Introduction

• An abundance of historical material is available for studying India from the mid-18th century to the mid-20th century.

• Priority in constructing the history of modern India should be given to archives, which are collections of historical records and primary source documents.

• Archives contain original documents created as part of activities like administrative, legal, social, or commercial processes.

• Official records are a crucial part of archives, including the papers of government agencies at various levels.

• The records of the East India Company provide a detailed account of trading conditions from 1600-1857.

• After the British crown took over administration, it maintained a large volume of official records, helping historians trace important developments and understand the decision-making processes of policy-makers.

• The records of other European East India companies (Portuguese, Dutch, and French) are useful for understanding the economic history and the political set-up during the 17th and 18th centuries.

• Contemporary and semi-contemporary works, such as memoirs, biographies, and travel accounts, provide useful glimpses into the history of the 18th and early 19th centuries.

• Newspapers and journals appeared in the later part of the 18th century, offering valuable information on various aspects of Indian society, particularly in the 19th and 20th centuries.

• Other sources for studying modern Indian history include oral evidence, creative literature, and paintings.

Archival Materials

• There are four categories of official records:

  1. Central government archives

  2. State government archives

  3. Records of intermediate and subordinate authorities

  4. Judicial records

• In addition to these, there are private archives and archival sources available abroad.

Central Government Archives

• The National Archives of India, located in New Delhi, contains most of the archives of the Government of India, providing authentic and reliable source materials on various aspects of modern Indian history.

• The records in the National Archives are organized into various groups, representing different branches of the secretariat at different stages of its development.

• The work of the East India Company was distributed among various branches such as public or general, revenue, political, military, secret, commercial, judicial, and education, with a separate set of records kept for each department.

• James Rennell was appointed as the first Surveyor General of Bengal in 1767, marking the beginning of the Survey of India, which mapped the unknown regions of the country and its borders.

• The records of the Survey of India, along with the journals and memoirs of the surveyors, provide valuable information on geographical matters, socio-economic conditions, and other important historical aspects.

• The proceedings of the public, judicial, and legislative departments provide ample data for studying the social and religious policies of the colonial government.

• The government’s policies on education and the growth of the education system during colonial rule are mentioned in the educational records of the central archives.

• The papers related to the emergence of the nationalist movement were part of the public series of the home department records; however, in 1907, a new series called Home Political was started to deal exclusively with political and communal issues.

• The records of the Reforms Office are useful for an analytical study of constitutional developments from 1920 to 1937.

Archives of the State Governments

• The source material in the state archives comprises the records of:

  • Former British Indian provinces

  • Erstwhile princely states incorporated into the Indian Union after 1947

  • Foreign administrations other than those of the British

• The records of Indian powers taken over by the British, such as the Kingdom of Lahore (also known as Khalsa Darbar records from 1800 to 1849), are important source material.

• The Peshwa Daftar, housed in the Alienation Office, Pune, is a valuable collection for the study of Maratha history for a period of almost a century before the fall of the Peshwas.

• For studying the history of the princely states of Rajasthan, such as Jaipur, Bikaner, Jodhpur, Udaipur, etc., the archives of these states, now housed in the Rajasthan State Archives at Bikaner, are valuable.

• The history of Dogra rule from 1846 in Jammu and Kashmir can be studied in the valuable collection of state papers housed at Jammu.

• Other significant archives of the princely states include:

  • Gwalior, Indore, Bhopal, and Rewa in Madhya Pradesh

  • Travancore and Cochin in Kerala

  • Mysore in Karnataka

  • Kolhapur in Maharashtra.

Archives of Three Presidencies

• The early records of Fort Williams (Bengal Presidency) were lost during the sack of Calcutta in 1756, but the archives of the Bengal Presidency after the British victory at Plassey have survived in a more or less complete series.

  • These records are partly available in the National Archives of India and partly in the State Archives of West Bengal.

• The records of the Madras Presidency begin from AD 1670 and include records of the Governor and Council of Fort St. George.

