british slave trader statue removed

Power and Dominance: The Indelible Link Between Race and Oppression

Protests in England have targeted the symbolic presence of the colonial era in the statues of statesmen and wealthy traders, prompting the need for a re-examination of colonial history.

The recent uprising and protests in a large number of White-settled countries in connection with the murder of an unarmed black American, George Floyd, by a white policeman on duty in Minneapolis has re-opened pages of history relating to unequal power, with state-sanction of white supremacy over ‘others’ having a subordinate status.

As history unfolds it, the over-powered acquired slaves from Africa, the indentured labour shipped from tropical Asia, while colonies like India provided the flow of unpaid ‘drain’ of surpluses from taxes collected within them. The pattern of racial dominance seems to have continued, even today, in the incapacitated Geoge Floyd’s choking to death.

One observes the vehement reactions to the murder from the present generation, both whites and the non-whites, mostly from Northern America and Britain. This comes not only with the claim that ‘Black Lives Matter’ but with questionings of repressive policies in the past, with the oppression of slaves in the US and elsewhere, and of labour from the tropics.

The anger is reflected in massive protests by the youth in different corners of the US as well as in Canada, followed by statues being overthrown in the UK. The dismantling of statues included that of Edward Colston in Bristol – the deputy governor of the then Royal African Company which had the monopoly in England, from 1662, of trade in precious metals and slaves along the west coast of Africa.

Colston organised the transportation of 84,000 Africans to different parts of the world as slaves. Well connected to the ruling elite including the royalty, Colston made a fortune and left a mark in Bristol where various buildings continue to bear his name to this day.

Also read: Bringing Down Statues Doesn’t Erase History, It Makes Us See It More Clearly

Protests in England, spread beyond Bristol to Oxford and London, have been targeting the symbolic presence of the colonial era in the statues of leading statesmen and wealthy traders from Britain’s era of global supremacy. The voices bring to the fore the need for a re-examination of colonial history – the modality of the colonial past engineered by statesmen like Robert Clive, Cecil Rhodes and even Winston Churchill who were rewarded for their successful handling of colonial matters. While this may involve further academic research on issues relating to colonialism, the anti-racism messages, hopefully, will also help in arresting the adversities faced by sections of society identified as the ‘other’ by white communities.

The Slave Trade by Auguste Francois Biard. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Digging up historical records of oppression, one may very well recall, the slaves in the background of the Civil War in the US, and the British Empire’s colonial past – the details of which may need further study. One comes across the loot of the taxed revenue from colonial India by Britain, the ruling nation, all under the pretext of meeting the so-called ‘home charges ’ to meet overseas expenditure.

As pointed by Indian nationalists like Dadabhai Naoroji, the tribute paid could be characterised as a ‘drain of resources’! One also needs to reckon, in a similar context, the collusion between the secretary of state for India in London and British silver merchants to keep out Bombay silver traders and bankers like Chunilal Saraya from the silver trade for coinage in India. Similar instances of coercion, malpractices and misappropriation abound in the history of British domination in colonial India.

Parallel to the drain of resources, which consisted of the unpaid transfers of revenue from colonial India, there ran a parallel drain from India, which was the flow of indentured labour. This labour was shipped to the British owned plantation islands in Mauritius, Demerara (now Guyana) and Jamaica, to work in sub-human conditions and to fulfil the commercial interests of the British elite owning such estates.

Also read: The British Empire Is Still Being Whitewashed in UK Schools – This Must Change

The flow was much needed in the plantations as slavery was banned all over the British Empire by an Act passed in the British Parliament in 1938. Incidentally, the legislation, advanced by the slavery abolition lobby in England, was also motivated by their interest in achieving efficiency by having a ‘free market’ of labour. However, the abolition of slavery, followed by other forms of deploying labour, was far from delivering a free labour market.

As for planters, the easiest way to keep the former slaves attached to the estates was to have them as apprentices over a short period. It was virtually a forced scheme of four to six years for the former slaves above the ages of six and a half – thus in effect a form of compensation to the planters. Moreover, the emancipated slaves were forced to provide over forty hours a week of unpaid labour to their former masters over the six years of apprenticeship. The scheme ended by 1838, largely with the reluctance of ex-slaves to continue as plantation workers.

Indenturing of labour started almost immediately afterwards with a fresh stream of involuntary workforce procured from India. Given the arduousness of the work and the sub-subsistence wages the planters were ready to pay, it soon became apparent that it was only those who were too poor to pay for even their own passage to the islands would accept such employment.

