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The British East India Company. Professor Pacas. India 1750’s.
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The British East India Company Professor Pacas
India 1750’s • From early 1700’s to as late as 1776- when Adam Smith published his Wealth of Nations, India enjoyed a flourishing domestic textile industry that supplied not only Europe with textiles but also European possessions of the Americas. • Adam Smith treated the subject matter of Eastern civilizations with deference and viewed them on par with those of Western Europe.
British East India Co. hegemony over India • The ‘conquest’ of India by first the British East India Co. and later the British Empire proper did not happen over night. • The collapse of the Mughals did not necessarily mean that India was weak and an easy target for Europeans to swoop in and conquer. • There still existed domestic Indian economic development, growth of the wealth of the merchant class, bankers, and tax-farmers.
Internal Weakness • After the collapse of Mughals India was fragmented into six mutually antagonistic kingdoms. • Merchants did not feel that these constantly warring kingdoms provided any real security for their interests and thus sought assistance from the British East India Co. instead to secure their interests.
Robert Clive • In the 1750’s this symbiotic relationship between Indian merchants and the company was transformed when the Company official Robert Clive successfully played off one claimant to power in Bengal against another and eventually gained control over the province which was the wealthiest part of the old Mughal Empire. • The Company collected the taxes and ran the government administration, while an Indian nawab continued to hold power as a puppet for the company.
How success in Bengal paved the way for empire • Other Indian rulers saw the Company as a useful ally, and used it to train their own troops and regularize their administration. • Indian merchant class welcomed its increased influence as it stabilized the political turmoil of previous years facilitating increased business transactions throughout the region. • The Company also was one of the Indian merchant’s greatest customer for their textile goods. • The Company helped guarantee the merchant class’ property against abuses by Indian rulers.
Cont’d • Taking advantage of its growing influence the Company further cemented its power by creating a new class of large-scale landowners out of sections of the old zamindars. • This further solidified their footholds in the region. • Continuing to play off rivals the British East India Co. successfully conquered the Kingdom of the Marathas in 1818, Sind in 1843, the Sikhs in 1849, and Oudh in 1856.
Divide and Conquer • The British East India Co. had successfully played rival kingdoms, diverse religious communities, different groups of castes, and diverse privileged classes against each other and by mid-19th century they had possession of most of India. • These internal divisions within India had allowed the British, whose European military presence in India only numbered 40,000, to utilize 200,000 Indian Sepoy troops; to conquer an empire of 200 million people.
India and the hemorrhaging of the wealth • The Indian possessions of Bengal and Bihar of the British East India Co. paid out 2 million pounds sterling of taxes per year making the Company men extremely wealthy individuals. • Clive left India with no less than 234,000 pounds sterling (millions in today’s money). • Because of their close ties to the Company the Indian merchant class also reaped huge monetary rewards and the expense of the commoners. • Conditions were so exploitative and volatile that ‘rebellion’ against the company and Indian elites was always simmering at the surface.
Revolt of the Sepoys 1857 • Even though dependent on their Sepoy troops to maintain the ‘peace’ the British Company men were extremely racist and insensitive to culture and customs of their Indian subjects. • Sepoy soldiers were ordered to grease their ammunition cartridges with beef fat (anathema to Hindus) and pig fat (anathema to Muslims) and the Sepoys rebelled. • The rebellion spread like a wild fire and within weeks the mutineers had seized control over huge portions of northern India, killing the British officers and officials. • Hindus and Sikhs set aside mutual animosity and animosity towards Muslims and installed an heir to the Mughals as emperor in Delhi.
New Imperialism in India • The British Empire rushed troops to the sub-continent. • They also successfully persuaded Indian soldiers of Madras and Bombay to attack the mutineers in the north. • The most savage repression of the rebels then ensued until India was firmly in the hands of the British Empire once again.
New Imperialism in India cont’d • After these events the British Empire opted to establish direct rule over India instead of leaving it in the hands of the British East India Co. • This paved the way for British citizens to make careers in India. • These British sahibs were extremely racist towards the native population. • Indians were treated as second class citizens.
Cont’d • Many of the former elite merchant class became recluse in their palatial estates as the sub-continent became a British colony to be exploited as the British Empire saw fit. • The former domestic industries were practically destroyed and Indian economy turned into an export oriented economy beholden to Britain. • Former wealthy empire was now turned into one of the poorest regions of the globe.
