Claiming the high ground: theories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

Political

Pergamon

Geogmphy, Vol. 16.No.8,pp.655-673. 1997 0 1997Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights resewed Printed

in Great Britain

0962-6298/97 $17.00+0.00

PII: SO%24298(%)00071-6

Claiming the high ground: theories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India JUDITH T. KENNY

Department

of Geography,

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA

Milwaukee,

WI 53201,

ARSTRACT. By the 188Os, imperial

government’s practice of ‘retreating’ to the Indian hill stations for much of the year was well established. Despite the strength of this new tradition, such a relocation of colonial administration never lacked its critics. This paper examines the expanding administrative use of the hill stations from the early nineteenth century through the 1880s. As the nineteenth century ‘scientific’ framework for British control of India was formed, conflicting strategies and practices for maintaining imperial control required mediation and contrasting frameworks for defining duty and loyalty between government and subject vied for dominance. The significance of Utilitarian thought, changing appraisals of climate and constructions of race are evaluated in an analysis of the imperial hill stations. 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd

Introduction in an 1884 edition

An editorial Ootacamund,

commented

of ne

South of India Observe? the local newspaper

on the qualities

of thaf hill station

of

by asking:

What is more natural and reasonable than, in a country like Southern India where the climate for nine months of the year is to the natives themselves barely tolerable that its European residents should flock to a spot, as to an oasis in the desert where the climate is cool and bracing, where holiday folk may enjoy outdoor sports and pastimes from sun rise to sun set and work-a-day officials go pleasantly to their daily labour and continue as it as long as inclination leads ot duty compels. (me South of India Ohse~~ June 28). Indeed, capital

by the

188Os, a decade

of the Madras

Presidency,

after this hill station relocating

during

was officially the hot season

named seemed

the summer natural

to

government. Over 80 such settlements had been constructed by rhe British in the higher elevations of India between 1820 and the 1880s. As the hill stations proliferated, retreat to the hills was viewed as a necessary ‘European’ response to life in South Asia.’ British imperial and provincial governments’ practice of migrating to the higher elevations of India grew in importance, in permanence, in population and in length of annual tenure from

the

mid-nineteeth

century.

By the

late nineteenth

century,

a new

‘tradition’

government in the hills had been established. The hill stations acquired significance political geography of empire from this time and became important components

of

in the of the

Theories of imperial authority and the British bill stations in India

656

apparatus of control not only in respect to how India was governed but also in the ‘European’ administration of other tropical colonial territories (Spencer and Thomas, 1948; Reed, 1976; Frenkel and Western, 1988; Aiken, 19941. What came to be described as a ‘natural’ arrangement for the colonial administrators in India,

however,

administrators

never

lacked

who moved

its critics.

The

East

India

their site of official business

Company

had

censured

from the plains to the hills

(Kenny, 1991). From their earliest use as sites of government,

British commercial

interests

in the colonial port cities objected to colonial administrators’ move to remote and sparsely settled areas (Kanwar, 1990). After the 1870s Indians organized the protests. As suggested in the following quotation, the ‘Hills’ of India came to represent a powerful idea: ‘The hills are the curse of modern India. They are the most fertile cause of the increasing alienation between

the rulers and ruled which menaces the safety of the Empire’ (7%e Madras Mail:

April 14, 1884). This editorial commentary

captures

nationalist group as well as the non-official

British community.

This paper examines early-nineteenth

the expanding

administrative

the sentiments

of a rising Indian

use of the hill stations from the

century through the 1880s in order to explore the imperial geographies

of British India. Imperial practice supported the distinction of these British enclaves as a racial and spatial category that symbolized superiority and difference (Kenny, 1995). The following discussion traces shifts in meaning which suggest a changing appraisal of climate,

constructions

competing

strategies

of race

and theories

for imperial control.

of authority

within

the framework

Although the ‘moral discourse

which Iinked climate, race, and moral temperament-ultimately

of

of climate’-

justified this practice in

the high Victorian age, I will focus attention on the critics of the summer hill capitals. While the nineteenth formed,

conflicting

mediation. coherent

century

strategies

Consequently, imposition

‘scientific’

framework

and practices

this paper

challenges

that was impervious

for British control

for maintaining

the idea of colonial

rationalization Britain

required between

to require

in Britain illuminates

with commercial

might be regarded occasions

different changes

strategies,

as imperial

theory

or in response

consideration

of shifts in

in Indian policy. Utilitarian thought,

and colonial objectives

role in colonial policy and representations particular

and subject vied

for the rulers and ruled. Although social and political differences

and India appeared

converging

government

in the context

the

of imperialism

Utilitarian thought

liberal thought

as a

‘other’ and

among British administrators,

Contrasting means of defining duty and loyalty between and western

required

discourse

to the imprint of the colonial

addresses the diversity of interests and experiences non-official British community, and Indian subjects. for dominance,

of India was

imperial control

in South Asia, assumed a primary

of India. At the same time, however, much that appears

to particular

to have arisen to meet the needs challenges

in India (Metcalf,

of

1994).

Historic ‘flashpoints’ such as the Indian Revolt of 1857 and the liberal Ilbert Bill of 1883 provoked a reformulation of imperial practice and theories of authority. In the first, an Indian revolt challenged British authority on the plains of northern India. The second event pitted the British colonial community against an emerging Indian nationalist group. The Ilbert Bill would have allowed Indian judges to preside over hearings involving ‘Europeans’.

Reflecting

the ‘racial’ division of imperial society,

the colonials

won their

battle against the proposed change and retained their ‘right’ to British judges. To explore the intertwined and evolving arguments related to imperial theory and government’s use of the summer capitals, I first outline the historical context for the development of the hill stations and the East India Company’s assessment of its administrators’ appropriate site for duty. Second, the decisions which permitted the use

JUDITHT. KENNY

657

of hill stations as summer capitals are related to the assumption Finally, by the 188Os, Indians

expressed

increasing

of Crown rule after 1857.

dissatisfaction

prolonged stay in the hills. Their critique and government’s

with government’s

justification of the practice are

explored through the particular instance of a petition to Parliament when 30 000 residents of Madras asked that government’s

‘exodus’ be halted. Throughout,

Simla, as the seat of

imperial government, and Ootacamund, the summer capital of the Madras Presidency, hold key positions in assessing the development of the summer capitals of the British ‘Raj’.

The early hill stations of the East India Company After nearly two hundred years in India, British coastal traders began to explore the hills. The new military stations built in elevations between 4000 and 8000 feet marked a special place in the consolidation significance

and expansion

of the British empire.

Many held strategic

as outposts of British control while others served primarily as sanitaria for

convalescing

soldiers and a remedy for the physical and mental health of ‘Europeans’

the tropics. Anthony King’s summary of the variables contributing

to the development

in of

the hill stations lists the British command of political power, social and cultural factors that supported the hybrid world of the Anglo-Indians’-as the colonials called themselves in the nineteenth

century, and the availability of enabling

technologies

(King, 1976: 156).

