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CHAPTER 1

Five thousand years of history

The history of India can be traced back some 5000 years. Rich natural resources – spices, indigo, silk, sugar, saltpetre, sandalwood, and ivory – made it a target for invasion and colonisation by European powers from the fifteenth century AD onwards. But India's history of invasion reaches back to the Aryans, Indo-Europeans who came from the north-west and overthrew the great Dravidian city-based civilisation of Harappa in the valley of the Indus around 3000 BC. The hymns and poems of the Aryan Vedic culture are still recited in Hindu worship, giving India one of the oldest continuous cultural traditions in the world.

In the fifth century BC, Buddhism began to spread; it was embraced in the third century BC by the Mauryan emperor Ashoka, who controlled a greater proportion of India than any subsequent ruler until the Muslim emperors – the Mughals – more than 1000 years later.

Mighty empires and dynasties rose and fell after the collapse of the Mauryas, leaving behind them some of the great buildings and art of the world – the elaborately sculpted and painted caves of Ajanta, for example, created by the Gupta kings, whose empire was established in the third century AD, ushering in a golden age of poetry, literature, and art, during which Hinduism underwent a revival and Buddhism began to decline. The invasion of the Huns from the steppes of Central Asia in the fifth century signalled the end of the Gupta empire, which fragmented into a number of separate Hindu kingdoms.

From the eighth century AD onwards, Muslim invaders arrived from the Middle East, although it was not until 1192 that Islamic power arrived on a more permanent basis, when the first Sultan of Delhi established his court. In 1526, Babar, the first of the great Mughal emperors, arrived in the northwest from Turkey, defeated the Sultan, and established an empire that was to dominate north and central India until it waned in the eighteenth century – leaving a legacy of architecture, arts, and literature that still influences Indian culture today.

The far south of India was unaffected by the rise and fall of kingdoms in the north, and the status of Hinduism in this region was never challenged by Buddhism, or Jainism (a religion dating from the sixth century BC), or Islam. The prosperity of the south and its great empires was based on long-established trading links with Egypt, Rome, and South-East Asia.

Although peninsular India has a long coastline, it has never been a maritime nation; rather, it has had a continental mindset. It is a fact of history that invaders who came over land – Greeks, Persians, Arabs, Turks, Afghans, and Mughals – stayed on; but all invaders from the sea – the Dutch, Portuguese, French, and British – ultimately returned.

The jewel in the (British) crown

British power in India was initially exercised by the East India Company, which established a trading post at Surat in Gujarat in 1612. The British were not the first or the only European power with a presence in India in the seventeenth century: the Portuguese had been in control in Cochin since 1503 (before the Mughals arrived), and the French and Dutch also had trading posts. After the Battle of Plassey in 1757, when Robert Clive, Governor General of Bengal, recaptured Calcutta from the nawab of Bengal, Siraj-ud-Daula, the power of Britain gradually spread until conclusively demonstrated by victory in the fourth Mysore War in 1799. The long-running British struggle with the Marathas was concluded in 1818, leaving almost the entire country under the control of the British East India Company.

The colonisers regarded India as a place to make money; they did not seek to interfere with its culture, beliefs, and religions. The British expanded iron and coal mining, developed tea, coffee, and cotton plantations, and began construction of India's vast rail network. They encouraged the system of absentee landlords, because it made administration and tax collection easier, but in the process they created an impoverished and landless peasantry – a problem which persists in several regions, especially Bihar and West Bengal, even today. An uprising in northern India in 1857 (referred to as 'the First War of Independence' by Indians and as 'the Sepoy Mutiny' by the British) led to the demise of the East India Company, and administration of the country was taken over by the Crown. In the next 50 years, the British empire in India expanded its dominion and exploited the country's resources for its own industries at home. But resentment against this policy was growing ...

Moves towards self-rule

Opposition to British rule began in earnest at the turn of the twentieth century. Until then, from the very first meeting of nominated members in 1885, the Indian National Congress had been resorting to 'petition, prayer, and protest' to achieve greater power for Indians in legislative councils, and to challenge imperialist exploitation of the country's resources. The Congress now began to push for swaraj – self-rule. Outside Congress, hot-blooded individuals pressed for independence by more violent means. In 1915 a young lawyer, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, returned home from South Africa. His policy of non-violent resistance – satyagraha – to British rule soon became the defining feature of India's independence movement.

