Causes of the Indian War of Independence

Political Causes

Starting from Warren Hastings to Lord Dalhousie, by mid-19th century, the English had become the virtual masters of the whole of India and little was left for them to conquer. However, even though the English conquered the states, yet curiously their method was not spontaneous, as the Muslims were during the Middle and Early Modern Ages. Instead, the British sought to gradually bring the native states under their belt. This not only reduced the native rulers as mere puppets controlled by the powerful Europeans but also added to the cumulative misery of the common people. But with the arrival of Lord Dalhousie in 1848, suddenly the English took a u-turn in their policies. Dalhousie abolished all royal titles used by the native rulers and began a policy of direct annexation either by waging wars or through his Doctrine of Lapse. Furthermore, he declared the Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah Jafar II, as defunct, a move that greatly angered the Muslims and the right to adoption was also denied to the Hindu princes.

Administrative and Economic Causes

This gradual annexation of the Indian states by the British created wide administrative and economic repercussions not only for the native princes but for the common people as well. Firstly, the rule of the Company was marred by a sense of European superiority that made them look down upon their dark-skinned compatriots. In the military service, the highest post available to an Indian was that of a Subedar, while in civil services the Indians could only reach to a post of Sadr Amin or a court official. The pay was miserable and all the higher posts were reserved for the Europeans.

On the other hand, the British followed a policy of economic exploitation wherein all the resources of India were transported to England in order to fuel her industries. Earlier Lord Cornwallis had introduced a system known as Permanent Land Settlement in which the zamindars were made the virtual owners of the farming land while the peasants were reduced to mere serfdom. Along with burdens of heavy taxation, the English encouraged the cultivation of cash crops rather than food grains due to their greater commercial value. This deteriorated the agricultural scenario in India and droughts became prevalent. As was expected, these peasants directly the blamed the English for their misery.

Social and Religious Causes

With the coming of the British, the social scenario changed drastically. The Company favoured English as a medium of instruction in schools and colleges and progressive Indians such as Raja Ram Mohan Roy supported this move as they thought that western education would cleanse the minds of the Indians of superstition and, therefore, such abhorrent social customs like sati would forever be gone. In his minute on educational policy dated 2 February 1835, Thomas Macaulay famously observed that “a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia.” This observation only shows the contempt that the British had for oriental culture. Governor-Generals like William Bentick abolished the social custom of sati by law. Even though these customs were barbaric and inhuman, the English failed to understand that these customs were emblazoned into the very fabric of Indian culture and a mere law banning them would only incur the public wrath rather than uproot the problem.

Role of The Enfield Rifle

All these years of simmering discontent needed a spark in order to burst into the flames of a massive revolt. This spark came in the guise of an inconspicuous object: the Enfield rifle. In 1856, the sepoys were issued this musket and soon rumours began to spread that the cartridges used in the weapon were made out of cow and pig fat. For a Hindu, cow is sacred and for a Muslim pig is considered as unclean. Hence, these two communities felt that the introduction of the new rifle was a British ploy to undermine their religious sentiments. The sepoys protested against the introduction of the rifle and refused to use it. This protest took the form of a revolt when a sepoy, Mangal Pandey, killed a British and was consequently executed. His regiment was also disbanded. In another incident, at Meerut, eighty five sepoys were disbanded and the guilty punished on their refusal to use the greased cartridges. On 10th May, the other regiments broke out in rebellion, swallowing up the entire North as well as parts of Central India.

Sources:

B.L Grover and S. Grover, A New Look at Modern Indian History (S.Chand Publishers, New Delhi)

Bipin Chandra, India’s Struggle for Independence (Penguin, New Delhi)

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