These factors expand upon the work of Nora Mitchell who emphasized of the hill station as it related to classical

theories

perception

causes

of healthy

environments

and

the significance

of climate and the Anglo-Indians’ of disease

(Mitchell,

1972).

Such

summaries may explain the status of the hill station as it became established but do not fit the record of the hill station when it was introduced to the ‘colonial ecosystem’ (Mitchell, 1972: 1). Review of the early years outlines a change in the cultural appraisal of the hills associated administrators

with the transition of the British in India from Company

and supplies

an important

benchmark

for the examination

traders to of colonial

discourse. IJntil the mid-eighteenth coastal

century,

British society

areas of Madras, Calcutta, Bombay

in India was confined

and Surat where

to the four

life was focused

on the

factory. In the late 175Os, the collapse of the Mughal Empire and wars between the French and British led to the growing control of wealth and territory by the British East India Company.

By the end of the century, colonial society had grown in numbers and was

composed

of the military and civilian administrators

growing presence from commercial

of the European

to imperialist channels

be embraced

the colonials’

unquestioningly.

interest in India, classical theories of

ability to acclimatize

Debates surrounding

to tropical lands could not

acclimatization

imperial history with significant changes marking its course (Kennedy, 1991; Anderson,

1992). In eighteenth

traders. The

(Spear, 1963; Bayly, 1988).

As colonial ‘duty’ replaced trade as the expressed climate which challenged

as well as Company

military helped divert the British coastal settlements

would run through 1990; Livingstone,

century British texts, historian Thomas Metcalf notes

that the enduring influence of Montesquieu emphasized the formative role of the environment in ‘making India a land so well suited for despotism’ (Metcalf, 1994: 9). Yet, such conclusions became awkward when ‘_ Europeans, following the conquests of Clive (1X7), explanations

began to contemplate extended years of residence in India, climatic for India’s degeneracy had of necessity largely to be set aside . .’ Instead,

from the 177Os, detailed study of India focused less on climatic determinism and more on the ‘enduring‘ cultural characteristics of the Indian people. Surveys of the ‘physical

7beories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

658 constitution’

of the land and climate, including

foundations

descriptions

of local populations,

for colonial power. The appraisal of India’s hill country demonstrated

the symbolic

laid both

and practical value acquired with empirical experience.

Despite the fact that European’s oldest method of protection in the tropics was altitude, as the British expanded

their command they did not immediately seek out higher ground.

Even though the Spanish in Middle and South America had determined from the sixteenth century that malaria and yellow fever could be escaped at higher altitudes (Curtin, 1989: 47), the equation of altitude and freedom from disease was not quickly defined in India. As late as 1847, Sir Richard Burton

observed

during his visit to Ootacamund

in the

Nilgiris: The purely European

reader will consider

it extraordinary

range of lofty hills should not have suggested

that this beautiful

to all men at first sight, the idea

of a cool, healthy summer abode. But we demi-Orientals, who know by experience the dangers of mountain air in India, only wonder at the man who first planted a roof-tree upon the Neilgherries (sic) (270).

The British appraised the merit and ‘practical application’

of the hill climates cautiously

(Murray, 1836: 1). Many of the earliest hill stations were located in the strategically important Himalayan foothills. The area around Simla came to the attention of the British during the Gurkha wars in 1815-16

and, in 1819, the Assistant Political Agent for the Hill States erected a

cottage in Simla to serve as his headquarters. to visit Simla arrived amid debates season. Amhearst’s two-month June. Facilities constructed convalescing

soldiers

Eight years later, the first governor-general3

over the healthiness

of the station during the rainy

stay was cut short by the onset of the monsoon

for the Governor-General’s

after officers

suggested

in mid-

visit were converted to housing for

that they would

be ‘.

a boon

very

gratefully received by all classes and particularly those whose means or distance from the Presidency

render a voyage to sea

impracticable

or greatly inconvenient’

(Kanwar,

1990: 16). The request refers to the practice of either sending invalids on a sea voyage or relocating

them to the Cape of Good Hope for convalescence.

based on the assumption In the less strategically were being evaluated. from 1819 to 1826-to officer

assigned

Each prescription

was

that a change in air facilitated recovery. important hill regions of southern

India, similar experiments

Advocates of Ootacamund launched a seven-year campaignestablish a military sanitarium there (Kenny, 1991). A medical

to Ootacamund,

climate in 1834 comparing

Robert

Baikie

it to Great Britain’s

enthusiastically

endorsed

Yet, he acknowledged

pensioners

might not benefit

complained

of by any but such as from a long residence

from the hills, stating:

‘.

the Nilgiri

that Company

the temperature

is seldom

in a warm climate have become

so Indianized both in their feelings, constitution, and habits, as to be unable to bear the slightest approach to an European climate ’ (Baikie, 1934: 49).* Ironically, the same year that Baikie published his Observations on the Neilgherries, the Governor of the Madras Presidency stopped funds to the fledgling sanitarium stating that the medical reports for the preceding two years had shown benefits ‘far short of those anticipated at the time that it was started, and that such as had accrued were in no way commensurate with the expenses incurred’ (Government of Madras Despatches, 1834: 10). Writing his observations of the Mahabaleshwar Hills climate in 1836, a medical officer in the Bombay Presidency stated that the recent establishment of hill-station convalescent centres formed ‘an important epoch in the history of medical policy in this country’ (Murray, 1836: 1). He warned against Baikie’s excesive praise, however, stating: ‘There is

JUDITHT.

659

KENNY

nothing more likely to bring the Indian hill stations into disrepute,

and to deprive them

of the reputation, they now deservingly enjoy, than an over estimate of the merits of their climate’ (Murray, 1836: 2). Edward Balfour’s analysis of Indian hill regions in 06servations on the Means of Preserving (1845)

Cantonments

the Health of Troops by Selecting Healthy Localities for their

shared this cautious endorsement.

results of ‘medical topography’

He summarized

and statistical surveys and concluded

the combined

that altitude tended

to make for better health, but not necessarily. Associated

with establishing

attention to the appropriate

control

relationship

over

new

between

territory,

To determine

where government

government’s

role should be. Clearly there was an economic

colonial

control

commitment.

of India,

the administrators

should be located required an understanding

but that logic

The tradition of a paternalistic,

did not define

all aspects

of the

administrative

state (Stokes,

Reinterpreting

in Britain

defined the difference between British

and Indians, reforms would free India from stagnation something

of

British

civilizing mission had a long and influential

and changes within India. If cultural characteristics India could become

of what

logic to the maintenance

pedigree with shifts of meaning related to the strength of particular philosophies

Furthermore,

gave

the British rulers and the Indian ruled.

and set on the road to progress.

of a laboratory for the creation of the liberal

1959; Metcalf, 1994).

the impact of capitalism on British society, Utilitarians undertook a major

shift in their conception

of polity during the nineteenth

century

The ‘negative’ liberalism

of the early Utilitarian privileged the legislative branch as the instrument of the individual. The executive

should remain in the background

only when individual selfishness

as the enforcer of law and order and act

required intervention (Stokes, 1959). Later, to ameliorate

the worst features of capitalism, advocates of a ‘positive’ liberalism focused on the welfare of the whole rather than privileging the competition then recognized

of society’s individuals. This shift

the executive or head of state as a ‘symbol’ of authority, justice and unity.

