Talk:British Raj/Archive 12

Archive 5

←

Archive 10

Archive 11

Archive 12

The Raj defined as rule of the crown in the Indian subcontinent

The introductory paragraph originally defined the British Raj as rule on the Indian subcontinent, however Burma, or modern-day Myanmar, was a major province of British India and the Raj but is part of Southeast Asia and not on the Indian subcontinent, its an important geographical distinction. Not including Burma, a major province which was outside of the Indian subcontinent in the definition would make the article contradictory to the wikipedia article “Indian subcontinent”. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 17:08, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I personally don't disagree but you are going about this the wrong way. You are edit-warring which will only end up with you being blocked. Being "right" isn't a defence. Per WP:BRD and WP:ONUS as you are introducing the change if you are reverted the onus is on you to gain WP:CONSENSUS for what you want. Your edit summaries are telling others to leave it the way you've changed it and for them to take it to the talk page. That's exactly the wrong way round. I'm spelling this out for you because I can see you're a new user (i.e. few edits). I suggest you self-revert before you get blocked and let the consensus emerge here. DeCausa (talk) 17:44, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

Apologies, I wasn’t aware of the procedure and the edit war rule. Once I noticed it I had already revised but I posted this discussion afterwards as an attempt to reconcile. How do I go about reaching consensus for the changes to be made properly? MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 01:10, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

MDM. You’ve made a reasonable point. The thing about Burma was that there was a lot of ambivalence about Burma being included under the administration of India (from the get go). Upper Burma was annexed after the last Anglo Burmese war in 1885. It was a chief commissioner’s province and after 1897 a Lt Governor’s province until 1937 when as a result of the Raj’s final, some say first, the Gov of India Act 1935, it stopped being administered from the capital of British India. Earlier there hadn’t just been opposition to Burma’s inclusion in British India from many Burmese but also some British officials. The bottom line though is that modern historians do not include the history of Burma in the History of what they call the Raj. I’m traveling until the 16th. When I get back home and to my sources, I’ll check if late 19th century and early 20th century sources considered Burma just as separate. It may not help us to make the change you would like (as modern sources are preferred to the old) but it will give us some perspective. Best, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:42, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

Please read: some say first constitution Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:45, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree, MDM, that Burma is a part of SE Asia, not South Asia, and certainly not the subcontinent. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:51, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

While I agree that modern historians often neglect to include British Burma as part of the Raj, the fact of the matter is that at the time and until 1937, Burma was administered as a major province of British India, and was not considered a separate colony of the crown, but just an additional major province of India. Here’s one source but I would be able to find more. Thank you for your patience and comments. I look forward to a discussion and reaching consensus. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 01:23, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

The source im citing is page 29 of the 4th volume of the Indian Gazetteer, published 1909 which is a primary source about the administrative divisions of British India. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 01:25, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

It’s the Imperial Gazetteer of India, the same that we have used in the tables in section 3.1 and 3.2 for over 15 years. In 2007 I had to use the hard copies which I luckily have. Now they are available on line. But the administrative divisions don’t really help us here. Even in the high noon of the Raj no one ever called going to Burma going to India. But every other province was included in going to India though. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:19, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I don’t believe so. For example in the encyclopædia britannica of 1911 British Burma is said to be a province of India many times, it’s constantly referred to as a province throughout the article. Not that the encyclopædia britannica is a good source for how Burma was defined according to law, and its position within the Indian Empire. It is however relevant to what you were saying because it’s a source of information for the general consensus of people at the time. That British Burma is defined as a province, (therefore its is not viewed separately) and that in the article simply titled “India” Burma is immediately mentioned as a province of the Indian Empire is a testament to the fact that contemporarily with the British Raj, Burma was known, at least to many, as part of India, not a separate entity. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 20:55, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Burma (and Aden) are well-covered in the 3rd para of the lead, but there may be a case for squeezing in something to para 1. The "South Asia" bit at the start has an epic footnote. Para 3 might also spell out that Ceylon was not included, which is counter-intuitive to modern readers. For a long article, the lead is only 3 paras, btw. As for the map, putting Nepal and Bhutan on the same footing as, say, Mysore, seems a bit wrong - there was no question of them joining India in 1947. Not for nothing was the entrance hall of the Foreign Office dominated by a dashing 19th-century portrait of a Nepali ruler until Jack Straw had it removed. Johnbod (talk) 03:26, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

That’s a great story Jb. I wonder when in the 19th century the portrait was from. Is there any chance it could have been from after 1923, given that ceremonial attire is usually anachronistic? See below.

