3.1 Arms of The Colonial State Army, Police and Law

Arms of the Colonial State: Army, Police, Law
Subject: History
Unit: Colonial State and Ideology
Lesson: Arms of the Colonial State: Army, Police, Law

Lesson Developer : Dr.Anirudh Deshpande
College/Department : Associate Professor, Department of
History, University of Delhi
Institute of Lifelong Learning, University of Delhi

Table of contents
Chapter 3: Colonial state and ideology

• 3.1: Arms of the colonial state: army, police and law
• Summary
• Exercises
• Glossary
• Further readings

3.1: Arms of the colonial state: army, police and law
The colonial Indian army: a history
The Indian army was the strongest pillar of British colonialism in Asia. Given the numerical
insignificance of Europeans working and settled in tropical India, the army played a crucial
role in protecting them and their various colonial interests. During the colonial period the
Indian army remained the greatest symbol of coercive state power in colonial India because
in the ultimate analysis the British Raj was founded not on consent but on compromise and
force. Throughout the colonial period the military establishment in India consumed the
largest proportion of Indian revenues, leaving very little for development activities, public
health and education. The colonial Indian military establishment comprised the Indian army
and a backup British garrison, the strength of which varied between 60 and 80 thousand
men drawn from the British army. Both these components were paid for by Indian
revenues.
During the period 1757-1947 the armies raised by the British in India were the chief
instruments of imperial expansion and colonial consolidation not only in India but in many
parts of Asia and Africa. Many areas in the middle-east, the Himalayas and Burma were
conquered for the British by units of the Indian army. During the two world wars (1914-18,
1939-45) the Indian army expanded considerably and its units fought successfully on the
Asian, African, and European fronts. During World War II the performance of the Indian
army divisions in North Africa, Italy and Burma was noteworthy and crucial to Allied
successes. The world wars, and specially the Mesopotamia campaign of World War I, also
exposed serious problems in the army organization in India, highlighting the imperatives of
reform.
The army’s participation in these wars proved important in other ways as well. The world
wars raised the consciousness of Indian soldiers, added to their growing confidence in their
own abilities, and underlined the importance of military reform including the demand for
opening the commissioned officers’ ranks to all Indians and improving the working and
living conditions of Indian troops. However, despite these imperatives the reform process
remained slow during the colonial period because of easily identifiable ideological, political
and economic reasons. Both official will and spare money were in short supply during the
turbulent decades following World War I. With mass nationalism rising from the 1920s, and
despite the rhetoric of reform, the increasingly insecure British rulers of India tried their
stubborn best to delay and possibly obstruct military reform in India. They feared that
losing control over the army, perhaps the most conservative of colonial institutions in India,
would have meant giving up the jewel in the crown of British Empire – India itself!
The interesting history of the colonial Indian army (1757-1947) can be perceived in three
distinct phases. The century between the Battle of Plassey (1757) to the Great Mutiny
(1857) comprised the classic era of the Bengal, Bombay and Madras Presidency Sepoy
Armies. The second phase began after the Mutiny of 1857 when the Indian military was
reorganized in the light of that cataclysmic event and according to the Peel Commission
recommendations of 1859. This phase, increasingly dominated by the martial races theory
since the 1880s, ended with the beginning of World War I in 1914. Between 1914 and 1947
the Indian army was shaped by policies which responded to the exigencies of total war,
pressures of nationalism on the question of Indianization, military expenditure,
independence and partition.
From sepoy army to Indian army
Although the European merchants and trading companies employed Indian mercenaries
from the 16th century onwards to protect their trading caravans, the credit for raising well
drilled and disciplined battalions of Indian sepoys (from the Indian word for soldier, sipahi)
trained in the European ways of warfare goes to the French and British. The French initiated
the process at the beginning of the Carnatic Wars and the English, led by men like Stringer
Lawrence and Robert Clive, followed. Military labour markets and professional soldiering,
with specific notions of courage, honor and loyalty to salt, had existed in India for many
centuries prior to the arrival of the Europeans. The sepoy battalions, which later grew into
three separate armies, were produced by the interaction of European methods and the
communities of professional fighters which dominated the rich and varied Indian military
labour market. The largest of these markets was in the plains of north India although
military labour was plentiful in the Deccan, Punjab as well as the deep south. During the
18th century the Rumi (Ottoman) military influence characteristic of the Mughal period gave
way to the increasing popularity of European methods of training and deployment. Due to
the innovative exertions of the European trainers the sepoy infantry battalions became the
first ones in India to be trained, drilled, supplied, paid and deployed in accordance with the
methods popularized by the military revolution of early modern Europe. Their success in
battle prompted most Indian rulers, such as Tipu Sultan, Mahadji Scindia, and Maharaja
Ranjit Singh to raise Company style infantry battalions and artillery units in the latter half of
the 18th century. However, these native battalions were led by a motley crowd of European
mercenaries who could not be relied upon to lead their men against the British. Further, the
Indian states of the 18th century suffered several institutional deficiencies because of the
feudal nature of the native ruling elites that impeded modernization. Hence, despite fighting
bravely against the Company armies, one by one these powers were defeated and
subjugated by the Company. (See chapter 2 on British annexations in India for details).
From the mid 18th till the early 19th century three distinct sepoy armies developed in India –
the largest and most powerful being the Bengal army. After the Mutiny of 1857 in the
Bengal army, the armies in India were organized according to the principle of ‘counterpoise
of native against native’ enunciated by the Peel Commission in 1859. The single class
company and mixed class regiment structure of the colonial Indian army, designed primarily
to prevent a repeat of 1857, dates from this period. Moreover, the period after 1857 was
also marked by increased recruitment among the so called ‘Punjab’ classes and the
Gurkhas. Sikh and Gurkha troops, it is worth remembering here, were crucial to the British
victory over the rebels in Delhi. Thus the Mutiny expanded the military labour market of
north India into the plains of Punjab and hills of Nepal. The Presidency armies were merged

