The Summer of ’47

Yasser:

I can categorically tell you that:

i) I have no idea who Akash is;

ii) I have never met or spoken or communicated with him in any way whatsoever (other than possibly through Chowk interacts since I don`t know what other nom de plumes he might have adopted);

iii) I have never discussed you with anyone (other than ask someone at Rutgers if she knew you and she had no idea who you were) in any way shape or form.

Hope this sets the record straight. Whatever differences you and I might have had at some point in the past, you know ALL the details about that.

I think Akash is lying through his teeth or, to be charitable, pulling your leg.

Regards.

PS: Akash, I suggest you stop making up discussions you have had with me.

TO SameerJB

Sir, If you get the impression that I am a rabid nationalist who is blaming British for all our ills, then you are wrong. I believe that British brought some good things to India like I mentioned in my previous mails, But I also feel they have crippled us, in many aspects but most of it ecnomically.

Intentionally or otherwise they did some good things to us, I have acknowledged it earlier also. Even you have mentioned the Railways and towns in NWFP. That part is good. But it reminds me about the news item I have read recently which is about China building roads upto the Indian border where not even grass grows. So tell me, Should the tibetians praise the Chinese for setting up such wonderful infrastructure of should they blame them for exploiting and suppressing them?

The answer lies somewhere in the middle right? Thats what I feel. Hope I make it clear to you. The reason why I am talking more about Economics is because we studied Economic history of India under British rule, though not in great detail.

And as far as Economics is concerned, it is blind, rampant exploitation. period.

````````

It should not hurt the nationalistic pride in anyway whatsoever. Nationalist pride is forward looking as much as backward looking. There are many examples where post independent administrative did better job than British Raj. The contribution of C. Subramanium in griculture is one such shining example and so is the education system.

