Book Synopsis

MISSIONARY CONSPIRACY: LETTERS TO ARUN SHOURIE—A POSTMODERN HINDU  Preface to the First Edition Five major interests shaped the British East India Company’s rule in Bengal:  (i) Individual need and greed drove the rank and file of the Company. They had come to a distant land to make money. Their salaries were meagre because it was assumed—and permitted—that they would engage in private trade on the side. Military success made Clive almost a millionaire; other Company employees therefore saw nothing wrong in using the political power they had acquired in Bengal after 1757 to accept, if not extort, bribes. Their corruption, Lord Macaulay later remarked, made them “a gang of public robbers.” It turned British rule into “an empire of evil genii,” far worse than the Mughal Empire it had replaced. For the directors of the Company, India was simply (ii) a trading base. They had neither the interest nor the aptitude for military expeditions. Commercial rivalry from the French, Dutch, and Danish companies was challenge enough; they could not risk the very existence of their Company by turning it into a political rival of the Mughal Empire, Indian rulers, and other European powers. Their practical commercial outlook, for example, found Lord Wellesley’s empire-building military successes too costly for their ledgers—the reason he was eventually recalled. These traders understood that the best way to maximize profits was to minimize involvement in India. Consequently, they repeatedly insisted on closing Fort William College, their only college in India, where Company employees were trained for governance. The importance of political and military power for securing commercial interests was recognized early enough as indispensable in a land frequently at war with itself. Yet the idea of assuming a moral responsibility to reform or uplift India remained as absent from their thinking as it was from their account books. For British military leaders such as Clive and Wellesley, India became primarily (iii) territory to be conquered. Their chief concern was to weaken present and potential political rivals, not to empower Indians. They focused on combating forces that threatened British interests; the social and cultural evils that weakened and oppressed Indian society were not part of their agenda. This attitude explains why, although Lord Wellesley was convinced of the justice of Rev. Dr. William Carey’s campaign against Sati (widow-burning) in 1806, he did not prohibit the practice, as Lord Bentinck later did in 1829. For Wellesley, it was difficult enough to contend with Muslim and Hindu rulers; provoking Brahmanical opposition by interfering in socio-religious customs, however harmful, seemed politically unwise. A few widows being burned alive here and there affected neither British commercial interests nor imperial governance. For secular British scholars, India offered a fascinating new field of (iv) research—Indology—in which they had the privilege of being pioneers. Many Indologists admired ancient India and encouraged the emerging Indian intelligentsia to study, appreciate, and preserve its cultural heritage. The European rediscovery of ancient India eventually contributed to the growth of Indian nationalism. Yet Indians themselves could not readily access these scholarly works, since very few knew English beyond what was necessary for conducting business with the British. India had no printing press capable of disseminating such scholarship widely, nor did it possess colleges where Indological research could be systematically studied. Indeed, the preceding seven centuries of Islamic rule had not produced a single college in India, and no Hindu ashram had evolved into a university. The audience that read and appreciated the painstaking work of the Indologists was largely Western. Their scholarship, therefore, had little immediate impact on India itself. Several British humanitarians and philanthropists respected and even romanticized “the customs and wisdom of the natives.” These “Orientalists” patronized and promoted ancient Sanskrit literature, yet they had little trust in the Indians they encountered. As a result, British policy for many decades excluded Indians from positions of significant administrative responsibility. Some highly respected British officials, such as Sir Thomas Munro, agreed that dishonesty was widespread among Indians, yet opposed this discriminatory policy. They argued that if Indians were paid salaries comparable to those of the British, they too might develop higher standards of public integrity. Even so, these men generally dismissed the possibility that Indian society itself could be fundamentally reformed. Munro, Governor of Madras from 1820 to 1824, wrote in a letter dated 30 June 1821: I have no faith in the modern doctrines of the rapid improvement of the Hindoos, or of any other people. The character of the Hindoos is probably much the same as when Vasco da Gama first visited India, and it is not likely that it will be much better a century hence. When I read, as I sometimes do, of a measure by which a large province has been suddenly improved, or a race of semi-barbarians, civilised, almost of Quakerism, I throw away the book. The (v) reformers who advocated “the modern doctrine of the rapid improvement of the Hindoos” constituted the fifth force. They stood in opposition to the views of British scholars, the military and commercial interests of the Company, and the greed of individual Englishmen. At the turn of the nineteenth century, their influence within the Company was marginal. After 1813, however, their perspective gained ascendancy. It was strengthened and legitimised by the remarkable moral transformation that England had undergone during the second half of the eighteenth century as a result of the Evangelical revival led by John Wesley. This close-knit group of reformers believed that what God had done for a morally degenerate England, He could also do for India. Indeed, in keeping with their doctrine of Providence, they argued that God had entrusted India to England because He loved India and desired to bless her. Consequently, they believed it was England’s moral obligation to bless India by “evangelising,” “Christianising,” “civilising,” “educating,” and “modernising” her. To them, these terms were essentially interchangeable. To reshape British involvement in India according to their moral vision—that is, to empower, emancipate, and modernise India—this group of Evangelical Christians, led by