by BISWAMOY PATI
1857 revolt by M.F. Husain PHOTO/V.V. Krishnan
Great Indian Revolt by Amit Kumar Gupta. New Delhi: Routledge, price: Rs. 795
The nature of the Great Indian Revolt of 1857 has been debated from the time it originated. While the logic of retaining the monopoly of the English East India Company (EEIC) was behind the definition of 1857 as a “Sepoy Mutiny” (viz. sipahi, as the company’s “native” soldier was called), the idea of wiping out its monopoly gave thrust to the effort to uncover deeper problems that needed immediate attention. What needs to be highlighted is the sheer diversity of interpretations of the nature of the revolt even among contemporaries.
Those who harped on the “Mutiny” theme saw it as the handiwork of a set of discontented sipahis who were unhappy with the introduction, in 1857, of the new Enfield rifle with its distinct ammunition, which required the bullet to be bitten before loading. Rumours that the grease used on the bullets was made of either the fat of cattle or pigs had symbolic implications. Cows were considered “sacred” by Hindus, and Muslims considered pigs to be “polluting”. The introduction of such bullets was seen as an attack on Hindu and Muslim religious beliefs. Another feature influencing contemporary official thinking was that it was the handiwork of upper castes who wanted to fan a rebellion through Brahminical institutions such as the Dharma Sabha of Calcutta. Subsequently, it came to be located as a “Muslim conspiracy”, and this got stabilised as a part of the “commonsense” of the colonial officialdom.
Syed Ahmad Khan (1817-1898) wrote Asbab-e-Baghawat-e-Hind (1858), in which he sought to examine the underlying features that determined the nature of the 1857 revolt. Interestingly, some historians have made an effort to show that Khan countered the argument that projected 1857 as a “Muslim conspiracy”. However, what is not projected properly is that Khan’s was perhaps the first Indian viewpoint that located 1857 as a “Rebellion” (viz. Baghawat) and critiqued imperialism and its policies in order to explain its causes.
The power of the 1857 revolt divided English opinion at “home”. Thus, Chartists like Ernest Jones hailed the rebellion and unmasked the colonial exploitation of India. Of course, the most serious dissenting voice was that of Karl Marx, who linked the colonial exploitation of India to the anger that was displayed by the people during the revolt.
Post-Independence resources
Better access to sources after Independence saw interesting developments related to exploring the nature of the revolt and the emergence of a sophisticated nationalist historiography with serious possibilities. Nevertheless, it did not document the role of the common people in the 1857 revolt. Despite this, as subsequent historians show, it complicated issues and questioned many commonly held positions associated with the revolt such as the overemphasis given to “economic” factors or its impact in the areas outside the Indo-Gangetic plain.
The development of other historical approaches generated a lot of debate on the nature of the revolt. The first exhaustive work on it was published in 1957 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the event. Edited by P.C. Joshi, it focussed both on its diversities and its specificities. This included assessing 1857 against the colonial backdrop, examining aspects of participation and focussing on the internal contradictions. Its significance lay in the fact that the contributors worked with Urdu sources. This volume also sought to highlight the dimensions of popular culture by incorporating folk poems that have survived. In many ways, this work inspired a serious spell of writings on the revolt that focussed on a diverse range of issues and regions. More recently—since the 1990s—historians have focussed on the popular dimensions of 1857, including the specificities of the involvement of Adivasis, “lower castes” and outcastes, popular culture and mentalities, and questions relating to the alternative order that emerged. Working within the paradigms of cultural studies, present-day scholars foreground the way racism and gender emerged as a virtual fallout of the revolt.
Development of capitalism
Amit Kumar Gupta’s Nineteenth-Century Colonialism and the Great Indian Revolt needs to be situated in the context of this diverse historiographical tradition. It is a welcome addition to the growing interest in and the debates related to the Great Revolt. Gupta focusses on colonial north India, and his central argument relates to the EEIC’s efforts at India’s bourgeoisification which precipitated the 1857 revolt. Some of the seminal ideas of the author are contained in his essay “Bourgeoisation and the Great Revolt of 1857” (in Sitaram Yechury, ed. The Great Revolt: A Left Appraisal, Delhi, 2008). The way in which Gupta develops his ideas illustrates not only his interest in the subject but also the continuing curiosity that the revolt inspires.
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