Introducing 

Prezi AI.

Your new presentation assistant.

Refine, enhance, and tailor your content, source relevant images, and edit visuals quicker than ever before.

Loading…
Transcript

The EIC in India to 1800

More Changes

Cornwallis:

- only British officers in EIC army

- alienates Indians, can't rise through ranks

- 1793 Code of Forty-Eight Regulations

- no more Indian judges, four courts with British judges

- British magistrates can immediately try small offenses

- abolished taxes and internal tariffs in EIC India

- EIC can start a tax whenever, wherever it wants

- monopoly on collection, sale, and importation of salt (Gandhi later)

- monopoly on production and sale of opium

Trade following the flag or the flag following trade? Which comes first?

Expansion:

- Mughals still fending off Afghan or Persian armies

- Marathas, Mysore, Hyderabad fighting each other

- 1793 - EIC only has Bengal, Orissa, and Bihar - populous and wealthy

- Richard Wellesley (1798-1805) expands up Ganges, takes Mysore

- 1802 - 1818 British takeover of Maratha lands

Lord Cornwallis, 1785-1793

Buxar

Afghan invasions:

- 1739 Nadir Kuli of Safavid Empire defeats Mughal forces, but returns to Central Asia

- 1748-1760 - five Afghan invasions of northern India

- January 1761 - massive Afghan-Maratha battle at Panipat

- Maratha army destroyed, but Afghans leave

- prevents a strong Maratha empire from taking place of Mughals

1761 - French power in India broken when British take Pondicherry during Seven Years' War

Battle of Buxar:

- new nawab of Bengal, Mir Kasim, dislikes EIC activity

- Mughal Emperor Shah Alam turns to help

- October 1764 - EIC forces defeat main Mughal army at Buxar

Impact:

- Clive warns against futility of occupying Delhi at this point

- EIC shouldn't attract animosity, should still rule through local nawabs

- EIC does take over diwan for Bihar and Orissa in addition to Bengal

- EIC controls some of wealthiest regions of India - tax income and trade without taxes

- 260,000 pounds annually owed to Mughals, but extracting millions

Initial actions:

- reputation for honesty/integrity

- believed in British ability to rule, if officials paid enough to avoid corruption

- fired bad officials and raised salaries

Permanent Zamindari Settlement of 1793:

- zamindars = Mughal tax collectors in rural areas

- changed to lump sum payment to gaurantee EIC income

- in exchange, gave land rights to zamindars as long as they paid the taxes

- previously, zamindars only had "an interest" in land and were mainly administrators of Mughal Empire

- private property was not a very important aspect of Indian society before this, at least at this scale

- rural society's interdependence ripped apart

- now a powerful landowing class that owed taxes

- floods/drought follow and many contracts bought by bankers/lenders in Calcutta who become absentee landlords

- creates class of pro-British Indians, but at a cost

- peasantry plagued by unknown absentee landlords

Conclusion

Criticisms from Home

Britain Stays in India

Key resources in Bengal:

- opium and saltpeter

- possibility of altering balance of power in Europe during war

- very lucrative during peacetime

- 1760s opium trade from India to China begins

- exchanged for tea from China - sold in Europe and America

- taxes on tea were 5-10% of British government revenue

- British gov - real problem with "nabobs" was inefficiency

India Act of 1784:

- sponsored by Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger

- extends EIC monopoly in India, China, Indian Ocean

- new Board of Control (3-6 officials from Parliament) will oversee the EIC Board of Directors

- can recall any EIC official

- no nationalization due to potential backlash, cost of paying for EIC army in India

Concerns in Parliament:

- EIC will involve Britain in endless wars

- wars will drain British resources

- some worried about plight of Indians

Problems in India:

- 1767-1770 severe monsoons destroy crops

- in 1770 Bengal famine - 1/3 of peasantry die

- high white death rate leads to officials quickly accumulating goods and returning home

- EIC claiming it can't pay British taxes, but officials returning home wealthy

Parliament's reactions - late 1760s/early 1770s:

- EIC officials are embarrasing, immoral, unethical

- selfish enrichment at India's expense

- "nabobs" = wealthy goofballs

- did Clive/EIC redound to English morality and credit?

- view was that EIC using military means, not commerce, to become rich

- taxing foreigners to fill English treasury was wrong

- Edmund Burke - EIC leaders should be restrained/jailed, demanded reforms/investigations, said Britain should gaurantee stability and act on behalf of Indians, even governing India on its own terms

The Governor-Generalship

Demise of Hastings:

- opponents - wars in India just waste EIC resources and engander EIC position in India

- charged with stealing money - symbol of "nabobs"

- 1785 recalled to England

- 1786 Burke urges a trial

- 1788-1795 trial in House of Lords drags on

- acuitted but career/reputation in shambles

- historians - Hastings not at fault, a victim of politicans who legitimately cared about morality of EIC in India or saw EIC as rival

1773 India Regulating Act:

- longer terms for EIC directors in London = stability

- EIC presidencies of Madras, Calcutta, Bombay under single Governor-General in Calcutta

First EIC Governor-General Warren Hastings - 1774-1785:

- 1774 Clive commits suicide

- reduces corruption in Bengal

- clarifies peasant rights and taxes - undermines nawab as middleman

- makes nawab of Bengal pure figurehead

- ends annual EIC payment to Mughal emperor

EIC foreign policy:

- ensures Oudh's independence of Mughals or Afghans, dependence on EIC

- 1774 supplies mercenaries for Oudh's fight against Afghan forces

- seeks to undermine Maratha power

- 1760s - 1770s Marathas consumed by civil wars

- yet, 1782 EIC-Maratha treaty fo honor status quo, peace until 1800

- 1780 - EIC client in south, Arcot, attacks Mysore, which retaliates ferociously with siege of Madras by army of 90,000

- Mysore leader, Tipu Sultan, trying to enlist support of Marathas and the nizam of Hyderabad to unite against British, but fails

Learn more about creating dynamic, engaging presentations with Prezi