I came across this fascinating piece of research a while ago but almost forgot to post it here. From The Colonial Legacy - Myths and Popular Beliefs, some thought-provoking excerpts:
*** Excerpts Begin ***
While few educated South Asians would deny that British Colonial rule was detrimental to the interests of the common people of the sub-continent - several harbor an illusion that the British weren’t all bad. Didn’t they, perhaps, educate us - build us modern cities, build us irrigation canals - protect our ancient monuments - etc. etc. And then, there are some who might even say that their record was actually superior to that of independent India’s! Perhaps, it is time that the colonial record be retrieved from the archives and re-examined - so that those of us who weren’t alive during the freedom movement can learn to distinguish between the myths and the reality.
Literacy and Education
…(since) the last year, I have been making a point of asking English-speaking Indians to guess what India’s literacy rate in the colonial period might have been…Most guessed the number to be between 30% and 40%. When I suggested that their guess was on the high side - they offered 25% to 35%. No one was prepared to believe that literacy in British India in 1911 was only 6%, in 1931 it was 8%, and by 1947 it had crawled to 11%! That fifty years of freedom had allowed the nation to quintuple it’s literacy rate was something that almost seemed unfathomable to them…
Urban Development
It is undoubtedly true that the British built modern cities with modern conveniences for their administrative officers. But it should be noted that these were exclusive zones not intended for the “natives” to enjoy. Consider that in 1911, 69 per cent of Bombay’s population lived in one-room tenements (as against 6 per cent in London in the same year). The 1931 census revealed that the figure had increased to 74 per cent - with one-third living more than 5 to a room. The same was true of Karachi and Ahmedabad.
…Yet, in 1757 (the year of the Plassey defeat), Clive of the East India Company had observed of Murshidabad in Bengal: “This city is as extensive, populous and rich as the city of London…” (so quoted in the Indian Industrial Commission Report of 1916-18). Dacca was even more famous as a manufacturing town, it’s muslin a source of many legends and it’s weavers had an international reputation that was unmatched in the medieval world.
…The percentage of population dependant on agriculture and pastoral pursuits actually rose to 73% in 1921 from 61% in 1891. (Reliable figures for earlier periods are not available.)
In 1854, Sir Arthur Cotton writing in “Public Works in India” noted: “Public works have been almost entirely neglected throughout India…
Nothing can be more revealing than the remark by John Bright in the House of Commons on June 24, 1858, “The single city of Manchester, in the supply of its inhabitants with the single article of water, has spent a larger sum of money than the East India Company has spent in the fourteen years from 1834 to 1848 in public works of every kind throughout the whole of its vast dominions.”
Irrigation and Agricultural Development
There is another popular belief about British rule: ‘The British modernized Indian agriculture by building canals’. But the actual record reveals a somewhat different story. ” The roads and tanks and canals,” noted an observer in 1838 (G. Thompson, “India and the Colonies,” 1838), ”which Hindu or Mussulman Governments constructed for the service of the nations and the good of the country have been suffered to fall into dilapidation; and now the want of the means of irrigation causes famines.” Montgomery Martin, in his standard work “The Indian Empire”, in 1858, noted that the old East India Company “omitted not only to initiate improvements, but even to keep in repair the old works upon which the revenue depended.”
The Report of the Bengal Irrigation Department Committee in 1930 reads:…“As regards the revival or maintenance of minor routes, … practically nothing has been done, with the result that, in some parts of the Province at least, channels have been silted up, navigation has become limited to a few months in the year, and crops can only be marketed when the Khals rise high enough in the monsoon to make transport possible”.
Sir William Willcock, a distinguished hydraulic engineer, whose name was associated with irrigation enterprises in Egypt and Mesopotamia had made an investigation of conditions in Bengal. He had discovered that innumerable small destructive rivers of the delta region, constantly changing their course, were originally canals which under the English regime were allowed to escape from their channels and run wild. Formerly these canals distributed the flood waters of the Ganges and provided for proper drainage of the land, undoubtedly accounting for that prosperity of Bengal which lured the rapacious East India merchants there in the early days of the eighteenth century.. He wrote” Not only was nothing done to utilize and improve the original canal system, but railway embankments were subsequently thrown up, entirely destroying it. Some areas, cut off from the supply of loam-bearing Ganges water, have gradually become sterile and unproductive, others improperly drained, show an advanced degree of water-logging, with the inevitable accompaniment of malaria. Nor has any attempt been made to construct proper embankments for the Gauges in its low course, to prevent the enormous erosion by which villages and groves and cultivated fields are swallowed up each year.”…
Keep Reading…
August 30th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Distortions, Misrepresentations about India, Modern Indian History |
4 comments
From the original post by Dr Andrew Bostom, “End the Moral Idiocy on Kashmir”
*** EXCERPTS BEGIN ***
I participated in a forum on Kashmir last night at MIT in Boston, as this Muslim supremacist, jihad-inspired conflict—really a tragic ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Hindus by Muslim jihadists which began in earnest during the 14th century—re-emerged in the news recently when the Indian government had the “temerity” to want to transfer 99 acres of land to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board…
…Please watch the video linked below, which chronicles in gory detail the brutal ethnic cleansing of some 350,000 indigenous Hindus from Kashmir during early 1990, orchestrated by Pakistan and it’s “moderate” Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto.