Good point about the map. It’s from the IGI Atlas, volume 26. Nepal and to a greater extent Bhutan had only a semi independent status at that time, 1907 or thereabouts. (Each volume of the Gazetteer proclaims: Published under the authority of HM’s Secretary of State for India In Council or some such on the front page; so I imagine there was some official oversight of what OUP @ Clarendon was publishing) After the Treaty of Segauli 1814 or 1815, a British resident sat in Kathmandu. Although he wasn’t as intrusive as the residents in the princely states, he could be assertive, Brian Hodgson being an example. It was not until 1923 and another treaty that Nepal became truly independent and recognized internationally, ie League of Nations etc.

However each volume of the Gazetteer also has a folded (15x15 approximately). That map obviously is more detailed than the Atlas one (which is 8x8 ish) but it’s also more accurate in coloring. Nepal and Bhutan are in green and the princely states in yellow. In 2007 I didn’t have easy access to a large enough printer which I do now. When I get back home I’ll have it scanned. As for the lead, it too needs to be smoothed if not rewritten. (Stopping in light of warnings that I have exceeded my cellular data allowance for the month. … :) ) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:14, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

PS Ceylon is mentioned in Company rule in India, but because it separated so long ago, it didn’t fit here chronologically though it does pedagogically. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:31, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I forgot all about the bigger map. I'll scan and upload it this weekend. Apologies. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:25, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I definitely feel something should be squeezed into para 1. To define British Raj as only the rule of the crown on the Indian subcontinent neglects of the fact that Burma was a lieutenant-governorship (major province) of British India, because Burma is not part of the Indian subcontinent. It also contradicts the image in the infobox of the article showing a map of the Raj which was published in the Imperial Gazetteer of India which was published under the authority of the Crown. It depicts Burma as a central part of the Raj, with Burma and the rest of British India coloured pink, the princely states are depicted in yellow. This article mentions British India as including Burma as a major province multiple times, and is already cited in the article. The Imperial Gazetteer includes Burma as part of the “Indian Empire” in text as well. A change in the first paragraph defining the Raj to state that it was the rule of the Crown over the territory of British India, constituting the Indian subcontinent and modern-day Myanmar would be fitting. Or something along those lines for clarification purposes. Additionally, in the parliament British India was defined as “all territories and places within Her Majesty's dominions which are for the time being governed by Her Majesty through the Governor-General of India or through any governor or other officer subordinates to the Governor-General of India.” As opposed to the Native states, which Burma was not one of. I’m not sure if the case can even be made that Burma wasn’t part of the Raj and British India. And since it is, ignoring that in the definition of the Raj doesn’t make sense, it constituted a large part of British India and was one of only 8 major provinces. Any discussion about this would be great for reaching consensus. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 20:38, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Apologies @MichaelDMelvin23: I did not see your last post. You will appreciate that I, the editor who uploaded all the maps and wrote section 3 (major and minor provinces, am aware of British rule in Burma. I do have some sympathy for your basic point which I don’t for DeCausa’s cherry picked sources. Upon returning home I’ll examine the major sources I have access to and see whether or not we can tweak our definition in some small way. Best Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:54, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I see no reason why we shouldn’t. The article as currently published already notes that Burma was a major province of the British Raj, so the current definition in the leading paragraph contradicts the information presented in the article. primary sources I’ve seen under the authority of the Crown contemporary with British India define Burma as a province of British India, a part of the “Indian Empire”, just like in the map you uploaded. While you’re busy I can look for more reliable sources to send to you. I’ll link them in a reply later. Ultimately we should either come to the conclusion of redefining the Raj in para 1 as Burma is a major province of British India, or find consensus that Burma was never part of the Raj, at which point all reference to it in the provinces section should be removed, otherwise a contradiction would remain between the definition and the rest of the content of the article. All the best. MichaelDMelvin23 (talk) 15:04, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Jang Bahadur Rana, by Bhajuman Chitrakar (1849)

