Our Moon Has Blood Clots

Title: Our Moon Has Blood Clots – The Exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits

Author: Rahul Pandita

Publisher: Random House India, 2013 (First)

ISBN: 9788184000870

Pages: 258

 

When India was partitioned in 1947, the British provinces were annexed to each successor state on the criterion of which community commanded a majority in population. When that majority was thin, the province also was partitioned otherwise it went as a whole. For native states ruled by local princes, there were no solid criteria but the general communal principle was still upheld. If a state had a majority of a particular community and if it was geographically contiguous with the new nation in which that community held a majority, the native king acceded likewise. The rulers of Junagadh and Hyderabad wanted to join Pakistan, but that was out of the question. Not only were those two states having a very large Hindu majority, but were totally landlocked by India. States on the border regions had much more flexibility. Two states were notable in this respect for the choices they made. The state of Amarkot had a Hindu ruler and a Hindu majority in population, but the ruler decided to join Pakistan. Jinnah readily agreed even though the merger went against his foundational two-nation theory. The ruler of Kashmir prevaricated for a while, but Pakistan forced his hand with an invasion of his country by a mixed lot of tribal Pathans and disguised Pakistan army soldiers. Kashmir immediately acceded to India, but Pakistan continued its subterfuge ever since; and from the 1980s onwards, it is carrying out an armed jihad. The Islamists don’t want to just free Kashmir politically, but also to drive out the Hindus from their own soil and establish an exclusive Islamic state. Consequently, the Kashmiri Brahmins called Pandits have been at the receiving end of a brutal planned violence from the year 1990, forcing them to flee Kashmir and settle as refugees in other parts of India. This book tells this story from the author’s own painful personal experience. Rahul Pandita is a journalist-cum-author who has reported extensively from warzones. He was born in Kashmir valley and was only 14 years old when his family was forced into exile.

 

Pandita establishes his community’s roots in Kashmir with an eagle’s eye view of the attacks and persecutions they suffered at the hands of religious bigots. Towards the end of 14^th century, Islam entered Kashmir. Initially it fused with local practices and evolved into a way of life rather than a strict monotheistic religion. By the turn of that century, the picture changed. Sultan Sikander unleashed a reign of terror and brutality against his Hindu subjects. It is said that the number of Pandits he killed was so large that the sacred threads worn by these unfortunate men weighed nearly 200 kg when they were weighed before burning. A century later, Chaks of Shia sect took power and they were intolerant to both Sunnis and Pandits. Iftikhar Khan, who was the provincial governor in the time of Aurangzeb, was the next in the line of oppressors. Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth Sikh guru, was martyred when he intervened with the Mughals on behalf of the Pandits. Kashmir fell to the Afghans in 1752. Conditions were then so hostile that during the reign of Atta Mohammed Khan, any Muslim who met a Pandit would jump on his back and take a ride (p.17). Finally, the Hindu Dogra family bought Kashmir from the British for 75 lakh rupees, one horse, twelve goats and three Cashmere shawls! Even under their rule, Pandits were targeted by Muslim hardliners many times, especially in 1931.

 

The author claims that irreversible bitterness between Kashmiri Muslims and Indians caused the minority Pandits to be at the receiving end of the wrath which it evoked. A lot of illustrative examples are given in the book in which Kashmiris victimized the Pandits. Crowds half-mad with religious frenzy chanting hum kya chahte? – Azadi (what do we want? – freedom) would attack Pandit homes and their business establishments on the wayside. They would kick Pandit children at school for singing India’s national anthem. The author’s personal experiences include Kashmiri children tearing off images of goddess Saraswati from school magazines and grown up men flashing openly when Indira Gandhi addressed them in a public meeting in Srinagar. When India played against other teams in cricket, spectators would raise Pakistan flags and cry for Pakistan’s victory. Pandit homes’ window panes would be smashed whenever India defeated Pakistan in cricket. The entire Kashmir erupted in celebration when Javed Miandad scored a sixer from the last ball at Sharjah in 1986. This was in the 1980s, even before the violence escalated.