into a single Indian army in 1895 dominated by the so-called ‘martial races’ (the Punjabi
Musalmans, Sikhs, Pathans, Gurkhas, Dogras, and Rajputs) and deployed in four
commands; north, south, east and west each under a Lt. General answerable to the
Commander in Chief who held the rank of a General and was an extremely important
member of the Viceroy’s Executive Council. It is easy to see that this command structure
survived British rule in India. The dominance of the Bengal army over the Bombay and
Madras armies changed into the hegemony of the largely north Indian martial races over
the Indian army as a whole from 1895 onwards. The martial races theory came under
severe strain during World War I but survived during the inter-war period only to be
overthrown during World War II as mentioned in the narrative below.
Value addition: common misconceptions

Martial races
It is commonly believed that the concept of the ‘martial races’ was inflexible.
However it must be noted that the list of martial races changed over time as new
martial groups were ‘discovered’ during new wars. For example the list underwent a
considerable expansion after the experience of the First World War during which the
Indian army was mobilized for total war for the first time. During this war new
martial races were discovered in south India and the Deccan.
Source: Deshpande, A. 2005. British Military Policy in India, 1900-1945:
Colonial constraints and Declining Power. New Delhi: Manohar.
Organizational structure of the sepoy armies
The credit for converting Indian jamadari war bands into regular army battalions during
the 18th century goes to the tactical organization of the sepoy armies evolved by the English
East India Company. The key to cohesion in this organization was the stratum of native
officers between the English officers and Indian sepoys. These native officers came to be
called the Viceroy’s Commissioned Officers (VCOs) in the 20th century. These were the
subedars, jamadars, havildarsand naiks who led the sepoy units in peace and battle and
formed the crucial social and political link between the sepoys and all the European officers.
They translated orders in the vernacular, maintained discipline among the sepoys and,
occasionally, prevented mutinies. The success of the sepoy armies rode on the prestige of
the native officers, the senior most of whom often happened to be the respected community
patriarchs of the sepoys.
Nonetheless, over time the subedars were subjected to increasing control by the European
battalion commanders. The number of European officers in the battalions continued to grow
and the avenues of promotion to the native commandant rank for the native subedars
vanished in the 1780s. The reorganization of 1785, following the Pitt’s India Act of 1784,
“brought the sepoy armies in all three presidencies within a uniform command structure.”
European control over the sepoys tightened as a consequence of a “major reorganization” in
1796 which brought the sepoy battalions into the regimental system of organization. In
short, with the emergence of British sovereignty in India and increasing Parliamentary
interference in Indian affairs, the powers of command enjoyed by the native officers during
the mid 18th century lessened considerably towards the beginning of the 19th century.
Nonetheless British administrators like John Malcolm remained acutely conscious of the
need to treat the native officers wisely 1. A large number of British officers also understood
the difference between being the military leaders and natural leaders of their men. There is
evidence to suggest that the gradual downgrading of the native officers and the restriction
of promotion avenues for them were important causes of the Mutiny of 1857.
Figure 3.1.1: The British and Indian column storming the gates of Ghazni during the first
Afghan war
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Britattack.jpg
Loyalty and disloyalty
The resilience of the basic three tier organizational structure of the sepoy armies (English
commissioned officers – native officers/VCOs – sepoys/jawans) survived the Mutiny of
1857. But periodically it came under the attack of new British self perceptions from the end
of the 18th century. These self perceptions were a result of the growing realization of being
a ruling class in India among the English ruling order both in Britain and India. With the
passing of the days of Warren Hastings and the coming of zealous reforming Governors
General like Cornwallis and Wellesley, and the increasing control of the British parliament on
Indian affairs, a feeling of racial and imperial superiority became palpable among the
English administrators, soldiers and diplomats in India. Thus the material and intellectual
transition from trade to empire had a profound impact on Anglo-Indian relations in all fields.