Thus, the planters’ targeted the denser populations of Asia which included those in the poverty and famine-stricken India. “..Importation of East Indian Coolies “, as pointed out by the Royal Commission of Labor (1892), “did much to rescue the sugar industry from bankruptcy”.

The workers were faced with a miserable state in a distant land, having been recruited with no knowledge of the destination or the terms of the make-believe contract. On reaching the workplace, their movements were under strict control with penalties including whipping by cat o’ nine tails to inflict severe punishments. On the whole, the flow of the recruited Indians signified a parallel process of drain from the subcontinent, of people often ‘ignorant’ of the destination or the life awaiting them there.

Also read: Transatlantic Slave Trade Was Not Entirely ‘Triangular’

Voyages to carry labour were organised, amongst others, by the well connected Liverpool merchant, John Gladstone, who was familiar with the earlier slave trade. As an owner of estates, plantations and a shipping company, Gladstone was responsible for initiating shipments of indentured labour from India by using the contact of Gillanders, Arbuthnot and Company in India with a request for the “…supply of 100 young, active, able-bodied” labourers on contract for his estates.

That he was powerful enough to stall a temporary ban on such shipping was evident with his success in persuading Robert Peel. The British administration was very supportive of the indenturing project which helped both investments on those estates by rich people from London and the mercantile trade in processing raw sugar from there.

Power, based on proximity to ruling authorities, has been responsible for using race as a tool for subordination. This is evident in the continuing pattern of oppression, from the colonial era down to the current episodes of brutality in the most advanced regions. Refusal and disapprovals, on part of the current generation, to accept the past, will hopefully help shape a future in harmony with humanity.

Sunanda Sen is a former Professor of Economics at the Jawaharlal Nehru University. She can be contacted at (sunanda.sen@gmail.com)

The Taking Down of the Colston Statue Should Make Indians Confront Our Own Past and Present

Our relationship with history is complex which allows destructive forces to use it to their advantage.

Many Indians will fully support the taking down of the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol. He was a slave trader and no matter how it is viewed, it was despicable and inhuman.

In the aftermath of the killing of George Lloyd by the police in the US, protesters have gone after what they see as a symbol of that sordid practice and Colston certainly was among them. A statue is a public reminder of that past and in this day and age should not stand in a public square, never mind if he also founded institutions in the city.

There is now also a move to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes in Oriel College in Oxford—Rhodes was a pioneer of the exploitative diamond trade, an imperialist and colonialist and an ardent believer in the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race.

But he funded a very prestigious scholarship in Oxford and a trust named after him set up a university in South Africa. In the post-apartheid era, Africans think that his statue and legacy should be removed to continue the process of reconciliation—in Oxford, many students agree and post the Colston episode, protests have been held against the Rhodes statue in Oxford. The college is against it. (Ironically, it was white Afrikaans-speaking students who had first demanded, in the 1950s, that a statue of Rhodes in Cape Town be taken down—history moves in intriguing ways).

Also read: What I Learnt at the ‘Rhodes Must Fall’ Protest in Oxford

Indians who support the fall of the Colston statue understand the ravages of colonialism. After all, we felt the brunt of it too.At the same time, this moment compels them have to confront their own history and grapple with all its grey shades. The debate on colonialism is a continuous one, but even more urgent now.

How does one view our history of the past few centuries? A good place to start is a hidden corner of the Bhau Daji Lad museum in Mumbai (it was once called the Victoria and Albert museum). In a tiny garden patch lie a handful of dismembered life-sized statues of British grandees of the Raj.

Lord Sandhurst, Governor of colonial Bombay at the turn of the 19th century, looks at into space, Marquess of Wellesley, Governor of Bengal and later the British Foreign Secretary, sits forlorn, his head missing, and the Empress of India, Queen Victoria, is unrecognisable with the nose chopped off. At one time, her statue had a magnificent canopy, but it disappeared and later surfaced in the garden of an industrialist.

Next to the museum, in the zoo, named Jijamata Udyan after Shivaji’s mother, (it was earlier named after Victoria), is the resplendent equestrian statue of Edward VII, the Prince of Wales. Thousands of visitors here to see the animals pass it by without a second glance, ignorant of the fact that this is the original ‘Kala Ghoda’ after which the eponymous art district of Mumbai was named. Only a few local history buffs know or care.

King Edward VII on the original ‘Kala Ghoda’ statue. Photo: The Wire Staff

These statues once occupied pride of place in Bombay – sometime after Independence, they were removed and the government, uncertain what to do with them, placed them in their present location. In Delhi, Coronation Park is where the colonial-era statues of the city lie. It is a history best dealt with by ignoring it.