``````

I could not agree with you more. Well said. But let me make it clear, I am not hurt by british rule. If anything else our community came up from the lowest of that caste hierarchy and directly or indirectly that process was accelerated by the British. ;-)

``````

What is wrong if a mechanism is developed by which it grows 5-6 percent irrespective of the heavy cost of that mechanism amounting to 1 percent-being skimmed off. A limited corrupt (or colonial) but effective and apt running of the country is more benefitial than 5 time praying-honest-newspaer reading-tea drinking-do nothing type-administratration``````

Our moral standards have come down a bit right? ;-) That statement of yours itself needs a seperate article.

Cheers,

jntuece99

Pankaj: I hope you will like reading Vinay Lal`s reviews of several books about British colonialism in India. I am reproducing excerpt from one of his review:

http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/British/BrEmp.html

Much Ado About the British Empire

a review-article by Vinay Lal *

Originally published as ``Good Nazis and just scholars: much ado about the British Empire``, review of P. J. Marshall, ed., Cambridge Illustrated History of the British Empire, Race and Class 38, no. 4 (April-June 1997):89-101.

Until quite recently, historians and political commentators were inclined to take a largely benign view of the empire, and though it was acknowledged that British administrators had been somewhat remiss in the performance of their duties on occasion, or even taken recourse to unnecessarily repressive measures at even rarer moments (goaded to fury by the actions of rebellious and ungrateful natives), it was reasoned that no person attempting a balance sheet could but think that the empire had brought progress, development, moral sense, and the other good things of life to savage, semi-barbarous, or otherwise backward people trapped in an arrested state of development. The military fiasco at Gallipoli, the brutalization of the Boers in South Africa, the massacre of Indians at Amritsar: all these stood as blots upon the `fair name` of England, but this was as a speck in the ocean alongside the achievements, from the building of the railroads to the establishment of universities, that could be trumpeted by empire-mongers. At this time, the study of the empire was thought to belong properly with the study of European history and the history of European expansion, the colonies being seen as the arena of European activity, the fulfillment of Europe`s ordained role to civilize the world, at once terra nullis and tabula rasa awaiting the penetrating presence of the European gentleman. When, however, attention began to be riveted, not upon the colonial office in London, or upon the great proconsuls -- Rhodes, Lugard, Cromer, Curzon, Kitchener -- of the empire, but rather upon resistance to colonialism, the activities of subalterns, the intrusion of colonialism into the everyday lives of people, and the oppressiveness of colonial structures, then colonial history began to be seen as something quite distinct from the concern of Europeanists. What was to be done with a field of inquiry that European scholars could no longer command? The study of colonialism, at least in history departments, was now seen as belonging within the purview of historians of Asia and Africa, and the attendant ramifications, such as the loss of funding, were soon experienced. Since the study of colonialism now appeared to have fallen largely into the hands of its detractors, who saw the whole business of empire as an unmitigated evil, it was and continues to be erroneously assumed that historians of the British Empire (and likewise of the imperial conquests of other European powers) belong to the `left`. From these historians, it was said, `objectivity` could scarcely be expected.

As the Cambridge Illustrated History of the British Empire so amply demonstrates, the study of the Empire remains, as it has always been, a conservative and cautious if not retrograde affair; it suggests also the hazardousness of the quest for `objectivity` (p. 13), and renders dubious the moral integrity of any such enterprise. This volume begins with the Britain`s almost simultaneous loss of its American colonies and its acquisitions of territories in India; and in four chapters, all by Marshall, a chronological account of the Empire is skillfully sketched out. Before the end of the eighteenth century, as Marshall says, the British had consolidated their territories in the Caribbean and what was to become Canada, and very substantial parts of India had fallen under their rule. The nineteenth century was to be the great era of British expansion: if for some imperialists the economic imperative was paramount, the militarists were eager to secure Britain`s primacy among European nations and provide Britain with a reserve of men whose lives could be sacrificed without much compunction, while the missionaries were desirous of finding terrain where the heathens, not having to contend with the formidable attractions of the pub, could perhaps more reliably be expected to receive the teachings of the Lord. This empire constituted the colonies of white settlement -- Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa -- with which Britain would have a