Civil servants were to take positive steps to ensure the welfare of the state’s subjects. Administrators-as one author named them, the ‘IJtilitarian despots’ (Inden, 1990)--assumed Indians

this role in India earlier than in Britain. As defined by the British rulers,

were

not culturally

prepared

for representative

government.

The

Utilitarian

project aimed to reform and educate the Indians to prepare them for that future. Idealistic principle and pragmatic colonial administration

met in the beliefs of T.B. Macauley, the

first law member of the East India Company’s Council. Macauley’s famous 1835 quotation on the benefits intermediaries:

of an English educational ‘.

system argued for the creation

a class who may be interpreters

between

of cultural

us and the millions whom

we govern; a class of persons, Indian in blood and color, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, middle-class

and

in intellect

(cited

in Hay, 1988: 31). The education

secular knowledge

and values related to the guarantees

Moderate, western-educated to their experience

of an ‘enlightened

government’.

reformist sentiments

dominated

of western

of civil and religious

individuals tended to acknowledge

vocabulary for future nationalist activity.’ From Governor-General William Bentinck’s (184%1856),

of India’s growing

in an English system did produce individuals with a background

liberty.

certain qualified benefits

At the same time, they gained the

time (1828-1X35)

to that of Lord Dalhousie

British policy in India (Metcalf,

199G: 2X).

Hoping to introduce a symbolic change from the maritime/mercantile past, Bentinck argued as early as 1829 the need for a ‘cardinal point’ for an imperial seat of government. He recommended that the new capital be located at Agrd which he believed as Akbar‘s capital was ‘the scene of past and future glory, where the empire is to be saved or lost’ (Cohn. 1983: 174). The Board of Control responded by reminding Bentinck that India ‘is

i%eorzes of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

660 governed

by a distant Maritime

reference

power,

to that peculiar circumstance’.

on the part of governor-generals in British representation

and the position

must be considered

to symbolize

a new order or to eliminate contradictions

of authority met with skepticism

and disapproval from the East

India Company and the president of the Board of Control (Cohn, While Bentinck

with

Historian Bernard Cohn notes that various efforts

sought to alleviate inconsistencies

between

1983: 174).

the role of merchant

and

sovereign by recommending an imperial capital, the great hero of the Madras Presidency, governor Thomas Munro (1820-1824) earlier emphasized the need for close contact with the Indian people. Years later, those in opposition his position: personages

‘.

to a high temperature,

insignificance’

to the hill-station capitals would quote

the “loss of touch” is an evil besides musquitoes

which the subjection

of august

(sic>, and prickly heat dwindles

into

(cited in 7&e Madras Mail: July 18, 1884).

The East India Company’s general policy appears to have been consistent with Munro’s views.

In a letter censoring

Government

the behaviour

of one company

employee,

which they inspire in those whose public duties requires their presence only public evil which has arisen from their discovery. cautious

the Madras

wrote of the Nilgiri hills in 1830: ‘Indeed, the excess of the local affection

and frugal government

proved

unable

elsewhere

is the

.’ (cited in Price, 1909: 24). A

to control

the enthusiasm

for and

attraction to the sanitarium of Ootacamund. Perhaps the biggest battle during the early days of the station was waged between Madras Governor-Lord

Elphinstone,

Elphinstone

spent

reprimands

from the Company’s

statement:

‘The removal

immediately remove.’

eleven

months

and the East India Company

in the hill station Board.

of the seat of Government

on receipt of this despatch,

Elphinstone

during

He was ordered be brought

the

Board of Directors.

1840 and received

two

back

to Madras with the

is contrary

to law, and it must,

back to the Presidency

and not

and his council returned to Madras several months later. For the

next 30 years, the definition of duty would prohibit administering

from the hills.

Imperial India and the summer capitals The year 1858 is recognized

as the watershed

for colonial rule in India. After the British

defeated Indian military forces following a year of fighting in the northern plains a new order ensued. The Government set aside the Mughal emperor,

of India Act of 1858 dissolved the East India Company, and named Queen Victoria sovereign

of a new pulity-

the Indian Empire. At the conclusion of the revolt, or the ‘Mutiny’ as the British named it, W.W. Hunter described a new imagery associated with the reorganization: ‘. the problem

for the Company

government contained

divergent

proclamation

the problem

views. While setting aside the Mughal Emperor,

assured the Indian princes

sions would be respected. inheritance

was to divide and govern;

of the Queen’s

in India is to unite and rule’ (Hunter, 1903: 41). Resolution

Since

Victoria’s

that their rights over their territorial posses-

earlier disregard

rights served as provocation

of this problem Queen

for religious

custom

for the revolt, the Queen

and princely

Empress’

subjects

were further promised protection from those reform efforts that would disregard ‘ancient rights, usages and customs of India’. Aristocratic rule, and a feudal mode of government, was legitimized by representing the Queen as the latest foreign ruler in a succession that dated back to the Aryan invasions. At the same time, the proclamation announced

that she was bound ‘to the natives of Our Indian territories by the same obligations of duty which bind us to all our other subjects’, and her Indian subjects were to enjoy ‘the equal and impartial protection of the law‘. Historian Bernard Cohn

JUDITH

describes ment

the contrasting

and subject

(Cohn,

frameworks

as a feudal

T.

for defining

versus

661

KENNY

modernist

duty

and

conception

loyalty

of social

between

govern-

and political

order

1983: 166).

As the British

rethought

the manner

in which

authority

was to be represented

to the

Indians, George Trevelyan stated the dominant lesson taught the colonials (Trevelyan, 1858: 58): ‘(the revolt) irresistibly reminded us that we were an imperial race, holding our own on a conquered of the importance crisis British rule coincided

soil by dint of valour

and foresight.’

of the ties of race, in contrast faced. The Victorian revival

with the waning

of reform

A new and enduring

to those of culture, of theories relating

enthusiasm

sense

emerged from the race and climate

in India. As early as September

1857, an

in the Economist asked:

editorial

whether India is to be governed as a colony or as a Conquest whether we are to rule our Asiatic subjects with strict and generous justice wisely and beneficently, as their natural and indefeasible superiors, by virtue of our higher civilization, our purer religion, our sterner energies or whether we are to regard the Hindoos and Mahomedans as our equal fellow citizens, fit to be entrusted with the functions of self-government, ripe (or to be ripened) for British institutions, likely to appreciate rhe blessing of our rule, and, therefore, to be gradually prepared, as our own working classes are preparing, for full participation in the privileges of representative assemblies, trial by jury, and all the other palladia of English liberty (cited in Metcalf. 1994: 58) The liberal the

presumption

violence

difference

of

replaced

determinism

‘struggle

conflict

took

‘scientific

rational

and educable

racialized

politics

racism

but provided

did not create

for interpretations

theory’s

inherently

A dominant,

fell apart

in

inherent

emphasizing

it.