 

Matters came to a head in 1990. A notable feature of the book is that it horrifies readers with the plain truth in the narrative. One would be unable to contemplate the emotions which would stir a person to inflict such cruelty on his fellow humans. The events of Jan 19, 1990 were nightmarish for the Pandits. Slogans and war cries were raised from mosque loudspeakers throughout the night. Meanwhile, hoodlums assembled outside Pandit homes and threatened them by pelting stones. This pattern repeated in the following days. The mayhem would begin in the night and would continue till the wee hours of the morning, thus continuously depriving sleep for the victims. The incident of Naveen Sapru’s murder exposes the complicity of ordinary Kashmiris in the ethnic cleansing. Sapru was targeted and shot near a mosque in Habba Kadal. The attackers and spectators then danced around the bleeding body which was writhing in pain and agony of death. Minutes later, the spectacle ended and Sapru’s body lay motionless. A police truck then took the body to a hospital. The crowd followed the vehicle cheering from behind and shouting slogans. Nobody was convicted as the police also sided with the militants. Throughout the year 1990, Pandits were picked up selectively and put to death. If the chosen one was not to be found, a proxy of the same community sufficed. It was all about numbers and how many were killed. Kashmiris freely molested Pandit women in public and they habitually removed their bindis while going outside their homes. These innocent people suffered because the Islamists wanted Kashmir to be cleansed of Pandits. The jihadis were sure that if one was killed, a thousand would flee. Ads were placed in newspapers asking the Pandits to leave the valley or face consequences. Once they vacated their houses, the neighbours swooped in to claim the articles left behind. After a few months in the hellish refugee camps in Jammu, agents would approach them with offers of sale of non-movable property like houses, land, farms and orchards at rock bottom prices. Desperate for money, the Pandits would sell their assets to their attackers. The Kashmiris had done their groundwork well and made a perfect example of ethnic cleansing.

 

The author provides a grim description of the refugee life. His house in Srinagar had 22 rooms in total, but the family had had to accommodate themselves in a single room in Jammu without any kind of privacy. Government employees continued to receive their salaries but most others had to manage with the pittance offered by the administration. Denied their cool homes, several refugees were killed by heat stroke in Jammu. Eventually, they spread to various parts of India, notably in Delhi, with memories of uprootedness still fresh in their minds. For some of the older generation Pandits, this was a rerun of the 1947 exodus from the areas that lay in the path of attacking Pakistan tribals. They also killed, raped, looted and burnt. We read about people who had thus to undergo two such migrations in a single lifetime.

 

What makes this book unique is its personal touch. Most of the described incidents were directly experienced by the author or occurred to a close friend or relative. In spite of this, he maintained a right balance of mind and sense of justice. Years later, as a journalist, he questioned and opposed the authorities in cases of alleged human rights violations of Kashmiri Muslims during counter-insurgency operations. He also declined to join right-wing organisations as an act of avenging for his losses. Pandita’s lack of bitterness against his tormentors is remarkable. He still maintains touch with several people in Kashmir and visit there often as a solace to the feeling of loneliness in the collective psyche of the Pandits. The book has some disadvantages as well. There is no mention of the actions of the mainstream parties in the uprising and also in the buildup to the final outbreak. Readers don’t get an idea of how the restlessness originated and developed to disastrous proportions. Readers can not close the book without a pang of sadness and a thought for the miserable plight of an innocent diaspora that is still struggling to find their place and plant roots wherever they are living at present.

 

The book is highly recommended.

Rating: 4 Star

 

The Indian Contingent

Title: The Indian Contingent – The Forgotten Muslim Soldiers of the Battle of Dunkirk

Author: Ghee Bowman

Publisher: Macmillan, 2020 (First)

ISBN: 9789390742097

Pages: 310

 

The Indian army was constituted by the British more than a century ago and they widely used the troops in their battles around the world. The Indians excelled in warfare after it obtained modern training and lessons in discipline. The Indian contingent was effectively used in both world wars in many theatres of operation such as France, Italy, north and east Africa, Mesopotamia, Burma, Malaysia and Singapore. They fought on all roles like combat troops, transportation and medical corps. This book narrates the experiences of an Indian support contingent who operated in France and England. These transportation companies assisted frontline soldiers by carrying the war material on the back of mules. When the Allies buckled before the German onslaught in 1940, a large number of them were evacuated to Britain. A group surrendered to the Germans as prisoners of war. Some of them enrolled in Subhas Chandra Bose’s Indian National Army (INA) and fought on the Axis side. After the major thrust of the war was over, the troops were reunited in India but the country was just about to submerge into the partition horrors. Contrary to expectations of racism, the British people treated the Indian soldiers rather well and there were even some instances in which a few babies were left to the care of their mothers when the troops returned home! Ghee Bowman is a historian, teacher and story teller based in Exeter, England. This is his first book that sprang from research he undertook to explore Exeter’s multicultural history. His extensive study of the Indian military contingent took him to five countries and numerous reference sources.