special relationship, and other colonies in Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean where the impress of British rule was experienced rather differently; it also, in a manner of speaking, extended to those countries, such as China, where the British exercised a form of indirect rule, or where in any case they were able to gain, usually by the display of military force, extraordinary trading privileges. By the latter half of the century, the Empire was showing signs of stress, and rebellions in both India (1857-58) and Jamaica (1865) had to be suppressed with brutal ferocity. India was then brought directly under the Crown, and shortly thereafter the scramble for Africa commenced among the European powers, Britain gaining a large share of the spoils. The Boer War at the turn of the century, and unrest in India, first during the partition of Bengal in 1905 and subsequently in the Punjab after the termination of the Great War, considerably rattled the British. Resistance would only grow over the years. The emergence of Gandhi and his great non-cooperation movement against British rule in the early 1920s are sometimes seen as signalling the end of the empire. But Marshall is at pains to note that ``the British empire [only] came to an effective end in the 1960s`` (p. 105), and indeed the inestimable contribution of the Dominions, as well as India and the African colonies, to the war effort, both in 1914-18 and 1939-45, conveys the impression that Britain could rightfully expect the loyalty of its possessions.

How, then, do Marshall and his associates write the history of the Empire, and what are the principal features of this history? A great many admissions are made which previous histories of the empire, whose authors were moved by jejune emotions of patriotism and foolish considerations of Christian pride, would perhaps not have allowed. It is asserted that though the British ``liked to assume that their role in the world was an essentially peaceful one``, the ``reality`` was ``a record of almost continuous conquest or violence overseas between 1783 and 1870`` (p. 30). It is similarly conceded that though Britain is thought to have aided greatly in the `development` of the colonies, ``the British invested overwhelmingly in countries of recent white settlement, whether they were British colonies or not`` (p. 57). Apparently only white-skinned subjects were fit for development. While Britain vigorously defended free trade, it ``retained a disproportionately large share of the trade and investment in its own colonies`` (p. 110), on the principle of course that while its own privileges were not to jeopardized, the rest of the world was not to be allowed to pursue protectionist policies. A. J. Stockwell, in his essay on ``Power, Authority, and Freedom``, even makes bold to suggest, after contrasting the simplicity of 10 Downing Street with the ``grandeur of almost any of the government houses decorating British dependencies from India to the West Indies`` (p. 166), that democracy at home went hand in hand with authoritarianism overseas.

These admissions (mild as they are) of hypocrisy, which E. M. Forster had characterized as an indelible British trait, might almost fill one with the hope that the authors are prepared to ask some searching questions about the nature of the British empire and offer a sustained critique of imperialist enterprises. But even a cursory reading would belie such a hope. The endeavor, present almost throughout the volume (with the exception of Tapan Raychaudhuri`s article on India), but perhaps more marked in Marshall`s contributions, is to offer a `balanced` account, lest it be supposed by innocent readers that the business of empire may well be evil, that the history of Britain, and likewise of other European powers, is marked by ruthless and single-minded self-aggrandizement, or that the British were callous in their treatment of colonized people. Consider briefly, for example, the manner in which the suppression of the Indian Rebellion of 1857-58 is represented. ``Mutineers and their supposed supporters were often killed out of hand`` (p. 50), Marshall acknowledges of the British reaction to the mutiny, but it is at once added that ``British civilians, including women and children, were murdered as well as the British officers of the sepoy regiments`` (p. 50). As far back as 1925, Edward Thompson, eager to defend the British as the world`s noblest race, and contemptuous of Indians as a people so poorly skilled in scholarly matters as to be unable to defend themselves before the wilting fury of the Englishman`s pen, was nonetheless constrained to admit that the Indians almost invariably resorted to brutalities after having been brutally victimized by the British; it is also noteworthy that though the British widely believed that their women had been molested and raped, this scurrilous rumor being used to terrorize the entire population, an inquiry conducted by order of the Governor-General, Lord Canning, was unable to point to a single instance of the molestation of British women. Moreover, if Marshall`s interpretation has nothing more to say for it than the simple expedient of quid pro quo, he must ask how it is that the British were able to characterize themselves as an overwhelmingly superior people, a people whose Christian virtues stood in sharp contradistinction to the immorality of the heathenish Hindus. That was, after all, the justification for British rule, but all these considerations are elided. The more pressing problem, of asking how it is that the Indians came to be characterized as the mutineers, when the British were legally no more than the subjects of the Mughal emperor, is never raised.

