Clearing the dust off Macaulay’s “famous quote”
Many of you must have come across this “famous quote” of Macaulay in which he appears to be praising the wealth, cultural and spiritual heritage of India:
“I have travelled across the length and breadth of India and I have not seen one person who is a beggar, who is a thief. Such wealth I have seen in this country, such high moral values, people of such calibre, that I do not think we would ever conquer this country, unless we break the very backbone of this nation, which is her spiritual and cultural heritage, and, therefore, I propose that we replace her old and ancient education system, her culture, for if the Indians think that all that is foreign and English is good and greater than their own, they will lose their self-esteem, their native culture and they will become what we want them, a truly dominated nation.”
Some of you may have also tried to locate the original source of this quote - a search that most likely ended in frustration.
I had my doubts about the quote ever since I first read it and I also wrote about this once before -specifically mentioning that the accuracy of the quote was questionable and it needed further verification.
A few days ago, Anirban forwarded me this email by Michel Danino which suggests that my doubts were correct and the quote is actually fiction. Read on:
***** Excerpts from Michel Danino’s email *****
“Respected friends,
Permit me to point out that this quotation of Lord Macaulay is a spurious one, faked in recent years and massively circulated on the Internet (even Dr Abdul Kalam put it on his presidential website at some point).
The quotation is a fake one because:
- No one has been able to give a proper reference for it, pointing to an original source of Macaulay’s speeches or writings.
- Macaulay was not in England on the purported date of this “speech in Parliament” but in India.
- In fact the date (2 February 1835) is the date of his famous Minute, which was aimed at convincing the colonial authorities that English education was the ideal for India, and not an education in Indian languages as a group of Orientalists (including Prinsep) wanted. I attach the Minute’s full text.
- The very text of the alleged quote could never have been written by Macaulay. “India’s spiritual and cultural heritage” is a phrase he would never have used: he denied the very existence — or at least value — of such a heritage, as his Minute makes clear again and again. Nor would he have acknowledged Indians’ “caliber” or spoken of India’s “old and ancient education system” (were it only for the bad English of the last phrase).
- Finally, the question of “ever conquering this country” had no meaning in 1835, when Britain was in nearly full control of the subcontinent.
The alleged quotation is a poor fabrication. Please do not circulate it without due warning. On the other hand, it would be worthwhile to study Macaulay’s Minute and to generate a debate on what India has done in the 60 years of her independence to reform her educational system.”
***** End *****
Michel added that:
“Macaulay had no intention whatsoever to “break the very backbone of India”, but was convinced that Indians (both Hindus & Muslims) were steeped in hopeless superstition, and that English education was the only way to bring them out of this dark stagnation. That was the usual colonial conceit, but he sincerely wanted to help Indians (which goes to show that sincerity is good only if enlightened !)”
Thanks a lot Michel, for setting the record straight.
Related post: The importance of accurate referencing
*** COMMENT EDITED ***
The false quatation of Macauley came originally from N.S.Rajaram… Macauley never wrote that. The minutes of the lectures and speach of Macauley is available in the Internet, one can verify ( link ).
However Hindutva people continue to quote this false quotation of Macauley to prove that India was a very prosperous country full of schools everywhere during the rule of the East India company.
*** NOTE by MODERATOR ***
Pl. refrain from personal insults and abuse.
Comment by Anrban Sen | February 17, 2008
Anrban: Thanks for your comment.
I would just like to make one point. It is very likely that the socio-economic condition of India before, and during the early days of British rule was a lot better than what it was by the turn of the 20th centurty.
See this links for some further reading on this subject:
The “truth” about a “benevolent Empire”
India in the 1820s…
Loot - in search of East India Co. (excerpts)
and
Economic Exploitation and the Drain of Wealth during British “Raj”
Comment by B Shantanu | February 17, 2008
Anirban Sen:
1. By name, you are a Bengali speaking Bharatiya. If you are younger than 35 years, you are born and brought up in a virus infected environment called communist environment. Even you are older than 35, most Bengalis are spoiled by the deadly virus called Communism (which teaches Self-hatredness). You are no exception (as your language shows it).
2. If NS Rajaram is an infamous fraud, what about Swami Vivekananda? Do you call him another infamous fraud? Swami Vivekananda deplored the malicious propaganda that had been unleashed by the Christian missionaries in India (Macauley was one; he was son of a Christian missionary). Did you every study Swami Vivekananda? If not, study Him. You will get enlightenment (and liberate you from communism virus infection).