Environmental support

that all men were

1857-1858.

of history

for survival’

place

racism’,

that

provided

and superiority racial character

already

tied

a mechanism

was defined was spatially

race

by which

region.

scientific

Evolutionary

racial differentiation

(Livingstone, referenced

additional

and

and

1994: 141). Through

in a ‘world unalterably

this

bound

by the imperatives of race, evolution, and climate‘ (Kennedy, 1990: 137). Statements made in terms of moral and cultural superiority earlier in the century attributed these qualities to a racial

superiority

phrase-‘the blessings

supported

inestimable of British

1877, British administrators

of implementing

standing

the new

order

of India. In an atmosphere

civil and military

personnel

of recent

assumed

danger,

primary

commonly

with

despite

medical

statistics

troops

in the higher

personnel

British

interests

the health

importance.

the

used

slogan

that did not necessarily

elevations,

while

worked and

‘the

rather

out the

their

and well-being

Climate

The assumption created growing

In an 1868 Lancet article, Sir J Ronald Martin-who Commission on the health of the army in India-proposed all European

the

replaced

and military

by juggling

dominated discussion of preferable environments, enjoy better health in the hill and plateau country military retirees

Subsequently,

of civilization’-was

rule’.

From 1857 through means

by geography.

benefits

under-

of British

than

disease

that Europeans would enclaves of civilian and match their reputations.”

became a member of Royal an elaborate plan for keeping ‘natives’

policed

the plains

(Curtin.

1989: 47). He recommended that the ‘European’ troops move down into the plains for only a few months of exercises during the cool season. The Royal Commission went part way and recommended that a third of the European force should be left in hill stations on rotation, unhealthy‘.

although

strategic

points

in the plains

had to be occupied,

‘whether

healthy

or

662 Soon

Theories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India after the transformation

of imperial

summer

capital of the Raj. The original

station,

however,

rebellion,

was

Sir John

cautiously

Lawrence,

made.

began

government,

decision The

first viceroy

the practice

ment to the hills during the hot weather

a hill station

to conduct

became

government named

the

from a hill

after

of an official relocation

the

1857

of govern-

in May 1864. In a letter to the Secretary

of

State in London (Charles Wood), Lawrence acknowledged the significance of the decision by noting the expense and the unpopularity of such a move, describing it as a change

that required

advantage

of a cooler

serious consideration.

noting that more work might be done Calcutta’s days (Buck, hills would existed on preserved

His supporting

climate and the growing

comments

on government

in the

debates. For many, no greater authority Lawrence-the man who, as governor,

peace in the Punjab during the 1857 rebellion

units to suppress

rested on the

day in Simla than the heat of five of

in one

1904). Years later, Lawrence’s

be used in the Parliamentary administration in India than

argument

work loads of imperial government,

and supplied troops from his

the uprising.

Wood responded

that the question of moving Government

be decided ‘off hand’. Furthermore,

annually was too serious to

he stated that ‘It is only by some management

that I

have prevented their (the Council’s) objections to going to Simla year after year’ (Lawrence Papers; Wood to Lawrence, 18 December, 1964). However, he continued: ‘They could not I am sure agree to its being cast down as the rule formally; but I may in each year prevent an objection

till it becomes

the practice. But you must not try them too

hard. They will get out of their unfashionable

notions

locating a new capital which would suit Europeans for a double capital. He advocated

Darjeeling,

Calcutta-or

Both offered

Poona,

near Bombay.

in time.’ Wood recommended

climatically, thus avoiding the need

a hill station only one day by rail from good communications

with England

given their proximity to the major coastal cities. The first was rejected as inadequate to the needs of government therefore

while the second

too easily cut off (Kanwar,

appeared

too inaccessible

1990: 38-39).

to Upper India and

Not being able to select a site that

would be the sole capital, Calcutta and Simla served as the appropriate seasonal locations. Transportation

improvements

increased

accessibility

and shortened

travel time between

the two capitals to 62 hours.’ Offered his choice of hill stations, Lawrence explanations

drew from an imperial geography

remained

a firm advocate

of Simla. His

that involved far more than a discussion

of relative temperature: Here you are with one foot, I may say, in the Punjab, and another in the northwest provinces. Here you are among a docile population and yet near enough to influence Oudh. Around you, in a word, are all the warlike races of India, all those on whose character and power our hold in India, exclusive of our own countrymen, depends (cited in Barr, 1978: 23). Thus, rather than being isolated, the summer capital was the symbolic

heart of British

India in the midst of a more desirable ‘race“ of people than the Bengali. Race and climate can be read as the underpinnings of the British classification of the peoples of India, a system which gave further shape to the theories of imperial rule. Regional differences were generally expressed in the classical terms of environmental determinism as suggested by Lawrence’s description of the warlike races of north-central India and the docile hill people. Within a few years, member of Parliament Charles Dilke felt compelled conventional

defense of the summer capital, stating:

to provide the

JUUITHT. KENNY

663

The climate of Simla is no mere matter of curiosity. It is a question of serious interest in connection with the retention of our Indian Empire Simla gives vigour to the Government, and a hearty English tone to the State papers issued in the hot months (Dilke, 1868). Despite

the insistence

on the essential

a dozen years before the imperial of decision-making as a necessary

British qualities

summer practice

required

for administration,

capital was formally recognized of the Government of India.

it took

by all levels

Initially, the Viceroy’s privileges and the promise of greater efficiency did not extend as readily to other officials of the new Raj. Given the distinction between imperial and local

government

their

use of the hill stations.

to relocate posed

responsibilities,

to the

Nilgiris,

the question

both

occasions.

at the time, months

WaS

request

would

of the year the Council the council.

Napier’s

was

denied.

The minute

was granted.

proposing

The official

(1861-1863)

and was denied

Lord Napier,

be convened

at their own

which

on

governor

in the hills.

discretion.

Prior

For four or five resulted

stay of government

this scheduled

to justify

first applied

Denison

his term

was rarely complete

by only a few members.

longer

Presidency

Sir William during

that his council take leave

of Madras

laboured

of the Madras

of State twice

recommended

of council

made

governments

a governor

not until 1870 that approval

cautiously

or decisions united

the

to the Secretary

It

to 1870, members

provincial

When

in delays on the hills

visit to Ootacamund

revealed

caution: 1 need scarcely say that the project now submitted has nothing in common with any scheme for the permanent removal of the Government from Madras. Relieving, as I do, that all the chief interests and establishments of the country must always be associated with the plains, no one would deprecate more warmly than I the habitual or prolonged alienation of the Council from its traditional and appropriate seat (cited in 7&e Madras Mud. January 5, 1885).

