced for membership in Indian
legislative councils. The "electorate" was limited, however, to a
small group of upper-class Indians. These elected members
increasingly became an "opposition" to the "official government". The
Communal electorates were later extended to other communities and
made a political factor of the Indian tendency toward group
identification through religion.

World War 1 would prove to be a watershed in the imperial

relationship between Britain and India. 1.4 million Indian and British
soldiers of the British Indian Army would take part in the war and
their participation would have a wider cultural fallout: news of
Indian soldiers fighting and dying with British soldiers, as well as
soldiers from dominions like Canada and Australia, would travel to
distant corners of the world both in newsprint and by the new medium
of the radio. India’s international profile would thereby rise and
would continue to rise during the 1920s. It was to lead, among other
things, to India, under its own name, becoming a founding member of
the League of Nations in 1920 and participating, under the name, "Les
Indes Anglaises" (The British Indies), in the 1920 Summer Olympics in
Antwerp. Back in India, especially among the leaders of the Indian
National Congress, it would lead to calls for greater self-
government for Indians.

In 1916, in the face of new strength demonstrated by the moderate

nationalists with the signing of the Lucknow Pact and the founding of
the Home Rule leagues, and the realization, after the disaster in the
Mesopotamian campaign, that the war would likely last longer, the
new Viceroy, Lord Chelmsford, cautioned that the Government of India
needed to be more responsive to Indian opinion. Towards the end of
the year, after discussions with the government in London, he
suggested that the British demonstrate their good faith - in light of
the Indian war role - through a number of public actions, including
awards of titles and honors to princes, granting of commissions in
the army to Indians, and removal of the much-reviled cotton excise
duty, but most importantly, an announcement of Britain's future
plans for India and an indication of some concrete steps. After more
discussion, in August 1917, the new Liberal Secretary of State for
India, Edwin Montagu, announced the British aim of “increasing
association of Indians in every branch of the administration, and the
gradual development of self-governing institutions, with a view to
the progressive realization of responsible government in India as an
integral part of the British Empire.” Although the plan envisioned
limited self-government at first only in the provinces - with India
emphatically within the British Empire - it represented the first
British proposal for any form of representative government in a non-
white colony.

Earlier, at the onset of World War I, the reassignment of most of the

British army in India to Europe and Mesopotamia had led the previous
Viceroy, Lord Harding, to worry about the “risks involved in denuding
India of troops.” [69] Revolutionary violence had already been a
concern in British India, and outlines of collaboration with Germany
were being identified by British intelligence; consequently in 1915,
to strengthen its powers during what it saw was a time of increased
vulnerability, the Government of India passed the Defence of India
Act, which allowed it to intern politically dangerous dissidents
without due process and added to the power it already had - under
the 1910 Press Act - both to imprison journalists without trial and to
censor the press. Now, as constitutional reform began to be discussed
in earnest, the British began to consider how new moderate Indians
could be brought into the fold of constitutional politics and
simultaneously, how the hand of established constitutionalists could
be strengthened. However, since the Government of India wanted to
check the revolutionary problem, and since its reform plan was
devised during a time when extremist violence had ebbed as a result
of increased governmental control, it also began to consider how
some of its war-time powers could be extended into peace time.

Consequently in 1917, even as Edwin Montagu announced the new

constitutional reforms, a sedition committee chaired by a British
judge, Mr. S. A. T. Rowlatt, was tasked with investigating
revolutionary conspiracies and the German and Bolshevik links to the
violence in India,with the unstated goal of extending the
government's war-time powers. The Rowlatt committee presented its
report in July 1918 and identified three regions of conspiratorial
insurgency: Bengal, the Bombay presidency, and the Punjab. To combat
subversive acts in these regions, the committee recommended that
the government use emergency powers akin to its war-time
authority, which included the ability to try cases of sedition by a
panel of three judges and without juries, exaction of securities from
suspects, governmental overseeing of residences of suspects, and the
power for provincial governments to arrest and detain suspects in
short-term detention facilities and without trial.

With the end of World War I, there was also a change in the economic
climate. By year’s end 1919, 1.5 million Indians had served in the
armed services in either combatant or non-combatant roles, and
India had provided £146 million in revenue for the war. The increased
taxes coupled with disruptions in both domestic and international
trade had the effect of approximately doubling the index of overall
prices in India between 1914 and 1920. Returning war veterans,
especially in the Punjab, created a growing unemployment crisis and
post-war inflation led to food riots in Bombay, Madras, and Bengal
provinces, a situation that was made only worse by the failure of the
1918-19 monsoon and by profiteering and speculation.The global
influenza epidemic and the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 added to the
general jitters; the former among the population already
experiencing economic woes, and the latter among government
officials, fearing a similar revolution in India.

To combat what it saw as a coming crisis, the government now drafted

the Rowlatt committee's recommendations into two Rowlatt Bills.
Although the bills were authorised for legislative consideration by
Edwin Montagu, they were done so unwillingly, with the accompanying
declaration, “I loathe the suggestion at first sight of preserving the
Defence of India Act in peace time to such an extent as Rowlatt and
his friends think necessary.” In the ensuing discussion and vote in
the Imperial Legislative Council, all Indian members voiced
opposition to the bills. The Government of India was nevertheless
able to use of its "official majority" to ensure passage of the bills
early in 1919. However, what it passed, in deference to the Indian
opposition, was a lesser version of the first bill, which now allowed
extrajudicial powers, but for a period of exactly three years and for
the prosecution solely of “anarchical and revolutionary movements,”
dropping entirely the second bill involving modification of the
Indian Penal Code. [71] Even so, when it was passed the new Rowlatt Act
aroused widespread indignation throughout India which finally
culminated in the infamous Jallianwala Bagh massacre and brought
Mohandas Gandhi to the forefront of the nationalist movement.