3. OK, as per your opinion, Hindutva people wrongly following and saying this quotation is correct. Now my question to you: Could you please prove this quotation is WRONG? Nor anyone out there, to prove thiat quotation is wrong? NS Rajaram didn’t invented that quotation, it is there over last one hundred years writings. First do home work, before putting bad words on others.
4. To me, neither you nor me can prove its right or wrong. But, surely history will prove its truthness (even it is bitter to your or my taste). We, if observe independenly, can only imagine the cunningness of British (and christian missionary) mind. And truth will prevail, Satyameva Jayate nanrittam.
5. Read this artcle, publihsed in 1953.
The Background of Macaulay’s Minute
Elmer H. Cutts
The American Historical Review, Vol. 58, No. 4. (Jul., 1953), pp. 824-853.
6. About economic history: Did you every study Economic History of India, pre-British Economic History and post-British economic History? If not, be silent and not try to show you are a sarvagya (all-knowing personality). First do homework, before writing on important issues like economic history of India.
7. Read here: British deindustrialised India in 18th and 19th century. While India produced about 25 percent of world industrial output in 1750, this figure had fallen to only 2 percent by 1900.
Between 1750 and 1938, India’s world manufacturing output share dropped from 24.5 percentage points in 1750 to 2.4 percent 1938. Corresponding drops for China was from 32.8 percent to 3.1 percent (1750 to 1938).
World Manufacturing Output 1750-1938
(in percent)
Year =India, China
1750 =24.5, 32.8
1800= 19.7, 33.3
1830 =17.6, 29.8
1880= 2.8, 12.5
1913= 1.4, 3.6
1938= 2.4, 3.1
Source: Simmons 1985, Table 1, p. 600, based on Bairoch 1982, Tables 10 and 13, pp.296 and 304.
Note: India refers to the entire subcontinent.
Bharat
====
Comment by Bharat | February 19, 2008
“Between 1750 and 1938, India’s world manufacturing output share dropped from 24.5 percentage points in 1750 to 2.4 percent 1938. Corresponding drops for China was from 32.8 percent to 3.1 percent (1750 to 1938).”
Ummmmmm ……… I wonder if that could have had anything to do with Industrialisation in Europe, besides the colonisation of India? The industrialisation suddenly turned world economies on its head, like globalisation is doing today, again.
Sometimes, the effect that you observe can have many causes, and we do ourselves an injustice if we refuse to explore all of them.
Comment by Patriot | February 19, 2008
This is N.S. Rajaram. I don’t believe I have ever used the Macaulay quote: “I have travelled across the length and breadth of India and I have not seen one person who is a beggar, who is a thief…”
On the other hand I have on several occasions used the quote beginning with: “Our English schools are flourishing wonderfully… if our plans of education are followed up, there will not be a single idolator among the respectable classes in Bengal thirty years hence…”
On page 105 of my book THE POLITICS OF HISTORY (footnote), I cite the reference MACAULAY, THE SHAPING OF THE HISTORIAN, pages 412-13.
I hope this clears up the ‘confusion,’ which is not of my making.
N.S. Rajaram
Comment by N.S. Rajaram | May 26, 2008
Dear Rajaram-ji: Thanks a lot for your comment and for clearing the confusion.
I am glad to set the record straight.
Please accept my apologies for inadvertantly hurting your feelings and reputation.
Shantanu
Comment by B Shantanu | May 26, 2008
Hello, this is N.S. Rajaram again. Please see the January-March 2008 issue of DIALOGUE, a public affairs magazine from New Delhi edited by B.B. Kumar. The issue focus is “India’s encounter with the West.” I draw attention in particular to the article: “British Raj in India: Myths and Relaities ” by B.B. Kumar. It has some interesting details.
There are other useful article by Lokesh Chandra, David Frawley, myself and others looking at different aspects of the encounter.
Although I have never used it, I am not prepared to dismiss the well-known Macaulay quote as spurious. I find it difficult to believe that a recent fabrication would gain such widespread acceptance in such a short time. It might be inaccurate but I doubt that a recent worker fabricated the whole thing.