I was privileged last night to meet the astute, courageous, and passionate filmmaker, Ashok Pandit, who produced this documentary, “And the World Remained Silent”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCRFWStxV_4 (Part 1)
Focus on the time period 2:15 to 4:00 minutes, from part 1 above, and witness the jihadist speech of the late, much ballyhooed “modernist reformer” Benazir Bhutto. She was a jihadist, plain and simple; the head of what remains a jihadist state, our “ally” Pakistan.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2vsztUdkpU&feature=related (Part 2)
Here is the text of the comments I delivered last night for historical background:
Islamic Separatism & Kashmir: A Panel Discussion Exploring the Relationship Between Religion and Kashmiri Tangle, July 9, 2008,
During mid-November, 2007, a grim milestone was recorded in the macabre tally being kept assiduously in cyberspace by blogger Glen Reinsford: the 10,000th attack by jihad terrorists resulting in some 60,000 dead and 90,000 injured since the cataclysmic acts of jihad terrorism on September 11, 2001.
Reinsford does not include combat-related statistics…His tally also excludes the genocide in Darfur committed by the Islamic government in Sudan…whose murderous ravages the UN estimated last year had resulted in some 400,000 dead, and 2 million displaced.
Reinsford identified three episodes of such continuous, mind numbing jihadist carnage which had perhaps unsettled him most: Nadimarg, Kashmir India (3/23/03), dozens of Hindu villagers roused out of their beds and machine-gunned by Lashkar-e-Toiba; Beslan, Russia (9/3/04), some 350 people slaughtered by jihadists—half of them children; Malatya, Turkey (4/18/07), three Christian Bible distributors bound, tortured for hours, then gruesomely murdered by men who acted explicitly in the name of Islam.
These data should remind us that there is just one historically relevant meaning of jihad despite contemporary apologetics. Jahada, the root of the word Jihad, appears 40 times in the Koran—under a variety of grammatical forms. With 4 exceptions, all the other 36 usages (in specific Koranic verses) are variations of the third form of the verb, i.e. Jahida. Jahida in the Koran and in subsequent Islamic understanding to both Muslim luminaries—from the greatest jurists and scholars of classical Islam (including Abu Yusuf, Averroes, Ibn Khaldun, and Al Ghazzali), to ordinary people—meant and means “he fought, warred or waged war against unbelievers and the like”, as described by the seminal Arabic lexicographer E.W Lane. Indeed, Lane’s, An Arabic English Lexicon (6 volumes, London, 1865) is still used to this day by Muslim and non-Muslim scholars for definitive Arabic to English translation. Thus Lane, who studied both the etymology and usage of the term jihad, observed, “Jihad came to be used by the Muslims to signify wag[ing] war, against unbelievers.”
Keep Reading…
July 12th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
Conversions, Missionaries in India, Hindu Dharma, Identity, Impact of Islam on India, India & Its Neighbours, Islamic Rule in India, Jammu & Kashmir related, Medieval Indian History, Modern Indian History, Pakistan related |
no comments
From a Sify report on a seminar held last Friday at IIC on ‘1914 Shimla Convention Agreement and Consequences’ (emphasis mine):
The fact that the Chinese refused to ink the 1914 Shimla Convention agreement between India and Tibet puts question mark over the legality or morality of China’s claim of sovereignty over Tibet, a group of India’s top jurists, scholars and security experts feel.
…The participants - who included senior Supreme Court Advocate Rajeev Dhavan, Arunachal MP Khiren Rijuju, Lt Gen. (Rtd.) F.R. J. Jacob, veteran diplomat Dalip Mehta, and writer Dr Parshotam Mehta - felt that this could make a strong case for India to press for autonomy of the Tibet in its negotiations with China during sixth round of discussions on Indo-China border that started today.
…Dhawan argued that China’s case for sovereignty over Tibet was inconclusive, contradictory and un-established. “I have gone through all relevant documents. At best, a nominal suzerainty was imposed by the imperial powers, which lapsed when the Chinese did not sign the agreement,” he said.
Writer Parshotam Mehta and Dr Anand Kumar of Jawaharlal Nehru University drew attention to the July declaration signed by the “plenipotentiaries of Great Britain and Tibet” which said if China did not sign the agreement “she will be debarred from all privileges”.
”It was an agreement between the government of India and Tibet and did not accept any claim by China if the latter did not accept the conditionalities,” they contended.
But all the legalities in the world pale against lack of political will and resolve…I am not in the least optimistic that the sixth round of discussions with China would be any different from the previous ones…
Related Posts:
Of sound bites, Shilpa Shetty and Arunachal
Tibet - not always part of China…
Dancing with the Dragon…
.
If you liked what you read, consider subscribing to my feed or subscribe by Email.
