ownership of land in India, though his motive was primarily antipathy to the
British. It is interesting to note a lack of such anti-British animus in the most
important Enlightenment work on colonialism, Raynal’s Philosophical and
Political History of the Two Indies (first published 1760), no less a contributory
factor to the French Revolution than Rousseau, now scarcely known. For Raynal
England is one among four powers in contemporary south India, no more out of
place than the Marathas, Tipu Sultan, and the Nizam of Hyderbad (Raynal
1820, vol 3: 187). All four powers were conquering outside their own territo-
ries. But the notion of Oriental Despotism is an instance where Said’s critique is
fully justified. So too the notion of the unchanging Indian village, dealt with by
Inden. But in these, and many other cases, the mistaken interpretation arises
from ignorance, from lack of sources of information.
Orientalism and Empire
Today the British Empire is widely seen as a blot on the history of the world.
Assessment of British rule in India is difficult. Postcolonialism has produced a
vast amount of literary criticism predicated on the cruelty and injustice of the
Raj; Vinay Lal declares that getting to grips with the products of this industry
leaves no time for old-fashioned history – even “the quest for objectivity” in
assessing the British Empire is “morally dubious.” A balanced judgment relevant
in the present context is that of Nirad C. Chaudhuri, even if Lal dismisses
him as “an indefatigable Anglophile” (Lal 1997: 100). Describing the 1920s,
Chaudhuri’s empathy with Englishness – though he disliked the few Englishmen
he met while under the Raj – does come out in his not unfavorable summary
of early British imperialism as “a mixture of humanitarianism, Evangelism,
Utilitarianism, and Liberalism.” But Chaudhuri continues:
That old imperialism had been replaced by the end of the nineteenth century by a
wholly shoddy theory, which was nothing better than boastful verbiage. By 1920,
even that had been discredited, and the Empire in India survived only as a
practical reality supported by vested interests. (Chaudhuri 1988: 775)Tapan Raychaudhuri in his important assessment of British rule in India
remarks that “In post-independence India, serious thinkers and historians who
see anything good in the imperial record can probably be counted on the fingers
of one hand” (Raychaudhuri 1996: 358); nor is he one of their number.
There can be no doubt that the British, with a few exceptions, had no
sympathy for Indian culture or religion, least of all sympathy for Hindus and
Hinduism. But that is all the more reason to give due allowance to the excep-
tions. Kejariwal shows commendable boldness in blaming Indian nationalism
for not giving credit to the early British Orientalists: “Indian historians
were more than eager to accept the glory of India’s past as revealed by British
orientalism and hinduism 51