Even if Macaulay was not in England at the time, someone else might have read his speech in the Parliament. Or it might have been scheduled on that day but delivered on a different day, but recorded as February 2. So it is worth tracing it to the source– even if it is spurious.
I would request Mr. Anirban Sen to use a more dignified tone in exchanges. It means nothing to me, for I don’t need a certificate from him, but reflects poorly on your blog.
Sincere regards,
N.S. Rajaram
Comment by N.S. Rajaram | June 24, 2008
Dear Sir,
I hope you would go throught the latest issue of the Business India Magazine, the cover being that of the Ranbaxy MD.
In it, a totally livid non “Hindutva” columnist has highlighted the fact that India was EXTREMELY PROSPEROUS BEFORE THE BRITISH RULE!!
Page 8. Issue dated June 29, 2008.
Regards,
vck
Comment by v.c.krishnan | June 24, 2008
Dear Shri Rajaram: Thank you for alerting me to the magazine. Is it available online?
As for your views on Macaulay’s quote, it might well be inaccurate (or distorted) rather than a fabrication…
The key issue (I think) is that given Macaulay’s views about India (and Indians), it is hard to believe that he would have said anything like that…
Having said that, I completely agree with you: “it is worth tracing it to the source– even if it is spurious.”
Thanks also for alerting me to the tone (and content) of Anrban’s comment…I realise that I should have moderated it and requested Anrbna to refrain from sweeping accusations of fraud…
I apologise for the hurt that this may have caused you and the damage to your reputation.
Rest assured, I will do my best that this is not repeated…
Thanks
***
@ vck: Thanks. Will have a look at the issue.
Comment by B Shantanu | June 25, 2008
1. There are some creatures in this planet, their behaviour is like todays Islamist Jihadis, Hit and Run, Blasts and Hide. By that time, damage has been done. These creatures are called Character Assassinators.
2. There are another group of creatures, they see right in wrong, sat in asat, honesty in dishonesty, truth in untruth, peace in violence, love in hate, and so on. Their armament is full of weapons of mass-destructions, that is, indecent, vulger, intimidating vocabularies. They used them as Brahmastras (Divine weapons) to bombard others, without realising they have turned themselves into self (suicide) bombers.
As Bhagavan Buddha said, “A fool who knows his foolishness is wise atleast to that extent, but a fool who thinks himself wise is a fool indeed.”
3. At the end: “What you speak, what you are. Words will measure the character and quality.”
Bharat
=====
Comment by Bharat | June 25, 2008
It is true that Macaulay wrote in his minute to British parliament.
Why should some body try to malign his name ?
It is also true that the version that is being alleged is exactly the one which fits his true style.
I have his original report submitted to his parliament which I got in 1998. Of late there are some blog site version which quote a little differently from the original but not countering his original report. It may be that all these years many educationalists believed and spread the idea that but for his bringing in English education to India we would have been lagging behind the rest of the world.
Probably they had been exposed to “sensored” version.
Do you know that we Indians are indebted to Colonial rule in one other way i.e. bringing hydel power generation (Shimsha) for the first time in Asia in the year 1902 in Mysore state.
That they did to tap power to run the gold mines in world famous Kolar Gold Fields of Karnataka!
Where did they take the gold from here?
You may believe at least this. No one has kept an account of the enormous amount of Gold they have dug out and used it as their property, because India was their country.
Bharath minus English would have probably prospered in different way and be a model to the whole world in its own way. Definitely the present day is not what India would have become.
Comment by Basu | October 17, 2008
Dear Sh. Basu,
Thank you for your comment. I would be very interested in the quote from the original..
If it is not too much trouble, please feel free to post it here or you can send me an email at jai.dharma AT gmail.com
As for the “drain of wealth” from India by the British, you may find these few articles interesting:
The Myth of a Benevolent “Raj”
The “truth” about a “benevolent Empire”
Loot - in search of East India Co. (excerpts)
and Economic Exploitation and Drain of Wealth During the British “Raj”.
Comment by B Shantanu | October 18, 2008
Here is a link to Macaulay’s Minute referred to above.
Comment by B Shantanu | January 6, 2009
Dear Sir,
I went through the minute and I am convinced that what has been attributed to Macaulay as untrue by our blue blooded Engblishmen is a summary of the obfuscation that existed in the minute.
The minute is so noxious in its content and so blatently anti Arabic and smacks of Chrisrtian hatred of Hindu knowledge, that somebody had the understanding of the English language to go deeply into this minute and summarise it, to bring out the truth in it.
