Indian Marxist on Colonialism

INDIAN MARXIST, HISTOGRAPHIC BACKGROUND
BRITISH CONQUEST OF INDIA AND THE DAWN OF COLONIALISM
THE INDIAN PROBLEM
STAGES OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE HINDUSTAN BY BRITIAN AND THE ROLE PLAYED BY THE EAST INDIAN COMPANY
OUTCOME OF BRITISH COLONIAL RULE
INDIAN MARXISTS IN PERSPECTIVE

INDIAN MARXIST, HISTOGRAPHIC BACKGROUND

It was a new approach in Indian historiography, or historiography in India, of colonialism and nationalism. It is good to note from the outset that when we speak of Indian Marxists, it means that all the writers were Marxists; but that, they more or less adopted the materialist interpretation like method of comprehension and tool of analysis of the historical phenomena. Their interpretation comes from Karl Marx's philosophy of history, dialectical materialism.

The essence of this new approach lies in the study of the relationship between social and economic organization and its impact on historical events. Instead of political history, they put more emphasis on the history of ordinary people and the history of lower people. In a preliminary perspective, the Marxist historiography of modern India was inaugurated by one of the founders of Marxism in India, MNRoy, with his work "India in Transition", published in 1922. It was followed by R. Palme Dutt's India Today in 1940 and "The Social Background of Indian Nationalism" by AR Desai in 1959. All three were classical Marxists and treated the Indian national movement as representing a certain stage in the development of fashion. of production. India has long been regarded today as an authoritative Marxist work. It became an important school of historiography in India. Dutt and Desai studied Gandhi's negative and positive roles in the national movement, they emphasized the positive ones, as he transformed the national movement into a mass movement by awakening the backward masses with national consciousness.

BRITISH CONQUEST OF INDIA AND THE DAWN OF COLONIALISM

Historians have noted that Britain was able to subjugate and colonize India around the middle of the 18th century. However, Britain had trade contacts with India long before this, although its trade with India grew rapidly in the first half of the 18th century. According to Aditya Mukherjee, trade in the first half of the 18th century consisted mainly (about three quarters) of imports of textiles and silk from India, the largest producer of raw cotton and the largest producer and exporter of cotton textiles in the world by the late 18th century. He continues: While Indian textiles were in high demand in European markets in previous centuries, the East Asian spice trade, one of the main drivers of increased demand for Indian textiles has was facilitating the golden age of the Atlantic slave trade.

Indian textiles were the largest item in which slaves were paid, accounting for about 27% of all goods shipped from England to Africa in the 18th century. Since Britain had nothing to sell to India and thus imports from India were financed by the export of treasure or bullion. At this stage, India was fully compensated for the growing exports of its raw materials, although the compensation for Britain may have been relatively cheap. Thus, while India's contact with Britain had not acquired colonial characteristics until the mid-18th century, India still fit neatly into the pattern of global domination by Europe that had begun some centuries ago, beginning from the cheap mining of gold and silver in the Americas and extended to the slave trade of Africa to the spice trade of East Asia. Beginning about the mid-18th century, with victory at the Battle of Plassey in 1757, Britain began to conquer and subjugate India.

THE INDIAN PROBLEM

Palme Dutt, a classic Indian Marxist, formulates the Indian problem beautifully. India's problem can be expressed very simply, he says: it is the problem of 370 million people, the vast majority of whom live in extreme poverty and semi-starvation, while at the same time living under foreign rule which has the complete control over their lives and forcibly impose the social system that leads to these conditions. These hundreds of millions are fighting for life, for livelihoods, for elementary freedom.

The problem of their struggle is the problem of India. One in six people is Indian. This very simple arithmetic fact is important in addressing Indian issues from the outset. Of the total world population, estimated at 2025 million in 1931, India held 353 million or 17%. “The 1931 census report states:20 “The population now exceeds even the latest estimate of the population of China, so that India now tops the list of all countries in the world in population. This most numerous people in the world (whether the census comparison with China is correct or not is another matter, because no one knows the population of China) is subject to foreign domination from a country 3000 miles away , inhabited by 46 million people. This is an extraordinary fact of the modern world situation. There is nothing like it and there has never been anything like it in history. This is how Palme formulates the Indian problem.

STAGES OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE HINDUSTAN BY BRITIAN AND THE ROLE PLAYED BY THE EAST INDIAN COMPANY

According to Palme Dutt, the British colonial administration gradually destroyed Hindustan. In the earlier period, the first stages of destruction were first accomplished by the colossal direct plunder of the East India Company. He points out that, throughout the 18th century, the treasures transported from India to England came much less from a relatively insignificant trade than from the direct exploitation of this country and the colossal fortunes extorted and transferred to England. On the second note, Dutt says that the irrigation and public works which had been maintained under previous governments have been neglected. In the third perspective, Palme Dutt posits that Briatian introduced the English land system, private ownership of land, with sale and surrender, and the whole of the English penal code; and fourth, there was a direct import ban due to high import duties.

In light of the East India Company, Palme proclaims that the East India Company was not interested in finding outlets for British goods. He tried to monopolize the trade in foreign goods imported from the east into England and Europe. British factory interests fought against the monopoly and had Indian manufacturers banned from England, while rival British business interests pushed for the abolition of the company's monopoly on Indian trade. The company had thus monopolized the trade and the Indian in question could neither import nor export.

OUTCOME OF BRITISH COLONIAL RULE

According to Palme, when Karl Marx spoke of British rule causing a social revolution in India and described England as "the unconscious instrument of history to bring about this revolution", his explanation made it clear that he had a dual process in mind. The dual process is both destructive and generative. From the destructive point of view, Palme talks about the old social order from the views of Karl Marx and from the revival point of view, Palme talks about the material foundation and basis of a new social order by the British in India.

The destruction of antiquated industry is still reflected in the continuing decline in the total number of industrial workers, as this decline has not yet been compensated for by the slow progress of modern industry. According to Aditya Mukherjee (2010), it was precisely in the process of colonialism's destruction of pre-colonial Indian society that Karl Marx saw the regenerative role of colonialism as it opened up the possibility of growth of capitalism and industrialization in the colony. The hope was that colonialism would cause the mirror image of capitalism to emerge in the colony and in that sense play a historically progressive role.

INDIAN MARXISTS IN PERSPECTIVE

Abdul Rahman argues that Marxists conceptualize the nation of colonialism as a collection of groups of people divided along class lines. They stress the differences between those classes and point out that nationalism's claims to commonality are superficial. Hence, the Marxist school of historical writing is concerned with the aspirations of marginalized sections of society. According to them, the struggle between rich and poor is at the heart of historical developments. He goes on to say that the proletariat in India was a by-product or unwitting contribution of the colonial administration. Marxist historians talk about how colonial processes bring awareness to certain classes of peasants and workers, breaking the historical ties between them and their exploiters.

For example, according to Marx, material destruction at the hands of British spoils in India would create conditions upon which the marginalized classes would build their own sources of emancipation. In other words, colonialism makes the poor classes sufficiently conscious to question their role and their place in the history of their societies. However, there have been criticisms that Marxist historians have overemphasized class divisions in the Indian context which has somewhat hampered their study of various other segments of society such as Dalits, Adivasis and women.