Britain and India
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Although the British never maintained a significant military presence in India, they were able to maintain political control of the colony through their effective manipulation of Indian culture. British missionaries, scholars, and writers undertook a comprehensive survey of Indian history, languages, and customs. The codified knowledge about Indian life that emerged from this survey allowed the British to manipulate Indian culture to maintain their political control of the continent. Although the British were most effective in setting different ethnicities and regions against each other in order to subjugate the whole of the country, perhaps the most important aspect of British colonial rule was the creation and psychological indoctrination of a new Indian elite that supported British rule. In effect, the British were able to exploit their knowledge of Indian culture by creating a new quasi-caste of British sympathizers. This elite was legitimized through the revival of several archaic Indian customs, such as the Zamindar system and the Manusmriti texts. The new elite quasi-caste within Indian society served as a buffer for the British and allowed them to rule the country effectively from afar. In 1835, the architect of Colonial Britain's educational policy in India, Thomas Macaulay, laid out England's goal vis-a-vis the new quasi-caste of British educated Indian elites: "We must do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we
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practice. The British used it very effectively to practice social control. As they established their quasi-caste of English speaking Indian elites, the British realized that the importance of not allowing their agents to face resistance or rebellion in both the military and social realms. Because the Manusmriti was highly repressive and divisive, it helped prevent resistance to local authorities who were typically upper caste, often Brahmin, and always loyal to the British. That the Manusmriti represented an archaic and outdated social code didn't matter. It fit in very well with the British colonial project. Because the Manusmriti advocated laws that legitimized gender discrimination and attacked same-gender relationships, it also provided a neat Indian fatade for the British as they imposed their European values on Indian society.
Thus, we have seen how the British exploited Indian culture to legitimize their rule. The British created a new English speaking Indian elite and indoctrinated them with English values and sympathies. This elite was then imbued with social legitimacy through the revival of outdated Indian cultural beliefs such as the Zamindar and Mahalawari systems of taxation and the Manusmriti texts. In
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Approximate Word count = 1776
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)
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