  • These records provide substantial information on the rise of the English East India Company as a political power in the south and the Deccan, including the Anglo-French struggle and English conflicts with other Indian powers.

• The archives of Bombay Presidency, housed in the Maharashtra Secretariat Record Office, Mumbai, are extremely useful for studying the history of Western India—Maharashtra, Gujarat, Sindh, and the Kannada-speaking districts of the erstwhile Bombay Presidency, which were incorporated into Mysore in 1956.

Archives of Other European Powers

• The archives related to the Portuguese, preserved in Goa, mainly belong to the period from 1700 to 1900, and are valuable for studying the history of Portuguese possessions in India.

• The most significant historical material among the Portuguese archives includes orders and dispatches from Lisbon received in Goa, and the responses and reports sent from India to Portugal.

• The Dutch records of Cochin and Malabar are housed in the Madras Record Office, while those of Chinsura are in the State Archives of West Bengal.

• The French archives of Chandernagore and Pondicherry (now Puducherry) were taken to Paris by the French authorities before relinquishing these settlements.

• The archives of the Danish possessions were transferred to Copenhagen when the Danes sold Tranquebar and Serampore to the English East India Company in 1845.

• The remaining Danish records, primarily related to Tranquebar (1777–1845), are now housed in the Madras Record Office.

Judicial Records

• The archives of the Mayor’s Court at Fort St. George begin from AD 1689 and are the earliest available judicial archives, housed in the Madras Record Office.

• The pre-Plassey records of the Mayor’s Court at Fort Williams have been lost, but records for the years 1757-73 are kept in the Calcutta High Court record room, along with the archives of the Supreme Court of Bengal (1774-1861).

• The Mayor’s Court records at Bombay, established in 1728, are available in the Maharashtra Secretariat Record Office, which also houses the archives of the Bombay Recorder’s Court and the Supreme Court.

• These judicial records contain proceedings and minutes, as well as copies of wills, probates, and letters of administration, useful for genealogical studies and investigations into the state of society and economic conditions in the respective regions.

Published Archives

• The most significant archival publications are the Parliamentary Papers, which include many excerpts from the records of the East India Company and the Government of India under the Crown.

• The reports of parliamentary select committees, various royal commissions on specific subjects like education, civil reforms, and famines, and the parliamentary debates on the Indian empire are indispensable sources.

• The proceedings of the Indian and provincial legislatures, weekly gazettes published by the central and provincial governments, and collections of laws and regulations issued from time to time also serve as valuable source material for historical research.

Private Archives

• Private archives comprise papers and documents of individuals and families of note, who played a significant role in the development of modern India.

• The papers of eminent leaders of the nationalist movement and the records of organizations like the Indian National Congress are housed in the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library in New Delhi.

• The archives of banks, business houses, and chambers of commerce are extremely helpful in the study of economic changes.

Foreign Repositories

• A vast body of historical material related to the history of modern India is available in the repositories of erstwhile imperialist powers who ruled different parts of the Indian subcontinent.

• In England, the India Office Records, London, and the records kept in the British Museum are very valuable.

• The India Office Records include documents such as:

  • The minutes of the Courts of Directors and the General Court of the East India Company.

  • Various committees constituted from time to time.

  • The minutes and correspondence of the Board of Control or the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India.

  • Records of the Secretary of State and the India Council.

• The British Museum possesses collections of papers of British viceroys, secretaries of state, and other high-ranking civil and military officials posted in India.

• The archives of the missionary societies, like the Church Missionary Society of London, provide insight into educational and social development in pre-independent India.

• Archives Nationale, Paris, and the French Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Colonies, and War have records shedding light on the history of French possessions and socio-political conditions.

• The records of the Dutch East India Company are available in Rijksarchief, The Hague, and those of the Danish and Portuguese are kept in Copenhagen and Lisbon, respectively.

• Archives preserved in Pakistan are of utmost importance for regional history and India’s relations with Afghanistan, Iran, and other neighbouring countries during the colonial era.