He requested

that members

a lo- to 12-week was

reluctantly

Council

period. approved

to the hill station

The migration people

and

traditional

of about

materials. practice

of government

be allowed

Even this proposal,

which

with

one

condition-no

in the interest a dozen

Years

of moving

later,

Indian

of economy.

members a governor’s

to Ootacamund

to ‘take their holiday

by later standards clerks

wife

were

That ban was soon

of government

produded

described

(Pentland,

together’

for

was quite modest,

what

to accompany lifted. a great

by then

train of was the

1928: 137).

after 1870 the Madras Government was transferred there from April to October every year. Government House was built by the Duke of Buckingham between 1876 and 1880 and after that the Governor always moved up for the hot weather to Ootacamund, about 350 miles from Madras. Several special trains conveyed this patriarchal following of staff, band clerks, servants of all kinds with their families, between five and six hundred souls. besides nearly a hundred horses from the stables; the cows of the dairy took their leisurely wa) by road.’ From humble

beginnings,

the Madras Governor’s

and Council’s

annual

exodus

to the hills

grew both in terms of the number of staff members involved and the duration of the stay. As efforts were made to accommodate government in an imperial style (Kenny, 1995), there was discussion in the hill station of the inevitability of Ootacamund becoming the permanent residence of the Rai:

capital of the presidency. In 1877, the proponents in Ootacamund pointed to geographic advantages

of government’s permanent required for siting a capital

7beories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

664

There are 5 cardinal points: access;

3. Possess

European

space

troops;

defense;

1. It should have a commanding for, and be well

4. Out of the reach

Such an argument

hoped

position;

2. Easy

to the encampment

of an attacking

5. Within quick reach of the chief productive

(abe South of India Observer January

geographies

adapted

foe, capable energies

of

of easy

of its Province

24, 1877).

to redraw the symbolic

map of the Presidency.

Imperial

were redefined by ascribing strategic advantages to the site and privileging

its location ‘within’ the cotton-producing

region described as the chief productive energy

of the province. The caution marks for ‘within’ are drawn because the Nilgiri Hills which lowlands. Reference

separate

the region

to the encampment

quite dramatically

of soldiers conformed

of the topography

of

from the area in the

to accepted policy which

sought to keep as many British soldiers in the hills and plateau country as possible where the medical authorities expected

better health. Employing the metaphor of Ootacamund

as the ‘invigorating heart of the Presidency,’

the newspaper’s

editor concludes that: ‘As the

source of circulation does not proceed from the extremities of an organism, so I think the circulation of Government should not emanate from Madras, a dusty and distant extremity ‘8 Colonial administrators viewed the hills as the scene of ‘future glories’ for an imperial race and a location where their empire could be saved. As successors invaders, they validated the shift away from the maritime locations centres of western-educated,

Theories

of government:

While post-Darwinian superiority

middle-class

Indian populations.

‘The hills vs. the plains’

racial theories

and government’s

educational

policy-intent

could be drawn upon to naturalize

location on

in the hills, the effects

eliminating

cultural

of the voice of western-educated

late-nineteenth

politics.

nationalism

(Dasgupta,

hall meetings.

broader

through memorials,

In the case of government

Utilitarian particularly

Indians characterized

and less articulate

and the practice of political influence.

they asserted themselves

organized opposition

Something

1977: ix) arose in the 1870s as Indians

attention to government associations,

Indian

both British

of earlier

difference-became

influential. A growing awareness century

to other northern and away from the

demonstrated

than a new

Forming urban political

petitions and organized town

from the hills, the most impressive display of

came in the form of the Madrassi Petition to Parliament in 1884. For

many of those in India who never saw the hills, they became

a symbol of government’s

disregard for the people of India. In the Madrassi newspapers,

the practice of government

from the Nilgiris for nine months of the year was decried as ‘desertion

of the plains’,

‘abuse of the hills’, ‘the official evacuation’ and ‘an alienation of the rulers and the ruled’. Of the 30 000 signatures attached to the 1884 petition, the majority were Indian residents of the Presidency joined by members of the Anglo-Indian business community, missionaries, and the press. Ootacamund had served as a summer capital of the ‘Raj’ for 14 years when British Parliament was asked to consider the ‘Humble Petition of Her Majesty’s European, began:

Hindu, and Mahomedan

HUMBLY

SHEWETH,-That

exercising

their constitutional

India, of submitting administration

Your

subjects

Memorialists

privilege,

for the consideration

in the Presidency

are desirous

as subjects

of this portion of Her Majesty’s Dominions

Empress

since the year 1653.

of

House. that the

is conducted

most part from the Nilgiri Hills, instead of from the Presidency which has been the seat of Government

of respectfully

of the Queen

of Your Honourable

of Madras’. It

for the

town of Madras,

Their arguments,

665

T. KENNY

JUDITH

reflecting a modernist conception

of political and social order, claimed

that they were more loyal to the true goals of the Indian Empire than were their English rulers. They expressed

ideas of civil liberties

and representational

government

ruler’s own rhetoric. Such nascent nationalism required a response. Several major events preceded the petition and suggest the context During the Imperial Assemblage

in the

for their action.

of 1877, which named Queen Victoria empress of India,

she cabled the message that her rule was based on the great principles of liberty, equity and justice,

‘which would promote

their happiness’

and add to their ‘prosperity

advance their welfare’ (Cohn, 1983: 206). A year later, in a more representative Vernacular Press Act was introduced government’s unpopular Afghan War.

to silence

Indian

Lord Ripon’s arrival in India as Viceroy (1880-1884) an era of British and Indian cooperation

newspapers’

and

action, the

criticism

of the

inaugurated what might have been

at all levels of administration.

Summarizing

his

priority for the Secretary of State, he stated: ‘You may rely upon it that there are few Indian questions

of greater importance

in the present day than those which relate to the mode

in which we are to deal with the growing body of natives educated by ourselves in Western learning and Western ideas’ (Martin, 1969: 1). His solution was to create municipal and district government or military) members,

boards with elected local non-official

(e.g. civil service

thus making good use of the ‘rapidly growing

intelligent class

of public spirited men who it is not only bad policy, but sheer mste

of power to fail to

utilise.’ His liberal goals, however, were sabotaged Perhaps

the most effective

lesson

inspiration to nationalist organization 1883, Ripon’s newly appointed

by an unwilling bureaucracy.