 

Even though the soldiers under study were part of the transport company and only indirectly linked to combat, Bowman presents their important contribution to the war and how the British war effort would not have been complete without them. The sound of a lorry engine and its high profile would draw fire from enemy side. Mules were quieter and far less visible. So, they were used to carry barbed wire, sand bags, timber and ammunition to the frontline within the view of Germans. This book deals with men of the 25^th Animal Transport Company of the Royal Indian Armed Services Corps, also called Force K6 or simply, Indian Contingent. They handled the mules really well. Almost all of them were Muslims and joined the Pakistan army after partition. Only a small part of them were assigned forward duty, assisting the British Expeditionary Force tasked with holding a 15-mile frontage of the Allied Line. They carried the soul of their native land abroad. The company resembled a Punjabi village transplanted in European territory minus women and children, self-sufficient in every physical, medical and spiritual need. Deaths occurred were mainly due to disease or accident. The only member of Force K6 killed by a rifle during their time in Europe was shot by a colleague after a petty dispute.

 

Bowman provides a glimpse of how the British Indian army restricted its recruitment to specific groups of people called the ‘martial races’ such as Sikhs, Gurkhas and Punjabi Muslims. These people were short in stature, but believed to be warlike and obedient. This false theory was based on colonial pseudo-scientific discourse and established by Field Marshal Roberts in 1857. However, the real reason was that it was these groups that opposed the national rebellion in 1857 and fought alongside the British. The recruitment policy lasted till World War II when the Commander-in-Chief Claude Auchinleck started recruiting from all areas. For a long time, the Indian army was led by an exclusive cadre of white British officers. Indians were admitted into the officer cadre only from 1919 onwards. Even then, they were not treated on equal terms with white officers and not paid the same amount as their British counterparts. They were not permitted to serve in courts martial, most social clubs would not admit them as members and there was a general feeling that they were still on a lower level.

 

This book also points out the sectarian feelings in the army, sometimes encouraged by the British. There was no feeling of equality between men. Even though the Indian contingent – basically muleteers – were entirely Muslim, the sweepers who disposed human and animal excrement were untouchables who belonged to Hindu, Sikh and Christian communities. Theirs was a sad lot among the others and even now in Pakistan, such menial jobs are reserved for them as seen in employment notices on newspapers. And there was no national feeling. The Muslim soldiers fought for the British and then for their religion. It was only after Jinnah’s profession of Pakistan that these men thought about an alternate career other than serving the British. When the fleeing Indian troops were evacuated from Dunkirk in France, they were taken to Britain. These were the first companies that were ever posted in Britain for war duty. It is interesting to note the people who gathered to welcome them. They were received at the dock by a representative of the Muslim Working Mission and a smattering of British and Indian Muslims.

 

Surveying the overall picture described in the book, readers reach a conclusion that racism spread its wings on all avenues of life, not only in Britain but their enemies Germany as well. However well the British generally behaved, the author does not deny a strong undercurrent of colour prejudice. Discrimination extended also to civilian sailors of the merchant fleet. They worked longer hours than their European colleagues, slept in worse conditions, ate a cheaper diet and were generally exploited. Things were not better in the case of prisoners who fell to the Germans. Nazis practiced racial supremacy principles and black Africans, Russians, Jews and Romany Gypsies were very badly treated. The author claims that Indians fared comparatively better as Hitler believed that the origin of the German ‘master race’ was in north India and they were thought to be fellow Aryans in the Nazi racial hierarchy. Even with these disadvantages, conditions in Europe were far more comfortable to what they experienced at home and were in fact enjoyable. When they returned home, their commanders found that England had softened and weakened the soldiers and observed that they were making silly demands that were impossible. They were like spoilt children much indulged by their parents. With this remark, the author has unknowingly let the colonial paternalistic attitude slip out.

 

For the Indian prisoners of war, there was one more chapter to play out before the end of the war. This book handles this topic with some seriousness. Subhas Chandra Bose escaped from his house arrest in India and reached Germany by clandestine routes. He implored the Indian prisoners to join him and fight against the British for Indian freedom with German and Japanese assistance. Bose’s personality and conviction won him many men. The trickle of Indian POWs grew into a flood after the surrender in Crete. A good many people demurred to make the defection to the German side. Objections were raised against breaking their oath of allegiance to the British. Pragmatic religious teachers found ways to circumvent the moral dilemma. The Indian camp maulvi informed the prisoners that the Quran exempted a Muslim from an oath if he starved for three days (p.150)! Instead of separation by community, Muslims, Sikhs, Gurkhas and Hindus were mixed up in Bose’s army, going against the idea of segregation. This policy was initially strange to the men, but proved surprisingly successful.