In the sepoy armies this attitude of superiority could, and occasionally did, manifest itself in
official modernist interference in long established practices. This is exactly what happened in
Madras where the Commander in Chief of the Madras army passed an order designed to
impose uniformity of appearance on the sepoys at the cost of their caste marks, beards and
moustaches. In the event, and this must be said to his credit, Governor William Bentinck’s
efforts to have this order reversed failed and the violent Vellore Mutiny of 1806 broke out.
The Vellore Mutiny was also a result of various other factors. Increasing missionary activity,
the presence of significant sections of the recently defeated Mysore aristocracy including
many sons of Tipu Sultan in and around the Vellore fort and issues emanating from low pay
and harsh service conditions following the last Mysore and Maratha wars were some import
causes of large scale sepoy discontent in the Madras army.
In this sense Vellore can said to have been a dress rehearsal of the Mutiny of 1857 which
can also be perceived as a mass revolt against the imposition of a colonial Christianized
modernity on some recently conquered regions of north India. Despite the best efforts of
the English, both loyalty and disloyalty remained consistent themes in the sepoy armies.
Mutinies usually followed British conquests because of easily identifiable causes; increased
expectations, demand for extra field allowance (batta), heightened consciousness of harsh
working conditions, highlighted racial discrimination, political impact of displaced Indian
elites etc. Aggressive missionary activity from the 1820s contributed significantly to the
fear, and potent volatile rumors, of British attempts to convert sepoys to Christianity. While
the Vellore Mutiny of 1806 and the Mutiny of 1857 were the biggest mutinies in India during
the 19th century, lesser ones occurred in Sindh and Punjab after their conquest. The Mutiny
of 1857, it is well known, occurred after the momentous annexation of Awadh by the British
in 1856 – an event which left a large mass of Bengal army sepoys anxious, discontented
and ultimately rebellious.

Figure 3.1.2: Vellore fort

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vellorefort.jpg

Figure 3.1.3: Indian sepoy

Source:
http://media.photobucket.com/image/sepoy/chalklands/Sepoy/Sepoysoldierc1780.j
pg
From 1857 to 1946 – main trends

Large scale mutinies like the one of 1857 in the Indian army did not occur between 1857
and 1945 because of a number of causes which cannot be mentioned in detail here. With
the virtual completion of British conquest in south Asia, the size of the Indian army
stabilized at around 200,000 men, including infantry and cavalry, recruited from the north
Indian martial races in the 1880s. Till the beginning of World War I two major tasks were
entrusted to this army. One, defending the north-west frontier of India and two, aiding civil
authority in the event of a serious breakdown of law and order. To meet these ends it was
thought that a well knit regiment based army drawn from the loyal martial races was
sufficient. Further, the British officers tried their best to cultivate romantic ties of
paternalism with the martial races to maintain a high quality, professional and apolitical
Indian army in the face of rising mass nationalism in India. Due to the experiences of 1857,
artillery was made a British monopoly in India except for some light mountain guns handled
by Indian troops. The cantonment system was developed in an attempt to socially and
intellectually isolate the army from the civilian population and the civil lines in the new
towns were linked to the cantonments by broad roads which allowed a swift movement of
mounted troops in the event of serious civil disturbances. New colonial town planning made
it clear that the British were determined to do their best to either avoid or quickly crush
another event like the Mutiny of 1857.
Figure 3.1.4: Revolt of 1857 at Delhi

Source: http://www.xtimeline.com/evt/view.aspx?id=55208
Mass recruitment during World War I, supported by the Indian nationalists, temporarily
changed the Indian army by bringing in new social groups including dalit troops from the
Mahar community of Maharashtra and the Mazhabi Sikhs in Punjab. During the war, Indian
troops fought in Europe for the first time and gave a good account of themselves, earning
praise and medals. However, the dalits were often the first to be retrenched after the war,
in preference to the more established, caste conscious, upper caste martial races. The war
also expanded the list of the martial races as the Marathas and some others were
discovered in the killing fields of Mesopotamia and elsewhere. To attract Indians in large
numbers during the war the British made several promises of reform most of which were
promptly overlooked once the war ended. Military reform following the war remained limited
in scope and the attempted Indianization of the Indian army officer corps during the 1920s
proved disappointing to the Indians.
Value addition: did you know?

The Mahar Regiment
The Mahar Regiment was finally raised during World War II after persistent demands
from the Mahar community of Maharashtra. During the 1920s and 30s the dalit
communities in India protested against the way dalit soldiers were the first to be
retrenched after World War I.
Source: Longer, V. 1974. Red Coats to Olive Green. New Delhi: Allied
Publishers; and Cohen, Stephen. 1990. The Indian Army. Oxford University
Press.
After the war the winds of retrenchment began blowing over the Indian army. In the event
the recommendations of the Indian Retrenchment Committee (1923) overruled the gentle
reforming tone of the Esher Committee set up to reform the army organization in India after
the armistice. However, the recommendations of this committee did not satisfy the Indians
who responded to its half hearted proposals by launching a political campaign in favour of
speedy Indianization of the Indian army officer corps. Moreover, the economic conditions in
the 1920s and 30s combined with official apathy and the obsession with balancing the
budget ruled out a significant modernization of the Indian army. Therefore, when another
world war became imminent and the Chatfield Committee took up the matter of
modernizing the Indian armed forces in 1938 it was found that the Indian army was, at
best, obsolete by contemporary standards.
Mutinies on a small scale occurred in some units of the Indian army at the conclusion of
World War I but these were nothing compared with the events of the 19th century
mentioned above. During World War II, with British military prestige taking a beating at the
hands of the Germans and the Japanese, thousands of Indian POWs in Singapore and
Malaysia joined the Japanese supported Indian National Army (INA) formed by nationalists
like Rash Behari Bose, Mohan Singh and Subhas Chandra Bose.
Real discontent surfaced after the war which swept aside a military recruitment based on
the martial races. Wartime demand altered the social composition of the Indian army and
brought in hundreds of urban, lower middle to middle class Indians into the services. The
war also forced some technological improvement upon the normally stagnant Indian army
and this necessitated the recruitment of a large number of matriculates and graduates who
were not politically as innocent as the primarily rural martial races were supposed to be.
The war also led to the recruitment of thousands of Indians from the Madras and Bombay
Presidencies. Due to the social transformation of the Indian armed forces during the war
and the sharpening of political conflicts in India, a heightened and unprecedented political
consciousness among the Indian servicemen was visible towards the end of World War II.
To make matters worse, the colonial state proved inept in handling the post war scenario in
India. As post war demobilization degenerated into a mess there were ‘strikes’ in the Royal
Indian Air Force in 1945. The currents of disaffection in the armed forces finally came
together in the Naval Mutiny of February 1946, which affected the entire Royal Indian Navy,
a new service created in 1934 and hastily expanded during the war. The Naval Mutiny of
1946, accompanied by an uprising of the Bombay working class, was put down by the
British with great bloodshed. But it told everyone that the days of the British in India were
indeed numbered.
Figure 3.1.5: Naval mutiny