The treatment of the Punjab disturbances of 1919 is likewise unsatisfactory if not deceptive. A chilling photograph of an Indian being compelled to crawl at the point of a bayonet, pursuant to General Dyer`s issuance of the notorious `crawling order` (p. 98), is accompanied by the caption that ``counter measures of a most ruthless kind were taken by the British commander, General Dyer.`` But this caption obscures more than it reveals. It was, as historians of India are only too well aware, a regime of `frightfulness` which the British inaugurated in the Punjab, and Dyer was only one of many martial law commanders who took it upon themselves to inflict `fanciful` punishments upon Indians. Yet clearly the suggestion, an altogether misleading one, is that Dyer stood in sinister isolation, for this strategy allows the larger enterprise of imperialism to remain unscathed: excesses can always be put down to the madness and barbarism of one man. It is also at this time that the bombing by air of entire villages was introduced, and air power, though it receives no mention in the history of Marshall and company, was henceforth to be critical in the maintenance of the British empire, as relentless `air terrorism` in Mesopotamia and the North West Frontier Province over the next decade showed. Orwell registered this fact, when he made the observation that words like `pacification` had slipped into the English language with disturbing ease, it being considered no remarkable matter to bomb entire areas from the air. Though Marshall`s work is set up as a paean to the British commitment to `fair play`, nowhere is it mentioned that Dyer, upon receiving a mild censure from the House and being relieved of his services, was congratulated by the House of Lords for having saved India from ruin, while the British public feted him with a private purse to the staggering amount of 26,317. In a similar vein, though it is noted that Governor Eyre`s brutal repression of the Morant Bay uprising in 1865 was ``much criticized in Britain and produced a vigorous altercation between those who held the Governor responsible and his defenders`` (p. 158), the crucial detail, of Eyre`s vindication by the House of Commons, is suppressed. The leading men of the day -- Carlyle, Ruskin, Tennyson, Dickens, and Kingsley, among others -- supported Eyre, and those who did not, such as John Stuart Mill, were nonetheless ardent believers in inequality. Only a few public men were moved by the plight of the natives, but a great many more were concerned that England, having behaved badly, had tarnished her name. What is rather surprising about the enterprise of empire is the overwhelming support it received from all classes of English society (p. 321), and radicals who mouth platitudes about the revolutionary potential if not ardor of the working class might be reminded that over 100,000 working men presented a petition to the Queen in 1870, declaring their ``alarm that Your Majesty has been advised to give up the colonies, containing millions of acres which might be employed profitably both to the colonies and to ourselves as fields of emigration`` (cf. p. 329). Even the `Little Englanders`, who again receive no mention, were no keen proponents of emancipation for the non-white colonies, claiming that India (and the Caribbean colonies) could not be abandoned to anarchy.

Pankaj:

I read your post, and I wanted to say that it was one of the better balanced posts on Chowk.

`1. The political integration of the country into a single unit. Without Raj, we could today have been living in a dozen weak countries ruled by Marathas,Rajputs,Sikhs, Mughals etc.`

Undoubtedly, indeed India largely has been a cultural and sociological expression. British gave India one unitary state system. In many ways, India the country existed in the minds of the British and the British alone.

`2. Exposure to western education and science. It was indeed the exposure to modern ideas of liberty, equaltity and fraternity that produced a class of enlightened leadres like Gandhi,Nehru, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, Jinnah etc `

Western Education and science, along with the western concepts of Liberalism, Nationalism, and Populism brought about all the leaders starting from Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, Gokhale, Tilak, Dada Bhai Naoroji, sir Pheroze Shah Mehta... and these great men passed their enlightenment forward to

Jinnah, Chandrabose, Nehru, Gandhi etc who added their own unique styles to it.

3. Inspiration and training in the working of a parliamentary democracy. India is perhaps one of the very few third world countries that enjoyed continuous and relatively successful regime

of parliamentary democracy.

Democracy and western style governance was a great blessing in disguise for the subcontinent.

`4. Finally a reasonably developed infrastructure originally intended for more efficient exploitation came as a boon in disguise`