The minute is so full of untruths and pure hatred against the ancient way of life in Bharat that it smacks of sheer arrogance.
Thanks fore the connection. It convinces me more and more that the English did more harm to our way of life than really build a new strong nation.
Regards,
vck
Comment by v.c.krishnan | January 7, 2009
Those Bharatiya and Hindus defend that Macauley or Cacauley are nothing but the decendents of firangee British slaves. Basu is undoubtedly a decendent of firangee slaves, thats why it hurts him so much and came out to defend his firangee masters. These Basus, Sens, Roys belong to same self-hater slave groups.
More they defend their firangee masters, more they expose their own slavic mentality. Most Bengalis are transformed into self-haters by the Communism virus, they speak nothing good of Hindu dharma, Bharatiya culture, heritage. They learn it as part of their school courses at early age. Read the book of Arun Shourie: Eminent Historians, you will find self-hatred and invador gloriflying course curriculms of Bengal primary, middle and high schools.
I wonder how does it hurts these Basus, Sens, Roys for someone writing on Macauley or any invador/coloniser firangees. It is clear, they (communists) are the agents of British masters. It is a fact that Communist Bengal still get lots money from UK on diffrent projects. We have to weed out these fifth columns, the real traitors of Bharat.
Comment by Bharat | January 8, 2009
Even if we grant that those comments by McCaulay are genuine, they give credit to the Mughal and other various muslim rulers who were controlling most parts of the country until the end of the 18th century, not the ancient culture of India - and what would he know of our ancient culture? McCaulay as many have already commented was one with all colonial conceits and wouldn’t even be ready to acknowledge the merits of a non-Christian land. And, isn’t it evident from the very language that it is not written by a native English speaker?
BTW, we can say it is a good summary of what actually happened as a result of McCaulay’s efforts.
N.S. Rajaram, are you the N.S Rajaram of the “Harappa horse” scandal?
Comment by Prasad | January 23, 2009
Prasad,
Instead of arguing, why don’t we just refer Hansard?
There was a difference between the previous rulers of India and the British. Whatever their provenance, China, Scythia, Fargana, they came as (mostly impoverished) migrants to this country, much in the way the whites traveled to the New World. This was in contrast from the people who came as raiders, the Pindaris, the Ghaznavids, Nadir Shah etc. who, in the time-honored tradition, came, looted and scooted. These people came to settle down. So the wealth stayed in India. They had the normal aspirations of the normal immigrants. So they tried to take over the country, in much the same way we and the Chinese are swamping the world, albeit in a much slower fashion.
Now, when you intend your children and grandchildren to live in a country, your method of loot is the one we see in the politicians and industrialists of India, with a slight difference. They could not send their children abroad and there were no Swiss banks. So, perforce, they had to maintain the country in such a fashion that their children could also live peacefully. It is a wise king who sees to the welfare of his people - his head is safe and he
needs to fear only his brothers.
The British had a place to take all the money to. So the loot started. And it was greater than the Spaniards ever got from America - this is well documented, thanks. We were lucky we got the English, if we had got the Belgians, we would have known what loot was. Some butchers are kinder. They had better technology and an industrial economy turning out cheap stuff which needed a market. They were the present China, so we suffered globalization then. Our industry simply got swamped by volumes, it needed no conspiracy. Which is why that wily bania Gandhi hit them where it hurt, in their wallets, with his Swadeshi movement.
So what are we complaining about? They came to fill their pockets - they did it in all possible ways. Sirajaddaulah’s estimate of the loss to the Moghul exchequer by fraudulent evasion of duties by the Company was only 15 million rupees. Clive’s personal share of the loot at Plassey was only 234000 pounds. Heavily biased tariffs was another way pf loot. That they let a few million die in famines instead of starting the time-honored relief works is another issue.
And there was no shortage of Indians willing to sell their souls. The native princes who claimed descent from the Sun and the Moon, the Rao Bahadurs, the ICS wallas. And we blame the Commies? Forgot the Ghadar party, Bhagat Singh, the mill workers in Bombay, Punnapra Vayalar, the armed insurrection in Telengana? India’s freedom was not won by the people who now claim to be the real patriots. It was won by the lowly commoners, who had no place in our great culture. When you cannot see the truth, it is time you took off your glasses.
