Thomas Sunil K August 27, 2018

Colonial Period and Modern India

'What would have been “Modern India” like, if colonialism was nothing but
a fairytale of our History? Would our metros have all-glass buildings with
showrooms or Green Bazaars of small businesses? Would our countryside
farmlands produce surplus of everything using fertilizers or be tilled and
ploughed to produce everything as per need? No one would know the answer
because colonialism is not a fairytale; it was the reality which shaped and fueled
India’s tryst with Modernity.

Pre-colonial India was a civilization more than a defined border. India

contained advanced studies in astronomy, medicine and other earth sciences.
But it was intermixed with religion and traditions. And above all the land was
politically contested by many factions. But the civilizational qualities of society
sustained over these conflicts until British entered the arena. As Marx wrote

‘There cannot, however, remain any doubt that the misery inflicted by the
British on Hindustan is of an essentially different and infinitely more intensive
kind than all Hindustan had to suffer before’ [CITATION Mar53 \l 1033 ].

Rule of British deprived the Indian civilization its resources it needed to

develop, while it was being used to transform Britain into The Great British
Empire. Existing Indian populace encountered modernity as prescribed by
British. Small scale industries succumbed to industrialization, agriculture became
commercialized, social identity and dignity of local population was diminished in
the Colony of India. ‘The disgraceful sight of the loin clothed boatmen was not
merely shocking to Europeans. It also confirmed their notion of the evolutionary
inferiority if the Indian race – of its backwardness and barbarism’ [ CITATION
Emm96 \l 1033 ] says Tarlo about the westerner’s perspective of Indian
civilization.

Even after gaining autonomy of the country the definitions of modernism

remained unchanged. Indian development policies was not derived from our old
civilization but from the western seeds of modernism. Some denied influence,
while some embraced them, some tried to interconnect the old and west but in
the end, the pillars were chiseled out from the modernity that was defined by
Colonialism.

The reaction to this modernism varied during different time periods

among different ethnicities. It differed between genders as in the case of
Gharwali people of Uttarakhand (Nordfeldt, 2008), it differed among urban and
rural populace, and it was not the same from upper and lower castes. Reaction
to a same aspect may even differ between 1960 and 2010. In the aspect of local
identity dressing represents a lots of changes that occurred during the transition.
As Vijayatunga said ‘The white man is our standard. Once the standard is
recognized and accepted, it is easy to emulate…’ [ CITATION Emm96 \l 1033 ],
we were either copying western ideas or mixing them with our existing culture
while we first came into contact with them. But over time the Indians reacted to
Thomas Sunil K August 27, 2018

western clothes through Swadeshi Movement. But in present time we see a

growing likeness towards western clothes available in market through
globalization, which some refer to as neo colonialism.

British also bought in new education methods to create ‘a class who maybe
interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern: a class of person,
Indian in blood and color, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and in
intellects’[ CITATION Emm96 \l 1033 ]. In the short run many of these
introductions were mocked and disrespected, but over time they became the
corner stones of independent society.

Government also imitates western principles of modernization. By the second

five year plan of the government, Industrialization became the main aspect of
development. India was caught in “the development race” by following a same
approach with modernity that the west already laid. Modernity altered the course
of our social structure; the self-sustaining village culture turned into urban –
rural growth mechanism. The concept about individual and social welfare
changed and was rated in terms of materialist achievements.

“The people of Europe today live in better houses than they did a hundred years
ago. This is considered an emblem of civilization, and this is also a matter to
promote bodily happiness.” Says Gandhi [CITATION MKG10 \l 1033 ]. He goes
on to criticize the idea that projects mechanization as a symbol of modern
human life “Men will not need the use of hands and feet. They will press a
button and they will have clothing……… This is civilization. Formerly men worked
in the open air only so much as they liked. Now, thousands of workmen meet
together and for the sake of maintenance work in factories or mines”.

The holistic concepts of individual independence or efficiency in terms of welfare

of Indian civilization was replaced with modern theories of utilitarianism and
maximum output efficiency. Indian modernity was born into the age of war for
markets globally, to which we succumbed by 1991.

Gandhi is the father of our nation, but for Modern India, it’s a chain of
intellectuals born and trained during British rule. And so for present day we live
in the same “cost benefit analysis” society Gandhi warned us of. But what is
modernity for the present day modern Indian? Modernity do not just end, it
evolves as we climb each steps. Policymakers feel that Bullet trains are the
symbol of modernity in a country with millions who can’t drink water to their fill.
For a citizen, national attributes have faded away to digital influence in concepts
about modernity. That same influence has bought in ecological concepts into
modernity. Exchange of tradition globally has breathed life into old Indian
civilizational methods of development, of which majority is, ironically, due to
studies by Western scholars. A call for “Ghar Vapasi” has certainly took birth
among modern Indians, a call to redo certain aspects, not by breaking but by
mending, ‘Jallikettu’ protests in Tamil Nadu is a pointer. But the dilemma for
India is the co-existence of both Modern and not modern populace. The diversity
of concepts about modernity from 121 crores creates a blurry cloud in which
minority is usually sidelined and decisions are mob pleasing. The system
sustains despite the dark curiosity at global levels. Also Indians adopted
Thomas Sunil K August 27, 2018

concepts like humanitarianism, equalitarianism and secularization from the

modern global world forming a mixed identity.

Modernity may be called the next link in the chain of Human evolution by
future generations. Science fueled, regionally divided and globally aspired:
modernity is the ‘Heaven’ and globalization it’s religion for 21 st century Homo
sapiens. Not all follows a religion. Some ‘thinkers’ (citations to all who are
always discredited by journal reviewers) explains how development is not a race,
but is a link in chain of evolution. Gandhi in his teachings emphasized the
difference between need and necessity, which later, world complicated as
Sustainable development. Gandhian idea of development was based on
necessity, it did not see growth as an exponential process. This was derived
from the self-sustaining nature of pre-colonial Indian villages and the network of
small cottage industries existing in harmony with nature all over the
subcontinent. Village republics of ancient India points towards a federal system
of modern times. That system is what protected Indian civilization from political
conquests and changes in empires.

When we step into a theoretical modernity constructed from Indian

civilization that existed before colonialization, we start rowing against the flow to
explore a real sustainable society, that account for environment and individual
freedom, which entitle social responsibility to all. This theory opens the question
that, what would have been “Modern India” like, if colonialism was nothing but a
fairytale of our History? But alas colonialism is not a fairytale. It is India’s
History.

Works Cited
Gandhi, M. K. (1910). "Civilisation" and "What is true Civilisation?". In S. Chari, The Development
Reader (p. 79). New York: Routledge.

Marx, K. (1853). The Britsh Rule in India. In S. Chari, The Development Reader (p. 65). New York:
Routledge.

Nordfeldt, C. (2008). We were never sick in our times.

Tarlo, E. (1996). Clothing Matters. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers.

Thomas Sunil K August 27, 2018