The Decolonization of India

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that the most notable internal factors influencing the decolonization of India is the gradual handing-over of more and more power to Indian political elites in the Legislative Councils of India in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century. The author points out how collective memory, while well-concealed during the apogee of British might in the last-half of the nineteenth century, also fueled underground resistance to British rule. The paper explores how the rise of nationalist associations and a series of reforms by the British - the 1861 Indian Councils Act, the 1892 Act and most significantly the sweeping Morley-Minto reforms of 1909 in response to the foolishness of former Viceroy George Curzon - led to India being slowly introduced to responsible government and to the parliamentary traditions, which would sustain it when it became wholly independent after the Second World War.

From the Paper:

"It is axiomatic that empires cost a lot of money; it is also axiomatic that empires eventually must respond to the demands and concerns of the repressed - at least somewhat - or destructive rebellion, the disruption of trade and commodity production, and a general rise in hostilities will result. For the British, the 1857 Uprising and the subsequent 1861 Councils Act were only the first steps towards recognizing that the cultural imperialism of the past was no longer going to suffice as the twentieth century drew nigh. To wit, in 1892 a revised Indian Councils Act was passed that permitted "local comment" and criticism for legislation passed by the provincial legislative councils."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Carr, Robert. "Concession and Repression: British Rule in India, 1857-1919." History Review, no.52 (2005): 28+, Questia databasehttp://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5014492287 (Accessed March 15, 2007).
• Heehs, Peter. "Terrorism in India during the Freedom Struggle." Historian, 55, no.3 (1993): 469-482.
• Hubel, Teresa. Whose India? The Independence Struggle in British and Indian Fiction and History (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996): 14, Questia database http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=23124367 (Accessed March 15, 2007)
• Lansing Paul and Sarosh Kuruvilla. "Job Reservation in India." Labor Law Journal 37, no.9 (1986): 653-659.
• McLeod, John. The History of India (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002): 83, Questia database http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=101360237 (accessed March 15, 2007).

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