1849 apparently]. I was wrong (but right about Jack Straw): it was in the Foreign Secretary's office, and has now found a home among/above the Indian collections at the British Library. ~ Johnbod (talk)

Dashing indeed. He’s a famous one, and infamous also. Visited Britain, sided with the British during the mutiny, recovered some terai lands back, put Nepal on the map of the world, a powerful Peshwa-like figure who also killed many opponents… Love the coat-tunic. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:14, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

• Looking at WP:RS I'm seeing quite a few references to Burma being part of the British Raj e.g: The war ended the Konbaung dynasty in Upper Burma and saw the loss of Burma's sovereignty as Burma became part of the British Raj, a province of British India, from Topich, William J.; Leitich, Keith A. (2013). The History of Myanmar. Greenwood (ABC-CLIO). p. 48. ISBN 9780313357244. (The war in question being the Third Anglo-Burmese War). It's seems fairly clear cut. Do we really need to go down any other WP:ORish rabbit holes on this? DeCausa (talk) 21:23, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

  ABC-CLIO is not the most reliable. They published a book in which my Indian famine articles had been copied verbatim. The author had not even bothered to paraphrase here and there. Their books are not rigorously peer reviewed. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:56, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  Regardless it seems to be that any accurate source will tell you that Burma was a province of the Raj. Is there a debate to be had? 2601:18E:C101:E720:E8DD:8B81:48F2:57FB (talk) 05:20, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  !! You may have had one bad experience but disregarding anything published by ABC-CLIO would wipe out a huge swathe of RS on Wikipedia. It's a significant publisher and part of Bloomsbury. In any case I was just giving it as an example. I don't think there's much doubt the RS generally consider Burma to be part of the Raj. Here's another one by Prof Chie Ikeya (Any view on the University of Hawaiʻi Press?) or this from Prof Ashley Jackson (historian) (Bloomsbury!). DeCausa (talk) 07:56, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  See here See in particular:

  Wikipedia is copied and pasted without attribution by 100s / 1000s of academics or sources. Typically these are not high quality sources or notable publishers. "ABC-CLIO" is not a serious publisher. When the Oxford University Press copied and pasted from Wikipedia in one of their medical textbooks that turned out to be news worthy.[4]Doc James(talk · contribs · email) 16:47, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

  As I’ve stated, after I return from my vacation I’ll post a list very reliable scholarly sources. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:50, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  One or two sources don’t determine due weight which is the nub of the issue here. WP:TERTIARY tells us that tertiary sources, ie other reliable encyclopedias and dictionaries, major introductory textbooks published by scholarly publishers, and review or survey articles in scholarly journals do.

  Here is the late Stanley Wolpert in the Encyclopedia Britannica entry

  British Raj

  British raj, period of direct British rule over the Indian subcontinent from 1858 until the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947.

  The rest after August 16th. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:13, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  I don't think a "headline" generic comment in a source like that can be counted. The source needs to specifically address the question of whether Burma was in or out of the Raj to determine WP:DUE, as in the sources I've cited. I've seen no source that says Burma was outside the Raj. I think rather too much heavy weather is being made of what I think is rather a straightforward point. DeCausa (talk) 10:29, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

  @DeCausa and MichaelDMelvin23:, I'm sorry, your sources are histories of Burma. Of necessity, they will go into more detail about the place of Burma in the Raj, than a history of the Raj will.

