British in India
Europe first discovered the vast resources India held in the 1600’s when a British company called the British East India Company set up trading posts in India. Officially, the British government regulated the East India Company’s efforts, but the company ruled India with little interference from the British government. The company even had its own army, led by British officers and staffed by SEPOYS, or Indian soldiers, who worked for the British in carrying out the British laws / rules.
Britain’s “Jewel in the Crown”
The Industrial Revolution had turned Britain into the world’s workshop, and India was a major supplier of raw materials for that workshop. Beyond these resources, India also had a large population – over 300 million people – who were also a large market to sell British goods to for a sizable profit. For these reasons, Britain considered India the brightest “jewel in the crown,” or the most valuable of all of Britain’s colonies.
The British Take Control in India
On August 2, 1858, the British Parliament passed the Government of India Act. This act transferred authority for India from the East India Company to Queen Victoria. In 1876, Queen Victoria declared herself "Empress of India." In 1869, the Suez Canal was completed, reducing the time for sea passage to India from 3 months to 3 weeks. Because of this, British women began to come to India, and the British developed their own society in India separate from the native society. Another effect of the opening of the Suez Canal was that more and more British goods were imported to India, which usually destroyed the business of many Indian crafts made in India. Despite these problems, however, an increasing number of factories, railroads, hospitals, schools, and roads were built.
Britain and the goods of India
India became increasingly valuable to the British after they established a railroad network there. Britain built a railroad across the country in order to bring in goods from the interior of India, and out to the ports (water) so they could be finished in the factories and shipped back out again. Most of the raw materials were agricultural products produced on plantations and were extremely valuable to the British. Some of the resources of India were: tea, indigo, coffee, and cotton. Another crop produced in India was opium. Opium is a very addictive drug made from the poppy plant. The British shipped opium to China and exchanged it for tea, which they then sold in England.
1857: Sepoy Rebellion
Besides being completely controlled by the British, the Indians felt that the British were trying to convert them to Christianity. This problem, along with the racist attitudes many British employed, led to a revolt called the Sepoy Rebellion. Sepoy’s were Indian soldiers hired by the British to carry out their laws in India. These sepoy’s carried British guns and took orders from British leaders. The issue came when the sepoy’s heard that the cartridges they used in their guns were covered in beef and pork fat. To use the cartridges, soldiers had to bite off the ends off of them in order to load them into their guns. While this may not seem like a big deal, sepoy’s were a mix of Hindu and Muslim men. Both Hidus, who considered the cow sacred, and Muslims, who do not eat pork, were outraged by the news.
Some sepoy soldiers decided to not refuse the cartridges to show their discontent with the British, and conflict ensued. Ultimately, the Sepoy Rebellion lasted for about a year, but the sepoy’s were unable to overthrow the British.
1900’s : Nationalism and the start of India’s independence from Britain
Situations in India took a turn for the worse in 1919 when Britain passed the Rowlatt Acts that allowed the government to jail protesters without trial for as long as two years. Both Hindu and Muslim leaders of India protested these acts. On April 13, 1919, around 20 thousand unarmed men, women, and children gathered in a public square in Punjab's capital to protest these acts. British general R.E.H. Dyer brought 50 soldiers to the one passageway in and out of the square. Without warning, he ordered soldiers to fire into the gathering. In the next 15 minutes, 1650 shots were fired. Around 400 people were killed, and another 1200 wounded received no medical attention. Dyer later said that if he had had more ammunition, he would have continued to fire.
This massacre, known as the Amritsar Massacre, caused Mahatma Gandhi and other nationalist leaders to cease all cooperation with the British. Indians changed from loyal British subjects into nationalists, and they demanded independence. The strategy for gaining independence was to boycott all British goods, schools, courts, and elections. This policy of CIVIL DIOBEDIENCE (openly refusing to comply with laws that are seen as unjust) and non – violence became the trademark of the Indian independence movement, led by Mohandas Gandhi (also known as Mahatma).