in the future of liberal politics in Indian and an came in the form of the controversial

law member,

Sir Courtney

remove racial restrictions enacted in 1872. Under these restrictions, British Judicial Service could not try cases involving Europeans. Indian associations

protested

‘peers or equals’ of Europeans (Wolpert,

Ilbert bill. In

Ilbert, introduced

a bill to

Indian judges in the

Quickly organized Anglo-

the liberal bill arguing that ‘nigger natives’ were not the and, therefore,

1982: 257). Anglo-Indian

had no business

public opinion

presiding over their trial

was so united in its outrage

over

government’s

effort to remove bias in the legal system that the bill was defeated. Despite

the message

conveyed

in its defeat,

Indians learned

the lessons

of organized

protest

through the storm raised by the Ilbert Bill. Sir Mountstuart Geographical

Grant

Duff,

who

Society, was appointed

would

become

the

as the liberal governor

president

of

the

Royal

of the Madras Presidency

during Ripon’s term as viceroy. He did not share Ripon’s liberal views of government

in

India. Writing to the Secretary of State, he argued: We imagine that we can govern here on the principles which are recognized as best for Western societies-Call them liberal principles or what you willforgetting that our being here at all is if this country were fit theatre for these excellent principles an usurpation and atrocity (Lyall Collection, MS Eur. F. 132. 10 June. 1884). Such an attitude, although expressed presidency. The Hindu, an Indian-run

privately, was common newspaper, had described

knowledge in the Grant Duff a year

earlier: All that philosophical

radicalism, the maxims of democracy, of representative government, in fact of good government itself. are all good to European people: but to the semi-civilised races of India paternal despotism IS the only good government possible. On this conviction he has ever endea\,oured to uphold

7beories of imperial authortty and the British hill stations in India

666

the measures of individual European officers, especially the executive, and has shown utter contempt for public feeling (The Hindu, July 19, 1883). Grant Duff had incurred the wrath of many in south India by what was judged to be an excessive

reliance on the bureacracy

Grant Duff described

and a disregard for public opinion.

the protest against use of the summer capital as a: ‘clique of

agitators in the Presidency towns are fanning the old jealousies between Calcutta and Simla, Bombay and Poona, Madras and Ootacamund You know what hollow rubbish it all is-’

(Northbrook

Collection,

MSS Eur. C. 144, No. 6). Nonetheless,

several days

before the meeting to draft the Madrassi petition, the Madras presidency’s

governor came

down from his hill to address the city’s residents. He used the ceremony

for the opening

of the Madras Drainage Works project as an occasion

‘Madras, in my

for his remarks:

opinion, wants nothing but good sanitation to be, making allowance for the fact that it lies far within the tropics, a most agreeable I pass elsewhere’

(77zMadrus

Duff was not sincere in his preference Ootacamund,

place. I for one infinitely prefer it to that which

Mail, July 1, 1884). There is no reason to believe that Grant for Madras. In one of his few private references

he wrote: ‘I am very grateful to Ootacamund,

both to my wife and to the children

.; but I have never myself cared much either for the

climate or the life’ (Grant Duff, 1886; 262-263). Dismissing personal preference, he moved from a compliment major city to a justification

to

which has been most useful

of the location of government

for the Presidency’s

in the hill station:

If, however, anyone wishes me to go a step further and to say that I think gentlement from ‘the rainy isles’ who have spent long years in India, can be expected to do work even in a tropical garden of Eden anything like as well as they do it, among the Wiltshire downs, seven thousand feet nearer the skies, on the plateau of the Nilgiris, I must respectfully take leave to differ from him. There comes before my mind’s eye the picture of one of the most hard working men in the Presidency, rubbing his hands in a driving Scotch mist, as happy as a Newfoundland dog on a frosty day in England. That is a sight welcome to a Governor who likes to get through business, and it is a sight which would be against nature to expect when the thermometer stands among the nineties. Ootacamund’s

‘Wiltshire downs’, ‘driving Scotch mist’, and ‘frosty day in England’, are

phrases that create an image of Britain. Grant Duff saw such a place as an environment appropriate for the efficient workings of a British administration in India. In effect, he stated that it was both an appropriate

and necessary

adaptation

to the conditions

of

imperial government: The shadow does not go back upon the dial and until some place is created in each Province of India, which will fulfil the functions of a capital all the year round (a thing not likely to happen in this geological period, which will last our time) you may be very sure that from the Himalayas to Cape Cormorin the existing, not perfect, but sufficiently convenient, dual arrangement will continue. These being the circumstances with which we have got to deal, what should Madras wish for? Listing his definition of ‘our chief duties in India’, his apology moved from an explanation of the location of government to a statement of his commitment to ‘concrete, palpable improvements’ for India. Phrased in rational and scientific terms, albeit a ‘gentlemanly’ science, his arguments made the arrangements as evident as natural laws governing climate and geological periods. By attempting to displace anger with his reference to ‘what Madras should wish for’, Grant Duff claimed understanding of their needs and the

JUDITH

special

knowledge

required

T.

KENNY

to meet them. Thus, he made

imperialism’ was the work of British administrators the people. claimed, sensible

667

Certainly not the ‘small clique of wire-pullers’

exerted

‘little influence’

things, bridges,

that a ‘modernizing

Chr

and required no direct involvement

over the masses

in India who only wanted

roads, railways & so on (Dufferin

Collection-Reel

comments

effectively tied together the discourse of imperialism that encodes

economic

and political control

of the non-western

climate that relates climate, health, productivity,

of

in the large towns who, he

world; the European

and racial difference;

‘quite

501). His the right to discourse

of

and, the privilege

the Utilitarians gave to specialists’ knowledge. Announcing

that ‘numerous

Europeans

& Native speakers

well-known

in Madrds’

would participate in a meeting on July 2nd, a public notice called for participants to join a petition to parliament.

The London

European,

in denouncing

are unanimous

Times noted earlier that newspapers, the system of Government

native and

from the Hills (June

16. 1884). As reported in 7&e Hindu, participants in the felt involved a significant event for India Her millions stood forth as one man, gigantic in their strength, but at the same time imperturbable in their allegiance to constituted authority. She (sic) took reason and good sense for her guides. Display of violence there was none. Through her spokesmen, she waged a moral war against unfeeling despotism, and her triumph was simply decisive may Rajah Sir T. Madhavd Rao lead the people to constitutional victory and moral triumph. May our Anglo-Indian brethren ever fight by our side, in the cause of justice and agamst perpetrators of national wrong (irhe Hindu, July 4, 1884). A crowd too large to be accommodated

in any public hall attended, so they appropriated

the British military’s Esplanade. The irony was not lost on the editor of 7&z Madras Mail who reported that ‘the Esplanade was taken possession ‘what will happen

of in vast force’. commenting-

to the Sheriff when the Commander-in-Chief

hardly think.’ The editor explained

hears of this we dare

the practical and symbolic meaning of the gathering

site: The Esplanade is to the Black Town of Madras what Hyde Park, or Regent’s Park is to London, a wide extent of open ground that acts as a lung, or breathing space. It intervenes between the town and Fort St. George, whrch alike protects and dominates the town. But, strange to say, as cannot be said of Hyde Park or Regent’s Park, the public whose property the Esplanade presumably is, are not possessed of the right of holding public meetings there. The Esplanade is under military law to the south-east of it is the old Fort, which historians regard as the seed whence sprang the mighty Indian Empire (The Madras Mail: July 4. 1884). The

dramatic

confidence

setting

for the

protest

meeting

was

serendipitous

yet matched

the

of the crowd. Capitalizing upon its symbolic quality, the local press claimed

it as an appropriate

site for launching

the petition.