My sources, of which I have dozens more, are histories of the Raj. In them, Burma is not a significant enough feature to gain prominent mention. Lower Burma became a part of British India from the time of Company rule in India, yet there is nothing about Burma in the various laws the British enacted in India. Not just in the Bengal Sati Regulation, 1829, Female Infanticide Prevention Act, 1870, or the Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act, 1856, which one could insinuate are certifiably Hindu, i.e. not Buddhist, but also Macaulay's education minute incorporated in the English Education Act 1835, Wood's dispatch (1854), or Macaulay's Indian Penal Code which are secular. Their evidence, too, one might object predates Burma incorporation as a province. But then there is nothing about Burma in the Ilbert Bill (1883), Age of Consent Act, 1891, Indian Councils Act 1892, Minto Morley Reforms 1909, Government of India Act 1919 (or the Montague Chelmsford reforms) which came well after the incorporation. I'm willing to give this issue some thought, but the both of you should stop posting obliquely relevant quotes from here and there found from cherry-picked Google searches. The tenor of your arguments give little indication that either of you have read this article with any care; otherwise MDM would not be carrying coals to Newcastle with a source that has been a part of Section 3 from 2007. Please cease or have an RfC if you think you can make a convincing case. This exchange has been going on for far too long. I'll give the issue some honest thought and will post here in a month's time. If I don't, please ping me. Bottom line: getting something into a lead is not just a matter of finding a source here and another there. One has to ponder due weight. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:24, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

And here the OED (subscription required) with which we have had a symbiotic relationship. We took part of our definition from them in 2007 and they took the fine print of their revised definition, verbatim, from us in 2008, as the top of this talk page indicates:

2.1857–spec. In full British Raj. Direct rule in India by the British (1858–1947); this period of dominion. Often with the. Also in extended use: any system of government in which power is restricted to a particular group.The British Raj was instituted in 1858, when, as a consequence of the Indian Rebellion of the previous year, the rule of the British East India Company was transferred to the Crown in the person of Queen Victoria (proclaimed Empress of India in 1876). In 1947 the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two sovereign dominion states, the Union of India (later the Republic of India) and the Dominion of Pakistan (later the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh) (cf. partition n. 7c).

Whatever you might think of this, it does show that a major authority of British English had enough faith in our definition to deem it worthy of mirroring. Best, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:05, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Again, a headline generic description – from which an implication is to be taken – is not what's needed. It's sources that directly discuss and address the status of Burma specifically that are required - as in the ones I cited. DeCausa (talk) 11:45, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Like I said, above, @DeCausa:, have an RfC if you think you have the goods. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:24, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Fowler&Fowler, I have no idea why you think it's appropriate to think that the next step is an RfC to such an obvious change. I've put forward RS that directly address the issue and you've put forward a dictionary definition that doesn't. A simple Google Books search would tell you how offtrack you are. To be honest I've grown tired of your verbose WP:OWN attitude to this article and will take it off my watchlist (and will ignore any ping from it). DeCausa (talk) 18:57, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

High Res Map of the Raj

High Res Map of the Raj from the IGI. It shows Nepal and Bhutan in Green. 1908

As promised I have uploaded a high-res map of the Raj. In hard copy, it is approximately 18 inches horizontally by 16 inches vertically. Each of the 25 volumes of IGI, 1908, have this map, folded, and attached to the front end paper, but not volume 26, which is the Atlas with lower res maps, each the size of a double page spread, i.e. 10 inches horizontally x 8 1/2 vertically. The map that has appeared in the infobox of this article since 2007 is a map from the Atlas.

As I don't have a big enough scanner at home, I had to scan the map in four pieces and match the pieces. Also, of the 25 maps, only this one (in Volume 2) has come off its moorings. It had also split here and there along the folds, and my effort to unfold probably made it worse. But this is a trial run. The others are in better shape. If there is an appetite for this high res map, I can detach one of the other maps and have it scanned professionally.

As stated, this map does not show Nepal and Bhutan in the same colors as the princely states, though it doesn't show them in the colors of truly independent nations either, which they weren't before a treaty signed in 1923.

