Within decades of the East India Company’s first decisive battle victory at Plassey in 1757 – which eventually paved way for the definitive growth of the British empire in India – Irish statesman, economist and philosopher Edmund Burke (1729-1797) had stated that the Company was the ‘state in the guise of the merchant’.
It was, thus, clear, right from the start that the British rule in India would be designed to serve only British interests. Any ‘development’ that the colonial rulers brought about, had only British interests in mind and they employed every scientific tool within their means to exploit India to achieve their goal.
What is unfortunate, however, is that the narrative highlighting the benefits of colonial rule continued even after Independence.
The turning point
The Battle of Plassey, 1757, is important for several reasons, the most important being the fact that a merchant organisation – East India Company (EIC) – gained diwani rights in Bengal, to collect revenue. Soon, this body of traders controlled by a board in London was at par with the moribund offshoots of the once glorious Mughal empire.
Before 1757, Bengal had a surplus Balance of Payments and its exports exceeded the imports. But after the battle, in the period 1757-80, a whopping sum of 36 million pound sterling was siphoned off from Bengal to England, to fuel the Industrial Revolution and support several mechanised inventions.
Given the success the British tasted through the EIC in Bengal, it was only a matter of time before it employed every means within its reach to exploit India, and this included the latest tool of advanced scientific knowledge which was simultaneously powering the Industrial Revolution in England. In fact, science became EIC’s biggest weapon in the exploitation of India.
Institutionalising Exploitation
It’s no coincidence that within a decade of the Battle of Plassey, the EIC had embarked on the ambitious project of ethnographic and geographic profiling of the sub-continent through the seminal institute called the Survey of India, founded in 1767.
A systematic scientific effort had become essential for them to survey the land and navigation routes to increase revenue and implement administrative and military measures to fulfil their expansion plans. Maj James Rannell was appointed as the Surveyor General of Bengal, after the company received Diwani rights over Bengal, Bihar and Orissa in 1767.
The name of the first British institute in the sub-continent – the Survey of India – had all the pomposity of a governing power, which was a misnomer as EIC was not a government but a trading body. But, it was definitely a hint of things to come. It clearly established the intentions of the EIC in taking control over the sub-continent in all spheres as the Mughal empire was past its glory and much reduced, and its chief provinces such as Awadh and Bengal had become independent. The effete state of political affairs across the sub-continent was a grand opportunity that the EIC had seen and embarked upon seizing through systematic, scientific means, of which the Survey of India was the first flag post.
Through the Survey of India, the EIC mapped the entire subcontinent, creating quantifiable knowledge – data, maps and census – that was seen as a necessary step for efficiently conquering and administering India. Over the decades, different kinds of topographical, geometrical, military and revenue surveys were conducted by building various institutions. ‘
This was also the time when scientific instruments were introduced – even second hand ones- in the country by the British to fulfil their ambitions.
In fact, the Trigonometrical Survey of Peninsular India was established in 1800, with second-hand instruments. After the complete defeat of the Marathas in 1818 in the Anglo-Maratha war, the entire territory on the south of river Sutlej came under the control of the EIC. The British renamed the Trigonometrical Survey as the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India (GTS) in 1818, which covered the entire country, including the trans-Himalayan region. The intention behind surveying of Himalayan region was its rich mineral wealth.
It’s the same GTS that calculated the height of the highest mountain peak of the world called Peak XV and the man – the unsung hero behind it was none other than an exceptionally brilliant young Indian mathematician, Radhanath Sikdar, who was employed at the post of ‘computer’. But without giving any credit to Sikdar, the peak was named after Surveyor-General George Everest as ‘Mt Everest’. This is but just one of the innumerable examples, where Indian scientists were deprived of their legitimate due through discriminatory policies.
Whether it’s the looting of wealth from India or winning accolades, the British used science, scientific institutions and tools as potent ammunition to exploit the nation to the hilt. And, it was done by oppression and domination of India’s indigenous science and the valuable work of Indian scientists.
An important tool in fulfilling this goal was to discredit India’s indigenous science and Indian scientists, including those educated in foreign universities by building a narrative that Indians lacked scientific temperament. This would play out very clearly in the decades to come.
Loot of India through Indian Railways
The date of April 16, 1853, is etched in our history in gold as the day when the first rail ran in India, courtesy the British.
