INTRODUCTION
It is a well know fact that the colonizing of India by the British was not just done with “the power of superior arms, military organization, political power, or economic wealth – as important as these things were”, but it was “sustained and strengthened by cultural technologies of rule” (Bernard S. Cohn, Colonialism and its Forms of Knowledge, ix). The British “had to devise novel, and exceptional, theories of governance,” (Thomas R. Metcalf, Ideologies of the Raj Vol. 3, ix) as they started making space for themselves as the rulers of India. Further, they started to make their power visible through ‘officialising’ the process of administration. The reconstruction and transformation of cultural forms was performed through the mechanisms of knowledge during the colonial period, which distinguished and created “categories and oppositions between the colonizers and the colonized, European and Asian, modern and traditional, West and East” (Cohn, ix).
The imperial object of knowledge always wanted the Indian to appear in a prescribed manner. However, there were groups that threatened the prescribed sociological order. The practices of these groups never went under the societal orders or mechanisms. “These were people who appeared by their nature to wander beyond the boundaries of settled civil society: sannyasis, sadhus, fakirs, dacoits, goondas, thags, pastoralists, herders, and entertainers” (Cohn 10). The wandering attitude of these groups functioned as a reaction that strongly affected the course of events and the nature of things that the British were surveilling. It has been noted that Warren Hastings and his officials were being disturbed by the sannyasis. Hastings writes in one of his letters: We have lately been much troubled here with hordes of desperate adventurers called Sannyasis, who have overrun the province in great numbers and committed great depredations. The particulars of these disturbances and of our endeavours to repel them you will find in our general letters and consultations, which will acquit the Government of any degree of blame from such a calamity. At this time we have five battalions of Sepoys in pursuit of them, and I have still hopes of exacting ample vengeance for the mischief they have done us as they have no advantage over us, but in the speed with which they fly from us. A minute relation of these adventures cannot amuse you, nor indeed are they of great moment, for which reason give me leave to drop the subject, and lead you to one in which you cannot but be interested, etc. (Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Anandamath Tr. Sree Aurobindo & Barindra Kumar Ghosh, Appendices, iii, Hastings to Purling – dated, 31st March, 1772 – Gleig’s Memoirs of Hastings – Vol. 1) It evoked the consciousness of fear in them, moreover, questioned the very existence of imperial domination of the state. Even though, these groups wandered beyond the boundaries of the civil society, which might be a common phenomenon describing the groups, they actually had their own individual practices and ideologies. The very presence of these groups caused a feeling of agitation and anxiety among the British officials. Warren Hastings in one of his letters asserts about the sannyasis: You will hear of great disturbances committed by the Sannyasis or wandering Fakeers who annually infest the provinces, about this time of the year in pilgrimages to Jaggarnaut, going in bodies of 1,000 and sometimes even 10,000 men. An officer of reputation (Captain Thomas) lost his life in an unequal attack upon a party of these banditti, about 3,000 of them, near Rungpoor with a small party of Purgunnah Sepoys, which has made them more …show more content…
This process of fabrication involved the codification of religious laws and the disposal of the Indian people into ‘Hindus’, ‘Buddhists’, ‘Jains’, ‘Muslims’ and so on. This seems to have taken place due to the needs of the governing system of the British colonial rule. But, it cannot be claimed as a function that was one-sided. The imperialists and the ‘native’ English educated elites, in particular, the Brahmins, collaborated in concocting a uniform religion. However, the indispensability of considering thoroughly about the depictions lies in the certainty that they have expressed a mismatch between the descriptions of ‘Hinduism’ on the one hand, and the realities of the Indian culture on the
It is a well know fact that the colonizing of India by the British was not just done with “the power of superior arms, military organization, political power, or economic wealth – as important as these things were”, but it was “sustained and strengthened by cultural technologies of rule” (Bernard S. Cohn, Colonialism and its Forms of Knowledge, ix). The British “had to devise novel, and exceptional, theories of governance,” (Thomas R. Metcalf, Ideologies of the Raj Vol. 3, ix) as they started making space for themselves as the rulers of India. Further, they started to make their power visible through ‘officialising’ the process of administration. The reconstruction and transformation of cultural forms was performed through the mechanisms of knowledge during the colonial period, which distinguished and created “categories and oppositions between the colonizers and the colonized, European and Asian, modern and traditional, West and East” (Cohn, ix).
The imperial object of knowledge always wanted the Indian to appear in a prescribed manner. However, there were groups that threatened the prescribed sociological order. The practices of these groups never went under the societal orders or mechanisms. “These were people who appeared by their nature to wander beyond the boundaries of settled civil society: sannyasis, sadhus, fakirs, dacoits, goondas, thags, pastoralists, herders, and entertainers” (Cohn 10). The wandering attitude of these groups functioned as a reaction that strongly affected the course of events and the nature of things that the British were surveilling. It has been noted that Warren Hastings and his officials were being disturbed by the sannyasis. Hastings writes in one of his letters: We have lately been much troubled here with hordes of desperate adventurers called Sannyasis, who have overrun the province in great numbers and committed great depredations. The particulars of these disturbances and of our endeavours to repel them you will find in our general letters and consultations, which will acquit the Government of any degree of blame from such a calamity. At this time we have five battalions of Sepoys in pursuit of them, and I have still hopes of exacting ample vengeance for the mischief they have done us as they have no advantage over us, but in the speed with which they fly from us. A minute relation of these adventures cannot amuse you, nor indeed are they of great moment, for which reason give me leave to drop the subject, and lead you to one in which you cannot but be interested, etc. (Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Anandamath Tr. Sree Aurobindo & Barindra Kumar Ghosh, Appendices, iii, Hastings to Purling – dated, 31st March, 1772 – Gleig’s Memoirs of Hastings – Vol. 1) It evoked the consciousness of fear in them, moreover, questioned the very existence of imperial domination of the state. Even though, these groups wandered beyond the boundaries of the civil society, which might be a common phenomenon describing the groups, they actually had their own individual practices and ideologies. The very presence of these groups caused a feeling of agitation and anxiety among the British officials. Warren Hastings in one of his letters asserts about the sannyasis: You will hear of great disturbances committed by the Sannyasis or wandering Fakeers who annually infest the provinces, about this time of the year in pilgrimages to Jaggarnaut, going in bodies of 1,000 and sometimes even 10,000 men. An officer of reputation (Captain Thomas) lost his life in an unequal attack upon a party of these banditti, about 3,000 of them, near Rungpoor with a small party of Purgunnah Sepoys, which has made them more …show more content…
This process of fabrication involved the codification of religious laws and the disposal of the Indian people into ‘Hindus’, ‘Buddhists’, ‘Jains’, ‘Muslims’ and so on. This seems to have taken place due to the needs of the governing system of the British colonial rule. But, it cannot be claimed as a function that was one-sided. The imperialists and the ‘native’ English educated elites, in particular, the Brahmins, collaborated in concocting a uniform religion. However, the indispensability of considering thoroughly about the depictions lies in the certainty that they have expressed a mismatch between the descriptions of ‘Hinduism’ on the one hand, and the realities of the Indian culture on the