This goes without saying. I believe the British rule could be best described as symbiotic.

British were efficient administrators and their rule was better than most that the South Asians had had previously.

Sigalph:

` Had the English not ruled the Subcontinent would the place be more democratic, more healthy, more open, more tolerant, and more unified than it is today? In other words, would the Marathas, the Mughals, the Nizams, and the Rajput Maharajas have created a more 21st century India than you find? If the answer is no, please stop bashing the British. Is is the only honourable thing to do in that case.`

I am myself sometimes amazed at the tolerance British have of being bashed. I think your question has been answered very well by Pankaj.

The point remains, yes British were exploitative, but who can blame them for it? Atleast theirs was a symbiotic relationship with the subcontinent, they left us a legacy which will remain for a very long time.

I believe the exception to the rule (Indigenous rulers were bad) was the father-son duo who ruled Mysore during the time of Warren Hastings, Cornwallis, etc. Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan`s administration was undoubtedly one of the better ones in the Subcontinent. I suppose it was because both the father and son were francophiles (just like Jefferson, ironically just like the American founding fathers Tipu went up against the same General Lord Cornwallis)....

Tipu Sultan undoubtedly deserves to be mentioned as one of the earliest Modernizers amongst rulers of the East. The man was a political genius especially in Foreign Relations... Sultanat-e-Khudadad Mysore had an embassy in virtually every major Power in the Northern Hemisphere. To the French he appealed in the name of common hostility with the British. With the Ottoman Sultan and the King of Afghanistan he played up Pan Islamism.With the Marhattas he appealed to a common Indian front against the British.

Arguably, Tipu Sultan had managed to create perhaps the first true Nationstate of the subcontinent.... the Mysore State... and he alone became the embodiment of the Mysorian Nationalism.

I find it sad and ironic that a debate about the British Colonization, and Empire building in India has excluded the mention of Tipu Sultan.

-YLH

Fuzair,

Akash informed me rather rudely the other day, that you hate me, and you think I am stupid. I didnt know he had the intimate knowledge of that.

Akash,

You talk about intellectual discussions of high calibre ? You? That is a joke... Betay arent you the one who informed me that Jinnah was a `parsi` and that I need to know the facts?

I dont know why you consider yourself an equal or a rival of mine on chowk... you are really a nuissance who knows very little.....

Betay when you get in the mood to read some real intellectual stuff, read my article `Tilak and Gokhale`

-YLH

tahmed321 #139:

...for a 7/24 firefighter!:)

...check reply #216 out in the speaker’s corner...might interest you...

rgds,

t

Arun, Fuzair and Sameer

The role of British rule is best analysed if we look at it from economic point of view, the way British looked at it. The first assumption in this theory is that British were not necessarily saints or had betterment of of India as their guiding philosophy. When British arrived in eighteenth century, the GDP of India and China( with Chinese share slightly higher than India) combined was around 25% that of the known world and the trade around 30% of the total world trade.(quoted from the memory, should be checked against a proper reference). Although India did not have factories, there were guilds of talented workers in every city who used to manufacture items. Thus the economy was mainly based on small scale industries that used primitive technology but employed highly skilled workers. The first job that Britishers did was to transform India from a manufacturing country to a source of raw materials for their factories. I guess in long term the mass production of factories would have decreased the demand for hand-made items anyway but Britishers hastened this process. The atrocities commited by British in forcing indigo cultivation in Bengal are well known. The wealth drain theory, that I consider a useful one, explains how this system by which Britishers, like parasites sucked the wealth by selling us manufactured items made from our own raw materials. Thus the exploitation was much more sophisticated than the previous rulers, but exploitation it was. This also explains the relative apathy of British towards the hardships of Indian populace by famines/taxation. While the native rulers often decreased/waived the tax in the areas struck by famines, British insisted on complete payment further aggravating the problems.

Now to effectively exploit India as a source of raw materials, they needed an effective system of transport so that raw materials can be brought together from remote areas cheaply and efficiently. Thus they developed a good rail/road/postal system throughout India. Infact this infrastructure helped them in wars and also helped in bringing distant areas under proper administration/control.

