A few reminisces of British India History of India, the book under review was originally written in English by E. Marsden, a British bureaucrat whose Urdu translation was first published in India a few years ago. The British author had deep interest the history of this part of the world. He has fondly written about the people, geography, history and culture of ancient India. He has, however, focussed more on the British period when a number of development projects were completed by the colonial rulers during their 200-year occupation of this Asian landmass.
The British who set their feet on this vast sub-continent in the garb of traders, through deceit and chicanery, nibbled at its vast territories and ultimately conquered much of it with the help of armies raised from the local people by 1957. The annexation of Indian sub-continent with the British Crown culminated after the defeat of the Sikhs in 1849. The History of India was translated jointly by Lala Jia Ram and Khalifa Amaduddin in Urdu and was first published in India.
Book Home, a publishing house of Lahore has reproduced its Urdu translation in 2005. The British author has correctly stated that the map of India showed three separate and well-defined regions. They are the Himalayan ranges and their foothills; the broad, fertile river plains, and the plateau. The highest range of the Himalayas rises to a mean elevation of 20,000 feet. The lower slops and hills are mainly in forest or grazing land. Among them lie lovely, rich valleys with fields and orchards.
The giant rivers that built the vast river plains have their source in the Himalayas' melting snows. For ages they carried down the silt that now lies thousands of feet deep over the broad valleys. Religions, the author says, have divided the people even more than languages and physical differences. Major religions in India are Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism and Buddhism.
The ancient Hindu literature, according to the author, consists of the Vedic hymns in the Sanskrit language of which the Rig-Veda is the oldest collection. It projects a picture of a high civilisation existing about the time the Aryan invaders had reached the banks of the Indus and were fighting the "dark people" into the south.
The two most famous historical poems are the Mahabharata; or the chronicles of the Delhi kings, and the Ramayana, or the story of the Aryan advance into southern India. The early history of India is lost in the mists of ancient traditions. Archaeological excavations at Mohenjo-daro and Harappa reveal the existence of a civilisation in the Indus Valley as long ago as 3000 BC. The remains show that a city manner of living had developed in which the people had wells, bathrooms, drainage systems, handsome jewellery and well-made household utensils and copper weapons.
The struggle between European powers for dominance in Indian affairs had begun when Vasco de Gama discovered the ocean route around the Cape of Good Hope. Portugal, Holland, and France began a race for the rich Indian and Spice Islands trade. In 1600 the British East India Company joined in the rivalry and within a century had trading posts at Madras, Bombay and Calcutta. The French under the leadership of governor, Joseph Dupleix organised an army of local troops.
With them he interfered so successfully in the quarrels of Indian rulers that by 1751 the Carnatic and Deccan areas became under French influence. When British influence was threatened with extinction in India, the genius of Robert Clive turned the tables. His storming and successful holding of Arcot in 1751 and then his victory at Plassey in 1757 over their French laid the foundations of the rule of the British East India Company.
Later, trading rights gradually grew into political rule. It was a strange conquest in which a private trading company conquered an empire primarily through the use of soldiers raised in the land itself. In 1858, after the abortive war of independence waged by the Indian people, the administration of India was transferred to the British Crown. In 1876 the British parliament ruled that India should be designated as an empire. The next year Queen Victoria was crowned Empress of India.
The Viceroy of India, appointed by the Crown, ruled directly the provinces of British India. The Hindu and Muslim princes continued to govern almost 600 princely states, which were nominally independent but were forbidden to make war on one another and the Viceroy kept an agent at each court to advise the ruler. The British rule, claims the author, brought internal peace and a measure of economic development to India. The British built roads and railways, canals, extensive irrigation works, mills and factories.
They introduced Western law and police systems, modernised cities, and built scattered schools and universities. Most British civil service personnel displayed ability through their aloofness aroused resentment. Indian intellectuals, many of them educated in England, began to dream of a free India. In 1885, the first political party was founded in India to further independence. The last chapter of the book under review lists income and expenditures from the 1911 budget of the Central Government of India, which when compared to the current situation looks so surprising.
The income in federal budget from different heads was: Income from land revenue 310 million, from railways 190 million, from excise duties 100 million, Custom duties 90 million, Judicial stamps 70 million, from Irrigation department 55 million, from the sale of salt 50 million, from post and telegraph deptt. 45 million. Expenditures: On army 310 million, on Railways 160 million, on establishment 320 million, on collection of revenue receipts 110 million, maintenance of irrigation system 45 million, on construction of public works 70 million, on Post & Telegraph and Mints 45 million, on miscellanies expenditures 140 million. This tells the story of good old days when things were not expensive and life was relatively more enjoyable.
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