Meanwhile, Montagu and Chelmsford themselves finally presented

their report in July 1918 after a long fact-finding trip through India
the previous winter. After more discussion by the government and
parliament in Britain, and another tour by the Franchise and
Functions Committee for the purpose of identifying who among the
Indian population could vote in future elections, the Government of
India Act of 1919 (also known as the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms)
was passed in December 1919. The new Act enlarged both the
provincial and Imperial legislative councils and repealed the
Government of India’s recourse to the “official majority” in
unfavorable votes. Although departments like defense, foreign
affairs, criminal law, communications and income-tax were retained
by the Viceroy and the central government in New Delhi, other
departments like public health, education, land-revenue and local
self-government were transferred to the provinces. The provinces
themselves were now to be administered under a new dyarchical
system, whereby some areas like education, agriculture,
infrastructure development, and local self-government became the
preserve of Indian ministers and legislatures, and ultimately the
Indian electorates, while others like irrigation, land-revenue,
police, prisons, and control of media remained within the purview of
the British governor and his executive council. The new Act also
made it easier for Indians to be admitted into the civil service and
the army officer corps.

A greater number of Indians were now enfranchised, although, for

voting at the national level, they constituted only 10% of the total
adult male population, many of whom were still illiterate. In the
provincial legislatures, the British continued to exercise some
control by setting aside seats for special interests they considered
cooperative or useful. In particular, rural candidates, generally
sympathetic to British rule and less confrontational, were assigned
more seats than their urban counterparts. Seats were also reserved
for non-Brahmins, landowners, businessmen, and college graduates.
The principal of “communal representation,” an integral part of the
Minto-Morley reforms, and more recently of the Congress-Muslim
League Lucknow Pact, was reaffirmed, with seats being reserved for
Muslims, Sikhs, Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians, and domiciled
Europeans, in both provincial and Imperial legislative councils. The
Montagu-Chelmsford reforms offered Indians the most significant
opportunity yet for exercising legislative power, especially at the
provincial level; however, that opportunity was also restricted by
the still limited number of eligible voters, by the small budgets
available to provincial legislatures, and by the presence of rural and
special interest seats that were seen as instruments of British
control. It scope was however, severely dissatisfactory to the Indian
political leadership, famously expressed by Annie Beasant as
something "unworthy of England to offer and India to accept"

In 1935, after the Round Table Conferences, the British Parliament

approved the Government of India Act of 1935, which authorized the
establishment of independent legislative assemblies in all provinces
of British India, the creation of a central government incorporating
both the British provinces and the princely states, and the
protection of Muslim minorities. At this time, it was also decided to
separate Burma from British India in 1937, to form a separate crown
colony. The future Constitution of independent India would owe a
great deal to the text of this act. The act also provided for a
bicameral national parliament and an executive branch under the
purview of the British government. Although the national federation
was never realized, nationwide elections for provincial assemblies
were held in 1937. Despite initial hesitation, the Congress took part
in the elections and won victories in seven of the eleven provinces of
British India, and Congress governments, with wide powers, were
formed in these provinces. In Britain, these victories were to later
turn the tide for the idea of Indian independence.

World War 2 And Independence

With the outbreak of World War II in 1939, the viceroy, Lord

Linlithgow, declared war on India’s behalf without consulting Indian
leaders, leading the Congress provincial ministries to resign in
protest. The Muslim League, in contrast, supported Britain in the war
effort; however, it now took the view that Muslims would be unfairly
treated in an independent India dominated by the Congress. The
British government—through its Cripps' mission—attempted to
secure Indian nationalists' cooperation in the war effort in exchange
for independence afterwards; however, the negotiations between them
and the Congress broke down. Gandhi, subsequently, launched the
“Quit India” movement in August 1942, demanding the immediate
withdrawal of the British from India or face nationwide civil
disobedience. Along with all other Congress leaders, Gandhi was
immediately imprisoned, and the country erupted in violent
demonstrations led by students and later by peasant political
groups, especially in Eastern United Provinces, Bihar, and western
Bengal. The large war-time British Army presence in India led to
most of the movement being crushed in a little more than six weeks;
nonetheless, a portion of the movement formed for a time an
underground provisional government on the border with Nepal. In
other parts of India, the movement was less spontaneous and the
protest less intensive, however it lasted sporadically into the
summer of 1943.

With Congress leaders in jail, attention also turned to Subhas Bose,

who had been ousted from the Congress in 1939 following differences
with the more conservative high command; Bose now turned to the
Axis powers for help with liberating India by force. With Japanese
support, he organized the Indian National Army, composed largely of
Indian soldiers of the British Indian army who had been captured at
Singapore by the Japanese. From the onset of the war, the Japanese
secret service had promoted unrest in South east Asia to destabilize
the British war effort, and came to support a number of puppet and
provisional governments in the captured regions, including those in
Burma, the Philippines and Vietnam, the Provisional Government of
Azad Hind (Free India), presided by Bose. Bose's effort, however, was
short lived; after the reverses of 1944, the reinforced British Indian
Army in 1945 first halted and then reversed the Japanese U Go
offensive, beginning the successful part of the Burma Campaign.
Bose's Indian National Army surrendered with the recapture of
Singapore, and Bose died in a plane crash soon thereafter. The trials
of the INA soldiers at Red Fort in late 1945 however caused
widespread public unrest and nationalist violence in India.