Undoubtedly British were efficient administrators. After 1858, they developed a good bereaucratic system to efficiently run the country. The atmosphere of relative peace in their rule enabled them to carry out the exploitation of India as a raw material source in an efficient manner. This is why British adopted a policy of non-interference with the social ills of the locals fearing any disturbance that could jeopardise their economic interests(except for abolishing Sati in 1835). Non cooperation movement hurt them where it mattered most- the economic interests. Swadeshi movement,by discouraging the use of British made products, and refusal to cooperate with the system(like non payment of unjustified taxes) hit at the very foundation of British interests that eventually forced them to retire.

In summary, the essence of British rule was not a noble motive to ``civilise the natives`` euphemistically called White Man`s burden, but to exploit colonies to further their economic interests. However we also benefitted by it although it was not intentioned by British. I list some of these benefits below:

1. The political integration of the country into a single unit. Without Raj, we could today have been living in a dozen weak countries ruled by Marathas,Rajputs,Sikhs, Mughals etc.

2. Exposure to western education and science. It was indeed the exposure to modern ideas of liberty, equaltity and fraternity that produced a class of enlightened leadres like Gandhi,Nehru, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, Jinnah etc

3. Inspiration and training in the working of a parliamentary democracy. India is perhaps one of the very few third world cuntries that enjoyed continuous and relatively successful regime of parliamentary democracy.

4. Finally a reasonably developed infrastructure originally intended for more efficient exploitation came as a boon in disguise.

Akash I asked Harimau some questions ... I hope you answer them too, but I know they are beyond your understanding capacity:

1) Who rejected the Cabinet Mission Plan (assuming you know what that is) Jinnah or Nehru? Muslim League or the Congress Party? I had posted the letter from Wavell in the past in which he admits that he was wrong about Jinnah and the League... and that it was now clear to him why Jinnah didnot trust Nehru or Gandhi.

2) You say Jinnah would not have any job in United India ? Then in the same post you admit that Gandhiji offered him the Prime Ministership of India. So which one is it, would he have a job or wouldnt he?

3) Dont you think the Prime Ministership of United India, the largest democracy in the World, leader of 400 million free souls, presiding over the representatives of the second largest country in the world and perhaps even the largest, would have been a greater honor, and Jinnah would have his place in History not only as the first Prime Minister of United India, but also as the best ambassador of Hindu Muslim Unity that he formerly was? So how can you accuse Jinnah of being power hungry for becoming the first governor General of what he thought was a `moth eaten` and `truncated` Pakistan? The truth is Jinnah did not sell out his constituents. I met an Indian on the west coast once, a malyalam Hindu... and he and I spoke about Jinnah in detail... and he said, that Jinnah stands head and shoulders above all other leaders because he did not sell out to the opponent Party, and hence you have Pakistan.

Re: Siraj #140

I suggest you read my ENTIRE post before firing off a reply and thus confirming what some have said about your intelligence.

Kindest regards.

macgupta (various posts): I checked out the book you keep quoting from (The Great Indian Headge): Here is what I found on the hedge as described on Amazon.com - ``a giant hedge, running east to west, 2,500 miles long and six to 12 feet thick, and guarded by 12,000 men, in British India in the late 19th century. This `eccentric enterprise... a quintessentially British folly,` as Moxham calls the hedge, was designed as a customs border, in particular to collect the salt tax that was so oppressive to India`s poor. ``

It goes on to say that the hedge was maintained until 1879 and that the author visited India and found remnants of the hedge still around.

This is the first time I have heard of this one. Since you have read the book, any further light you can shed on the hedge (particularly what kind of a boundary it represented and where it extended) would be appreciated.

On the point you were making I think, incidentally, the brits seemed to have a thing about taxes. They lost the US colonies for the same reason. The issue of course is ``no taxation without representation``. The other side of the coin of course is ``taxation with representation`` is ok, particularly if these taxes are then put to work for the community. Even the bitterest critic of the british raj agrees that they left behind better infrastructure and law and order in the subcontinent than they found, and indeed that law and order at least has not improved (at least in pakistan) after independence. So maybe we should have taxation with representation and contract out executive functions (we already have the precedence of a Chief Executive in pakistan, so might as well carry it forward by opening up the job to international competitive bidding).

NB Please keep on carrying out this highly informative discussion. Do not be distracted by YLH( and myself)