• The West Pakistan Record Office in Lahore, Record Office in Peshawar, and records available in Sind offer significant historical data.

Biographies, Memoirs and Travel Accounts

• Many travellers, traders, missionaries, and civil servants who came to India left accounts of their experiences and impressions of various parts of India.

• An important group among these writers were missionaries who wrote to encourage their societies to send more missionaries to India for evangelising its inhabitants.

• Bishop Heber’s Journal and Abbe Dubois’s Hindu Manners and Customs provide valuable information on the socio-economic life of India during the period of the decline of Indian powers and the rise of the British.

• Some famous British travellers who wrote travel accounts include:

  • George Forster

  • Benjamin Heyne

  • James Burnes (Narrative of a Visit to the Court of Sinde)

  • Alexander Burnes (Travels Into Bokhara)

  • C.J.C. Davidson (Diary of the Travels and Adventures in Upper India)

  • John Butler (Travels and Adventures in the Province of Assam)

• Famous non-British travellers who wrote about India include:

  • Victor Jacquemont (Letters from India describing a journey in the British Dominions of India, Tibet, Lahore, and Cashmere during the years 1828-1829—1831)

  • Baron Charles (Travels in Kashmir and the Punjab)

  • William Moorcroft

• These travel accounts are indispensable and generally reliable sources for constructing the history of modern India, especially as they supplement official papers.

Newspapers and Journals

• Newspapers and journals of the 19th and 20th centuries, published in English and various vernacular languages, are an important and authentic source for the construction of the history of modern India.

• The first attempts to publish newspapers in India were made by disgruntled employees of the English East India Company who sought to expose malpractices of private trade.

• In 1776, William Bolts planned to publish a newspaper after being censured by the Court of Directors for private trading, but his plan ended before materialising.

• In 1780, James Augustus Hickey published the first newspaper in India, The Bengal Gazette or Calcutta General Advertiser, but it was seized within two years due to Hickey’s criticism of government officials.

• Other early publications included The Calcutta Gazette (1784), The Madras Courier (1788), and The Bombay Herald (1789).

• Early newspapers mainly aimed at providing intellectual entertainment for Europeans and Anglo-Indians.

• From the second half of the 19th century, many powerful newspapers were published by distinguished journalists, some of whom were founding fathers of the Indian National Congress in 1885.

• Notable publications included:

  • The Hindu and Swadesamitran (edited by G. Subramaniya Iyer)

  • Kesari and Mahratta (edited by Bal Gangadhar Tilak)

  • Bengalee (edited by Surendranath Banerjea)

  • Amrita Bazaar Patrika (edited by Sisir Kumar Ghosh and Motilal Ghosh)

  • Sudharak (edited by Gopal Krishna Gokhale)

  • Indian Mirror (edited by N.N. Sen)

  • Voice of India (edited by Dadabhai Naoroji)

  • Hindustan and Advocate (edited by G.P. Varma)

• Other significant publications included The Tribune, Akhbar-i-Am (Punjab), Indu Prakash, Dnyan Prakash, Kal, Gujarati (Bombay), and Som Prakash Banganivasi and Sadharani (Bengal).

• Indian nationalists and revolutionaries living abroad published newspapers to promote nationalism, such as:

  • Indian Sociologist (London, Shyamji Krishnavarma)

  • Bande Matram (Paris, Madam Cama)

  • Talwar (Berlin, Virendranath Chattopadhyay)

  • Ghadar (San Francisco, Lala Hardayal)

• Newspapers from around the 1870s onwards depicted nearly all aspects of life in colonial India.

• From the 1920s onwards, newspapers tracked major events during the freedom struggle.

• However, newspaper accounts cannot be seen as unprejudiced or completely objective, as the perspective in British pro-Raj newspapers differed significantly from those in Indian nationalist papers.

Oral Evidence

• Oral history refers to the construction of history using non-written sources, such as personal reminiscences.