July 6th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, China related, Current Affairs, Geo-Strategic Issues (incl. Nuclear, Oil, Energy), India & Its Neighbours, Miscellaneous, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India, Post Independence History, World History |
one comment
Thanks to Suneel who alerted me to this interview with prolific author, broadcaster and columnist Tarek Fateh (also author of “Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State”)…
Two short excerpts:
How do you distinguish between an Islamist and a Muslim?
An Islamist is someone who believes in invoking Islam for a political agenda. A Muslim, on the other hand, uses Islam as a moral compass for his betterment and the betterment of his family. An Islamist is also a Muslim but a Muslim is not an Islamist.
India’s first education minister, Abul Kalam Azad, a most respected statesman in the country, was not an Islamist. He was against Islamists. Similarly, there are many ayatollahs in Iran who are in jails — as they are not Islamists. [ link ]
***
…The movement for Pakistan was never by the people that comprise Pakistan today. The movement for Pakistan was essentially by upper class Muslims of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.
Right up to 1946, Balochistan and Sindh were not voting for the Muslim League. They were voting for the (Indian National) Congress party. Balochistan was an independent state and they declared their independence three days before India’s Independence.
The coalition government headed by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy in Bengal was the result of Direct Action Day of August 16, 1945, which led to the massacre — actually genocide — of Hindus in Noakhali (now in Bangladesh). [ link ]
Related Post: Will the Darul Uloom now declare war on “Islamism”?
Also recommended: Distinguishing between Islam and Islamism (from 10 years ago!).
June 19th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
Current Affairs, Debates & Discussions, India & Its Neighbours, Islam & Reform, Islamic Rule in India, Modern Indian History, Pakistan related, Post Independence History |
2 comments
In my previous post, I has asked the question: What could be the reason(s) for the Government’s continued silence on the matter of Netaji’s disappearance?
It would be tempting to blame this on partisan politics but actually it is not just the Congress that has failed us in this regard. As Anuj Dhar mentions: “The BJP seems to be in unison with the Congress over the Subhas Bose death case. That’s why you haven’t heard anything on this matter from their senior leaders, with the notable exception of Dr Murli Manohar Joshi”
.
Time for a little bit of history.
In the early days of the struggle for India’s freedom, Netaji’s influence and impact on the freedom movement was equal to (if not more than) that of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru…Unfortunately the relationship between Netaji on one hand, and Mahatma on the other was uneasy and fraught with disagreements.
As many of you may know, his re-election to the post of Congress President in 1939 created further tension between him and the Mahatma - especially as he had won the post defeating Pattabhi Sitaramaiah (who was Gandhiji’s nominee).
Gandhiji apparently took Sitaramayya’s defeat personally and is believed to have remarked: “I consider Pattabhi’s defeat as my own”.
There were other reasons behind the tension, including disagreement over the immediate goals and objectives of the movement. Soon after his re-election, Netaji “…brought a resolution to give the British six months to hand India over to the Indians, failing which there would be a revolt. There was much opposition to his rigid stand, and he resigned from the post of president and formed a progressive group known as the Forward Block… [link]”
Here is another account and interpretation of events around the time:
In a letter dated March 28, 1939, from Manbhum, Bihar - Bose complained bitterly to Nehru of Gandhi’s quiet campaign of non-cooperation with him. Bose had just won the Presidency of the Indian National Congress, defeating Gandhi’s chosen nominee, Dr Pattabhi. At first, Gandhi had tried to talk Bose out of running for the post, and tried to work out a backroom deal for Dr Pattabhi’s ascension (as he had done on many earlier occasions). But Bose was determined to seek the mandate of Congress activists, and won by a handsome margin in an election where the official machinery of the Congress had put all its weight behind Gandhi’s hand-picked nominee.
Bose’s historic election signified the mood of the Indian masses, who were becoming increasingly impatient with Gandhi’s tepid nationalism. Bose had always strived to accelerate the freedom struggle, and the mass of Congress Party workers appreciated his sincerity and unswerving commitment to the national cause. In many ways, he was the best person to lead the Congress, with intellect and vision that exceeded Gandhi.
But Gandhi, along with Patel and Nehru formed a tactical block against Bose, and prevented him from functioning effectively as leader of India’s preeminent national organization. In vain did Bose make his case with Nehru, who remained unmoved, and eventually, it led to Bose having to quit the Congress, and organize outside it’s tedious confines.
But there was more to this than met the eye…
In the words of Prof Satadru Sen, “Gandhi certainly saw Bose as a rival and a dangerous upstart, and did his best to destroy him politically”
What follows is probably the most truthful (and detailed) account of what actually happened during the months following Netaji’s re-election that ultimately led to his ouster as Congress President.
Keep Reading…
May 30th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India, Post Independence History |
5 comments
Like many of you, I have often wondered how India’s present would have looked if Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose had lived (and led) an independent India.
Last week I was alerted to this site dedicated to finding the truth behind Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose’s tragic disappearance from the national freedom struggle in 1945 (Thanks a lot, Mohan). Specifically it deals with the Mukherjee Commission (which was the third official proble into Netaji’s disappearance) and what came out of it.
