Administrative Policies: Divide and Rule, Zamindars, Social Services and Labour Laws

At a Glance

• Turn Reactionary policies after 1857
• Allies Princes and zamindars as counterweights
• Factory Acts 1881 (child labour) and 1891 (women and children’s hours)
• Excluded British-owned tea and coffee plantations
• Exam link UPSC Prelims, Modern History: British Policies and Their Impact

Where Does It Fit?

This is the first topic of the category on British policies and their impact. The previous topic covered constitutional development from 1861 to 1935. This topic covers British administrative policies after 1857. The next topic covers the Vernacular Press Act; repealed 1882 1908 and 1910 New…">restrictions on the press and white racism. Previous topic: Constitutional Development 1861-1935: Councils Acts to the Government of India Act.

How Did Administrative Policy Change After 1857?

Contrary to their pre-1857 intention of modernising India on progressive lines, the administration now adopted blatantly reactionary policies, on the pretext that Indians were not fit for self-governance and needed British presence in their lives. The changes in the government after 1857 are in Major Administrative Changes After 1857: Central and Provincial Government.

What Was the Policy of Divide and Rule?

Determined to avoid united mass action against their authority, the British practised a naked policy of divide and rule, setting princes against the people of the states, region against region, province against province, caste against caste and Hindus against Muslims. After a spell of repression against Muslims following 1857, the authorities decided after 1870 to use the middle and upper educated classes among Muslims against the rising tide of nationalism. They used conflicts over scarce resources in education, administrative jobs and later political spoils, inherent in the logic of colonial underdevelopment, as a tool to split educated Indians along religious lines. Hamilton, Secretary of State, wrote in 1897 that unity of ideas and action among Hindus and Muslims could be very dangerous politically, while divergence and collision were administratively troublesome but the least risky of the two. The communal outcome is in Birth, Spread and Characteristics of Indian Communalism.

How Did the British Treat the Educated Indians?

The emerging middle-class nationalist leadership was analysing the exploitative colonial character of British rule and demanding Indian participation in administration. When the nationalist movement was born, with the Congress in 1885, the British read it as a challenge to their authority and adopted a hostile attitude to such leadership, and from then on opposed those who stood for modern education. Charles Wood, Secretary of State, is quoted as saying that where a dominant race rules another, the mildest form of government is despotism, and the scholar Anil Seal says that systems of nomination, representation and election were all means of enlisting Indians for imperial ends.

Why Did the British Favour the Zamindars?

In pursuing reactionary policies and hoping to widen their social base, the British looked for alliances with the most reactionary social groups, the princes and zamindars, whom they meant to use as a counterweight to the nationalist-minded intelligentsia. Zamindars and landlords were hailed as the natural and traditional leaders of the people. Lands of most of the Awadh taluqdars, confiscated before 1857, were restored to them. The interests and privileges of landlords were protected against those of peasants, and the landlords in turn saw the British as guarantors of their existence and became their firm supporters. The agrarian side is in Intermediaries, Absentee Landlordism and the Ruin of Old Zamindars.

What Was the Attitude to Social Reform and Social Services?

Having sided with the reactionary elements of Indian society, the British withdrew support to social reform, which they felt had aroused the anger of orthodox sections, and by encouraging caste and communal consciousness helped reactionary forces. Disproportionately large spending on the army and civil administration and the costs of wars left little for social services such as education, health, sanitation and physical infrastructure, a legacy that still troubles the country, and whatever facilities were created served the elite sections and urban areas.

What Were the Labour Laws?

As in the early stages of the industrial revolution in Europe, working conditions in the factories and plantations of nineteenth-century India were miserable, with long hours for women and children as well as men, low wages, overcrowded, poorly ventilated and poorly lit workplaces, and practically no safety measures. The first demand for regulation of factory conditions came, ironically, from the Lancashire textile capitalist lobby, which feared a competitive rival in the Indian textile industry under cheap, unregulated labour. The first commission was appointed in 1875, though the first Factory Act did not pass before 1881.

These laws did not apply to British-owned tea and coffee plantations, where labour was ruthlessly exploited and treated like slaves. The government helped the planters with laws that made it virtually impossible for a labourer to refuse work once a contract was signed, and a breach of contract was a criminal offence, with a planter allowed to have a defaulting labourer arrested. More labour laws were passed under nationalist pressure in the twentieth century, but overall conditions remained deplorable. As an analytical point, the Factory Acts show that colonial labour law was shaped by the competition between Britain and India as much as by concern for workers. The working-class movement is in Working Class Movement: AITUC, Trade Union Act 1926 and Meerut Conspiracy Case.

Why Is This Topic Important?

• Reactionary turn A standard Mains framework for British policy after 1857
• Factory Acts Provisions and dates are Prelims facts
• Lancashire lobby The irony of the first demand for labour regulation

What Came Next?

The next topic covers the restrictions on the press and white racism. Next topic: Restrictions on the Press and White Racism.

Key People and Terms

• Divide and rule Setting groups against each other
• Taluqdars Awadh landlords whose lands were restored
• Indian Factory Act, 1881 The first Act on factory conditions
• Indian Factory Act, 1891 Second Act with women’s hours
• Lancashire lobby British textile interests demanding regulation
• Breach of contract A criminal offence for plantation labour

Exam Corner

Mains Angle

Questions ask about the nature of British policy after 1857. These points add depth.

• Allies Princes and landlords
• Opponents The educated middle class
• Neglect Social services and labour