|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Intimate enemy The Lion and the
Tiger: the Rise and Fall of the British Raj 1600-1947.
The earliest contacts between the two lands go way back to the reign of the Queen Elizabeth I (r. 1558-1603). The British who came as interlopers and traders were viewed as no better than pirates and ‘potentially’ troublesome conquering barbarians. After a series of hard-won battles against the French and local potentates, the John Company had, by the opening decades of the 19th century, gained mastery over the subcontinent. Yielding ground to Whitehall’s direct rule after 1857, the less than hundred years that followed were witness not so much to a clash of civilisations as a battle royal between two powerful cultures engaged in an often bloody battle over political control, land, trade. And, above all, a way of life. The narrative is spread over 10 crisp chapters and has interesting if intriguing headlines as "Infamous for their honest endeavours" which covers the 17th century; "The Devil’s Wind: the Great Indian Uprising, the Mutiny of 1857-1858" and "Engine of War or the Enemy Within?: India 1939-1945". Judd has singular command over his material and his account is interspersed with interesting stories. And, a chockfull of quotations and anecdotes vividly capture the spirit of the times. They make the book racy and eminently readable; more, it offers a judicious, well-balanced and insightful account. From 1858 to 1905, the Raj could claim "some credit" for economic, legal and educational improvements. But the long-term objective remained unclear. The Victorians and Curzon for one could not "seriously" consider its collapse resting as it did on the twin pillars of the Indian Civil Service (ICS) and the Indian Army. As the twentieth century opened, there appeared "a permanent and almost divine order." And yet the Raj was less than 50 years away from total collapse and disintegration. Some astute observations on Gandhi and the Mountbattens may interest the reader. Among the Europeanised, highly educated leaders of India’s nationalist movement, Gandhi — fresh from South Africa in 1915 — seemed the odd man out. A Bombay police enquiry concluded that though "not a Bolshevik", he was some sort of ‘psychological case". For long the Raj underrated him as simply "a wily, and almost certainly hypocritical political tactician." And yet by the early 1920s he was being sought out by the Viceroy (Lord Reading) and told him that in his view every action of the government, "actuated (as it was) by the sinister motive of trying to fasten" British dominion on India, was suspect. There was a lot in common between Nehru and Mountbatten. Born to privilege and power, both men were used to exercising authority and inclined to "shows of personal vanity." Judd makes the valid point that the "intimate relationship" between Nehru and Lady Mountbatten "seems not to have disrupted" Nehru’s friendship with the Viceroy but appears "to have enhanced it." The British rule ended
"amid a welter of bloodshed, constitutional haggling, mass
migrations and a frenzy of hope and pain." Was it for better or
worse, it is almost impossible to say. The plain fact is that the
interaction did happen and was spread over an extraordinary number of
years. Is it not enough "simply to note and celebrate that
fact"? |
It is more than half a
century since the British rule in India came to an end yet it continues
to evoke no dearth of literature: memoirs, personal accounts and any
number of books.