Source:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_xQ24dGvRW4w/SHo1kbR_n5I/AAAAAAAAAOE/h5_mKhkuq40/s1
600-h/DSC01717.jpg
Value addition: did you know?

Indianization
Mohammad Ali Jinnah played an important role in the Indianization debate which

took place between the Government of India and the Indian nationalists in the
Central Legislative Assembly during the 1920s.
Source: Deshpande, A. 2005. British Military Policy in India, 1900-1945:
Colonial constraints and Declining Power. New Delhi: Manohar.
The colonial Indian police
Like the Indian army, the police organization developed by the colonial state in India from
the late 18th century was based on a fusion of British elements and extant Indian practices.
Indians were co-opted into it in subordinate positions from the late 18th century to serve the
colonial state. The police system which ultimately evolved in India after 1857 was led by
British officers at the senior level and Indians recruited from regionally preferred
communities. At least one study of the Indian police claims that recruitment to the colonial
police closely followed the recruitment pattern of the Indian army. This means that men
from the so-called martial races were preferred by the police because they were thought to
be well built, docile, apolitical and rural. These men, in accordance with their educational
standards, were employed as constables, head constables, assistant sub-inspectors, sub-
inspectors and inspectors. At the same time keeping men from communities which posed a
threat to British rule in India out of the police was important. Like the army, loyalty as a
value was uppermost in the minds of police recruiters.
The process of recruitment tended to become more formalized with the increasing
enumeration and classification of Indian communities after 1857. Employing urban English
educated middle class Indians during the latter half of the 19th century was discouraged
because of political reasons and also because the higher ranks of the colonial police from
the District Superintendent of Police (DSP) upwards were virtually reserved for the British.
The model for this was provided by the Indian army and the Indian Civil Service (ICS). As
far as the colonial state was concerned its police was the first line of defense against
internal unrest. This was followed by the Indian army and finally the British army
garrisoning India.
In the beginning the British inherited the medieval Indian police system prevalent in Bengal.
The Mughal police system was based on a chain of organization stretching down from the
kotwalis under the kotwals to the locality thanas under thanedars or darogas and the
village watchmen under the command of local village authorities. This system worked in
tandem with the Mughal administrative and military command structure to which officers
like the mansabdars, faujdars (area commandant) and subahdars (provincial governor)
were central. Upon the decline of the Mughal Empire the police functions in most Indian
localities devolved upon the powerful zamindars and jagirdars, many of whom were ex-
Mughal officers themselves. Hence the credit for developing a modern police system in India
suited to the exigencies of a colonial, and later post-colonial, state in India goes to the
British.