The colonial rulers introduced the railway system in India because they felt the need for fast and quick transportation of coal, iron, cotton and other natural resources from across the country to ports to be shipped to England, to fuel the Industrial Revolution and for the development of their country. The earliest railway lines were laid down from natural resource-rich regions of India to ports of the presidency towns of Calcutta, Bombay and Madras — like the coal-rich belt of central India’s Shahdol (now in Madhya Pradesh) or in Chhota Nagpur (now Jharkhand).
The movement of people was incidental, except when it served colonial interests. For Indians, the third-class compartments, with wooden benches and no amenities, were the only option provided.
However, a myth was built that the railways was Britain’s gift to India, and unfortunately this continues even today. Many apologists for the British colonial rule in India, instead of questioning the exploitation, loot and plunder for 200 years, prefer to give a counter-argument on what the British Raj gave to this country, like the Railways.
The railways, one of the greatest inventions of science, were first conceived of by the East India Company for its own utility. Governor General Lord Harding had argued in 1843 that the railways would be beneficial “to the commerce, government and military control of the country”. This scientific tool was in fact used by the British shareholders to earn a huge amount of money by investing in the railways. The government guaranteed returns double those of government stocks, which was paid entirely from Indian taxpayers’ kitty, and not British taxes. It was a big scam.
Even in early 20th century, all key employees of the Railways, from directors of the Railway Board to ticket-collectors, were whites, with high salaries at par with European pay scales.
Another example will prove how the British suppressed India’s scientific and technological efforts for its own benefit. The railway workshops in Jamalpur in Bengal and Ajmer in Rajputana were established in 1862 to maintain the trains, but their Indian mechanics were so efficient that in 1878 they started designing and building their own locomotives. Their success alarmed the British, since the Indian locomotives were equally good, and much cheaper, than the British-made ones. In order to nip this in the bud, the British passed an act of parliament in 1912, making it impossible for Indian workshops to design and manufacture locomotives. No locomotive was built after 1912. Between 1854 and 1947, India imported around 14,400 locomotives from England alone.
Ulterior motives behind labs and institutions
The year was 1787. Col Robert Kyd, an army officer in the EIC founded the Calcutta Botanical Garden (now Acharya Jagadis Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden)near Shibpur at Howrah in Calcutta.The purpose of setting up the Botanical Garden has an interesting history behind it with a selfish motive. The Company had no interest in Indian botany or medicinal and commercial plants. Their one and only interest was to procure wood for building freight vessels for shipments out of Calcutta. They used to buy teak from Burma at a high price. The garden was set up as an alternative place to grow teak.
Probably the last scientific act by the British Indian government was the setting up of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in 1942. Again it was not for the progress of India but to provide scientific support to Britain’s participation in World War II.
At The Cost of India
Colonialism is a practice of domination. The British left no stone unturned to execute it on Indians. They earned the honour in modern history as the first industrialised nation. But, at whose cost? Was science or scientific attitude absent in India? The British spread a lie that Indians were immersed in superstition and myths and had no rational knowledge. Indians lacked scientific temper. Pre-colonial science was rated as third grade knowledge that could not be trusted or accepted unless validated by Western scientific authorities through their methods. The Indian market emerged as another channel to draw off the wealth that served as the consumer of manufactured products of the Industrial Revolution. Every resource of India, which was looted, was used to earn this accolade – at the cost of India.
The Impact
In 1600, when the East India Company was established, Britain was producing just 1.8% of the world’s GDP, while India was generating around 23% (27% by 1700). By 1940, after nearly two centuries of colonial rule, Britain accounted for nearly 10% of world GDP, while India had been reduced to a poor ‘third-world’ country, destitute and starving, a symbol of poverty and famine – over 90% living below the poverty line. And, this was done by using science.
The British rule drained away the resources of a several-thousand-year-old civilisation – with rich cultural and educational heritage, scientific knowledge, pioneering inventions and indigenous industries (crafts) – and left it in an impoverished state.
John Sullivan, president of the Board of Revenue of Madras Presidency had rightly observed in the first half of the 19th century: ‘Our system acts very much like a sponge, drawing up all the good things from the banks of the Ganges, and squeezing them down on the banks of the Thames’.
*The writer is Editor, Science India.
