Topic: Impact of West on Modern India

Question : Critically Examine the Impact of West on Modern India?

Answer :

In the eighteenth century, Indian society was rigid within itself, but not closed to external influences. By the first half of the eighteenth century, the Europeans had become a definite factor in Indian politics. By way of a historic accident the eighteenth century was an age of unusual mental and physical activities that Europe came nearer to India. During the second half of the eighteenth century and the early decades of the nineteenth century the effects of that impact became manifest.

European influence operated in three spheres economic, religious and political. The trade and commerce which the Europeans carried on ruinously influenced the total Indian Economy It was through their religions and political activities that the Europeans, on necessity, came very close to the Indian ways of life. Or, more precisely, they broke through the seclusion of the Indian society for the purpose of preaching their own religion as well as introducing their own political and legal systems. India, too, had to understand the West. The impact was not merely on imposition. It was also in the nature of an accommodation.

The religious activities of the European missionaries brought Christianity to a direct confrontation with Hinduism. For India it was a blessing in disguise that the Christian missionaries felt so strongly against some of her socio-religious customs. Practised through ignorance they were required to be exposed by an external agency. Indirectly, the Christian crusade against Hinduism inspired higher Hindu minds a sense of inwardness to discover in the inner core of their own religion, concepts of monotheism, and all other higher philosophies to feel proud of thus the impact of Christianity led to external and internal change.

Bengali literature, too, began to develop under the patronage of the missionaries. The missionaries established a printing press at Serampore. The press also caused the birth of journalism. The impact of the west was also felt politically. The leader of the new administration could not, of necessity, have been composed only of Englishmen; its lower rungs had to be filled with Indians. The people, long accustomed to dealing with foreigners in trade, felt attracted to join their administration. There was the necessity for them to learn English. Early in the nineteenth century, Calcutta led the way in the new desire to acquire knowledge of the English language. In other parts of India, a similar desire was awakened. In 1817, the famous Hindu College was founded in Calcutta with encouragement from David Hare, Rammohan Roy and Radhakanta Dev. In 1818, some Christian missionaries, with the help of some influential Indians established an English School at Banares. In any case, the greater impact of the West was bound to percolate through education, with far-reaching consequences.

There was yet another platform on which West-East understanding took shape. At first, to the leaders of Indian thought, Englishmen either as traders rulers or missionaries were enemies of the Indian culture, religion and traditions. But such an antagonistic attitude began to subside because of the unique role of some notable Englishmen who dedicated their Indian careers to discovering India. William Jones founded the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1784. With earnest compatriots like Charles Wilkins and H.T. Colobrooke, he initiated the, great movement of discovering India. The history and literature, and many facets of Indian civilization began to emerge steadily out of the limbo of oblivion. The more Western scholarship threw light on India, the greater research and learning.

The nineteenth century in the history of India possessed the same characteristics which the eighteenth century possessed in the history of Europe. It was an age of enlightenment and awakening, of renaissance and reforms, of rationalism and progress, which all ultimately culminated in a growing consciousness of the need for liberty and unity.

Throughout the nineteenth century there followed phase after phase of various reform movements in India to renovate the society and rationalise religious thoughts. The first in the series was the movement initiated by Raja Rammohan Roy.

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