East India Company and Urban Environment in Colonial South India

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moola Atchi Reddy
Keyword(s):  
Urban Environment ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company

Changes in the South Indian Hindu Family Structure in West Malaysia

1982 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-97
Author(s):  
K.S. Susan Oorjitham
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Family Structure ◽  
Urban Environment ◽  
South India ◽  
Family Values ◽  
Family Structures ◽  
Indian Family ◽  
South Indian ◽  
The Family ◽  
Conducive Environment

AbstractThe largest group of Indians in West Malaysia are the Tamil-speaking Hindus who originate from South India, particularly from Tamilnad. According to S. Arasaratnam, not only are 80% of Indians in Malaysia Tamil speakers but a vast majority of them are also Hindus.1 It is further established that the majority of this group are members of the working class, either in the plantation or in the urban sectors. The family structures of these Tamil working-class families originate basically from the traditional Indian family structure of India. This traditional Indian family structure was maintained in the "conducive" environment of ethnic isolation, found in the plantations. Since my purpose is to study changes in the family structure, Tamil working-class families in an urban environment were selected. It is expected that some changes in family values and structures have occurred among this group of Indians in West Malaysia.

Mysore’s Pre-colonial Potentialities for Capitalist Development and Industrialization

Capitalisms ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 152-179
Author(s):  
Kaveh Yazdani
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Industrial Capitalism ◽  
Capitalist Development ◽  
British East India Company ◽  
Economic Developments

This paper enquires into Mysore’s potentialities for a proto-capitalist development and a sort of industrialization during the reigns of Haidar ‘Ali (r. 1761–82) and Tipu Sultan (r. 1782–99)—the first Muslim rulers of the sultanate of Mysore. During the second half of the eighteenth century, these two autocrats were not only among the most powerful modernizers of South India but also of the subcontinent and Asia as a whole. The threat posed by the growing power of the British East India Company lubricated the wheels of political, fiscal, and military reforms and fuelled profound efforts at centralization. In conjunction with the already existing advances in commerce, artisanry, and incipient capitalist relations of production, the changes that were set in motion suggest that Mysore found itself in an interim stage and historical conjuncture with multiple prospects of socio-economic developments, as well as the potential scope for a transition towards a type of industrial capitalism.

THE SETUPATIS, THE DUTCH, AND OTHER BANDITS IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY RAMNAD (SOUTH INDIA)

2001 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 540-574 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lennart Bes
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
The Political ◽  
Dutch East India Company ◽  
Political Arena ◽  
South Indian ◽  
Marginal Power ◽  
Culture Politique

AbstractIn Ramnad, bandits could be king. The open-ended political culture of this South Indian kingdom presented even people on the margins of society with opportunities to attain political power. Likewise, the VOC (Dutch East India Company), operating from the coastal frontier of the kingdom, played a significant role in the political arena of Ramnad. Given this similarity, it may be asked whether the Dutch were regarded as neutral outsiders (as they themselves thought they were) or rather as an indigenous marginal power. By comparing the internal and regional relations of Ramnad with its contacts with the VOC, this article attempts to determine the kingdom's perception of the Company. In Ramnad, could the Dutch be bandits? En Ramnad, un royaume dans l'Inde méridional, il arrive que le bandit se fait roi. La culture politique, ainsi que les avenues du pouvoir y furent en principe ouvertes à tous; aux marginaux indigènes, vivants dans les terres sèches périphériques, autant qu'aux fonctionnaires de la compagnie néerlandaise des Indes Orientales, la VOC, qui avait un comptoir sur le littoral. Elle se considerait neutre. Toutefois elle allait jouer un rôle important dans l'arène politique de Ramnad. Or, au niveau conceptuel la question se pose si la perspective indigène différenciait entre le roturier indigène d'au-delà de la terre de grande culture, et l'aventurier étranger, ou par contre les confondait l'un l'autre. Cet article se propose d'y voir plus clair par l'étude des liens internes et régionals entretenus par le centre politique de Ramnad, en comparant ceux-ci avec les relations vis-à-vis la VOC pour en déduire le statut social des Hollandais dans la société indigène.

Sultan among Dutchmen? Royal dress at court audiences in South India, as portrayed in local works of art and Dutch embassy reports, seventeenth–eighteenth centuries

2016 ◽  
Vol 50 (6) ◽  
pp. 1792-1845 ◽  
Author(s):  
LENNART BES
Keyword(s):  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Dutch East India Company ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
Works Of Art ◽  
South Indian ◽  
Dress Codes ◽  
Islamic Courts

AbstractFrom the fourteenth century CE onwards, South Indian states ruled by Hindu kings were strongly influenced by politico-cultural conventions from Muslim-governed areas. This development was, for instance, manifest in the dress and titles of the rulers of the Vijayanagara empire. As has been argued, they bore the title of sultan and on public occasions they appeared in garments fashioned on Persian and Arab clothing. Both adaptations exemplified efforts to connect to the dominant Indo-Islamic world. From Vijayanagara's fragmentation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, new Hindu-ruled kingdoms arose. We may wonder to what extent those succeeding polities continued practices adopted from Islamic courts. With that question in mind, this article discusses royal dress at court audiences in four Vijayanagara successor states, chiefly on the basis of embassy reports of the Dutch East India Company and South Indian works of art. It appears that kings could wear a variety of clothing styles at audiences and that influences on these styles now came from multiple backgrounds, comprising diverse Islamic and other elements. Further, not all successor states followed the same dress codes, as their dynasties modified earlier conventions in different ways, depending on varying political developments.