World War II brought the end of imperialism, and Indian independence became inevitable. However, local elections began to reveal the alarming growth of communalism, with the Muslim League, led by Muhammed AH Jinnah, speaking for the majority of Muslims, and the Congress Party, led by Jawaharlal Nehru, representing the Hindu population. An overwhelming number of Indian Muslims began demanding a separate homeland.

Prompted by rising political and communal tension, the British government decided to divide the country, and the Viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, set a rapid timetable for independence. Unfortunately, the two predominantly Muslim regions were on opposite sides of the country, meaning that the new nation of Pakistan would consist of two halves, East and West, divided by India. When the dividing line was announced, the greatest violent exodus in human history took place, as Muslims moved to Pakistan, and Hindus and Sikhs relocated to India. More than 10 million people changed sides, and 250,000 people (a conservative estimate) were slaughtered in mindless barbaric violence.

In the final stages of the independence campaign there was one last tragedy to be played out. On 30 January 1948 Gandhi, deeply saddened by the partition of the nation and the subsequent bloodshed, was assassinated by a Hindu fanatic.

Independence and after

Following the trauma of partition, India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, championed a secular constitution, socialist central planning, and a strict policy of non-alignment in foreign affairs. The India of today is vastly different from that of the late 1940s, when the constitution was framed. Since 1947 and through 13 general elections, democratic institutions have been strengthened, the size of the population has more than doubled, social tensions have increased, and political fragmentation has occurred – but Indian democracy continues to function.

The fulfilment of India's 'tryst with destiny' (to quote Nehru's commemorative speech on Independence Day) at midnight on 15 August 1947 was the beginning of a long political journey. India has maintained cordial relations with its former colonisers and elected to join the Commonwealth. Continuing the domination of domestic politics by the Congress Party, Nehru's daughter Indira Gandhi became Prime Minister in 1966. After she was assassinated in 1984, the Gandhi dynasty's grip on Indian politics continued when the party brought in her son, Rajiv Gandhi. Best known for his attempts to propel India into the world's economy, he suffered a fate similar to his mother's when he was assassinated during an election campaign in 1991.

Since then India has experienced numerous political mutations, and coalition politics has become the norm. Increasing political awareness among the public has led to the emergence of a multi-party system. Today there are as many as seven national political parties and 38 regional parties registered with the Election Commission, many of them representing factions based on cultural, social, ethnic, caste, community, and religious interests.

Coalition governments can confer indirect advantages, such as a wider representation of views, and greater consensus on significant issues. Also they reduce the possibility of a party with an overwhelming majority imposing a state of emergency like the one declared by Indira Gandhi in 1975, which was accompanied by draconian laws and infringements of civil liberties. At the same time, coalition governments can create political instability, giving rise to dangerously divisive communal politics.

Religious differences have not always led to conflict and violence in India: communities of different faiths have co-existed peacefully for years, and continue to do so in many parts of the country. But, for historical reasons, communalism is deep-rooted in the Hindu psyche, and the emotional insecurity of voters who perceive traditional values to be threatened by the advance of a 'modern' or different culture can be exploited by politicians all too easily. These dangers were clearly evident during the violent conflict at Ayodhya in 1992, when a Hindu mob stormed and destroyed a mosque which they believed had been built on the legendary site of the birth of Lord Rama, the seventh incarnation of the Hindu deity Vishnu.

Playing on the national sense of insecurity, in 1998 the BJP government (formed by the Bhartiya Janata Party, whose policies are inspired by Hindu nationalism) fulfilled its promise to make India a nuclear weapons state. Despite international outrage, the nuclear tests were met with widespread jubilation in India and created a groundswell of support for the BJP. The elections held in 1999 produced the NDA (National Democratic Alliance) government, a 22-party coalition led by BJP's Atal Behari Vajpayee. This government was able to function partly on the strength of its pragmatic survival instincts and partly also because of the failure of opposing parties to unite to defeat it.

Yet, against all expectations, the elections for the Lok Sabha (lower house) held in 2004 decisively voted out the ruling BJP. Although Sonia Gandhi, the Italian widow of Rajiv Gandhi, led the Congress Party's winning campaign, she declined to accept the most powerful job in the country. Manmohan Singh, a renowned economist, was sworn in as prime minister, heading a 19-party coalition – the United Progressive Alliance – which includes parties of the left.

It is now generally accepted that only coalition politics can accommodate the intrinsic diversity of this complex nation. By and large, the constitution of India has tried to meet the demands and aspirations of the people, within the framework and through the mechanisms provided, even though India continues to face major social, economic, and political challenges.

