The British Impact on India

Sir Percival Griffiths

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780367177805
• eBook ISBN: 9780429614248
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

First published in 1952, imperialism is a regularly recurring historical phenomenon, calling for neither approval not condemnation in the abstract. A more profitable exercise is to consider particular imperialisms and assess their spirit and their achievements. From this premise Sir Percival Griffiths proceeds to examine the political, administrative and economic effects on India of British rule. Formerly a member of the Indian Civil Service, later the leader of the British representatives in the Indian Legislative Assembly and now closely connected with commerce and industry in India and Pakistan, he has the advantage of a three-sided approach. He was, moreover, playing an active part in Indian public affairs throughout the years leading to the transfer of power. In 1942 he declared that he would fight any government which resiled from the promise of independence for India and when the Cabinet Mission visited India in 1947, it fell on him to assert - on behalf of the British community in India – their conviction that independence must be granted without further delay. It is because he has thus been a close eye-witness of the events of the last three decades in India that he has written this book.

Although Western civilization is often regarded by Indians as materialistic, it is the spiritual rather than in the material sphere that British influence has been greatest. It has built up Indian nationalism; it has engendered in Indian minds a new concept of equality and of human rights; it has rekindled the scientific spirit; and is has profoundly modified the Indian intellectual approach to the problems in life. In all this there have been losses as well as gain – not least among the losses being the partial destruction of village corporate life and the spread of specticism among the intelligentsia – but there can be little doubt which way the balance lies. A further fifty years may have to elapse, Sir Percival suggests, before a final assessment of the impact of the British is possible. In the meantime the present book may be confidently recommended as the most authoritative and objective examination of the history and influence of British administration in Indian, which has yet appeared; a book, furthermore, that may be expected to achieve the status of a standard work.

INDEX

A

Absenteeism of Bengal landlords, 172

Abul Fazl’Allami, 33, 36, 122 et seq.

Abul Kalam Azad, 310

Ackland, George, 441–2

Acworth Committee, 426

Adam, John, 469–70

Administration, civil, in British India, characteristics, 227–8; benefits conferred by, 229, 232–4; defects of, 229–32; cost of, 400 et seq. See also names of famous administrators, and place names, and Courts; District administration; Diwani and Diwans; Education; East India Company; Famine administration; Fiscal policy; Governor-General and Council; Indian Civil Service; Indians, employment of; Judicial machinery; Law, Anglo-Indian; Local self-government; Montagu-Chelmsford Report; Morley-Minto Reforms; Parliamentary Government; Police Force; Public Works; Revenue System; Taxation; Zemindars.

Administration, civil, under the Guptas, 119–20; under the Mughals, 122–42

Adult suffrage, 327, 335

Afghans, invasions of India, 28, 37, 65, 72, 81, 87; wars, 95–6, 99, 105, 402

Age of Consent Bill, 285

Agra, 91; English representative at, 50–1

Agrarian reform, as a cause of the Mutiny, 103; Hume and, 281. See also Agriculture

Agriculture, research in second half of the nineteenth century, 415–19; increase in production under British rule, 475

Ahadis, 126, 130

Ahmad, Sir Sayyid, 274, 309

Ahmadabad, English factory at, 51; Congress at (1921), 321

Ain-i-Akbari, 122 et seq., 135, 138, 141, 264, 376

Aitchison, Sir Charles, 194; Aitchison Commission, 195

Akbar, Emperor, his empire, 32 et seq.; unites Hindus and Muslims, 33, 131; his infallibility decree, 33; his religious policy, 33–4, 122; removes poll-tax on non-Muslims, 34; alliance with Rajput chiefs, 34; administrative system, 34, 122 et seq., 227; settlement with the cultivators, 135–6; revenue system, 137–41, 165; famine in reign of, 181–3; and irrigation, 406. See also Akbarnamah; Ain-i-Akbari

Akbarnamah, 123, 141

Ala-ud-din, 34, 133, 135–8, 183

Al-Badauni, his...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• SECTION I THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
• SECTION II THE ADMINISTRATIVE IMPACT
• SECTION III THE POLITICAL IMPACT
• SECTION IV THE ECONOMIC IMPACT
• Lists of Books
• Index
• Maps