Comment by Jayadevan | January 26, 2009
Minor comment in response to Prasad above:
“they give credit to the Mughal and other various muslim rulers who were controlling most parts of the country until the end of the 18th century”
That is not true. By early 18th century, the marathas were the dominant military power in India. The maratha army had entered Delhi in 1737, and for a period of 5 years around 1760, the mughal ruler even paid tax to them.
I found a map of India in 1760 on dharmaveer’s blogsite (dharmaveer.blogspot.com).
Again, this is relatively minor to the point Prasad-ji was making, but thought I should add this note anyway. Jai Hind.
Comment by Pankaj | February 6, 2009
Additional note: If you look at the map of India in 1760 (on dharmaveer.blogspot.com), you will also see the regions to the north and west of the maratha empire in green. Those were under Afghan rule. This was the cause of the Maratha-Afghan wars, which led to the 3rd battle of Panipat in 1761. The Marathas wanted to bring all of the areas (yellow + green) under the HIndu flag. They almost succeeded. Had they won at Panipat, all of today’s India + Pakistan would have been a large Hindu empire.
While they lost at Panipat, it was a pyrrhic victory for the Afghans too (under Ahmad Shah Abdali, the founder of modern Afghanistan). THey never ventured back into Indian Punjab, which left a major power vacuum there where years later the sikhs were able to establish a kingdom for 50 years.
Read the Encyclopaedia brittanica for the Maratha-Afghan wars for control of Punjab. Interesting reading. The maratha empire ruled India for almost 120 years. The british conquered most of India from them after the second Anglo Maratha wars in 1818. That was the end of their imperial ambitions.
Comment by Pankaj | February 6, 2009
Nice to see some enlightening information in this current blog.
My regards to Shree N S Rajaram.
regards,
RV
Comment by ravindranath | February 11, 2009
Now I know what the Harappan horse means, now. Prasad, when you make references,please show some consideration for oldies like us, who find it difficult to remember, or even do not know things in the first place. Here is a link.
http://www.safarmer.com/frontline/horseplay.pdf
Oh, by the way, I spent some time with Hansard. Couldn’t find the quoted quote. Now, either my search was not very thorough, or the poor guy never said such a thing. Hansard is not censored and does not lie.
And, again, did the Marathas rule India any better than the British? I remember vaguely that they were only interested in their chautha and left things in the hands of the local kings and self-appointed Peshwas, much like the British did.
Comment by Jayadevan | February 14, 2009
Jayadevan: it is very easy to dismiss the Marathas as being a oppressive regime as has been started by the British/Muslims and readily latched on by the with uber-secularists and left wings. The Mughals by comparison imposed 40% or greater tax if you were a non muslim. USA by comparison imposes a slabbed tax structure that can go as high as 41% (excluding SOcial Security and Medicare). India imposes 30% tax. Don’t the Marathas compare favourably against all these?
It would also help to remember that Maratha confederacy started as a small kingdom under Shivaji which eventually grew with time but was at constat war with Mughals in North/East, variaous muslim Bahamani kingdoms in south (AdilShah, Nizamshah, Kutubshah etc) Portuguese and British. The Marathas never had a standing army, their army was always part time farmers. Such were the circumstances and it would not have been possible to sustain the empire with chauth. In the end they protected Hinduism and the Dharmic way of life. So thank God for Shivaji and the brave Marathas.
Comment by Santosh | February 28, 2009
@JayaGoebbels,
That you have quoted a website belonging to Steve A.Farmer (the white Aryan racist and self-styled “scholar” who tried to play his anti-Hindu tricks in the California Textbooks controversy) speaks a lot about your intent and mindset.
Comment by Bengal Voice | March 3, 2009
Bengal Voice,
Thanks for the surname, which my parents never gave me. (My parents named me after a Bengali, who sang of love. You know, we sing the Geeta Govinda in temples in Kerala, call it the Ashtapadhi.) And the intent and mindset which you attribute to me. I suppose I will now need to find out what these are. I really do not know who taught you your manners. Any way, I don’t know this guy Steve A.Farmer from Adam, this was one of the sites that came up when I Googled “Harappan Horse”. So does the colour of the messenger determine the veracity of the message? I thought N S Rajaram looked quite an interesting person. And in any case, the white Aryan racist pointed me to a Frontline article. The Frontline, if you remember, is an Indian publication, belonging to the Hindu group.
