British Colonialism in India: An Introduction

In this workshop, students will learn about the history of British colonialism in India. We will focus on two key aspects – 1. The benefit of the trading relationship and 2. The attitudes of British colonials to South Asians. By the nineteenth century, a predominant British attitude to others was that people of colour and those who lived in the Middle East and Asia were inferior. Students will read some excerpts by British colonials writing about South Asians, and be asked to think about the range of attitudes the British had towards others different from them.

One feature of British colonial rule in India often presented incorrectly is the continuity of self-rule in some areas, areas known as ‘princely states’. For the second half of this workshop, students will be introduced to some of the many ‘princely states’, and discuss the extent to which they could be thought of as ‘nations’ within India in their own right. We will look in detail at the leader of one such princely states, the Maharaja of Kashmir, Gulab Singh. Students will study the actions of this regional leader, and asked to decide for themselves what might have been the motivations for his actions, and what his views of the British might have been?   

A map of the ‘princely states’

Curriculum for Excellence subjects and skills:

SOC 3-01a / SOC 4-01a / SOC 3-02a / SOC 4-02a / SOC 3-03a / SOC 3-04a / SOC 4-04a / SOC 4-04b / SOC 4-04c / SOC 3-05a / SOC 4-05c / SOC 3-06a / SOC 4-06a / SOC 3-06b / SOC 4-06b

National Curriculum subjects and skills:

History: Development of Church, state and society in Medieval Britain, 1066-1509: First colonies/ first contact with India. Ideas, political power, industry and empire: Britain, 1745-1901: The development of the British Empire. Challenges for Britain, Europe and the wider world 1901 to the present day: Indian independence and the end of empire. Understanding the expansion and dissolution of empires, learning to ask perceptive questions, think critically, weigh evidence and develop perspective and judgement.

Geography: Developing contextual knowledge of the location of geographically significant places. Building knowledge of globes and maps, analysing and drawing conclusions from geographical data.

RE: Learning about the history of Sikhism, Islam and Hinduism. Learning about relationships between religion and politics.