 

Bowman has chosen the K6 contingent as it had been stationed in his home town of Exeter. Otherwise, the selection of this company would have been odd. Thousands of Indian soldiers had laid down their lives elsewhere in Europe in a war for which they were deployed as mercenaries. Tales of heroism abound in those warfronts. Instead, the author has selected a group of Pakistani troops whose sole job in the war was to transport material on mules. The book is neatly and pleasantly written that readers would find it difficult to believe that it is the author’s first work.

 

The book is recommended.

 

Rating: 3 Star

Beyond Rampage

Title: Beyond Rampage – West Asian Contacts of Malabar and Khilafat

Author: B S Harishankar

Publisher: Bharatheeya Vichara Kendram, 2021 (First)

ISBN: 9788195394241

Pages: 328

 

The year 2021 marks the centenary of a massive communal violence that shook Malabar to its roots in 1921. Normally, by the term communal violence we mean clashes between two communities. But this was strictly a one-sided affair in which Mappilas (the local appellation of Muslims) subjected their Hindu neighbours to all kinds of outrages imaginable to a wicked mind – murder, rape, pillage, forced conversion, arson, eviction and temple destruction. The scale of violence was so high that it is often termed as ethnic cleansing like what we saw the Islamic State doing to non-Muslims who came under their rule in Iraq and Syria. However, left historians portray this pogrom as a peasant uprising and the ruling governments in Kerala has granted freedom fighter pensions to those criminals implicated in the violence. This book attempts an academic reassessment of the historical documents which have been hitherto conveniently suppressed or marginalized by left historians. It identifies the outbreaks from 1836 to 1921 as one single stream and provides an ideological framework by analyzing history from the time of the Portuguese in Kerala. B S Harishankar is a member of the academic committee of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study in Shimla. He has completed two post-doctoral researches in archeology and has six published works and numerous articles to his credit.

 

Historians who are prejudiced to paint the 1921 outbreak as some kind of class struggle routinely try to emphasize the economic condition of Mappilas as very poor and dependent on agriculture alone. The author takes the wind out of this argument’s sails. Trade and commerce in Malabar were virtually under the sole control of Mappilas at that time. Many of them were very rich, with monopoly rights on spices and timber trade. Of course, their numbers were small, but their clout in the community was considerable. Much before the outbreak, they had emerged as coastal cosmopolitan entrepreneurs and commercial tycoons who also financed other traders. Thus the leftists’ portrayal of them as tenants, landless labourers and petty traders is an outright falsehood. Muslim notables are even now addressed by the honorific kakka which was first used by Gujarati traders in their deals with Mappila merchant princes. The Mappila merchant community also got on well with the English East India Company and usually financed them in their ventures. A few even entered into marital relations with company officials. Chovakkaran Moosa, a merchant magnate, married off his daughter Mussooruat Sauer Nhaunus (sic) to William Tippet, later magistrate of Patna (p.37). The book includes tables listing prominent Mappila merchants and landlords.

 

The arrival of the Portuguese upset the Mappilas’ monopoly of overseas trade. As the clashes escalated, the Portuguese attacked pilgrim ships carrying devotees for Hajj. This grew into calls for jihad and extreme hostility to the Europeans was stoked on by religious teachers known as thangals and musaliars. There was no element of nationalism in any of these fights. During those battles, the ideas of jihad and shahadat (martyrdom) established the dividing line between Muslims and other-religionists. During Tipu Sultan’s invasion of Malabar, the strife reached breaking point. Arackal Ali Raja invited Tipu to invade Malabar and local Mappilas sided with them. Harishankar specifically targets the myth of Tipu’s struggles as forming a part of Indian anti-colonial resistance. This was nothing of the sort. Tipu was an ally of the French which was trying to establish their own colonial possessions in India at that time. Moreover, Tipu encouraged Zaman Shah, the Amir of Afghanistan, to attack Delhi and replace the weak Mughal Emperor Shah Alam, who was a puppet of the Maratha confederacy. The plan was to make a joint attack with Tipu coming from the south. How such a person who instigated outsiders to attack India can be called a national hero? Tipu’s cruelty to captured Hindus and Christians was hellish. Men and women who refused to convert to Islam were hanged. Small children were hanged from the neck of their mothers’ lifeless bodies, themselves dangling on another piece of rope. Mappilas of Ernad and Valluvanad became a law unto themselves during the Mysorean invasion. Conversion ceremonies ended with forcibly feeding beef to the victims. Thousands of wealthy Hindus fled to Travancore. After the British defeated Tipu, they returned. But their Muslim tenants had appropriated their land in the meantime and refused to accept overlordship of Hindu landlords. Adding to the explosive mix, Tipu had taken over land from temples while destroying them and had allocated it tax-free to mosques. The British resumed the land to its previous owners.

