The Story of Rammohan Roy’s Statue
In 1997 the statue in Source 5 was set up in Bristol. It commemorates a remarkable man who died in the city in 1833. His story involves religion, superstition, determination and death. It is not well known, but it tells us about a really significant change in the way the British ruled India in the early 19th century.
‘Live and let live’
When the British first came to India they marvelled at its main religion, Hinduism. Over thousands of years the Indians had developed many religious customs and practices that must have seemed strange or alarming to the British.
Before 1800, British traders were happy to accept or ignore these customs no matter how odd they seemed. After all, they were East India Company merchants. They were traders, not rulers. It might have caused problems among the Indians they traded with if they had tried to interfere. On the whole they decided that it would be best to ‘live and let live’. But around 1800 that attitude began to change.
Challenging the culture
The evangelicals were a powerful group of Christians. They took their Christian faith very seriously. They did not believe in ‘live and let live’. They believed they should try to convert people of other faiths to Christianity.
One famous evangelical was William Carey. He was sure that God wanted him to go to India to convert people to Christianity. He arrived in Calcutta in 1793.
At first, British leaders in India – including some bishops – were angry that Carey had come to India. They were scared that he might upset Indian traders by interfering in Hindu beliefs. In fact, Carey won the respect of most Indians. Over the next 40 years, he treated them with great love and respect while challenging some of their customs.
The Story of Rammohan Roy’s Statue
Sati
In 1811 a deeply religious Indian called Rammohan Roy attended the funeral of his brother in West Bengal. Roy and his family were Hindus. The body was to be burned according to Hindu custom.
The body was carried forward. Then another figure appeared through the crowd. It was the dead man’s widow. She was frightened – but she knew her duty. She allowed herself to be tied to her dead husband’s corpse.
Roy begged his sister-in-law not to go through with this ancient Indian custom, but the other relatives forced him back. They believed her suicide would show her love for her husband – and would help to pay for any sins her husband had committed. Roy watched as the widow was placed on the bonfire alongside her husband’s dead body. She choked and screamed as the smoke and flames enveloped her. She burned alive. The relatives danced around the fire singing ‘Maha sati! Maha sati! (A great wife! A great wife!)
From that day on Roy made up his mind to end this Hindu custom of widow burning, or ‘sati’ as it was known. He knew that very few of his fellow Indians would help him. He also knew that until recently he could have expected no assistance from the British. But the evangelicals had changed that.
Rammohan Roy became a close friend of Carey, the evangelicals’ leader. Together they worked hard to try to end the practice of sati.
In 1829 Roy made a brave decision: he agreed to travel to Britain to try to persuade more British people to support a ban on sati. Some Hindus warned him that travelling overseas would harm his soul forever. Roy dismissed this idea and set sail.
By the end of that year, the British Governor General of India finally decided that the time had come to act. He banned sati throughout British lands in India.
Roy was delighted at this news… but he was very unusual. The vast majority of Indians were angry and alarmed. This was a turning point in British rule in India. It was the first time the British had ever used their power to change an Indian custom. Where would it end?
Rammohan Roy died in Bristol in1833. He is now celebrated in India as a great reformer – but at the time he seemed to have betrayed India by supporting Britain’s new desire to interfere with Hindu customs.