Pinging @RegentsPark, Abecedare, Philip Baird Shearer, Rjensen, DuncanHill, Worldbruce, Johnbod, Rueben lys, GraemeLeggett, Moonraker, and Anupam: that my fading memory can remember from the old days. The more recent people will see this anyway, so apologies for not pinging you. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:10, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Hmm. It says it's a map of the British Indian Empire, but I have to admit I'm not familiar with the question of whether Nepal and Bhutan were part of the Empire in 1908. However, the legend on the map says yellow and green show "Native States and Territories", which seems to mean the ones within the Empire, and it does not explain why two different colours are used. The solid green seems to be used only for Nepal and Bhutan? I guess there is much better evidence of their relationship to the Empire at the times in various places in the text. Moonraker (talk) 00:31, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

thanks--it's terrific. Rjensen (talk) 00:39, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Correcting myself, the green also stretches eastwards over what may be the North-East Frontier Agency? By the way, whatever "Raj" means it is surely not a geographical area. Moonraker (talk) 00:47, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

User:Fowler&fowler, thanks for pinging me in this discussion. Your high-resolution map is detailed and aesthetically pleasing. Additionally, it makes it clear that Afghanistan was not under the British Raj, while the previous map could have been misinterpreted in this regard. Kind regards, Anupam^Talk 00:52, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for posting @Moonraker:

After the Treaty of Sugauli (with Nepal, 1816) and Treaty of Sinchula (with Bhutan, 1865) both kingdoms agreed to the presence of a British political agent in their capitals. and other forms of British control in the realm of foreign relations. Sinchula was modified in the Treaty of Punakha in 1910, but Bhutan's foreign relations continued to be managed by Britain. Sugauli, however, was abrogated by the Nepal-Britain Treaty of 1923, and Nepal was recognized as an independent nation. (Nepal was not a member of the League of Nations, but the treaty was recognized by the League in 1925.) This map, published in 1908, predates both revisions. The green color may have been employed to indicate a degree British control, but it was nothing like the degree exercised in the indirect rule of the princely states. In December this year, Nepal will celebrate 100 years of full independence. I should add that the Treaty of 1923, rumor has it, prevented the incipient Hindu nationalists within the Congress, such as Vallabhbhai Patel, from attempting to annex Nepal for India in 1947

Why Bhutan extends farther east in the map than it does today is not clear. You are correct about a portion to belong to what is today Arunachal Pradesh, formerly NEFA, not to mention the South Tibet of recent Chinese cartography that has given much heartburn to the Indian press this week (see here). These historical maps, though, are meant to be seen as part history and part artwork. They are not, in my view, meant to be disputed as inaccurate representations of the Raj's boundaries. The map is published by authority of the Secretary of State for India. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:49, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, Fowler&fowler, so it seems that in 1908 Nepal and Bhutan were constitutionally in the same position as most other Indian states and would have been deemed to be part of the "British Indian Empire", a rather nebulous concept, very like your "Raj". They might or might not have agreed with that, as the states were not British. On the size of Bhutan, I was not reading the map as including the North-East Frontier Agency area in it, but that area seems to have had an odd status, and it might be a clue to how the colour green is being used. Moonraker (talk) 23:13, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Well, yes and no. The internal politics of the princely states were monitored by the British resident with the eyes of a hawk. British interference was much greater. In Mysore State, for example, the British took full control during a period in the 19th-century. There were longstanding treaties of subsidiary alliance going back to Company rule in India. The princely states could not maintain armies. Their defense, communications, diplomacy, were all managed by the British.