 

Claims of peasant unrest as the cause of the Malabar riots is laid to rest by logical arguments in this book. The British had made investigations to assert the cause of the periodic riots occurring in Malabar from 1836. T L Strange, who was the Special Commissioner for Malabar, pointed out fanaticism as the root cause in a report submitted in 1852. The general character of the dealings of Hindu landlords with their Muslim tenants had been mild and equitable. The report rules out any discrimination between Hindu and Muslim tenants. Whatever be the causes of grievances, it fell equally on both. Moreover, the Mappila tenants remained quiescent when their landlord happened to be a Muslim. There was no outrage anywhere against a Muslim landlord from his tenants. The jenmi (landlord) system devised under colonial rule had extended to Tamil and Canara regions in addition to Malabar, but nowhere else did the violence and uprising occur. The social makeup of the rioters proves the fallacy of peasant revolt theorists. It included all class of Muslim society such as wage workers, poor tenants, mullahs of low economic standing and criminals.

 

Harishankar recasts the illogical leftist narrative in the light of historical truth. The Mappila community always had strong links to west Asia on account of their trade relations. The defeat and resultant elimination from Kerala’s maritime commerce at the hands of the Portuguese radicalized the community. Religious preachers added fuel to the fire. When Tipu conquered Malabar, Mappila prominence was restored, but it was short-lived. Rich merchants and timber barons planned and financed violent outbreaks as a consequence. This argument is well followed up in the main text. What makes this work noteworthy is the large number of tables listing out various facts. For example, it lists out 53 violent encounters that occurred in the period 1836 – 1919. It was only the 54^th in the series – in 1921 – that was against the British, all others were directed against Hindus. The list of temples destroyed by Tipu in Malabar runs into eleven full pages of the book with names categorized district- and panchayath-wise. Another little known fact that is fully developed in the text is the brutal violence perpetrated against lower castes. This busts the myth of Mappilas targeting only the upper caste rich landlords. People who were forcibly converted to Islam sometimes retracted to their original faith. Such people were summarily executed as per punishment prescribed by Islamic law for apostates at the next available opportunity. The book contains a list of incidents which were specifically aimed on lower caste people.

 

This book is an essential reference to students of Mappila riots in Malabar. There are plenty of tables, maps, notes and reference sources for them. The wide chronological span and analysis of west Asian links provide a comprehensive idea of the root causes of the unrest of 1921. Very few books handle Ottoman interference in Indian politics from the time of Tipu Sultan. It plainly confirms that Mappilas did not profess any allegiance to Indian nationalism, but were attracted by the religious status of the Ottoman sultan. Their prime motive was to establish an Islamic State in Malabar. The fight against the British was only a way to reach that objective. The author repeatedly quotes the writer’s name when a reference is made to him such as ‘according to Appadurai and A M Shah’ or ‘as recorded by C A Innes’. This becomes tedious after a while. This would be better indicated by super-scripted numbers and corresponding authors’ names and sources in footnotes or end-notes.

 

The book is highly recommended.

Rating: 4 Star

 

Sikkim – Requiem for a Himalayan Kingdom

Title: Sikkim – Requiem for a Himalayan Kingdom
Author: Andrew Duff
Publisher: Penguin, 2015 (First)
ISBN: 9780143427605
Pages: 380
 
Sikkim is the small bulge on India’s Himalayan border on the north of West Bengal. Unlike the British provinces and native states that acceded to India in 1947, Sikkim maintained its distinct status as a protectorate of India. The administration and defence of the state was controlled by Indian officials, but the traditional ruler known as Chogyal commanded respect and obedience from his subjects. However, the Chogyal possessed only limited constitutional authority, quite unlike Bhutan which retained its sovereignty under some obligations to India on defence and foreign policy. In the 1950s, the crown prince who in effect handled the Chogyal’s privileges began to get upset over the disparity with Bhutan as its ruling family was dynastically related to the Chogyal. He maneuvered for more space for himself in the state’s administration. He highlighted Sikkim’s political status in international forums which caused immense embarrassment to India. With Chinese military aggression in 1962, the northern border suddenly became very critical to India. As the Chogyal’s manipulations increased, popular protests for democracy assumed violent manifestations. With tacit support from India, the pro-democracy factions managed to gain limited power in the state. But the frequent clashes of the popular leaders with the Chogyal put impassable obstacles in the state’s progress. Finally, upon a request from the popular assembly, India militarily intervened. Chogyal’s bodyguards were disarmed, he was placed under house arrest and Sikkim was integrated into the Union of India. This book tells this story with a sympathetic view of the Chogyal. Andrew Duff is a freelance journalist based in London and Scotland who writes on India and other subjects. He travels frequently throughout India and East Asia.
 
