RADHARAO F GRACIAS
As we enter the eightieth year since independ ence the cliché that ‘the British followed the divide and rule policy’ becomes even more strident. But did they have to divide to rule? Let us investigate. Officially, 565 princely States woven into India, ex isted at the time of partition 1947. The Nawabs, Sultans, Rajas and Maharajas predate the arrival of the British by centuries; they were subdued into semi-autonomous terri tories under indirect British Rule via subsidiary alliances; they had no sovereignty and no armed forces. They cov ered 40% of the land area and held 23% of the popu lation. Did the British create these kingdoms even before they reached Indian shores? Or did the British, finding an India divided among warring satraps, take advantage of the pre-existing divisions (as any prudent conqueror would) to systematically target, defeat and subsume them under the British umbrella? Let us ex amine: Bengal (1757–1765): The British defeated Nawab Sir aj-ud-Daulah at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 by induc ing Mir Jafar, Commander of the Nawab’s army, to betray him. Jafar then ascended the throne as a vassal of the Brit ish. The Brits later won the Battle of Buxar in 1764, giving them direct revenue and ad ministrative control over In dia’s wealthiest province. Mysore (1767–1799): The British fought four Anglo-My sore Wars against Haidar Ali and his son, Tipu Sultan.
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Tipu was killed in 1799 at the Siege of Seringapatam, and his terri tories were seized. The Maratha Empire (1775–1818): The Marathas were a massive confederacy of rulers including the Peshwa, Scindia, Holkar, and Gaekwad. Three Anglo-Maratha wars completely shattered their power, and the British an nexed their vast western and central territories. The Sikh Empire (1845 1849): Following the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the British fought two Anglo-Sikh wars. Punjab became part of British India in 1849 after the British East India Company conquered the Sikh Empire in the Second Anglo-Sikh War and annexed a vast area of northwest India and parts of modern-day Pakistan and Af ghanistan that stretched from the Khyber Pass to Tibet and from Gilgit to Kashmir/Sindh. The Mughal Empire (1803 1858): The British captured Delhi in 1803, turning the Mughal Emperor into a pow erless pensioner. They official ly ended the empire in 1858 after the Indian Revolt and an nexed all Mughal lands. After their defeats, the Marathas, Scindia, Holkar, and Gaekwad accepted the British protec torate and were rewarded with small kingdoms which they held till independence.
Nawab Siraj-ud-Daulah and Tipu Sultan were killed; Ba hadur Shah Zaffar was exiled, his sons killed, and his family scattered; and Maharaja Du leep Singh was deported to the UK. Under the Treaty of Sugauli of 1816 following a defeat by the British forces, Nepal ceded roughly one-third of its terri tory—including Kumaon, Gar hwal, Haridwar, large parts of the Terai lowlands between the Kosi and Gandak, and lands extending west to the Sutlej River, east to the Teesta River, and parts of Sikkim and modern-day Darjeeling/Silig uri corridors —to the British East India Company; these areas now constitute India’s borders with Nepal. The British defeated Burma, signed the Treaty of Yanda bo in 1826, gained control of Assam from which the North East Frontier Tract was carved out in 1914. The British abol ished the remaining Ahom monarchy in 1838 and formal ly integrated the entire Assam into the Bengal Province only to later separate it The modern India-China border was primarily creat ed through British colonial administrative mapping and treaties in the early 20th century post annexation of Assam.
Tibet originally acted as a buffer zone; the British negotiated specific watershed lines to secure northern India from Russian and Chinese in cursions. The 1842 Treaty of Chushul set early traditional boundaries in the western sector between India and Ti bet creating the Mcmahon Line defining the frontier be tween Tibet and British India after the Simla Convention of 1914. China rejects the Simla Convention, arguing that Tibet lacked the sovereign authority to sign international treaties; the India-China border dis pute thus continues. Initial territorial separation in the east began after the Treaty of Yandabo in 1826, and the legal administrative border was finalised in 1937 when Britain officially split Burma into a colony separate from British India. The Naga People living in Nagaland, Ma nipur, and Myanmar’s Sagaing region found the border so created cut right through vil lages, including the chief’s house in Longwa village.
The Kuki-Chin-Mizo People who share the same culture and history were divided between Mizoram and Manipur in In dia, and Chin State in Myan mar. The Singpho (Jingpo) People were split between Arunachal Pradesh in India and Kachin State in Myanmar. It is only the Nagas, Mizos, Kukis and Singpho who may rightfully accuse the British of ‘divide and rule’ — but not In dia, which the British unified as never before. The Brits undisputedly came as colonisers. Whatever they did was to bolster their own rule. But in the process, India was knitted into one continuous whole with rail ways and highways linking the entire country. These were built to facilitate trade (for which the East India Company was incorporated, in the first place) and to link the various cantonments, to better con tain future military challeng es.
Thus, the framework for India came to be created. The Brits granted independence to two sovereign nations in 1947, instead of the several hundred kingdoms they had encountered when they en tered India. As they departed the British Army was divided between India and Pakistan; the princely States were left with no armed forces to chal lenge the newly created na tions, so most of them merged into one or the other. Why then blame the British for something they did not have to do? Why take credit away from Manu who unified India through divisions that still per sist? As the record shows, the British dismantled five major kingdoms and scores of small er ones to unify India under their rule. Irrespective of what ever else the Brits did and why they did what they did, they did not divide India.
Clearly, the policy was to unite and rule which they did and not divide and rule, which they did not! Colonising exploiters you may call them, but it is the very act of colonisation that laid the foundations for a unified India. Let us give credit to the British for subduing mutually hostile and warring Nawabs/ Rajas and creating the Repub lic of India we live in today. (Radharao F Gracias is a senior Trial Court Advocate, a former Independent MLA, a political activist, with a reputation for oratory and interests in history and ornithology.)