Independence for women?

Independence for India did not automatically mean freedom for women. Mahatma Gandhi's mass mobilisation for self-rule had involved women from all sections of society and leaders of the women's movement, as it then existed; and it had international links with the suffragettes and the anti-imperialist movements of the West. But only a small minority of women were active in the movement for independence. For the majority, life was a daily struggle for survival: barely 7 per cent were literate; female life expectancy was a mere 37 years; and maternal mortality was as high as 100 per 1000 cases of childbirth.

In the early years after independence, government planners tended to perceive women as weak, disadvantaged, and in need of welfare provision. In the 1970s and 1980s, more constructive ideas about social development came to the fore; and in the 1990s the goal became women's empowerment. The past half-century has witnessed changes in the status of women, in terms of their health, literacy, employment, and political and civil rights. Some political decisions now have to take account of women's concerns. Women are becoming more aware of their rights and are willing to assert them. In the fields of business, medicine, engineering, law, art, and culture, they are making major contributions. Yet, while some women are emerging strong and confident, in control of their lives, the majority still have to contend with a very different reality.

Most Indian women are far from enjoying equal status with men, whether in terms of equality before the law, in marriage, in the family, or in the wider society. The constitution guarantees equality for all, but the laws that have been passed to improve the lot of women are not widely implemented. There is a lack of will to do so among politicians, judges, the police, and, ultimately, men in general.

The structures of democracy

Independent India opted for a federal structure with a strong union. Administration, public welfare, and development are the responsibility of the individual states, but from the beginning taxes and other revenues have been collected centrally, in an attempt to achieve the social objectives of the whole nation: the alleviation of poverty, and the promotion of equality in development. But in reality states and central governments are often run by different – and opposing – political parties. The exercise of the presidential power to dismiss state governments and to assume control of state administration is the subject of much controversy, because it has been imposed on several occasions for partisan purposes.

In several states, including Punjab, Kashmir, Assam, and Nagaland, conflict over development policies, the displacement of communities by destructive environmental schemes, violations of civil liberties, insensitive economic policies and reforms, and the exploitation of rural areas by the urban classes have led to terrorism and militant armed conflict directed against the Indian nation-state. Such tensions in the relationship between central government and individual states have created a demand for greater devolution of power, and for local control over natural resources.

After independence, enormous power and resources became concentrated in the hands of the bureaucracy, under its socialist political masters. Governance, good or bad, depends on the political parties, personalities, administration, and institutions provided for it, and in the current Indian scene the politicisation of administrative institutions has created overlapping spheres of control. This has brought into sharp focus the inadequacy of the bureaucracy, which was once perceived to be 'the steel frame of India's democracy'.

The professional civil service that India inherited from the colonial period was created to maintain law and order, collect revenues, administer justice, and maintain the communications system. It had limited experience of development work. After independence, there was a vast expansion of civil and technical services, which created major problems of co-ordination and management and led to delay and inefficiency. In addition, there is growing evidence of unwarranted political interference, corruption, and inadequate leadership at all levels of the civil service. The administrative apparatus built for sustaining colonial rule is inadequate for totally different priorities in an independent country. A vast system of state-level licences and quotas, commonly referred to as 'the licence raj', is blamed by many observers for distortions in development and economic growth which prevent India from exploiting its potential in the modern globalised world.

The concept of the separation of power between the executive, the legislature, and the judiciary is built into India's constitution. While the judiciary has played a positive role in safeguarding civil rights and has been vigilant in preserving the spirit of the constitution against legislative and executive intrusions, it has not been very successful in providing justice for private citizens. Partly due to a huge backlog of cases, and due also to the fact that the judiciary seems to be more responsive to the demands of the Bar than to the needs of the client, ordinary people are losing faith in the judicial system. There is an urgent need for a less formal system of adjudication, the establishment of Lok Adalats (people's courts), and a revival of village courts to reduce the burden on the judicial system and also to make justice more affordable and more expeditious.

Grassroots governance

Gandhi's remark that India lives in the villages is still relevant, since three-quarters of the population continue to live in rural areas, spread over 600,000 villages. In a country where 26 per cent of the people live below the official poverty line and millions are unemployed or underemployed, improving conditions in these deprived areas should be the main objective of rural development.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "India"
by .
Copyright © 2004 Oxfam GB.
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