The site mentions how the government tried hard to stall the work of Justice Mukherjee Commission and avoided cooperating wherever it could. It also mentions some very interesting facts which I felt we should all be aware of:
- The UPA Government was overtly hostile towards the Commission. Justice Mukherjee was “humiliated” by them for his insistence to probe the Taiwanese and the Russian angles to the Netaji mystery.
- The Government was against the Commission visiting Taiwan, but Justice Mukherjee prevailed. Justice Mukherjee’s January 2005 visit to Taiwan and his direct interaction with Taiwan Government yielded the disclosure that there was no evidence of any air crash in or around Taipei around 18 August 1945. The Commission also found out that despite the claims of the previous panels, and so called eyewitnesses, Netaji and other victims of the “crash” were not cremated in Taiwan.
- It was established that the Governments of Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi’s either hushed up or destroyed several records pertaining to the reported death of Subhas Bose.
- The British Government told the Commission that they would not declassify some papers on Netaji until 2021. The Government of India would not help the Commission in accessing these papers.
- With the evidence hinting at no crash, the Commission made attempts to find out what had happened to Netaji after 1945. Starting February 2001, the Commission asked the Government to make arrangements for their visit to Russia so that the evidence could be assessed. The Government kept dilly-dallying. In September 2005, the Commission was (finally) allowed to visit Russia (after much dilly-dallying by the government) , but it never got access to major intelligence and security-related archives of Russia. One major witness did not turn up and others apparently turned hostile. As a result, the Commission’s Russia sojourn failed.
What did the Commission find? Amongst other things, it noted that:
- (Netaji)…did not die in the plane crash, as alleged
- The ashes in the Japanese temple are not that of Netaji
Getting into the details, the Commission didn’t just nix the air crash story; it paved the way for further inquiry, maintaining that Subhas had disappeared while heading towards the Soviet Russia.
A secret plan was contrived to ensure Netaji’s safe passage to which Japanese military authority and Habibur Rahman were parties.
The purpose of his (Netaji’s) flight was to go to the Soviet Union and with the aid of the Soviet Union he was to continue his independence movement.
The departure of Netaji from Saigon on August 17, 1945 along with Habibur Rahman and some Japanese officers for going to Russia via Manchuria is … not in controversy.
It stands established that emplaning at Saigon on August 17, 1945 Netaji succeeded in evading the Allied Forces and escaping out of their reach and as a camouflage thereof the entire make-believe story of the air crash, Netaji’s death therein and his cremation was engineered by the Japanese army authorities including the two doctors and Habibur Rahman and then aired on August 23, 1945 ….
Whether Netaji thereafter landed in Russia or elsewhere cannot be answered for dearth of evidence.
Read the full report here.
What does the government know that it does not want us to know?
Why is it that the Government believes: “disclosure of the nature and contents of these documents would … hurt the sentiments of the people at large and may evoke wide-spread reactions …. Diplomatic relations with friendly countries may also be adversely affected if the said documents are disclosed.”? [link]
As Anuj Dhar asks: “Should not we demand to know what these documents have to say? …Should not we ask our Government to state facts? Don’t we have a right to know what happened to the man who liberated us?
Some of you would of course know the history of tension and disagreements between Gandhi, Nehru (on one side) and Bose…Might that have something to do with the Government’s unusual (and almost hostile) attitude towards this issue?
More on this bit of history in Part II tomorrow…
.
Related Post: Reassessing Mahatma: Did Gandhi-giri really worked?
May 28th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India |
23 comments
Please watch this short video and spare a moment to remember the brave souls who laid down their lives so that we may breath free
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tb4sSKmdik&hl=en]
To share the video, pl. forward the link:
http://satyameva-jayate.org/2008/05/08/naman-1857/
Jai Hind, Jai Bharat.
May 8th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
An Indian Identity, British Rule in India, Current Affairs, Modern Indian History |
8 comments
Some of you may think I am getting obsessed with Aruncahal Pradesh, China or the North-East…but this issue deserves far more attention that it ever gets…
As I said in one of my previous posts, we seem to be sleepwalking our way into a disaster…
I am seriously tempted to start a “Save Arunachal” movement…(and I am not saying this light-heartedly).
Excerpts from a Rediff interview with Arunachal MP Kiren Rijiju, “”It is time to wake up to Chinese incursions”, March 04, 2008 (emphasis mine, as always):
“… Q: Chinese intrusions have been denied by the army and the government, but you have repeatedly brought the matter to public notice. Could you tell us what is really happening?
A: In my constituency in Arunachal (West), there are many points where Chinese intrusions are happening. And it happens throughout the year….The Chinese (intrusions) are happening in a slow, creeping manner. Inch by inch, the Chinese station their army personnel and bring equipment.