Although Kumaon and Garhwal were annexed by the British from Nepal after the Anglo-Nepal War, and various hilly tracts were taken from Bhutan, Nepal and Bhutan always had armies and telegraph if and when it was set up, was their own. Witness the difficulty the Great Trigonometric Survey had in measuring the heights of Everest and other eight-thousanders in the Nepal Himalayas. Although they had good long-distance data gathered by British surveyors using telescopes stationed below the border, and although their conjectures were verified by the spherical geometry models of Indian "computer" Radhanath Sikdar stationed in Calcutta, the British still needed trained spies, or Pundit (explorer)s to infiltrate Nepal for verifying the calculations up close, so suspicious were the Nepalese rulers of foreign presence. Bhutan probably did have more British interference. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:29, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

• I like this new map. Good resolution and clearly demarcates the areas of influence. Thanks Fowler. RegentsPark (comment) 16:26, 1 September 2023 (UTC)
• Thank you all. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:40, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

"As India" in the lead

The lead currently includes a section "The region under British control... though not officially" which emphasises that the contemporary name was "India." This makes an important point. It is followed by a paragraph of a single sentence listing occasions when the Raj appeared as "India" on the international stage: "As India, it was a founding member of the League of Nations, a participating nation in the Summer Olympics in 1900, 1920, 1928, 1932, and 1936, and a founding member of the United Nations in San Francisco in 1945." This second paragraph seriously breaks up the flow of the lead - chronologically and logically, in that we suddenly jump into the 20th century and then return to 1858 in the next paragraph, which begins "This system of governance" (i.e. it acts as if the second paragraph doesn't exist). It would be better if the second paragraph were a footnote. Also the citation only supports the point about the UN, not the other claims. Furius (talk) 09:04, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

@Furius: What do you think of this version in which I have attempted to address some of your questions or criticisms? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:27, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

"As India" is meant to show that the British Indian Empire was not just a loose-knit entity, but one whose sovereignty as a state with boundaries, surveillance of its population in censuses etc, defense, and diplomatic relations, was acknowledged in its appearances in the Olympics, as the founding member of both the League of Nations and the United Nations. The sources can be found if they are needed. Their absence is not a biggie. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:16, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

That was quick! I think this flows much better. I still find the chronological order a bit odd; it seems to me that that acknowledgement was a 20th C phenomenon more than a nineteenth century one. I'm also wary about using the lead to make points that aren't explicitly stated. But I acknowledge that this is not my area of expertise. Furius (talk) 20:31, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

"Indian Empire" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Indian Empire has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 October 2 § Indian Empire until a consensus is reached. DrKay (talk) 13:14, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Official political entity name

Passports from the British Raj had "Indian Empire" on them, thus suggesting it to be the official name. Ma Bufang's №1 fan (talk) 19:26, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Please surf the talk page archives for numerous discussions on the passports. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:49, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Flag?

The British Raj had a flag. This seems to mention it-Indian National Flag: Carving the National Identity | SpringerLink. Not only that, but I have a source from around that time that seems to confirm this https://archive.org/details/flagsofallnation0000smit/page/92/mode/2up?q=India Bubblesorg (talk) 03:08, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

You’ll have to read the talk page archives rigorously for why there’s no flag. We get this question on average once a month. Briefly, the Raj was an empire a loose-knit federation of areas that were administered by the British (called British India) and over 500

princely states, which flew their own flags, and which were at best only indirectly ruled. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:25, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

But the pages for the states within the Raj have this flag on their thing, also its in the article for the flag of British India. So to be consistent, can we go to each article for each wikipedia article talking about the Raj that has the flag and delete them? --Bubblesorg (talk) 03:34, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 22 November 2023

Note to editors: Propose to add a subsection, Environmental Impact, under the subpage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Raj#Legacy