The lead in this process was taken by Lord Cornwallis who reformed the police system
inherited by the East India Company in the late 18th century. Cornwallis regularized a police
force based on the thanas with darogas who worked under the zamindars. English officers
were appointed in senior positions and they were answerable to the collectors of the
districts. The practice of subordinating the police to the civil service dates from the years of
Cornwallis. This followed the principle of civilian control over the executive arm of the
government prevalent in Britain. The Cornwallis system continued more or less without
much change till the Revolt of 1857 threw the colonial imperatives into an entirely new
perspective. The events of 1857 underlined the fragility of British control over India and
thereby highlighted the importance of detecting and possibly pre-empting all those activities
which could be construed as crimes by the colonial state. Anti-British movements such as
the long drawn Wahabi movement of the 19th century created the conditions in which a new
police force was formed.
The important tasks of the colonial police, specially after 1857 and during the period in
which nationalism and revolutionary terrorism emerged as a major threat to the stability of
British rule in India (1905 – 1947), comprised gathering intelligence about these
movements, infiltrating revolutionary cells, arresting and torturing terror suspects, keeping
an eye on nationalists and manning jails. Throughout the colonial period the major task of
the Indian police comprised tackling nationalism, revolutionary terrorism and communist
activities in their various forms. Keeping a record of the so called officially notified criminal
tribes and rounding up their members in the process of criminal investigations was also an
important duty of the colonial police. Since the majority of the police were recruited from
the dominant castes of a region the caste bias in its anti-crime operations was quite visible.
In orientation and training the colonial police was imbued with colonial ideologies designed
to divide and keep India subjugated to British interests.
After 1857 the colonial police organization was based on the Police Act of 1861 – a policy
instrument obviously inspired by the great revolt and designed to pre-empt anti British
rebellions in future. It gave sweeping powers to the police over the colonial Indian subjects
while keeping the service subordinate to the ICS. Though this act was revised later, its
fundamentals remained unchanged and experts opine that the police in post-colonial India
has remained anchored to its provisions. That is one reason why the Indian police shows
scant respect for the democratic rights of Indian citizens and is popularly known as the most
‘colonial’ of the government services in independent India. To professionalize the police, an
officer service called the Indian Police was created in the 1890s. This service was modeled
on the celebrated ICS and, to begin with, excluded Indians. However, the Second Police
Commission of 1902 “recommended the opening up of recruitment at the officer level,
confined hitherto to Europeans, to qualified Indians as part of the Indianization drive.”
The composition of the colonial police was based on the principle of representing various
competing communities balanced by official nomination. In the event, officer recruitment to
the Indian police from among the educated Indians was “fairly representative of the
provinces and communities” if figures for 1936-38 are taken to be indicative. Nonetheless
the federal Indian Police was very small compared with the Indian army. Just before
partition, in June 1947, the Indian Police Service comprised 516 officers including 323
Europeans, 63 Muslims, 130 Hindus and some others. In addition to these were the officers
and men of the provincial police services and the reorganized police forces of the several
princely states. Most of these police services were partitioned along religious lines in 1947
and divided between India and Pakistan. After independence the Indian Police was renamed
the Indian Police Service (IPS) in the same way as the ICS was constitutionally renamed the
Indian Administrative Service (IAS).
Law
Like the evolution of the Indian army and police during the colonial period of Indian history,
the process of law formation in colonial India also came to represent a coexistence of
modern western ideas and colonially perceived notions of traditional Indian law. While the
western ideas in colonial jurisprudence were imported into India by the British colonial
administrators, the day to day imperatives of the colonial state underpinned the official
respect for Indian community based legal practices. Once again the British began where the
Mughal practices ended because during the Mughal period caste and community were the
sources of civil law in India. Hindus were subjected to their own laws which were backed by
the authority of the scriptures and the interpretations offered by the Brahmans while Muslim
law was interpreted largely by the qazis and other learned members of the ulema. Along
with the traditional intellectuals of the Indian communities, law was also defined and
imposed by the village and caste panchayats which were generally led by powerful rural
patriarchs. During the Mughal period criminal cases were brought before the state
functionaries like the faujdars who held courts regularly. Upon the decline of the Mughal
empire powerful intermediaries like the zamindars, jagirdars, talukdars and poligars
began to implement the law in many parts of India.
In sum, during the Mughal period and the 18th century, local definitions of criminal and civil
laws existed; while the former involved the state directly the latter was based on the
community in question. A clear distinction between the civil and the personal did not exist in
pre-British India because modern individualism which emanated from the new cities and
towns which developed during the colonial period did not exist. In many parts of India, like
Maharashtra for instance, law suits were publicly heard and disposed of by assemblies of
village or community elders. In many instances the cases impinged on disputes arising from
contested ownership of resources such as land and involved references to local history,
tradition and the authority of texts. While the law thus took its course in pre-modern India,
the idea of changing the law in conformity with the requirements of modernity or using law
to change and reform society did not exist in India prior to the establishment of British rule.
Law, scripture and community were intermeshed; law was not perceived as an instrument
of historical change or social reform. A clear separation of the legislative, executive and
judicial functions characteristic of a modern democratic order was absent in medieval India.
This separation, upon which a democracy with all its flaws in contemporary India rests, was
developed in India for the first time by British rule.
The question of defining and implementing law in India arose among the British once the
English East India Company began the transition from being a commercial organization to
becoming a state in Bengal. After the Battle of Buxar, and following the grant of Diwani in