Keep Reading…
March 25th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
China related, Geo-Strategic Issues (incl. Nuclear, Oil, Energy), India & Its Neighbours, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India, Post Independence History |
16 comments
I came across this article a few days back. Although slightly dated, the points made by Shri Shourie re. the shocking state of affairs at the Indian Council of Historical Research are still valid. The saga is shocking, shameful and disgusting beyond belief.
Excerpts from ICHR’s The Eminent Entrepreneurs! by Arun Shourie (emphasis mine)
“…Answer by the Ministry for Human Resources Development to Unstarred Question number 3466 in the Rajya Sabha:
“Professor Bipin Chandra was sanctioned a sum of Rs 75000 during 1987-88 for the assignment entitled ‘A History of Indian National Congress’. A sum of Rs 57500 has been released to him till 23-6-1989. The remaining balance of Rs 17500 is yet to be released because a formal manuscript in this regard is yet to be received.”
I, therefore, wrote to the Ministry:
“Does this mean that some informal manuscript has been received ? Or that no manuscript has been received ? If the latter is the case, how is it that nine years having passed, the scholar having taken Rs 57500 for a project and not having submitted the manuscript, no action has been taken ?”
After some reminders, the Ministry eventually wrote to say:
“… it has been confirmed by ICHR that no manuscript — either formally or informally — has been received so far.”
As regards the action taken, the Ministry said, information was being obtained from the ICHR.
I am now informed in writing that the Rs 75000 allotted to this “eminent historian” for this project — “the Oral History Project” — was but a part, a small part of the total take. Bipin Chandra was given in addition Rs 200,000 by the ICSSR and Rs 400,000 through the Jawaharlal Nehru University. Neither institution has received any manuscript.
…
As nothing but nothing has turned up in the ICHR in return for its grant, the second part of my query remained : what action has the ICHR taken in the matter? I am now told, “No action has been initiated on this as Dr. Bipin Chandra is stated to be still working on the project.” That is the position nine years after his eminence collected the money!
…it turns out that this is the pattern.
The ICHR commenced a National Movement Project — to which I shall come in a moment — to document our freedom struggle from the mid-1850’s.
Bipin Chandra took Rs 12000 to produce the volume covering 1885-86. Result? Nothing has been heard of it since. He took another Rs 12000 for the volume covering 1932-34. Outcome? “Not submitted,” says the ICHR. Being eminent, Bipin Chandra is naturally in the circle of friends among whom the “Towards Freedom Project” was parceled. To assist him to shoulder his onerous load in this regard, the ICHR has employed over the years one “regular” staff member plus eight staff members “on consolidated salary”. Result ? “Volume not submitted.”
But, to be fair, this pattern is not confined to this eminent historian alone. It has been the pattern for the entire institution manned and controlled by these “eminent historians.”
…Therefore, after some inquiries with, as journalists say, “informed sources,” I asked,
“But what about the project for documenting the National Freedom Movement from 1857 to 1936? How many volumes were to be produced under it? To whom was each volume assigned? How much was paid to each scholar? How much has been spent on each volume? How many volumes have been produced under this project ?”
The Ministry replied,
“… the Indian Council of Historical Research have stated that no project was commissioned by them to document National Movement between 1857 and 1937.”
What a foolish evasion ! All I had to do was to draw the attention of the Ministry to successive annual reports of the ICHR which had been presented to Parliament over two decades : report after report had listed this as one of the major projects which the ICHR had initiated! Please look at the account commencing from page 26 of the Annual Report for 1972-1973, I wrote; please look at the account commencing from page 16 of the Annual Report for 1973-1974, I wrote…
The result ? I am now informed that such a project had indeed been undertaken. Nineteen volumes were to have been produced. The volumes were assigned to different scholars — our eminencies as usual led the rest ! Each scholar collected Rs. 12000 per volume he had been assigned.
…
(The status of those nineteen volumes makes for depressing reading. Of the 19 volumes, only five had been submitted; 11 of these had been paid for but nothing had been submitted and three were not assigned at all! - Note by Shantanu)
…remember that they were paid out in the mid-1970s, when they amounted to much, much more than they do in these days of scams..
And what about the project to document the Praja Mandal Movement, the freedom movement in the princely states ?, I inquired. …
The ICHR…furnished the details…the Project was assigned to one of the key-point men of the “eminent historians” in the Council, R. C. Shukla. Staff was assigned. Materials are reported to have been collected between 1976 and 1982. A sum of Rs 435,000 was spent. The net outcome ? “No publication has come out on PMM [the Praja Mandal Movements], to the best knowledge of the Council,”
What about the project which was undertaken to document “Peasants Movements” ?, I inquired.
Fourteen volumes were to be produced, the ICHR says. Six of these were assigned among three scholars at Rs 12000 per volume. One of these has been published. Two are listed as “Not Submitted.” And three as “Submitted but not traceable.”
What about the “Economic Data and Statistics Project,” which was listed with such fan-fare in the Annual Reports till some years ago ?, I asked.
Six volumes were to be produced under it, the ICHR says…as against the six volumes which were to have been published, not one has been published.
…the “Project on Documentation on Economic History.” What about this one ?, I asked.