British presence on the Indian subcontinent left lasting effects on its environment and the concept of environmentalism to date. Since British rule began, with the onset of heavy industrialization and continental scientific developments, as well as emergent European environmental sensibilities in the 19th and 20th centuries, contradicting push-and-pull with the environment has led to fundamental changes in the landscape, climate, and environmentalism[1]. In the 19th and 20th century, the British enacted several colonial agricultural reforms in India. Some scholars qualify that their domestication of tropical nature was rooted in the ideology of exploitation and extraction[2]. The long-established system of subsistence farming was replaced with sedentary farming. Known as the “Great Agrarian Conquest” or the “Ecological remaking of Punjab,” the British began the largest irrigation project in the world that enabled sedentary agriculture, unraveling the agro-pastoral landscape and dry-land agriculture and animal raising to support crop exports. This was accompanied by a drastic transformation of the land and famines to come [3]. Studies suggest that the British ideal of forestry was the plantation—“a domesticated, rationalised, optimised form of the forest”[4]. The British enacted reservation policies over India’s forests. The 1878 Act to preside over a fifth of India’s land, most of it forests, marked the “heyday of colonial forestry”[5]. To supply high demand timber in both Britain and for railway construction projects in India, colonial regulation caused high displacement of aboriginal people. Importantly, levels of deforestation increased to alarming levels with which British scholars expressed concern, writing that India’s forests were not inexhaustible and would soon require ‘management’ to ensure supplies[6]. Deforestation also led to critical spells of flood, drought, and marked changes in agroecology[7]. Wolves and tigers, among many other species, were hunted on a wide scale[8]. By World War II, “the idea that development meant the conquest of nature took a concrete shape”[9].

During British rule, the rise of environmental consciousness in Europe also saw an increase in colonial attempts to protect wildlife[10]. A scholar described a “desire to transform the country into something akin to the rural landscape and agrarian economy of contemporary England”[11]. Eardley-Wilmot founded the Research Institute at Dehra Dun under the imperial Indian Forestry Service in 1906 to improve forest landscapes, which provided practical and theoretical training to would-be forest rangers, who were all Indian[12]. “[D]esiccationist alarm about deforestation” provided motivation for environmental conservation ideas starting in the period of the British Raj (Sivaramakrishnan 2008). Tropical India provided an impetus to biological research for many naturalists, whose sense of discovery and interest in diverse environments promoted studies that changed perceptions on species, naturalist works, and pathogens[13].

To date, the legacy of the British in India profoundly affects two primary strands: climate crisis and conservation. Ecological and biological changes to the landscape of India, as well as industrial pollution, have contributed to climate disruptions in India with lasting effects on demography[14], food sourcing, landscapes, air quality, ports and oceanic health[15], among others. With the growing aesthetic element to valuing wildlife, conservationist principles also carried over from British Rule with an increase in ecotourism and natural history filmmaking to date[16]. Royals’ conservationist ethos also stimulated environmental consciousness in conservative groups who may be less motivated in this regard. Britain’s King Charles III was famously a votary of the environment[17] (while some sources also suggest contradictory actions, such as his prolific hunting exhibitions), and his royal support promoted attention to environmental justice and finding innovative solutions to tackle climate crises in different parts of the world[18]. The environmental legacies of the British Empire are complex. With the world’s increasing attention to the ramifications of global warming, the exact quantification of British environmental impact on India continues to evolve.

Sunni426 (talk) 20:27, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

I am integrating this suggestion into the article, thank you for your request. Remsense聊 21:12, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

 Done Remsense聊 21:35, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have reverted the edit. The addition appears to be undigested, regurgitated, and polemical. I don't believe it carries due weight in the literature. Also, per WP:TERTIARY, this is not the view of introductory textbooks which are vetted for balance, e.g. Michael Fisher's An Environmental History of India:From Earliest Times to the Twenty-First Century, Cambridge University Press, 2018. This is a high-level article, one whose language has been used even by the OED. We can't afford to have something as unbalanced as this become a part of the article's presentation. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:36, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the addition needs to be toned down (and it reads too much like an essay and the reference to Charles is gratuitous, etc), but on the whole I'm not opposed to it. A discussion of the environmental impact of the Raj seems totally appropriate. WP:TERTIARY says "may help evaluate due weight," not that it is necessary for something to appear in a tertiary source in order to appear in the article. Are there sources that contradict the presentation advanced by the proposed text (rather than simply not mentioning the issue)? What does Fisher 2018 say about impact of the Raj?

The suggestion that a special effort should be made to keep the article's text stable is undercut by the fact that it currently has only a B-Class rating; we usually only do that for FA-Class articles. Furius (talk) 16:11, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I agree we need something, but not this. Johnbod (talk) 16:51, 23 November 2023 (UTC)