Bengal, the question of law in India steadily gained importance in British circles. From the
1770s increasingly the phase of plunder and extortion inaugurated in India by Clive gave
way to concern for order and a systematic exploitation of Indian resources. Furthermore,
the increasing interference of the British Parliament in Indian affairs from the 1770s gave
credence to the idea that finally the English East India Company had emerged as a
sovereign arm of British power in India. The question was, how was a diverse country like
India to be ruled? To begin with, early British administrators, and specially those among
them who had come to India as very young men, generally did not favor imposing alien
laws on Indians. Many British officers and administrators in the latter half of the 18th
century were, to use William Dalrymple’s phrase, ‘White Mughals’ in habits and culture.
They were least interested in changing India and that too with the aid of law.
While men like Warren Hastings understood the difference between Britain and India,
neither did they think or approve of reforming and modernizing an ancient people. Hastings’
views on Indian practices, both in legal and educational matters, were premised upon a
respect for Indian traditions because he was not an imperialist intervener in the mould of
later Governors-General like Cornwallis, Wellesley, Bentinck and Dalhousie. Hastings also
knew that British rule in Bengal was not secure enough for the English to try and
experiment with legal changes in India. In fact he remained preoccupied with keeping the
Marathas at bay. During his governorship and governor generalship of Bengal there was
hardly any Indian pressure for legal or social reform. In fact, during the period of Warren
Hastings the ideas of early Orientalists began to gain widespread acceptance and influence.
The English, with the aid of new researches in comparative philology, found themselves
discovering an ancient civilization which had well defined codes of law and caste behaviour
imprinted upon its social organization. India was not only ancient but essentially a land of
religions, religious sanctions, castes and long standing community based legal practices.
Indians, it was found, knew how to rule themselves and all the British needed to do was to
codify their laws. Thus the idea that both Hindus and Muslims in India were governed by
their own laws which derived legitimacy from their respective sacred texts came to prevail
over the British minds of that age. Men like Hastings and William Jones, therefore, saw no
reason in trying to interfere in this scheme of things. If Indians were to be ruled by the
English, they would be ruled in accordance with their laws as perceived by their new rulers
as far as possible. However, this understanding was not applicable to crime, or such cases
in which the English were found to be involved, where the writ and discretion of the infant
colonial state would prevail. The understanding was that as long as a community or any
group of people or an individual did not oppose British rule the colonial state would leave
them to their practices. Having said this, it must be added that new laws related to
property, inheritance and financial matters began to emerge in the cities founded by the
English in India in accordance with the historical needs of the Company’s rule. Cases in line
with these laws were now decided by a hierarchy of modern courts set up by the new rulers
of India.
The idea that law could be used to improve, civilize and modernize India following the
example of Britain can be dated to the days when Utilitarianism began to influence British
colonial policy in India. This began to happen from the early 19th century. The process was
also not divorced from the critique of Indian society developed by the Christian missionaries
who began to enter India in ever greater numbers during the decades preceding the revolt
of 1857. In the first few decades of the 19th century certain social and political
developments came together in a conjuncture favorable to a new interpretation of law as a
mechanism of social reform. The successful industrial revolution in Britain fortified the ideas
of the European Enlightenment and gave them a liberal capitalist twist. As Britain was
transformed by the rise of industrial capitalism the question of transforming India through
British rule was not far from the minds of British colonial policy makers. Consequently
several influential British scholars, statesmen and administrators, both at home and in
India, came under the influence of Utilitarian ideas and Whig history writing. Almost
simultaneously in India a new class of English educated Indian intellectuals began to grow
as a consequence of British rule and its interaction with sections of the Indian elite.
Intellectuals like Ram Mohan Roy, for instance, perceived British rule in India as an
excellent opportunity for Indians to reform a traditional society in which many inhuman
customs like sati prevailed. The interests of reform minded liberals like William Bentinck
and Indian reformers like Roy converged on the point of enacting new laws or banning
certain traditional practices in an effort to create a progressive liberal society in India.
In a significant departure from the days of Warren Hastings the British liberals perceived
India as a backward country in need of progressive British rule based on new laws. Thus we
find the debate on education, sati and Hindu widow remarriage located in the first half of
the 19th century. The results were Macaulay’s famous minute on education (1835), abolition
of sati (1829) and the enactment of the Hindu widow remarriage act (1856). The work of
Lord Macaulay as a law maker, both as Law Member of the Governor General’s Council
(1833-38) and as a leading member of the Law Commission in India must be viewed in the
context mentioned above. Following the revolt of 1857, which underlined the urgency of
defining and controlling crime in India from the British perspective, and based on the work
accomplished by official reformers like Macaulay, the Indian Penal Code (1860), Criminal
Procedure Code (1872) and Civil Procedure Code (1909) were brought into force.
However, and largely due to the mass reaction to colonial intervention in Indian religious
matters symbolized by the revolt, the British decided upon a policy of non-intervention,
unless absolutely necessary, in matters of personal law. Thus with the penal and civil codes,
community personal laws sanctioned by the various religions of India co-existed in colonial
India. The imposition of new legal codes on a colonial society did not mean the arrival of
juridical modernity in India. Alongside the nature of laws prevalent in the princely states
patronized by the British, the colonial legal system in India represented a compromised
colonial modernity working in the interest of the ruling and comprador elites of British
colonialism in India. In the event, the system of delivering justice remained skewed in
favour of the rich and powerful, most of whom were upper class and upper caste at the
same time. For the poor, the process of seeking justice remained complicated, time
consuming and expensive. It ended up giving enormous clout to the lawyers and
moneylenders. Most unfortunately these colonial legacies have survived in post-colonial
India. Justice delayed is justice denied and justice denied is democracy failed!