There are very important differences with the pulling down of the Colston statue – and those of Columbus in the US – of course, and the context matters too, but there are commonalities that cannot be ignored.

Wellesley fought in the Anglo-Mysore and Anglo-Maratha wars, which would make him an anti-Indian villain (except that we cannot make up our mind about Tipu Sultan!)

As for the Empress – to whom paeans were read out by prominent Indians in Bombay on her Golden Jubilee in 1887 – how do we evaluate her and her reign? The greatest changes happened in India during her period – the railways were introduced, modern education institutions were set up (many named after her), Bombay – and perhaps other cities – saw the construction of the grand Gothic buildings we are all so proud of. But India was ruled by a foreign power; similarly, Columbus’s advent set off a long period of colonialism in the Americas.

A statue of Robert Milligan is pictured being removed by workers outside the Museum of London Docklands near Canary Wharf, following the death of George Floyd who died in police custody in Minneapolis, London, Britain, June 9, 2020. REUTERS/John Sibley

Many places and institutions exist in India with British era names; some have been renamed but everyone ignores the change. A cabbie will confused if you direct him to Gopalrao Deskmukh Road in Mumbai, but will immediately understand once you say Peddar Road. The Victoria Memorial in Kolkata is the pride of the city, and Delhi still has a Lady Irwin College.

That’s not necessarily being pro-Raj, but it does illustrate how deeply it is embedded in us.

Bombay’s shetiyas in the 19th century cozied up to the Raj and many of them also were involved in the Opium trade – at the same time, they funded large public projects which are still in use. How should we view them?

Similarly, Colston was a pillar of Bristol society and gave away his money to philanthropy.

Coming to the present Delhi residents are up in arms about the proposed destruction of the Central Vista, the glorious path where the Government of India resides. They are convinced – and rightly so – that the outcome will be disastrous on many levels, not the least of them being aesthetic. The process has been opaque, and the cost is completely unwarranted, especially at a time when the government is broke.

Yet, this same vista was built not just by the British Raj, but as a statement of intent to showcase Imperial power. (One might say that the intent is the same now too, but leave that aside for the time being.) Should it stay or go?

Also read: The Folly and Vanity of the Project to Redesign Delhi

The Modi government of course has no anti-imperialist motives – it is motivated by delusions of grandeur and of leaving an imprint on the future and perpetuating the cult of the leader. But it will try and shape the argument differently and that is where it should be opposed—hailing the past is a slippery slope.

The government in power sees the Mughals too as an foreign power—but even if they came from ‘outside’ (as can be argued about every king who invaded a neighbouring kingdom), they settled down in the land and, over the next three centuries, as rulers, did good things and bad, like every other ruler.

The Sanghis don’t see it that way—they abruptly changed the name of Aurangzeb Road, named after the last effective Mughal emperor, whose rule they see as particularly cruel because he imposed a very rigid form of Islam and destroyed countless temples. Historians are divided on that, saying that the evidence about the latter claim is flimsy—only a handful were brought down over 49 years. And many a Hindu king rampaged through Hindu kingdoms too, pillaging everything in sight.

This portrait of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb mounted on a horse, and ready for battle, was originally produced circa 1660. Courtesy: Stanford University Press

Our view of Mahatma Gandhi is of one who won us our freedom from British colonialism. That is not how they see him in South Africa and other countries on the continent. Students and faculty in the University of Ghana petitioned and got the institution to remove a statue of Gandhi because of his allegedly ‘racist’ views. And our politicians, who go to South Africa regularly and deliver homilies about the Mahatma, will be surprised to learn that the locals – including black Africans – don’t quite see it that way.

The debate on the difference can go on endlessly, but at the root of it is a re-evaluation and reassessment of the past. Should it be preserved, with caveats, or should it be wiped out completely? Why not teach students history, with all its complexities, so that they can understand the past better, rather than make that past disappear, but yet get rid of such blatant public iconography which hurts? A statue is a cruel reminder of the past—but so is the scholarship, which is awarded to a hundred students a year. Should one go and the other stay? Or both should be removed?

Also read: Confronting a Bygone Era, London Removes Slave Trader Statue

A vast number of Indians may think that Aurangzeb was cruel, and so were the British, but there are many who will have a more nuanced take. This government itself is bitterly against the Mughals, but less so against the British – the RSS was not a participant in the freedom movement, whatever it might want to say now.

