Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Why are we still Less Developed? Westernization Revisited

India, along with many of the third world countries, remains so called developing -rather frankly speaking less developed - even after fifty odd years of political independence. A plethora of research is carried out and still being done to look into the reasons for this. This write-up tries to view this problem as 'Limitations to coping-up phenomenon' Coping up to Western -and only- standards of the day.I do not expect it to be lucid enough for everyone who is reading although I try to keep it as easy as possible. All loose ends and limitations are welcome to be filled up from the reader’s side.We revisit the 'Westernization concept and argue that the problem of development gap is essentially one of meeting the Western Standards that seem to be the order of the day.Take any strand of modern life; there will be umpteen no. of objects, institutions, trends- in all ways of life which have their root/ origin somewhere outside India. No big deal? We have been borrowing heavily from outside through invasions. The Muslim Regime left quite a many influences that became an integral part of ordinary Indian Life.(e.g. Perfumes) But all those influences can said to be assimilated in Indian Ethos over time. Whatever the invaders brought seems to have broken its link from its source. Iran/Persia never dictated Delhi even in the prime of the Mughal Dynasty.Now this was not the case with the British Raj. Establishment of the British Raj coincided with Industrial Revolution backed up by Cultural renaissance in Europe. While Industrial Revolution captured (along with the help of colonial trade policies) markets in India(&elsewhere), the intellectual revolution captured Indian Mentality forever.

Indians responded to this change in their usual manner of assimilation. Macauley’s intention of carving out ‘babus’ of education system was so successful that it still grips the Great Indian Middle Class.

Newly educated Indians who thought they too had a glorious past in so far as knowledge was concerned launched some initial counter attacks. This renaissance, however, was short-lived because partly the initiators (e.g. Justice M.G.Ranade) were civil servants themselves and lacked mass contact.

The other bitter reason for this short-lived renaissance was the fact that the British had done their bit in convincing the common masses that they had no future unless they fell in line with the new regime. Intellectuals, on the other hand, knew this beforehand and seemed to have adopted a hypocritical approach. (Dadoba Pandurang Tarkhadkar, one of the prominent figures in the field of education in the second half of 19th century has written a letter to his acquaintance which says—“Although I am helping the promotion of schools that give education in native languages, it is more than clear to me that my own daughter will go to English-medium school. Because I am convinced that if she has to have a future, that is the only way!”)

Soon the masses were transforming – at least in the urbanized areas. They started to attend ‘jobs’, be it clerical 9 to 5 or one in the shifts in a mill. They started signing ‘musters’, keeping accounts, use P&T services, the railways, wear trousers and suits, read and write in English. Everything primarily to earn a daily bread.

The system got rooted itself once and for all. One of the offshoots of it was the tremendous influence of this system on newly created group in the society better known as the ‘Middle Class’. It included the upper castes predominantly who were enticed by ruling British to ‘help’ in governing a huge nation. Bengal and Maharashtra were the beginners in inculcating the new system of values.