Sikkim’s ruler was traditionally submissive to colonial masters. The British had made a permanent presence in Sikkim from the 1890s. The ruling family adopted many elements of the imperial system and the lifestyle that went with it. Young princes were encouraged to develop an understanding of the British way of life. They all had English governesses who recreated British social life in Sikkim. The Chogyal was very popular with Europeans passing through Sikkim on purposes of travel, mountaineering, geology or plant-hunting. They frequently got invitations from the palace and dined with the ruler and his consort. They were fascinated by the combination of simple lifestyle and complex religious beliefs of the people set against the awe-inspiring beauty of the landscape. Sikkim’s aristocrats made it a habit to educate their children in England or prestigious British institutions in colonial India. Many of them married white women which made them more endearing to western travellers and media. Chogyal Palden Thondup Namgyal’s wife was an American girl who was seventeen years his junior.
 
The constitutional dilemma faced by Sikkim after the departure of the British was caused by large-scale immigration of people with Nepali ethnicity into the kingdom during British subjugation of the tiny Himalayan state. Even though the British established political supremacy over the Chogyal by virtue of their military muscle, they could not get enough manpower from among the native Bhutia and Lepcha communities to which the Sikkim aristocracy belonged. The British then sought out Nepali Hindus to settle in Sikkim and associate with public works designed for better integration with India. Sikkim was admitted to Indian Chamber of Princes in 1935. By the 1940s, Nepali Hindus constituted 75 per cent of the population that outnumbered the Buddhist Bhutias and Lepchas 3 to 1 even though the latter remained the ruling minority. Nepalis were excluded from all walks of state power. With increase in political awareness formed by exposure to freedom struggle in the neighbouring towns of Darjeeling and Kalimpong, the Nepalis formed the Sikkim State Congress and demanded accession to India. The Chogyal refused to have any truck with them. Even when democratic reforms were reluctantly introduced, it put the indigenous communities on equal parity in the number of reserved seats to the Nepalis. Their protests, which sometimes turned violent, prompted India to intervene. However, the author argues that public unrest was planned and orchestrated by India to forcibly annex the kingdom. After China’s occupation of Tibet and its war with India in 1962, having a firm grip on Sikkim had become highly strategic for India.
 
The book is indebted to people in the Chogyal’s inner circle for much of the information. But readers find him to be a profligate spender who used to travel extensively in Europe and America with family for purely personal reasons. He believed that the state and its resources belonged to him without accountability to anyone. In the 1950s and 60s, he indulged in conscious effort to assert his independence from India that troubled the relations with her. After his coronation in 1965 on the death of his father, Thondup Namgyal changed the usual title of Maharaja and Maharani to the traditional Chogyal and Gyalmo, emphasizing Sikkim’s distinctness. Hope Cooke, his American wife, muddled waters by writing an article in the Tibetology Institute’s magazine questioning the annexation of Darjeeling to India in British times and wanted the town back. A more odious challenge came in 1968, on India’s Independence Day celebrations in Gangtok. A group of Sikkimese school children went on a procession asking Indians to get out of the state and demanded full independence. Discrete interviews were arranged by the royal couple to prominent international journals to stress the liberation of Sikkim from Indian yoke. However, the people rose up in revolt at the blatant disregard of the Chogyal towards their wishes. The resultant flood of discontent swept away the his throne.
 
The book also describes the measures taken after annexation to remove the legacy of Chogyal. The family’s name was removed from the titles of prestigious institutes in the state. Palace budget was slashed to a quarter of the original. The ruler had raised a private militia called Sikkim Guards to protect his person and the palace. India withheld the money allocated to the contingent. The Chogyal ineffectively struck back by raising allegations in press conferences held in Kolkata and Kathmandu where he had visited in connection with the coronation of King Birendra of Nepal. The author alleges that India freely distributed money, promised promotions and threatened when the first two options proved unyielding. Anyway, he is able to cite only people who did not want to identify themselves as the source of information. India conducted a plebiscite to test the acceptability of Sikkim’s annexation. 63 per cent of the eligible voted and among them 97 per cent supported the integration and removal of the Chogyal. This was the same percentage of votes obtained by the ruling party in elections held in the previous year. But the author claims that the polls were rigged.
 