Which leads us to the most vexed question of them all, very pertinent in today’s India – what do we do about Nehru? He was no racist or communalist or slave trader. He is the builder of modern India, the advantages of which we see all around us. He was liberal, secular and most of all, modern and much loved. Entire generations have grown up as Nehruvian Indians, even if they were born much after he died.

The Sangh parivaar, however, detests him. They always have. The very attributes we love him for, are the ones they hate. They are uncomfortable with secularism and they are definitely uneasy about modernity.

The Modi government will not go as far as to bring down his statues, but they have systematically subverted institutions associated with his legacy, such as Teen Murti Bhavan and the Nehru library and have tried to replace with its own distorted view of history.

Narendra Modi himself rarely mentions Nehru and somehow manages to not mention the great man, even while waxing eloquent about India’s prowess in technology, which was entirely because of the IITs Nehru set up.Narendra Modi’s supporters view Nehru as anti-Hindu and it a Hindutva government now—it can do anything, any time. If they remove all traces of Nehru from India, who will be able to stop them? In the name of ‘correcting’ history, there is a lot of cherry picking to throw out everything that is inconvenient to the Hindutva project–even those who are hardline anti-colonialists need to understand how they could be used — and discarded — by those with their own agenda.

There is no hypocrisy in taking an-anti Colston view while also examining colonialism in a more layered way. Blind antipathy is a slippery slope. The effort should be not to concede ground to those who will apply a perverse logic to justify their own dubious claims about the past with the aim of demolishing the good and replacing it with the bad which may be historically inaccurate and worthless.

Confronting a Bygone Era, London Removes Slave Trader Statue

“Our capital’s diversity is our greatest strength, yet our statues, road names and public spaces reflect a bygone era,”: Mayor Khan

London: A statue of Robert Milligan, an 18th century slave trader, was removed from its plinth outside a London museum on Tuesday after global anti-racism protests triggered a debate about how Britain commemorates its imperial past.

Statues glorifying slave traders and colonialists have come into sharp focus in recent days, as part of a broader movement inspired by the Black Lives Matter protests that started in the United States following the death of George Floyd.

“While it’s a sad truth that much of our city and nation’s wealth was derived from the slave trade, this does not have to be celebrated in our public spaces,” said London Mayor Sadiq Khan in a tweet with a photo of the statue.

Earlier, Khan ordered a review of statues and street names across London, in response to mass protests in the city and elsewhere.

On Sunday, protesters in the English port city of Bristol tore down the statue of a slave trader and threw it in the harbour, while in Oxford on Monday more than 1,000 demonstrators demanded the removal of a statue of colonialist Cecil Rhodes.

The previously obscure statue of Milligan stood in front of the Museum of London Docklands, on the edge of the glitzy business district of Canary Wharf, which is surrounded by the multi-ethnic, working-class borough of Tower Hamlets.

Milligan, who owned sugar plantations in Jamaica, was involved in the construction of London‘s West India Docks.

Onlookers cheered and applauded as workers in high-visibility jackets separated the statue from its plinth, then lifted it off with a crane truck.

The mayor of Tower Hamlets, John Biggs, told Reuters from the scene he felt strongly it was no longer appropriate to leave the statue in place. He said it would be put into storage and discussions would take place about what to do with it.

A bygone era

“People assumed he was just a businessman who helped build the docks, but when you dig into it you learn that in fact he was a slave trader,” Biggs said. “I find it refreshing, I find it inspiring that people want to learn and reflect.”

The decision to remove the statue was taken by the owners of the land, a body called the Canal and River Trust. “We recognise the wishes of the local community concerning the statue of Robert Milligan at London Docklands,” it said in a statement.

The orderly removal of the statue was in contrast to chaotic scenes in Bristol on Sunday. Police there decided not to stop protesters from toppling a statue of 17th century slave trader Edward Colston to avoid inflaming the situation.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the felling of Colston’s statue was a criminal act, while interior minister Priti Patel called it “utterly disgraceful”.

Mayor Khan said a commission would review statues, plaques and street names which reflect the rapid expansion of London‘s wealth and power at the height of Britain’s empire in the reign of Queen Victoria.

“Our capital’s diversity is our greatest strength, yet our statues, road names and public spaces reflect a bygone era,” he said.

British merchants played a major role in the transatlantic slave trade, the biggest deportation in known history.

As many as 17 million African men, women and children were torn from their homes and shipped to the Americas between the 15th and 19th centuries. Ships returned to Europe with sugar, cotton and tobacco cultivated by slaves on brutal plantations.

(Reuters)