India in British Parliament 1865-1884: Henry Fawcett's Struggle Against British Colonialism in India (An Old and Rare Book)

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The present work attempts a study of a very significant aspect of British rule in India and of the British Imperial history -the defence of India's interests in the British Parliament during the mid-Victorian period when great personalities like William Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli were on the forefront of British politics. The study concentrates on the activities of Henry Fawcett for India. He was a member of the House of Commons from 1865 to 1884 and belonged to the Radical section of the Liberal Party. A devoted disciple of John Stuart Mill, a Professor of Political Economy at Cambridge and a close associate of some eminent nineteenth century personalities like Gladstone, John Bright and Dadabhai Naoroji, he constantly endeavoured to interest the House of Commons to the problems of India to which it was consistently indifferent. He persistently drew attention to the poverty of Indian peasantry, the inadequate protection of Indian interests, and the extravagance of official management.

The author attempts to analyse Fawcett's ideas about India and her problems as a dependency; to explore his activities in the House of Commons; and to evaluate the extent of success he achieved in influencing the governments, Conservative as well as Liberal, on India. It has also been shown how his ideas, activities and writings on Indian finance influenced the early Indian nationalist leaders.

SUMANTA NIYOGI is a member of the teaching staff of the Department of His- tory, Patna University, since 1963. He earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from the Patna University, and also did his doctoral research on the topic of British parliamentary attitude to India (1865 to 1884) from the same university. He teaches British History and the Socio-cultural History of Modern India at the postgraduate level in the university. Besides the present work, he has authored another book entitled, THE BRAHMO SAMAJ MOVEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF EDUCATION: A CASE STUDY OF BIHAR (Patna, 1985) and also edited The Souvenir, All India Brahmo Conference, 1984 (Patna, 1984). He has contributed research articles to many books, published under various editorships, and also to several journals include the Quarterly Review of Historical radies, the Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, The Current Studies (Patna University), the proceedings of the Bihar Puravid Parishad.

When I began this research I intended to make a thorough study of British parliamentary attitudes to India in the second half of the nineteenth century. I soon realised that this would be a lifetime's work. I decided therefore to concentrate on one individual. I chose Henry Fawcett, chiefly because of the fact that in spite of his long and dedicated services to the cause of India in England, he is comparatively little known among the scholars and intellectuals in India and outside.

This mid-Victorian personality, though not a top ranking politician, was a prominent representative of the Radical section of the Liberal Party in England. From the beginning of his parliamentary career in 1865 till his death in 1884, Fawcett took a keen interest in Indian questions. His sympathy for a population unable to make its voice heard in the Imperial Parliament led him to devote his attention to Indian questions. He persistently drew the attention of Parliament, which had generally been indifferent to the affairs of India, to the poverty of the Indian peasantry, the inadequate protection of Indian interests and the extravagance of official management.

In this book I have attempted to analyse Fawcett's ideas about India and her problems as a British dependency; to explore his activities in the House of Commons; to evaluate the extent of the success he achieved in influencing the policy of governments, Conservative as well as Liberal, on India; and to study the reception in India to his parliamentary role on her behalf.