The project was commenced in 1992, says the ICHR. Seventeen volumes were to be produced between 1992 and 1997. The total cost was to be Rs 25 lakhs. As of today, says the ICHR, no volume has been published. And a cool Rs 195,000 have already been spent.
What about the “Medieval Sources Project” ?, I asked.
After some search, the ICHR has supplied the following list of the scholars to whom the work was assigned, the subject he was to cover, the money sanctioned to each, and the result :
1. Satish Chandra & Co. : Hindi translation of “Early Sources of Akbar’s Reign”; Not completed, money not indicated.
2. Irfan Habib : Akbarat-e-Aurangzeb : Rs 27000; Not completed.
3. Moonis Raza : “Atlas of the Mughal Empire” : Rs 22400; Not completed.
4. Anis Faruqi : Tashir-ul-Aqwani : Rs 9000; Not completed.
5. Satish Chandra : Documents on Social and Economic History : Rs 23000; Not completed.
6. P. Saran : Tarikh-i-Akbari : Rs 18500; Submitted but not traceable
…
and so it goes on and on.
The article is a fine example of thorough “digging” and a diligently conducted inquiry. What is very worrying as one reads through, is how an institution - that should primarily be focusing on serious historical research - became part of a political agenda and a tool for promoting ideological bias…
Sad and disgusting. If you ever wondered why I deeply distrust the “history” we have been taught, now you know.
Related Posts: Lies and half-truths in the name of national integration and
somewhat more controversial: Taj Mahal: The Biggest Whitewash in Indian History?
.
March 6th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
Distortions, Misrepresentations about India, History, Medieval Indian History, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India |
no comments
A great post by Apollo on General Deepak Kapoor’s (Chief of Army) recent remarks re. China and incursions across the border:
Excerpts (emphasis mine):
“…Gen Deepak Kapoor has gone on record saying that India can be held equally to blame of intruding into Chinese territory!
“The Chinese have a different perception of the Line Of Actual Control as do we. When we come up to their perception, we call it incursion and likewise they do.”
His shocking statement that India can be equally blamed for intruding into Chinese territory is based on a presumed logic that since the two sides have not agreed on a mutual Line of Actual Control both sides can accuse each other of intruding into their territories.
Infact the Army chief by making such a statement has exposed his ignorance of the history of the India-China border issue…
He doesn’t seem to realise that technically India and China do not share a border.
Keep Reading…
February 28th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
China related, Geo-Strategic Issues (incl. Nuclear, Oil, Energy), Modern Indian History |
4 comments
This thought was prompted by an exchange in the comments section of this post.
Courtesy of Acorn, please read and reflect on this extract from a speech by the Honourable Dr. B.R. Ambedkar on 25th November 1949:
“If we wish to maintain democracy not merely in form, but also in fact, what must we do?
The first thing in my judgement we must do is to hold fast to constitutional methods of achieving our social and economic objectives. It means we must abandon the bloody methods of revolution. It means that we must abandon the method of civil disobedience, non-cooperation and satyagraha.
When there was no way left for constitutional methods for achieving economic and social objectives, there was a great deal of justification for unconstitutional methods.
But where constitutional methods are open, there can be no justification for these unconstitutional methods.
These methods are nothing but the Grammar of Anarchy and the sooner they are abandoned, the better for us.”
.
I look forward to your thoughts and views. I think this could be a very interesting discussion.
Related Posts:
There is a “???????” in “??????????”…
Reassessing Mahatma: Did Gandhi-giri really worked?
February 27th, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
Current Affairs, Debates & Discussions, Godhra, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance, Politics and Governance in India, Post Independence History, Ram Janambhoomi, Ayodhya, Terrorism in India |
one comment
Amidst all the recent brouhaha around Bharat Ratna nominations, someone conveniently forgot the “truth” about some of our nominees. I am thinking of Bahadur Shah Zafar who was proposed for the award as a champion of India’s freedom and someone who actively opposed the British.
The demand was made by Delhi Assembly Deputy Speaker Shoaib Iqbal…(who reportedly said that)… it was unfortunate that Emperor Bahadur Shah II, also known as Zafar, whose martyrdom and national stature rank among the highest in India’s freedom struggle, had not so far been conferred with the Bharat Ratna.
”Bahadur Shah Zafar was the leader of the freedom fighters of the entire sub-continent. He could have compromised with the British and lived a life like the royal family of England but chose to sacrifice his sons, pomp and grandeur - all for for the sake of the honour and independence of India and its people,”
The facts are somewhat different (and inconvenient).
The reality was that the Emperor did not think much of the Sepoys who had marched to Delhi to ask him to be their leader. He viewed them as “rustic, uncouth and ill-mannered”.
His support (for the revolt), when it came…was far from being decisive…”He vacillated, but overcome by the desire to reclaim his inheritance, he assented” (from “Requiem for Mughal Delhi” by By Muneeza Shamsie, a review of William Dalrymple’s book “The Last Mughal”).