I only asking, man, why you getting so hot hot under your collar? Black Madrassis not allowed to ask? Is the truth like the Gayathri mantra, not meant for Anaryas?
And Santosh, I learned history from Nilakantha Shastri. I was only saying that the Marathas were not really active as administrators. Now when even the most die-hard capitalists are asking for the Government to play a role in the economy, that wasn’t really a very bad bad question. Your Freudian slip maybe, but when were there Muslim historians to write the history of the Maratha Empire? Muslims seem to pervade your post like salt in the sambar. Only the Americans saw a Commie under every bed.
Comment by Jayadevan | March 3, 2009
@JayaGoebbels,
The truth be told – the credit for your Goebbelsian appellation goes to Reena Singh. Remember her? She’s the reader who gave you a sharp tongue-lashing (which hopefully you will never forget) for behaving rudely with her. That sent you scampering away with your tail between your legs.
Her retorts taught me an interesting lesson - that a senile whack-job like you who does not show manners (when talking to women) does not deserve to ask for proper manners from anyone else, manasulayo?
You facetiously claim to read Nilakanta Sastri’ books on history. But your pompous highness does not even know the basic fact that the immortal poet Jayadeva lived in Orissa. He was not a Bengali, as you falsely claim. I hope you know enough about the linguistic geography of eastern India to know the difference.
You wave and thump a Communist newsletter (Frontline) and a racist, redneck, white Aryan supremacist’s rants just as a Christian Padri would wave and thump his bible to “prove” that all of us are sinners. Such biased and bigoted rags don’t mean anything to my generation, gotcha?
For someone like yourself who seems to know an awful lot of details about Ahmedabad’s brothels (by your own admission), you seem to think the rest of India’s younger generation is as pathetically ignorant about other parts of India as your generation was.
As far as your pathetic attempt to portray yourself as a stereotypical underdog by using cheap terms like “Black Madrassi” and “Anarya”, I just feel deeply sorry for you. I have nothing but the deepest pity for you.
How do you know I am not a “Black Madrassi” myself? Thamizil paesi paarkalaama, thalaivarey?
Comment by Bengal Voice | March 4, 2009
Bengal Voice,
Jayadevan most likely is a troll suffering from senioritis with a mission of creating moral equivalence at any cost. Best to ignore than engage.
Comment by Kaffir | March 4, 2009
Bengal Voice,
My dear, when young people show a lack of manners in public, they need to be told. And when they cannot see anything except labels, they need to be told to take the blinkers off their eyes. This applies to you and your brothers/sisters-in-arms. It does not really matter if they can listen. Because they are in a defensive mood, they will just tune you out. But that does not mean that we, who are supposed to know better, shut up. Want to do a count of the epithets you kids use? This is verbal violence. Violence is resorted to when you run out of ideas. We do not mind this, so there is no need for me to even forgive. Kids are permitted quite a lot of things.
It is natural for young people to be impetuous and impatient. But to feel that you know all the answers is dangerous to your self-development. It is said that you are your own guru. Open your mind to yourself. And drop the compulsion to classify humans into convenient categories. The human mind is quite a complex thing. It has many facets, but the problem is again that these also reflect the observer, so a certain level of uncertainty remains between what is and what is perceived. If you ask me now, if I am not guilty of the same labeling sin, I am. It is difficult for a human being to get rid of this, however hard he tries.
And as for the sex industry part, I feel you still have to develop a bit of empathy for these people. Your delicate phrasing of words admits of charity and sympathy for the “fallen women”. To get over that and to come to have respect for them as human beings takes some time. You will, I am sure. You have feeling, which is evident from your outbursts of anger. Anger is, in the end, directed towards the self, which takes upon itself all the sins of the world. Then you learn to have compassion for yourself, and through that for your brother.
This is a road, man. We pass and we meet and we talk to many people going in various directions, running after various Holy Grails. We impinge, we bounce off, each imparting a bit of his properties and momentum to the other. We have hope in you. We bloody well have to. After all, we achieve immortality through our children.
Oh, and thanks for the Jayadeva origin info.
Comment by Jayadevan | March 4, 2009
I understand that personal remarks hurts! Lets remain out of it and hit the points where we dont agree in the comments. Sorry guys, I know I am no one to say anything to anyone here. But I felt like it so… I said.