Though having only a peripheral relation to the main narrative, one notable fact is Nehru’s bungling in crucial matters of international policy, landing the country in serious trouble. A delegation of Sikkim’s popular leaders had met Nehru in 1948 itself requesting the state’s accession to India. But Nehru’s response surprised them. He told them not to push for accession as it may lead to adverse international opinion that India coerced the small states unnecessarily. Instead, he asked them to grow according to their own genius (p.36). Nehru’s pusillanimity on Tibet was unpardonable. Perhaps he might not have been able to prevent China’s taking over, but the saddest fact is that he did not even try. Right in 1947, Sardar Patel felt that India should continue to support the autonomy of Tibet to keep it as a vital buffer against China. But Nehru rejected this line of thought. His vision was for a pan-Asian federation, with China and India as close partners in a post-imperial world. He feared that India’s strong commitment to Tibet would cause unnecessary tensions with China (p.39-40). So he sat back and impotently watched China walking into and annexing Tibet. The Tibetans turned to India for help in the form of a modest quantity of arms and ammunition for resistance groups. But Nehru refused, as he did not want to be seen as siding with the USA against China (p.42). In spite of obvious inimical signs from China, Nehru sheepishly tried to please them. In 1952, he downgraded India’s representation in Tibet to a consul-general, conceding that Tibet’s foreign relations were controlled by China. Two years later, India withdrew its military escort in the Chumbi Valley, which is the tri-junction between Sikkim, Bhutan and Tibet and handed the dak bungalows there over to the Chinese (p.53). It is ironic to remember that China’s incursions in 2017 were along this route!
 
Duff exhibits a hostile attitude to India throughout the text. This leads to absurd inconsistencies on a few occasions. He claims that another book critical of India, titled ‘Smash and Grab – Annexation of Sikkim’ is banned in India, but then retracts it in a footnote saying that ‘it is not banned, but cleverly sidelined by the authorities’. How can a government sideline a book displayed for sale in a bookstall or for lending in a library? As is typical of haughty European writers, clichés like flickering electric lamps and peeling paint in Indian buildings are scattered here and there in the narrative. There are many photographs that mainly show the personal life of Thondup Namgyal, but nothing of interest in the political front is seen. The book is easy to read, but a distinct feeling of relying too much on unverifiable hearsay cannot be shaken off.
 
The book is recommended.
 
Rating: 2 Star

 

Peace, Poverty and Betrayal

Title: Peace, Poverty and Betrayal – A New History of British India

Author: Roderick Matthews
Publisher: HarperCollins, 2021 (First)
ISBN: 9789354227325
Pages: 433
 
Thomas Babington Macaulay, a British politician tasked to formulate an education policy for India in the 1830s, once disdainfully remarked that ‘the entire native literature of India is so meager as to occupy just one bookshelf in a contemporary European library’. Macaulay’s gaff suited the tastes of a conquering society who had just earned the ‘jewel in the empire’s crown’. After a century, the British left India and handed power back to Indians. India’s colonization and her struggle had been the subject of numerous books that they would now need not just a shelf, but an entire library – such was the prodigious output of creative energy! This book claims to be a new history of British India. It indeed is, in one aspect. Earlier, popular British authors simply imitated the official Indian perspective and criticized the colonial masters whenever they had a chance. This book is different in the sense that it does not uphold all Indian claims of victimhood and calls the Congress bluff that it represented the entire Indian society in the struggle for freedom. Roderick Matthews is a freelance writer specializing in Indian history and politics. He claims connection to India in that his great-grandfather tutored the young Nehru and one of his great-grandmothers cared for Gandhi when he fell ill in London in 1914.
 
Even though Britain is hailed as the mother of democracy, the reign of the East India Company and the rule of the Crown failed to develop any democratic institutions worth its name. The rulers kept the concept of electoral representation at arm’s length. This book makes a post-factual estimate of what had actually happened. British administrators used liberal principles to govern India without accepting liberal consultative mechanisms and deemed it good as long as the intentions of the government were good. The justification for delaying popular sovereign government was that good men were trying to do good things. Matthews accepts this paternalistic claim as an honest assessment of the situation.
 
The author argues that the real losing side in the 1857 Rebellion was the Indian reformers who had found some traditional Indian customs galling in the face of the little modernity ushered in as a result of interactions with British mores. Rammohan Roy’s reforms were revolutionary which did not suit the conservative palate. But still Roy found acceptance, even if grudgingly, from the traditionalists. Reformers thought that the English language, English social norms and even Christianity were the best ways forward for India. The reformers threw aside the caution of the respecters of Indian tradition. The English company came under increased pressure from the evangelical lobby after 1834 but it resisted adopting conversion as a policy. We read about many administrators who found the missionaries’ work a hindrance in the company’s path, especially the estrangement it produced among soldiers in its payroll.
 