And yet, “
…he was never quite in control. His page, Zahir Dehlavi, who later wrote an invaluable memoir, Dastan-e-Ghadr, described Bahadur Shah’s horror when he learnt the sepoys wanted to slaughter the British families held prisoner in the fort. He pleaded with them.
He asked the sepoys, Hindus and Muslims, to consult their religious leaders if they had the authority to massacre helpless women and children. “Their murder can never be allowed,” he added. But in the end, he failed to prevent it.” (from Muneeza Shamsie’s review)
So much for leading the freedom fighters.
The end of his leadership was also far from heroic: “When the victory of the British became certain, Zafar took refuge at Humayun’s Tomb, in an area that was then at the outskirts of Delhi, and hid there. British forces led by Major Hodson surrounded the tomb and compelled his surrender.”
Will the Honorary Dy Speaker admit that he may have been mistaken?
For some extra “fun”, read this leftist interpretation of Zafar’s life from an article written for CPI(M)’s newspaper last June. I thought this bit was the funniest:
“One should not take too literally Zafar’s statement at his so-called ‘trial’ in which he projected himself as a mere prisoner of the sipahis.”
Classic!
Related Post: Lies and half-truths in the name of national integration
.
February 2nd, 2008
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Distortions, Misrepresentations about India, India & Its Neighbours, Islamic Rule in India, Modern Indian History, Politics and Governance in India |
3 comments
Several weeks ago, I came across this piece by Dr Dipak Basu (Professor in International Economics in Nagasaki University, Japan) examining the role of Satyagraha in the national freedom movement.
Until I read the article, I used to believe that Satyagraha as a tactic was effective to at least some extent in the fight for freedom. Now I am beginning to have some doubts. I would be very interested to hear from other readers on this topic.
But before that, excerpts from “Satyagraha and India”s freedom Movement” in which Dr Base analyses Gandhi-ji’s three major Satyagraha movements and their impact on the struggle for independence.
Although Gandhi-ji’s involvement with the freedom movement began with his visit to India in 1896, it was not until six years later that he began to get seriously involved.
*** EXCERPTS BEGIN ***
“…In his second visit for a year in 1901-2 he attended the Congress session in Calcutta and spent more than a month with G.K. Gokhale, who was very loyal to the British and was opposed to the ideas of freedom movement of Tilak, Lajpat Rai, Chittaranjan Das, Surendranath Banerjee and Bipin Pal. Thus, Gandhi has joined the Empire-loyalist camp within the Congress, disinterested in the Swaraj movement of Tilak.
Gandhi’s first Satyagraha:
Returning to South Africa, Gandhi began to defy the Transvaal Asiatic Ordinance, where the government wanted all Asiatic, Arabs and Turks to carry a pass all the time to prove their eligibility to stay in South Africa. It was not a big issue, as in most countries even today foreigners must carry such documents anyway.
Throughout the Satyagraha, Gandhi emphasized that it was not so much for the rights of the Indians in South Africa as for the honour of the motherland, but which “motherland’ Gandhi was talking about was not clear.
One of the most dramatic events of the Satyagraha was the burning of the passes. The question is did that help the Indians in South Africa. The answer is definitely negative. Indians were rounded up and deported in many cases. The campaign lasted for over seven years, and in 1913 hundreds of people went to jail - and thousands of striking Indian miners faced imprisonment and injury.
Even when General Smut decided to meet Gandhi, it was made clear that there would be no further immigration of the Indians to South Africa. Passes were withdrawn temporarily but soon after laws were passed to restrict the non-Europeans into designated areas in every cities; that was the beginning of the legal racial segregations in South Africa.
By all means Gandhi’s Satyagraha was not a success, but that had not stopped certain people and the English language media in India at that time to propagate Gandhi as victorious against a racist government of British origin for whom Gandhi had worked as medical orderly in the war against the Dutch settlers in South Africa and became a recruitment agent during the First World War…”
Dr Basu also notes that “…(during this time)..Gandhi had practically no contact with the African and their liberation movement”.
Keep Reading…
December 3rd, 2007
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Indian Media, Modern Indian History, Pakistan related, Politics and Governance in India |
16 comments
Varnam posted this great entry on “The Benevolent Empire“ earlier this week which mentions how British rule ended up with an impoverished India (emphasis mine):
When Clive of India came to Bengal, he described it — in a way all visitors of the time did — as “extensive, populous and as rich as the city of London.” It was a place of such “richness and abundance” that “neither war, pestilence nor oppression could destroy” it.
But within a century of British occupation, the population of its largest city, Calcutta, fell from 150,000 to 30,000 as its industries were wrecked in the interests of the mother country. By the time the British left, Calcutta was one of the poorest places in the world.
Reminded me of Loot and another post I had written many months ago on Economic Exploitation and the Drain of Wealth during British “Raj”
Related Posts:
India in the 1820s…
Loot - in search of East India Co. (excerpts)
November 24th, 2007
Posted by
B Shantanu |
British Rule in India, Indian Economy, Modern Indian History |
9 comments
A few days ago I came across this piece by Kishore Asthana which makes a number of important points that form the backdrop to Godhra.