Comment by Indian | March 6, 2009
*** COMMENT EDITED ***
@JayaGoebbels,
Please take your homilies…[elsewhere]…Those friends of yours need your unsolicited advice more than anyone else.
Stop trying to convert the lambs to Ahimsa….Try preaching to the wolves for a change.
*** NOTE by MODERATOR ***
@ BV: Pl. be mindful of your language and insinuations. Thanks.
Comment by Bengal Voice | March 11, 2009
Dear Sirs,
After reading the circulated write-up of Lord Mecaulay’s address to the British Parliament I really felt exhalted and I immediately circulated to other friends. And soon thereafter messages started coming to me that it was all concocted and incorrect. I, thereafter, went through this blog and now find myself totally confused as there are so many counter and counter to counter comments from various readers that the accuracy appears to have been lost altogether. Is there any one well read into history who can dig out the correct/genuine write-up and put it up on this blog for correct perspective. A response in decent language will generate good feelings among us Indian brotherens.
Jairath (Delhi)
Comment by Gp Capt I.Jairath(Retd) | March 12, 2009
Dear Capt Jairath: Pl. see my comment # 13 above which has a link to the original Minute.
Thanks.
Comment by B Shantanu | March 15, 2009
This article was written in 1908. The whole article is a very good analyis by Jabez T. Sutherland.
Why is England in India at all?
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/190810/nationalist-india
WHERE DOES MACAULAY FIT INTO THIS THOUGHT PROVOKING INCISIVE ESSAY?
Extract 1 from the above web site.
“In order to find answers to these questions we must first of all get clearly in mind the fact that India is a subject land. She is a dependency of Great Britain, not a colony. Britain has both colonies and dependencies. Many persons suppose them to be identical; but they are not. Britain’s free colonies, like Canada and Australia, though nominally governed by the mother country, are really self-ruling in everything except their relations to foreign powers. Not so with dependencies like India. These are granted no self-government, no representation; they are ruled absolutely by Great Britain, which is not their “mother” country, but their conqueror and master”
Extract 2
“Why is England in India at all? Why did she go there at first, and why does she remain? If India had been a comparatively empty land, as America was when it was discovered, so that Englishmen had wanted to settle there and make homes, the reason would have been plain. But it was a full land; and, as a fact, no British emigrants have ever gone to India to settle and make homes. If the Indian people had been savages or barbarians, there might have seemed more reason for England’s conquering and ruling them. But they were peoples with highly organized governments far older than that of Great Britain, and with a civilization that had risen to a splendid height before England’s was born. Said Lord Curzon, the late Viceroy of India, in an address delivered at the great Delhi Durbar in 1901: “Powerful Empires existed and flourished here [in India] while Englishmen were still wandering painted in the woods, and while the British Colonies were a wilderness and a jungle. India has left a deeper mark upon the history, the philosophy, and the religion of mankind, than any other terrestrial unit in the universe.”
Extract 3
Mr. W. S. Lilly, in his India and Its Problems,writes as follows:—
“During the first eighty years of the nineteenth century, 18,000,000 of people perished of famine. In one year alone—the year when her late Majesty assumed the title of Empress—5,000,000 of the people in Southern India were starved to death. In the District of Bellary, with which I am personally acquainted,—a region twice the size of Wales,—one-fourth of the population perished in the famine of 1816-77. I shall never forget my own famine experiences: how, as I rode out on horseback, morning after morning, I passed crowds of wandering skeletons, and saw human corpses by the roadside, unburied, uncared for, and half devoured by dogs and vultures; how, sadder sight still, children, ‘the joy of the world,’ as the old Greeks deemed, had become its ineffable sorrow, and were forsaken by the very women who had borne them, wolfish hunger killing even the maternal instinct. Those children, their bright eyes shining from hollow sockets, their nesh utterly wasted away, and only gristle and sinew and cold shivering skin remaining, their heads mere skulls, their puny frames full of loathsome diseases, engendered by the starvation in which they had been conceived and born and nurtured—they haunt me still.” Every one who has gone much about India in famine times knows how true to life is this picture.