Transferrable Surveys: Natural History from the Hebrides to South India

2018 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 143-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Minakshi Menon
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Historical Knowledge ◽  
Colonial India ◽  
University Of Edinburgh ◽  
English East India Company ◽  
Statistical Survey ◽  
The University ◽  
John Walker

In 1807 the English East India Company published a report by Dr Francis Buchanan (1762–1829), a Scottish medic in its employ. The report, titled A Journey from Madras, marked an important moment in colonial savoir faire – the emergence of the statistical survey as a form of natural historical knowledge-making in colonial India. What is not generally known is that Buchanan, who received his MD from the University of Edinburgh, had learnt the procedures he employed in his report in the natural history course taught there by the Rev. John Walker (1731–1803). This chapter seeks to explain why and how Walker's teaching travelled to India with Buchanan, and helped him justify British colonisation of south India.

“A Fondness for Military Display”: Conquest and Intrigue in South India during the First Anglo-Afghan War, 1839–40

2018 ◽  
Vol 77 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chandra Mallampalli
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
British India ◽  
Colonial State ◽  
Military Action ◽  
Conspiracy Narratives ◽  
The Way

As the East India Company prepared for its First Anglo-Afghan War (1839–42), its officials grew suspicious of a Muslim uprising within British India. They became convinced that itinerant Muslim reformers—mislabeled “Wahhabis”—were inciting princes of India's Deccan region to rebellion. This article describes how the very talk of this “Wahhabi conspiracy” not only triggered the interventionist impulses of the colonial state, but also inspired local intrigues associated with the downfall of two Indo-Afghan princes of the Deccan, Kurnool's Ghulam Rasul Khan and Udayagiri's Abbas Ali Khan. In both cases a preoccupation with the transnational Wahhabi operative masked local and sometimes petty interests, which drove the politics of these smaller regimes. The case studies of Kurnool and Udayagiri illustrate how news of events arising in one region of imperial conflict could “travel” to remote regions of India's Deccan, evolving into conspiracy narratives along the way. The discourse of conspiracy provided a pretext for military action and the annexation of territory. The story being told, however, is not simply about paranoid colonial officers who were all too eager to intervene, but is also about local entrepreneurs who knew how to exploit the situation toward their own ends.

scholarly journals Exploring the Dynamics of Social Composition and Recruitment Procedures of Madras Army, 1807–61

2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-38
Author(s):  
Manas Dutta
Keyword(s):  
South Asia ◽  
South India ◽  
Military History ◽  
East India Company ◽  
The Other ◽  
Military Establishment ◽  
Social Composition ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Military Tradition

In recent years, there has been a proliferation of research on the history of the colonial armies in South Asia in general and the Madras Presidency in particular. This has been further accentuated with the emergence of the new military history that explicates the social composition and the diverse recruitment procedures of the Madras Army, hitherto unexplored under the East India Company around the first half of the nineteenth century in India. In fact, the very concept of raising an army battalion in the subcontinent underwent change to meet the potential challenges of the other European authorities, which existed during that time. The very composition of the Madras Army and its diverse recruiting policies made the presidency army capable of handling the emerging threat and maintaining the trading interests in the subcontinent of the East India Company. The Madras Army looked upon the epitome of disciplined military tradition since its inception. This article argues how the social composition and recruiting procedures came to be conglomerated to form a distinct military establishment in south India under the company rule.

Petitions, the City, and the Early Colonial State in South India

2019 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 150-176
Author(s):  
APARNA BALACHANDRAN
Keyword(s):  
Urban Communities ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Legal Regime ◽  
Colonial State ◽  
Legal Subjectivity ◽  
Early Colonial ◽  
History Of ◽  
Colonial Urbanism ◽  
The City

AbstractThis article explores the entwined history of early colonial urbanism and the articulation of legal subjectivity under East India Company rule in South India. More specifically, it looks at petitions from outcaste labouring groups to the Madras government in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Although early colonial petitions were unequivocally products of colonial rule, which derived their distinctive form and language from colonial law, a reading of the petition archive is one of the only ways to achieve a historical understanding of the city of Madras as it was experienced by its less privileged inhabitants. This article looks at the delineation of the communal selfhood of subaltern urban communities through petition narratives, arguing that the variety and innovativeness displayed by petition writers is testament both to the acceptance of colonial legality and to the agency of native subjects in negotiating with, and appropriating the language and rationale of, the colonial legal regime.

NEW SCHOLARSHIP ON VICTORIAN INDIA

2015 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 203-207
Author(s):  
Deborah Denenholz Morse ◽  
Virginia Butler
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
South India ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Colonial India ◽  
The Past ◽  
Past Generation ◽  
Scribal Culture ◽  
Wide Range

A plethora of fine bookson Victorian India have been published in the last decade or so, a number of them in the past three years. These works cover a wide range of postcolonial thought: histories of Indian sub-cultures (Bhavani Raman'sDocument Raj, on scribal culture in the Madras East India company and Davesh Soneji's study of the devadāsī of South India inUnfinished Gestures); histories of English dissident subcultures (late Victorian homosexuals and vegetarians, among those documented in Leela Gandhi'sAffective Communities); Andrea Major's epicSlavery, Abolitionism, and Empire in India, 1772–1843, and the erudite and comprehensive Oxford edition,India and the British Empire, edited by Douglas Peers and Nandini Gooptu, a magisterial work that begins with recognition of the “remarkable efflorescence over the past generation” (1) in historical studies of colonial India.

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