3.1 Summary
• The Indian army, police and colonial law were essential to British colonial governance
in India. Since colonialism in India was based, foremost, on state coercion and did
not command the consent of the Indian people, the coercive state apparatus created
in India by the British must be studied by all students of Indian history.
• Since the postcolonial Indian army, police and law are based, in large measure, on
their colonial antecedents the importance of this lesson can hardly be over-
emphasized.
• During the colonial period the British physical presence in India remained marginal
and, except for the mountains in the north and south of the country, the British
chose not to settle in India in significant numbers. This made the Indian army,
police, colonial law and a strong garrison of the British army indispensable to British
colonialism.
• The Indian army, police and colonial law were produced by a unique interaction of
British policy and Indian society. However, the main aim of British policy in India was
the preservation and prolongation of British colonialism. This should not be
overlooked in discussions on the Indian army, police and colonial law.
• In understanding the history of the Indian army the following must be examined
carefully. First, the process of transition from the sepoy armies to a unified Indian
army in the 19th century must be studied. Second, the organizational structure of the
Indian army as it evolved from the mid 18th century till 1945 in response to the
historical challenges faced by colonialism, including the mutiny of 1857 and the two
world wars of the 20th century, should be researched. Third, the question of loyalty
and disloyalty in the colonial Indian military establishment should be studied to
examine Indian responses to the organizational and other changes in the army
initiated by the British. Finally it must be noted that of all the colonial institutions
created in India the Indian army was the most resistant to reform. This is proved by
the fact that Indianization, which began earlier than the army in the Indian Police,
was resisted by the Indian army well into the 1920s on some pretext or the other.
• The police developed by the British in India was based on a fusion of continuity and
change. It combined elements of existing Indian practices with the ideas imported by
the British. In general it employed Indians in subordinate positions while its senior
officers were almost exclusively British. To begin with, the Indian police was based
on the police organization which had served the Mughals. After 1857, the police
organization in India was based on the Police Act of 1861. Recruitment to the police
imitated the recruitment policy of the Indian army. While a service called the Indian
Police was created in the 1890s to professionalize the police the Second Police
Commission of 1902 recommended the opening up of the officer ranks to qualified
Indians.

• The colonial police was entrusted with two important tasks. The first was controlling
crime which itself was re-defined in the colonial interests by the British. The second
was to keep an eye on any activity or movement which threatened the British.
Hence, beginning with the stamping out of Wahabism, the suppression of militant
nationalism, revolutionary movements and communism preoccupied the colonial
Indian Police. Since the police enjoyed sweeping powers over a subject population it
developed a culture of corruption and an inherent disregard for human rights and the
notion of citizenship – notorious traits inherited by the postcolonial Indian police. It is
also important to note here that these tendencies became India wide because police
reforms in the princely states, often initiated by English police officers, closely
followed the colonial pattern.
• Law in colonial India was based on the official understanding of Indian traditional
laws and notions of modern secular law. While the former was expressed in personal
laws codified for the various communities of south Asia in keeping with respect for
‘community’ traditions and the policy of non-interference initiated by the Queen’s
Proclamation of 1858, the latter found expression in criminal laws which were
universally applied. The penal codes adopted after 1857 defined crime from the
perspective of a colonialism which felt threatened by Indian unrest. While the
enactment of secular criminal law was certainly an achievement of colonial modernity
in India, the encoding of community based personal laws related to matters like
marriage and inheritance tended to reproduce communities both in the interest of
colonialism and indigenous patriarchy.
• The tedious and expensive process of getting justice and the attitude of the colonial
state, as exemplified by police behaviour, made sure that the poor and marginalized
sections of Indian society remained legally un-empowered during the colonial period.
3.1: Exercises
Essay questions
1) The colonial Indian army was a synthesis of Western and Indian elements.
Comment critically.
2) Examine the chief features of the police organization set up in India by the British
from the late 18th century.
3) Examine briefly the changing perceptions on law in India among the British
administrators from the times of Warren Hastings to the late 1890s.
4) Do you feel that the army, police and law in postcolonial India bear a strong
resemblance to army, police and law in colonial India.

Objective questions
Question Number Type of question LOD
1 True or False 1
Question
The colonial Indian army was an equal opportunity employer.
Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)
Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Recruitment to the Colonial Indian Army was always tuned to the military labour
market in India. Men from upper caste communities with a tradition of producing
professional soldiers were preferred by the Indian Army. After 1857 there was a shift
in recruitment patterns. Recruitment from communities considered disloyal declined
and the intake of men from the so called Punjab Classes and the Gurkhas increased.
This happened because the Sikhs and Gurkhas helped the British put down the
rebellion of 1857 launched primarily by the Hindustani sepoys. During the last
quarter of the 19th century the pseudo-scientific theory of ‘martial races’ became
the guiding principle of recruitment to the Indian Army and remained so till World
War II undermined it. However, the Indian Army’s preference for men from
communities and families known to have produced generations of professional
soldiers remains strong despite its national character post independence. During the
colonial period lower castes and untouchable castes were also discriminated against
by the military recruitment policies despite the historical military record of many of
these communities.
Resource/Hints/Feedback for the wrong answer
Reviewer’s Comment:
2 True or False 1
Question
The colonial Indian Police left a legacy of democracy and respect for human rights to
the police forces of postcolonial India.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

