Identity

In the fourth episode of Imperial Receipts, Dr. Shashi Tharoor and RT’s Runjhun Sharma will examine the colonial strategies that reshaped Indian identity. They focus on the British policy of divide and rule, which became almost official policy after the uprising of 1857, when communities of different faiths united against colonial rule. Dr. Tharoor says the British deliberately worked to make major communities believe that their interests were incompatible, encouraging separate identities, particularly among Muslims. One example he cites was the partition of Bengal into Hindu and Muslim-majority provinces, despite its long-standing cultural and political unity. Similarly, through political and electoral reforms, the colonial government deliberately created political division by separating electorates along religious lines. Dr. Tharoor says this divide and rule policy ultimately resulted in the horrors of the partition between India and Pakistan and also resulted in nearly eighty years of hostility and wars with India’s neighbors. While Dr. Tharoor admits that the caste system had long existed in India, there still was some “fluidity” and the possibility of “mobility”, as he says. Under British rule, however, the castes became rigid, as colonial government worked to classify and categorize Indian society as a tool of control.