1857 is the year which marks a distinct milestone of colonial rule in India. The rebellion against the British was eventually crushed at great cost, but it shook the empire to its core. Company rule was disbanded and the Crown took direct responsibility of India. Along with this, the priorities changed. Matthews finds that the lasting tragedy of 1857 was that Indians collectively lost the chance to make a modern India of their own design. With the Crown’s resolve not to intervene in religious matters of the native subjects, the reformers lost patronage which was never restored. What was then seen in its wake are revivalist movements or campaigns to go back to the roots. Here, the author fails to notice the advocated element of social change in these movements. What they strived for was not a blind imitation of the customs practiced a great many centuries ago. The British then halted modernization in the post-rebellion years. They had drafted the Widow Remarriage Act of 1856 which needed only a few formalities to have effective penal force in the country. And then the rebellion broke out and the bill was kept in abeyance till the British left India for good. The bill for restriction of polygamy remained suspended until 1955. The government backed the landlords and tenants but not to the disadvantage of the other. Traditional social arrangements remained in place, but investments in public works increased.
 
This book contends that the colonial masters were always aware of the tenuousness of the rationale for ruling an alien land and its people. It sought legitimacy for the reign in the benevolent work they were performing on behalf of Indian people. Establishment of internal peace was one such point as the British had secured paramountcy over the native states and effectively disarmed local militias. However, they betrayed the newly educated, aspiring middle classes who could not find adequate reward for their skills or sufficient inclusion in the political life of the emerging India. It is hence not a coincidence that the freedom movement found its largest constituency in this group. The author also notes that before the electoral reforms in 1867 and 1884 in England that expanded voting rights to nearly half the adult male population, the two countries were run on a roughly similar pattern that in spite of no universal voting rights, the system accommodated diverse political interests indirectly.
 
Matthews lists out the events that led to the rise of a militant communal feeling that ended in the country’s partition into two states. Lord Ripon, then viceroy, introduced a package of reforming measures in local governments, which was designed to educate Indians in Western-style self-government. Municipal bodies had been appearing in Indian towns since the 1850s, but a system of elections was now introduced for membership which included separate electorates based on religious identity to ensure diversity of participation. This was then extended to rural boards outside the towns. Numbers now began to matter, especially for any self-identifying minority that perceived its own weakness (p.269-70). Gandhi exacerbated the issue with mass participation in protest movements. Until that time, political activity was limited to the elite or educated middle class, most of them lawyers. However, the book refrains from criticizing the Mahatma on this count. On other issues too, it even accepts his obviously make-believe excuses such as the one calling off non-cooperation upon the occurrence of the Chauri Chaura incident. The author meekly observes that ‘the Mahatma was distraught over the loss of life, and a combination of guilt and political instinct led him to call off the campaign’ (p.318).
 
The author produces a balance sheet of assets and liabilities of India on account of imperial rule that lasted nearly two centuries. Dadabhai Naoroji was the first to claim that Britain was robbing Indian financial wealth. This book refutes such claims with the argument that Indian anger against British loot of the nation is misdirected and inflated, being focused on trivialities like the Kohinoor. India’s wealth was primarily agricultural and it remained here for domestic consumption. There are speculative statistics with tall claims that India had 23 per cent of the world’s GDP in 1700, but this only proves that India was big. The country received internal disarmament and civil peace in return. The modern Indian state’s ideal of rule of law, religious liberty, legal equality, freedom of expression and protection of minorities were inherited from the British. Mass democracy was another legacy from the colonial stables, but ironically, it brought about partition. Matthews rebuts the claim that India funded the Industrial Revolution, which he remarks as a pleasing fantasy. Wealth transferred to Britain in the three decades after 1757 was spent on county houses and playing politics, rather than for funding power looms. After 1800, the profits in trade with India carried out by the East India Company were modest and the surplus came from its dealings with China. Positive balances in trade only grew substantially in the 1830s. Here the author forgets to mention that the largest export commodity to China was opium, which was produced in India. Direct drain of wealth from India was the Home charges, which are estimated at around 0.5 per cent of the GDP. Anyhow, India’s wealth was used in the imperial system for purposes that did not benefit India, such as military expenditure, preferential tariffs and the manipulation of foreign trade balances. He concludes that Naoroji was right about the concept, but wrong in estimating the numbers.
 
The book outlines the transition of the colonial government that was stern, kind and just in the initial stages to one that availed the first opportunity after the Second World War to cut losses and go back home.  It catalogues the British viewpoint of the Indian colonial venture. The narrative is not very focused, but examines the career of high British Indian officials threadbare who ruled before the advent of Gandhi. After that, it goes in fast forward mode with only a superficial analysis of the flow of events.
 
The book is highly recommended.
 
Rating: 4 Star