Rajah Sir T. Madava Row, KCSI, described by 7;be Madras Mail as the statesman who formerly directed, with admirable success, the destinies of Travancore’, and subsequently ‘led Baroda from the slough of despond into the paths of pleasantness and peace’, convened the meeting. The Rajah carried titles that confirmed his loyalty to the Queen Empress in terms of the new feudal order. The initials following his name indicate his receipt of the Star of India-a royal order of Indian knights. Yet, his commitment mS also phrased in the terms of modernizing order which advanced the progress ofcivilization for a

Theories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

668

people in the ‘slough of despond’. Giving further credibility to the gathering, Sir Alexander MacKenzie, a member of the Madras Presidency’s Legislative Council and a leading figure in the Madras commercial

world, was the event’s key speaker. MacKenzie indicated that this

issue primarily concerned

the ‘sons of the soil’, but since the protest had been formed by the

Indian community he would lend his voice. He described the dispute as being ‘between the whole population of Southern India and a few members of the administration who form the Headquarter

staff’. The Presidency

convenience

rather than manage them for the public.

administration

The drain of funds from the provincial

exploited

treasury

resources

for their personal

for the summer

capital was one

concern, as was the loss of a month of work caused by the coming and going of the upper echelons of government. The most significant concern, however, was the isolation of government.

MacKenzie

government

brought

both

laughter

from the hill station with ‘doctoring’

woman who could

not appear

and

support

when

a gosha woman-that

he

compared

is, a secluded

in public:

looks rather like a doctor examining a gosha woman through a purdah (curtain). I believe that the process is that she puts her hands and tongue through the slits in the purdah (curtain), and has her pulse felt and her tongue examined. The doctor cannot, of course, form any very good idea from that, and usually prescribed as simply as possible, and leaves nature to do the rest (7j?e Madras Mail: July 4, 1884). His metaphor

not only defined

the contemporary

relationship

of government

to the

people of the plains, it also represented many people’s view that government must check the ‘pulse’ of the population. Just as with a doctor, the government would administer to or act on the people rather than with them. Other meanings discourse

cling to his comparison.

underpinning

dangerous,

the notion

passive and emotional.

Britain produced

a devaluation

Gender

served as an aspect

that India was a ‘feminized’ The opposition

of a feminized

of imperial

land-seductive

and

India to a masculine

of the Indian male. India was ruled by womanly

men

(Metcalf, 1994: 104). The seclusion of Indian women-and the state of moral degeneration implied-became a primary representation of Indian men’s inability to order their households

properly. Confined ‘to a life of languid idleness in closed rooms,

hidden from view’, India’s women suggested unhealthy sexuality and disabling passivity while the zenana and veil represented languid

idleness

in closed

rooms,

a state of moral degeneration:

Confined

to life of

hidden

from view, India’s women were seen as suffused with an unhealthy sexuality & a disabling passivity’ (Metcalf, 1994). India’s men did not properly order their household officials had not either.

and, by conducting

gosha government,

British

Throughout the debate, humorous discussions of climate and efficiency emphasized the petitioners’ belief in the greater need of governmental proximity to the governed. Other facetiously suggested that if distance from the ruled was acceptable then the Presidency’s business could as easily be administered in Simla or, to obtain climatic benefits, in New Zealand or even London. Technological progress and an efficient bureaucracy could support either side of the argument-justifying the status quo or suggesting that the separation be taken to new lengths. One Anglo-Indian critic suggested that retired administrators in London might be preferred given their knowledge of the presidency and benefits of the English location: retired Anglo-Indian officials would certainly run no risk of having their view of native character distorted by irritating intercourse, for months together

669

JUDITH T. KENNY

with native domestic servants, demoralized by an uncongenial temperature, nor would they be allowed by home society to think of themselves more highly than they ought to think (7%e Madras Mail; July 4, 1884). The discourse of climate, and its association

with race, fuelled both sides of the argument

as well. ‘Native domestic servants, demoralized by an uncongenial temperature’ is as appropriated to this discourse as is the image of ‘one of the most hard working men in the Presidency government

rubbing his hands in a driving Scotch mist’. And while the argument against from the hills suggest

assumed to make it less accessible The appropriateness appropriate

isolation

due to distance,

the hill climate

is also

to the Indians.

of climate for the British administrator

was countered

with the

conduct of duty in the following challenge:

The study of the biographies of great Englishmen, Scotchmen and Irishmen whom India has known enforces this, among many salutary lessons, that it was felt by those that had the chief hand, under Providence, in building up this Empire, that the longer they lived in the country the more they did discover their own ignorance, and the more readily, therefore did they accept such counsel and support as their native fellow-subjects and coadjutors placed at their disposal (The Madras Mail July 4, 1884). The petitioners governing.

believed

They countered

that the hill stations were appropriate

to resort living-not

the claims of increased efficiency with the image of men on activities. Both the wisdom and constitution of the new

holiday pursuing leisure administrators were questioned

as they were denounced

for their ‘effeminate dread of the

conditions existent in the plains’ and their residence in ‘an European official atmosphere that is repugnant to liberty of opinion.’ The appeal to the traditional virtues of a heroic past was intended to counter those who defined the hill station as an efficient work place accessible

to the plains due to technological

With confidence

progress.

in their cause, the Madras petitioners

argued:

the principle contended for is in harmony with the modern perception of what is fairly due to a race, that loyally accepts a yoke, which must be galling unless it is wrapped around with the sympathy of close personal intercourse (Memotial, July 2, 1884; reprinted in The Madras Mail: July 4, 1884). On the strength of the protest that was launched other newspapers

across India, the petitioners

in Madras and supported

in at least 30

predicted

victory: ‘Madras may claim to

have placed the whole Empire under a great obligation

by her timely protests against

selfish conduct of the government

in regard to the hills’ (77~ Madras Mail; July 4, 1884).

They did not believe they could change the minds of members of the India Office whose ‘caste feeling of bureaucracy’,

it was assumed, would lend sympathy to the government

(me Madras Mail; September

11, 1884). Despite this, confident editorials suggested that

the ‘reformed and Radical Parliament’ would recognize overdone

that going to the hills had been

and issue orders to stop future migrations.

Rather than being thoroughly

‘thrashed out by the London press, and in Parliament’, as

was anticipated by at least 7Z1eMadras Mail, the issue received only scant attention. Lord Napier, the governor who initiated the use Ootacamund as the official summer capital of the presidency, presented the Madrassi Memorial to the House of Commons. The petitioners assumed that his advocacy would strengthen their request since he decried the contemporary practice as excessive in time and expense. However, regardless of party affiliation, Parliamentary members’ responses minimized the importance of the criticism. Secretary of State, Lord Kimberley, defended the practices of the Liberal heads of

Theories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

670 government relocation

in India by arguing that Lord Lawrence’s seemed almost conclusive

also insisted that the apprehension hill stations was unfounded.

position on summer government’s

(cited in me Madras Mail; December that government

means of locomotion’.