Mr. Lilly estimates the number of deaths in the first eight decades of the last century at 18,000,000. This is nothing less than appalling,—within a little more than two generations as many persons perishing by starvation in a single country as the whole population of Canada, New England, and the city and state of New York, or nearly half as many as the total population of France! But the most startling aspect of the case appears in the fact that the famines increased in number and severity as the century went on. Suppose we divide the past century into quarters, or periods of twenty-five years each. In the first quarter there were five famines, with an estimated loss of life of 1,000,000. During the second quarter of the century there were two famines, with an estimated mortality of 500,000. During the third quarter there were six famines, with a recorded loss of life of 5,000,000. During the last quarter of the century, what? Eighteen famines, with an estimated mortality reaching the awful totals of from 15,000,000 to 26,000,000. And this does not include the many more millions (over 6,000,000 in a single year) barely kept alive by government doles.
Extract 4
Another cause of India’s impoverishment is the destruction of her manufactures, as the result of British rule. When the British first appeared on the scene, India was one of the richest countries of the world; indeed it was her great riches that attracted the British to her shores. The source of her wealth was largely her splendid manufactures. Her cotton goods, silk goods, shawls, muslins of Dacca, brocades of Ahmedabad, rugs, pottery of Scind, jewelry, metal work, lapidary work, were famed not only all over Asia but in all the leading markets of Northern Africa and of Europe. What has become of those manufactures? For the most part they are gone, destroyed. Hundreds of villages and towns of India in which they were carried on are now largely or wholly depopulated, and millions of the people who were supported by them have been scattered and driven back on the land, to share the already too scanty living of the poor ryot. What is the explanation? Great Britain wanted India’s markets. She could not find entrance for British manufactures so long as India was supplied with manufactures of her own. So those of India must be sacrificed. England had all power in her hands, and so she proceeded to pass tariff and excise laws that ruined the manufactures of India and secured the market for her own goods. India would have protected herself if she had been able, by enacting tariff laws favorable to Indian interests, but she had no power, she was at the mercy of her conqueror.
A third cause of India’s impoverishment is the enormous and wholly unnecessary cost of her government. Writers in discussing the financial situation in India have often pointed out the fact that her government is the most expensive in the world. Of course the reason why is plain: it is because it is a government carried on not by the people of the soil, but by men from a distant country. These foreigners, having all power in their own hands, including power to create such offices as they choose and to attach to them such salaries and pensions as they see fit, naturally do not err on the side of making the offices too few or the salaries and pensions too small. Nearly all the higher officials throughout India are British. To be sure, the Civil Service is nominally open to Indians. But it is hedged about with so many restrictions (among others, Indian young men being required to make the journey of seven thousand miles from India to London to take their examinations) that they are able for the most part to secure only the lowest and poorest places.
Extract 5
“It is said that India is incapable of ruling herself. If so, what an indictment is this against England! She was not incapable of ruling herself before England came. Have one hundred and fifty years of English tutelage produced in her such deterioration? As we have seen, she was possessed of a high civilization and of developed governments long before England or any part of Europe had emerged from barbarism. For three thousand years before England’s arrival, Indian kingdoms and empires had held leading places in Asia. Some of the ablest rulers, statesmen, and financiers of the world have been of India’s production. How is it, then, that she loses her ability to govern herself as soon as England appears upon the scene? To be sure, at that time she was in a peculiarly disorganized and unsettled state; for it should be remembered that the Mogul Empire was just breaking up, and new political adjustments were everywhere just being made,—a fact which accounts for England’s being able to gain a political foothold in India. But everything indicates that if India had not been interfered with by European powers, she would soon have been under competent governments of her own agaiN”
Comment by gajanan | March 16, 2009
This quote is purely fake. I don’t think an Englishman from 1800s would use such simple English specially addressing the parliament on an important issue. It is so modern and simple.
Comment by Shiran | April 1, 2009
I have not read all that is written about this quote by Lord Macaulay, which is flowing through the internet, but I came to this site as I was trying to find out the validity of the quote. As soon as I read the very first sentence and saw the misspelling of the word traveled, I had the feeling it was not valid. I would not imagine a Lord would make such a mistake in writing.
Comment by Providence | April 14, 2009
It may not be easy to prove whether Macaulay really said that in the British Parliament or not, but one thing we should not forget why after all Britishers, French, Portugese and so on came to India in the first place. Why Vasco de Gama had to find India. Why Columbus was coming to India, got lost and found America instead?. Why?
Comment by R.N. Sahni | May 1, 2009