Course Title: Rise and fall of British rule in India

Semester VII (Maisam M. Kazim)

Useful reference books:

• Thomas Metcalf, Ideologies of the Raj (1994) and a concise history modern India
• Peter Robb, A History of India, 2nd edn. (2010)
• James Mill, The History of British India
Class Assessment:

• 3 essays (15 marks)

• Presentations (5 marks)

Syllabus
Week 1: Introduction
 Overview, assignments

Week 2: The Formative Years of East India Company

 Philip Lawson The East-india-company--the-1993

Week 3: Disintegration of central authority and Formation of Regional States in India

•Lecture: regional powers in the eighteenth century

•G. D. S. Sood, India and the Islamic Heartlands: an Eighteenth-Century World of Circulation
and Exchange (Cambridge, 2016), Introduction
• J. S. Grewal, The Sikhs of the Punjab (Cambridge, 2008), pp.82-98
• M. D. Faruqui, ‘At Empire’s End: The Nizam, Hyderabad and Eighteenth-Century India’,
Modern Asian Studies 43, no. 1 (2009), pp.5-43
• M. Alam, The Crisis of Empire in Mughal North India: Awadh and the Punjab, 1707-48
(Delhi, 1997)
Week 4: 18th Century: A Century of Decline?
• R. Travers, ‘The Eighteenth Century in Indian History: A Review Essay.” Eighteenth-Century
Studies’, 40:3 (2007), pp.492–508.
• R. Travers, ‘The Eighteenth Century in Indian History: A Review Essay.” Eighteenth-Century
Studies’, 40:3 (2007), pp.492–508.
• M. Alam and S. Subrahmanyam, Writing the Mughal World: Studies on Culture and Politics
(New York, 2012), Introduction
Week 5: The Rise of the East India Company (1757-1793)
• Metcalf, T. Ideologies of the Raj, Ch.1, ‘Britain and India in the Eighteenth Century’, pp.127
• Lecture: The Rise of the East India Company (1757-1793)

Week 6: East India company: From Trading Company to Political Power

 Thomas Metcalf A Concise history of modern India

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Week 7: Colonial Transformations: Caste and Religion
• S. Bayly, Caste, Society and Politics in Eighteenth-Century India (Cambridge, 1999), Ch.3
• N. Dirks, ‘Castes of Mind’. Representations (1992), pp.56-78
• N. Peabody, ‘Cents, Sense, Census: Human Inventories in Late Precolonial and Early
Colonial India’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 43:4 (2001), pp. 819–50.
• C. A. Bayly, ‘The Pre-History of ‘Communalism’? Religious Conflict in India, 1700–1860’,
Modern Asian Studies, 19:2 (2008): 177.
• K. Prior, ‘Making History: The State’s Intervention in Urban Religious Disputes in the North-
Western Provinces in the Early Nineteenth Century’, Modern Asian Studies 27, no. 01
(2008), 179.
Week 8: Revision / Midterm Examination

Week 9: Colonial Transformations: Caste and Religion

• S. Bayly, Caste, Society and Politics in Eighteenth-Century India (Cambridge, 1999), Ch.3
• N. Dirks, ‘Castes of Mind’. Representations (1992), pp.56-78
• N. Peabody, ‘Cents, Sense, Census: Human Inventories in Late Precolonial and Early
Colonial India’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 43:4 (2001), pp. 819–50.
• C. A. Bayly, ‘The Pre-History of ‘Communalism’? Religious Conflict in India, 1700–1860’,
Modern Asian Studies, 19:2 (2008): 177.
• K. Prior, ‘Making History: The State’s Intervention in Urban Religious Disputes in the North-
Western Provinces in the Early Nineteenth Century’, Modern Asian Studies 27, no. 01
(2008), 179.

Week 10: The Economic Exploitation of India under British

 K.N. Chaudhuri The Trading World of Asia & English East India Company 1660 1760
Chaudhuri
Week 11: The Colonial State, Liberalism and Education
 Lecture: Missionaries, Liberals and Orientalists, 1813-1835

• S. Evans, ‘Macaulay's Minute Revisited: Colonial Language Policy in Nineteenth-

century India’ (2002)
• ‘Introduction’ in ‘The Great Indian Education Debate: Documents Relating to the
Orientalist-Anglicist Controversy, 1781-1843’, ed. M. Moir and L. Zastoupil (1999) 
PRIMARY SOURCE: Macaulay, T. B. ‘Minute on Indian Education’ (1835):
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00generallinks/macaulay/txt_minute_ed
ucation_1835.html
Week 12: India on the Eve of 1857
 Lecture: 1857
Discussion and revision
Week 13 India Under British Crown
 India under British Rule : From the Foundation of the East India company by J Talboys
Wheeler
Week 14: Constitutional Development in India
• Phase-1 from 1773 to 1857
• Phase 2- from 1858 to 1947

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Week 15: Rise of Indian Nationalism
• Formulation of Indian National Congress and Muslim League
• Struggle for Independence
Muslim struggle for independence from sir syed to Quaid Azm by S. Qalb-i-Abid India’s
struggle for independence by Bipan Chandra

Week 16: Revision / Final Examination