The police force in India created by the colonial state was committed to fighting
crime, identifying so-called criminal tribes and checking all kinds of anti-British
activities. It was given sweeping formidable powers over a subject population. The
people of India, both in British India and the Princely States, were never considered
citizens by the police during the colonial times. Moreover, recruitment to the police
followed the army pattern and this meant keeping the poor and marginal
communities out of the police force. The sweeping powers of the police, the
helplessness of the social subaltern in front of this representative of colonial power
and official backing to routine police excesses against nationalists and revolutionaries
translated into a poor human rights record.
3 Multiple choice question 2
Question
Choose the correct statement from the four options given below:
a) The united Indian Army was created after the Mutiny of 1857 in 1858.
b) The united Indian Army was created in 1757.
c) The Presidency Armies were abolished in 1807.
d) The united Indian Army was created in 1895.
Correct Answer /
d)
Option(s)

The three Presidency Armies were abolished in 1895 and their forces were integrated
into one Indian Army with its four commands.
4 Multiple choice question 2
Question
Choose the correct statement from the options given below:
a) The colonial state disregarded Indian law altogether.

b) Colonial law was based on Indian traditional practices.
c) Colonial law was a compromise between modern law and Indian practices.
Correct Answer /
c)
Option(s)

There were basically two components of juridical modernity ushered into India by the
colonial state from the 18th century onwards. The first was a set of criminal laws
which were based on modern laws as they had evolved in Britain since the early
modern period of history. These laws can also be called secular in the sense that
they were universally applied to all subjects of British India. For example, the
punishment for murder or financial crime or cheating was the same for individuals of
all communities. Under British rule a Brahman and Shudra or an Englishman for that
matter could receive the same punishment for, say, a crime like murder. The second
set was personal and derived legitimacy from caste and community practices extant
in India. These were civil laws related to matters like marriage and inheritance.
Hence Hindus could appeal to Hindu personal laws and Muslims could appeal to
Muslim personal laws in case of disputes. Thus the colonial state, trapped between
the urge to modernize a traditional society and the imperative of not alienating large
sections of the subject population, created a complex web of laws in a diverse
society. A uniform civil code applicable to all subjects, therefore, did not evolve
during the colonial period. The issue of a uniform civil code applicable to all Indian
citizens remains contentious even decades after the British left India.

3.1 Glossary
Daroga: Senior police officer in charge of a large police station

Faujdar: Area commandant
Jagirdar: Local notable. Member of feudal Indian artistorcracy. Holder of transferable or
permanent revenue assignment (jagir) as different from zamindar.
Jamadar: Senior Native Commissioned Officer / Military Jobber
Jawan: Literally meaning young man. A word which replaced sepoy at the end of the 19th
century to describe a young Indian soldier.
Kotwal: Head of district / central police headquarter
Kotwali: District / Ward police headquarter
Mansabdar: Mughal military-administrative officer. Literally holder of a mansab.
Poligars: Local landed chieftains wielding administrative and military power in certain areas
of south India like Mysore
Qazi: Muslim magistrate
Sati: Practice of burning a widow on her husband’s funeral pyre
Sepoy: Indian soldier - from the Hindi word sipahi
Subahdar: Provincial Governor
Talukdars: Powerful intermediaries discharging important state functions
Thana: Local police station
Thanedar: Local police station chief (like the SHO of today)
Ulema: community of Muslim theologians
Zamindar: Influential landlords both big and small in north India - owners of land, as
distinct from jagirdars
3.1 Further readings
Cohen, Stephen. 1990. The Indian Army. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Deshpande, A. 2005. British Military Policy in India, 1900-1945: Colonial constraints and
Declining Power. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers.
Ellinwood, D. C. and C. Enloe. 1981. Ethnicity and the Military in Asia. London: Transaction
Books.
Ghosh, K. K. 1969. The Indian National Army. Calcutta: Meenakshi Prakashan.
Gupta, P. S. and A. Deshpande eds. 2002. The British Raj and its Indian Armed Forces,
1857-1939. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Khalidi, Omar. 2003. Khaki and the Ethnic Violence in India. New Delhi: Three Essays
Collective.

Kolff, D. H. A. 1990. Naukar, Rajput & Sepoy: The ethnohistory of the military labour
market in Hindustan, 1450-1850. New Delhi: Cambridge University Press.
Longer, V. 1974. Red Coats to Olive Green. New Delhi: Allied Publishers.
Malcolm, John. 1811, 1986 (reprint). Sketch of the Political History of India from the
introduction of Mr. Pitt’s Bill, A.D. 1784, to the present date. Delhi: Discovery Publishing
House.
Rosen, S. P. 1996. Societies and Military Power:India and its Armies. London: Oxford
University Press.
Roy, Kaushik. 2006. War and Society in Colonial India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Wicremesekera, Channa. 2002. ‘Best Black Troops in the World’ British Perceptions and the
Making of the Sepoy 1746-1805. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers.

3.1 Arms of The Colonial State Army, Police and Law

Enviado por

Dados do documento

Descrição original:

Título original

Direitos autorais

Formatos disponíveis

Compartilhar este documento

Compartilhar ou incorporar documento

Opções de compartilhamento

Você considera este documento útil?

Este conteúdo é inapropriado?

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

3.1 Arms of The Colonial State Army, Police and Law

Enviado por

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

Arms of the Colonial State: Army, Police, Law

Lesson: Arms of the Colonial State: Army, Police, Law

Institute of Lifelong Learning, University of Delhi

Chapter 3: Colonial state and ideology

Institute of Lifelong Learning, University of Delhi