• Oral sources allow historians to expand the boundaries of their discipline and corroborate findings from other historical sources.

• Many historians remain sceptical of the veracity of oral history.

Creative Literature

• The most significant outcome of Indo-European contact was the emergence of the novel as a literary genre in the latter half of the 19th century.

• The first important writer of this period was Bankim Chandra Chatterji (1838-94), a Bengali novelist.

• Bankim’s novels were mostly historical, with Anandamath (1882) being the most well-known, noted for its lyric ‘Vandemataram’ and depiction of the Sanyasi Revolt (1760s).

• His last novel, Rajasimha, is considered the grand finale to his career.

• Icharam Suryaram Desai (1853-1912) was a scholar of medieval Gujarati literary history.

• His first novel, Hind ane Britannia, was one of the earliest Indian novels with political overtones.

• Tamil writers like Girija Devi and Ramatirthammal wrote novels like Mohana Rajani (1931) and Dasikalin Mosavalai (1936), using the novel to explore social experience.

• G.V. Krishna Rao’s Keelubommalu (The Puppets, 1956) in Telugu explored the moral aspects and behavior of rural people.

• Vaikom Muhammad Basheer (1910-1994), an eminent Malayalam writer, is known for his famous novel Balyakalasakhi (The Childhood Friends, 1944), a tragic love story.

• Thakazhi Siva Sankara Pillai was known for his Tottiyude Makan (Son of a Scavenger, 1948) and Chemmeen (Shrimps, 1956) in Malayalam.

• Despite differing educational backgrounds and social outlooks, these writers shared a strong sense of realism and a deep interest in the lives of the marginalized and oppressed sections of society.

• These novels provide a picture of the social milieu of their respective periods.

Painting

• Socio-economic, political, and cultural life during the colonial period can be partially understood through paintings from that time.

• Company Paintings, also known as ‘Patna Kalam’, emerged under the patronage of the East India Company.

• These paintings depicted people and scenes from the period, showcasing trades, festivals, dances, and the attire of people.

• Company paintings remained popular until the 1840s when photography was introduced in India.

• Pictorial images such as paintings, pencil drawings, etchings, posters, cartoons, and bazaar prints provide valuable records of the 1857 revolt.

• British paintings aimed to provoke various emotional reactions and often commemorated British heroes who repressed the rebels, such as Relief of Lucknow (1859) by Thomas Jones Barker.

• In Memoriam by Joseph Noel Paton depicted two years of the revolt with English women and children appearing helpless and innocent.

• Paintings from the mutiny period offer insights into the British and Indian perspectives on the revolt.

• Kalighat paintings, prominent in Calcutta during the 19th century, depicted mythological figures and ordinary people in everyday life.

• These paintings reflected social changes in Calcutta and commented on the social evils of the time, sometimes satirizing the modes of life of that period.

• In the late 19th century, a new art movement emerged, driven by the rising nationalism in India.

• Nandalal Bose and Raja Ravi Varma were prominent artists of this new trend.

• The Bengal School, led by Abanindranath Tagore (nephew of Rabindranath Tagore), E.B. Havell (principal at the art school in Calcutta), and Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy (son of an important Tamil political leader), marked this new artistic direction.

Coins

• Coins serve as tangible evidence of trade and economic transactions. British Indian coins reflect the integration of British currency systems into the Indian subcontinent. The “Bombay Presidency One Rupee” coin, minted in 1858, is an illustration of this colonial monetary system.

Trade Warehouses

• Trade warehouses played a crucial role in the British Indian economy. They served as storage facilities for goods traded between Britain and India. The Cotton Exchange Building in Mumbai, formerly known as the Bombay Cotton Exchange, is a notable example. It served as a hub for the cotton trade during the colonial period.
• These material sources of modern indian history provide a window into various aspects of British India. They reveal the military, architectural, economic, and cultural dimensions of the colonial period. By studying and preserving these remnants, we gain a deeper understanding of this significant era.