I am reproducing some excerpts below but I would encourage you to read the article in full: Tehelka’s Gujarat Expose and the Deeper Truth
Excerpts (emphasis mine):
“……Look at the progression. Arguments with tea vendors and rumours of kidnapping lead a Muslim mob to burn 60 people alive. The burning of 60 Hindu pilgrims results in carnage all over the state. It is a case of a petty incident leading to gross over-reaction, leading to a grosser over-reaction. It does not need too much intelligence to fix the blame where it belongs.
Babulal Bajrangi was a mere symptom of the disease. The underlying causes are our lopsided politics of division along caste and religion and our skewed perception of the word “secular” since our independence.
…The lessons the mind draws from all this are chilling. They are at many levels:
The Resentments – Lesson no. 1 - It is obvious that there is deep resentment amongst Hindu s at their treatment by Muslims who are emboldened by India ’s secular nature and its liberal intelligentsia. Hindus view themselves as the subjugated people of India and are constantly reminded of this by the politicians and the media. I am talking of the “average” Hindu who eventually matter and not the urban Hindu intelligentsia who show remarkable unawareness of their own double standards.
Imagine a group of Muslims returning from the Haj, in Lahore . They are on a train and are chanting Allah O Akbar. The train stops at a station, some of the Hajis fight with a Hindu tea vendor, and a mob of 1,000 Hindus collects and stones and torches the train. Would such a scenario be feasible in Pakistan ? No. But, in India , the reverse is easily accepted and no one appears to question the mindset of the Muslim leaders who encourage this or the Muslim mob which acts in this manner with seeming impunity.
Hindu s are not even permitted to enter Mecca but Muslims lay a claim to Ayodhya, the Mecca of the Ram Bhakts. All this births dissonance in the Hindu mind and the pressure keeps building up.
The Consequences : Lesson no. 2 – When the cork is blown open by an incident like Godhra, people like Babu Bajrangi and his ilk emerge, monster-like, fattened on this resentment. Once the Djinn is out of the bottle, there is no saying what will happen. We must learn to identify and neutralise such Djinns before they emerge from the bottle or, better still, not even give them an opportunity to take birth.
The Deeper Truth: Lesson no. 3 -. The deeper truth is that such resentments are building up all over India. The pressures of modern living, the proliferation of the media and its populist feeding frenzy, the minority- appeasing manipulations of political parties, the subversion of the bureaucracy and other such factors ensure that the detonator is well primed, the fuel is available; the cynical facilitators are all in place and only the trigger is needed.
…
Emotional Integration: The need, today, is for a quest for Emotional Integration. For this to come about, it is essential to face some unpalatable truths and come to grips with some very important and difficult to implement matters:
a. Primacy to the Indian Constitution over religious laws:
b. Sensitivity towards the feelings of the Hindu faithful: …In 50 years of independence, should our leaders not have ensured this by peaceful, legal means? If they had paid half as much attention to Hindu concerns as they pay to the concerns of minorities, it would have been enough…Instead, Hindu s have been taken for granted and the minorities pampered, with catastrophic results as far as the average Hindu ’s mindset is concerned.
c. Ending the Politics of Appeasement: Special privileges – subsidies for pilgrimages, reservations in jobs, scholarships to minority students etc. need to be stopped. A secular state must only give special privileges only to citizens who are in financial need at this time.
d. A more responsible media: This needs no elaboration.
e. A quicker and more effective law enforcement and judicial system: When the citizens start thinking that mobs must do what the state is incapable or unwilling to do, then we have the Gujarat riots, the lynching of criminals in our towns and villages and even encounter deaths. This kind of disproportionate retaliation is a hallmark of frustration of the citizens with the legal machinery.
f. Imposition of minimum qualifications and law-abiding record for our legislators.
g. Improvement in our education system to promote self-esteem and regard for our nation-hood. Our education delivery system is pathetic and does not inculcate desirable values in our young. It does not encourage the feeling of emotional integration with others.
…Our education by rote and the politicised, Eurocentric curriculum is playing havoc with national self-esteem. Neglect of teaching as the most important profession in the country has made matters worse.
…In its vigilantism, Tehelka has focused on events, rather than deeper causes. However, all Indians must look deeper, into our own selves and at our politicians, media, judges and bureaucracy, if we have to avoid more bloodshed in the name of religion.
***
A slightly edited version also appeared here.
Comments, thoughts and suggestions welcome as always. I think this is too important a matter to be left for the media alone.
Related Posts:
Of Godhra and Gujarat
Join the discussion on Islam, Hindutva, Dr Zakir Naik, Godhra and
Perverse secularism and India’s future
If you liked what you read, please consider subscribing to my feed (here or by Email)
November 20th, 2007
Posted by
B Shantanu |
A Hindu Identity, An Indian Identity, Godhra, Impact of Islam on India, Indian Media, Modern Indian History, Pakistan related, Politics and Governance in India, Politics of Minority Appeasement, Post Independence History, Ram Janambhoomi, Ayodhya |
4 comments