7%e Timesof London assessed the debate considering concluded

in the

The Marquis of Salisbury stated that the ‘change had been

brought about simply due to the increased Simla and Ootacamund

4, 1884). He

would fii itself permanently

(reprinted

both the Government

in 7Xre Madras Mail, January

retreats of

5, 1885). The editorial

that it ‘must be the common fate of an autocratic Government

anywhere’ to be

in ‘danger of making mistakes about the wishes and wants of the people with whom it has to deal.’ The newspaper

report argued that ‘native’ opinion rarely reached government

in

the plains, let alone in the hills. While at first reading, this appears to censor government for its inaccessibility whose opinions

to Indian opinion instead it separated out the parts of the population

should be considered.

Middle-class,

represent any interest other than their own-as

western educated

Indians did not

colonial administrators argued-and

their

interests were felt to be at odds with the greater good of ‘the native’. Furthermore,

‘what

they are most certain to hear and be influenced community,

by, is the opinion of the Anglo-Indian

and by going to the (hills) they escape from this, or from its close pressure

at all events.’ Concluding

statements

in iSbe Times article dealt with the ‘unfavourable

climatic

especially

affected

conditions’

that

expressed the dominant Government of India. India,

whether

economy Service

view

viewed

by liberals

and sense of prestige. served

in England

to strengthen

the

European

which

was

or conservatives,

one

of these

7;be Times

of sympathy

was important

A myth of the self-sacrificing

trust in the wisdom

population.

with the

to the British

men of the Indian Civil ‘men on the spot’. The

Utilitarians’ faith in ‘the expert’ gained a romantic gloss when coupled with ‘service to the empire’. Challenges to the summer capitals continued unsuccessfully until the practice of conducting was discontinued

provincial government

for another 50 years

from relatively remote locations

in the 1930s.

Conclusion In 1830, members of the Madras Government

wrote that the only ‘public evil’ associated

with the ‘discovery’ of Ootacamund

was the ‘excess of affection’ inspired in those ‘whose

public duties require their presence

elsewhere’.

rulers of India, changed orientation

significantly

Who should be where, as defined by the

during the nineteenth

of the East India Company’s administration,

assessed cautiously.

Reformist sentiments

century. With the pragmatic

the value of the hill stations was

of a utilitarian regime might suggest the need

for a new imperial seat but the new order required proximity to the Indian people. After the revolt of 1857, British confidence in colonial control was shaken. The Utilitarians’ earlier assumption of mutable cultural difference was replaced by the assumption of inherent racial difference-and racial difference was linked to environmental needs determined by climatic conditions. The ‘natural’ arrangement for colonial administrators justified the use of the hill stations as summer capitals and the health and well-being of British civil and military personnel assumed primary importance. Furthermore, whether feudal or modernist conceptions of social and political order predominated in the years following 1857, the specialists’ knowledge was privileged over any need for direct access between subject and ruler. Reading the quotation that cites the hills as he ‘curse of modern India’ suggests a liberal belief in the right to accessible government. Such an interpretation has historical

JUDITHT. foundation

in Utilitarianism’s influence

would

easy

be

representative

to exaggerate

671

KENNY

on British governmental

the early

form of government-their

Utilitarians

policy in India. While it

commitment

higher commitment

a society of individuals governed by certain ‘scientific principles-the imperial government

contained

this liberal political philosophy.

justice under the law’ are examples nineteenth

century Anglo-Indian

to the members of the

by virtue of their association

society as a whole. With Western education,

Indian experience

with British

and beliefs overlapped

with the colonials’. The 1884petition to Parliament, reflecting a modernist conception political

and

government

social

order,

made

demands

for civil

liberties

and

of

representational

in the rulers’ rhetoric.

An intertwined

and evolving set of arguments

related to climate,

authority ultimately justified the practice of government discourses

are underscored

in a contextual

capital’s superior

position

linked to the Madras Presidency

an environment

climatically

colonial

In the case of Ootacamund,

in the hills of southern business

the

India was metaphorically

administrator’s claim to a superior knowledge

to rule. Above the interests of the Anglo-Indian voice of the Indian middle-class,

race and imperial

in the hills. Dominant

analysis of the hill stations as summer capital

but such an analysis also reveals a significant competition. summer

of

field of theories of

Utilitarianism and ‘equal

of beliefs that had significance community

to a democratic,

being the establishment

community

the men from the ‘rainy isle’ exercised

suited to their race. The members

and ability

and the growing their judgment in

of the Government

of

India, both literally and figuratively, were claiming the high ground. At the same time, the symbolic

significance

of the

hill station

was

established

for an emerging

Indian

nationalism.

Acknowledgments

I am very grateful for the comments of John Agnew, Suparna Chatterjee, James Duncan and three anonymous reviewers on earlier versions of this paper. Funds from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the International Studies Program, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee supported this research.

Notes 1. ‘European’ was used as a racial category by the British to distinguish themselves from their Indian subjects-and is used with that historical meaning in this paper. 2. Anglo-Indian was applied to the Eurasian population in India only after World War I. The nineteenth century definition of the term is employed throughout this paper. 3. The title of Viceroy was attached to the governor-general position only after 1857. This additional title acknowledged the significance of the highest ranking administrator in British India as the Queen’s representative. 4. Bailcie (1834) also warned that women were unsuited to the hill station climate because of their ‘highly mobile’ temperaments and/or preference for the social life of the urban centres in the plains. By the end of the nineteenth century, others described the hill station as best suited to ‘dames, damsels, small boys and ponies’ (7&e Madras Mail: April 1, 1884). 5. Cultural synthesis was valued by many Indians exposed to Western culture. One of the most prominent, Ram Mohun Roy (1772-1833) valued certain aspects of Utilitarian liberalism while warning of a future conflict if government by the ‘enlightened’ British nation did not give way to Indian nationalism.

672

Thories of imperial authority and the British hill stations in India

6. Bangalore serves as an example of the disparity between reputation and actual medical statistics. For more than a century, Bangalore than 1000 military veterans

was the preferred

residence

for civilian retiree and for more

despite the fact that death rates were much higher in this tableland

area than on either coast, or in coastal Burma (Curtin, 1989: 48). 7. Early in the nineteenth

century, travel between

Calcutta and Simla required three to four weeks.

By 1869, rail travel from Calcutta to Delhi and then to Ambala could be accomplished hours. A cart road between in an additional

twelve hours (Kanwar,

8. Train service directly to Ootacamund Mettapollium-at occupied

1990: 39).

was only completed

the foot of the Nilgiri hills-did

carts brought people

in fifty

Ambala and Simla could be covered by the Viceroy and his entourage

and goods up the remaining

in 1908, and service from Madras to

not exist prior to 1873. Tongas and bullock 31 miles of narrow, winding roads. The time

in horse transit for this last portion of the journey was eight to ten hours.

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