This fool ylh has again come to pollute this board where some intellectual discussion of high calibre is being carried out. See what he says

``1) Partition was caused by Nehru`s Hunger for power.

``

It is obvious to any reader of history that partition was caused by the arrogance and the power thirst of Jinnah( and may be even Nehru to some extent). This guy can not think of anything other than Jinnah. Needs attention of the resident sham shrink Shankar.

Fuzair:

And Muslim rule under the Moghuls was all sweetness and light?

Muslim rule in India was synonymous with tyranny and terror.

I am glad the Sikhs kicked the Afghans behinds when they took power, that is why I admire them so much, they dispensed Islamic justice, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth for the pogroms, persecutions and oppression perpetrated by the ``lilywhite`` Moghuls and other Muslims that Pakistanis fantasise about so much. Surely you should understand that way of thinking, an admirable thing.

But then again, maybe its just a question of interpratation.

Think about it....

Roy Moxham quotes the nawab, Mir Kasim, regarding

the activities of the East India Company (leading

up to the famine of 1770) as follows :

In every pargana, every village and every factory, they buy and sell salt, betel nut, ghee, rice, straw, bamboo, fish, gunnies, ginger, sugar, tobacco, opium and many other things. They forcibly take awa the goods and commodities of the ryots and merchants for a fourth part of their value...they oblige the ryots to give five rupees for goods which are worth but one rupee... near four or five hundred new factories have been established ... they expose my government to scorn and are the greatest detriment to me.``

--

Even Mir Kasim, the British puppet, was appalled by the Company`s activities.

The Company may not have been a profitable stock to hold; because the Company was run by the employees for the employees. Clive bought control of the Company in 1760, writes Moxham, and then purchased enough rotten boroughs -- seats where a small number of electors made it possible to easily bribe a majority -- so that he, and his Company, became almost immune from parliamentary control.

-Arun Gupta

Remember, Sikhashahi was synonymous with terror and tyranny. Avitable, the Italian governor of Peshawar under Maharaja Ranjit Singh, used to hand out jagirs whose rent was payable in Afghan (i.e., Pathan) heads. If I remember correctly, he had a sliding scale: something like 1 male head = 1+n female heads = 1 + xn children`s heads (sorry, don`t remember the exact ratio, although male children were worth more than female ones). I believe even Clive would have drawn the line at this! Lest we say that this was a White Male European thing, don`t forget that mothers in Hazara (NWFP) used to quieten their crying children with, ``Hush, or Hari Singh Nalwa will hear you!``

Of course, the Moghuls treated the Sikhs not much better. And the Mahrattas had good reason to hate (and be hated by, in turn) the Moghuls. And so on, ad infinitum.

Was the Raj perfect? Of course not.

Did it have no glaring faults? Of course it did.
Could it have done much better with relatively minimal effort/cost. Of course.

Was it better than what came before it? Of course.

Are we better off because of it? I would say yes.

Have we shown that we are morally superior to it? Of course not.

Look at how brutally we treat our own people: the E. Pakistan civil war, Baluch insurgency, Sindh MRD agitation, Punjab/Khalistan insurgency, Kashmir insurgency, NEFA/Assam insurgency, the Sri Lankan civil war and the list is seemingly endless. Oh yeah, all this is the Gora Saab`s fault and if he didn`t directly cause it, it is the inevitable result of the harsh, repressive, dehumanizing, fill in a few more adjectives here, nature of the colonial state.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Arun:

Before we get too ecstatic about how great our pre-Raj institutions were, any anthropologist/sociologist will tell you that a key, if not the key, function, of most traditional institutions (e.g., village panchiyats) is to ensure that the dominant power and socio-economic position of the existing village elites is maintained. If some have managed to make the traditional system (or variants thereof, e.g., the AKRSP in Pakistan) work, its because you have an outside agency that acts to keep the exising village elites in line.

The simple line of questioning is this:

Had the English not ruled the Subcontinent would the place be more democratic, more healthy, more open, more tolerant, and more unified than it is today? In other words, would the Marathas, the Mughals, the Nizams, and the Rajput Maharajas have created a more 21st century India than you find? If the answer is no, please stop bashing the British. Is is the only honourable thing to do in that case.

Punjabi Mussalmans were major benefectors of the British Raj since it eased the pain of the Sikh joota and the Sikh danda on and in their behinds, respectively. Other Pakistani people who suffered immensely will have a different opinion of the Raj, closer to the views of the Indian interactors here. These would include the Pathan Red Shirts of Ghaffar Khan, the Sindhi Hur Mujahids of Pir Sahib Pagaro and the Mohajirs whose ancestors perished in 1857.