Transcript Y8HiU3C Conquest and Corruption Jan29 - InterHigh

'Conquest and Corruption. The
Struggle for Supremacy
Y8 History
What happened next?
• After a certain amount of disagreement, thing
for the EIC appeared to be settling down.
• There continued squabbling, but as Sir
Thomas Roe had set out, the way forward
was negotiate and trade rather than strong
arm tactics, and the EIC would have been
happy to let this continue
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• Ideally the EIC would have
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liked to continue as a
commercial business only.
But their hand was forced by
a new kid on the block, the
French East India company.
To begin with the French
were happy to trade with
India, but in 1741 a certain
Joseph Duplex was put in
charge and he began to
meddle in local politics.
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• Due to a war currently being fought (War of
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Austrian Succession) in which the French and the
British were on opposing sides, he used this as an
excuse to call in solders from Mauritus and capture
Madras from the British.
The local Mogul chief, known as the Nawab of
Carnatic, demanded the French hand back Madras
to him.
When Duplex refused, the Nawab brought in a huge
army of 10,000 men to teach the French a lesson.
The French only has 230 French soldiers and 700
local soldiers but their superior technology and
strategy led to the India army being soundly routed.
And as a result Duplex became to all intents and
purposes the new Nawab.
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• Had Duplex had support
from the French, India would
probably have become a
French colony. But he wasn’t
and as a result of a treaty
between the 2 countries,
Madras was handed back to
the British.
• It did not take a young man, Clive long to put the lessons
learnt from Dupleix into action. Almost immediately, he took
advantage of a dispute between three local chiefs. While
one, Chanda Sahib, was laying siege to another one,
Muhammad Ali , Clive snuck into Chanda Sahib's capital of
Arcot with 200 English and 300 sepoys (local soldiers) and
took the town.
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• Clive then installed Muhammad Ali as
Nawab. And as a result, Clive had
made his reputation as a daring general
and became the effective Nawab broker
of the Carnatic. After some years Clive
returned to Britain and became a
member of parliament..
Eighth Nawab of the Carnatic Muhammad Ali
Wallajah ( 1749 - 1795 )
• The Seven Years war (1756-1763) would provide Clive
with another excuse to return to India and extend British
power in India. The Seven Years War was really the first
world conflict, with battles between various countries in
Europe and America and then in India too. There were
various alliances, but always the French and British were
on opposite sides.
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• The local commander
decided to fortify Calcutta,
saying that he feared an
attack by the French.
• The nawab of Bengal,
Siraj-ad-Daula found out
about it and did not like the
idea of foreign powers
building fortifications on his
land so he ordered the
British to cease building.
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• When they refused, Siraj gathered an army of
50,000 soldiers and descended on the small
garrison of 1,000 British soldiers, many of
whom escaped to nearby ships. The
remainder of the garrison surrendered when
realising that the powder for their antiquated
guns had become damp and unusable.
• But Siraj's victorious army gave Britain an
excuse for moral outrage by what has
become known as 'The Black Hole of
Calcutta'.
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• One version of this, the one
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believed by British is that Siraj had
146 people shut in a dark airless
room on the evening of June 20,
1756, said to be only 4.3 by 5.5 m.
By morning, when they were
released, according to only primary
evidence we have of one of the
survivors John Howell, 123 of them
had died from suffocation and
trampling.
It is accepted that John Howell’s
version was probably fanciful. But it
was one that was clung to by the
British and one they used to
excuse them doing whatever it took
to avenge the deaths.
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• However if you read other accounts, those
written by Indians in particular, there are
claims that
 it never happened,
 that if it did happen then Siraj knew nothing of it
and finally
 that there were not that many British soldiers left
in the fort when Siraj took it over and so at the
very least it was huge exaggeration.
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By this time Clive had returned to India
• Whatever the truth of it, Clive believed to worst case
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version
Clive and a fleet of warships were despatched from
Madras. The warships bombarded the French base
at Chandranagar whilst Clive led an attack on the
French fortress at Hughli. This removed French
influence from the region of Bengal.
Clive then turned his attention on Siraj.
History at the time was used to tell the Battle of
Plassey as a great victory of a small army against a
huge one.
However, it was not quite that straight forward!
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By this time Clive had returned to India
• Clive found a suitable replacement Nawab, Mir
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Jafar. He also found allies in the form of Hindu
bankers who were willing to bribe Siraj's soldiers not
to fight.
Then on June 23rd 1757, Clive met the 50,000 army
of Siraj with only 700 European soldiers and some
2,000 Sepoys.
Mir Jafar defected with many of Siraj's men midway
through the battle as most of Siraj's troops had been
paid not to risk their life or limb.
Those who did fight were overwhelmed by the
ferocity of Clive's superior firepower and with the
resolve of the men using it.
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• When Clive installed Mir Jafar as ruler, he
awarded himself the lion's share of the
financial spoils and granted himself a
substantial area of land.
• Not only had the EIC gained financially, but
the Nawab, by granting so much land to gain
his position, had robbed the treasury of
funds. It was not too long before Mir Jafar
stood down to be replaced by another
Nawab - willing to grant yet more land for the
privilege of becoming ruler.
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• In 1764 the Mughal emperors
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Major Hector Munro
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amassed their armies in a last
attempt to rid India of the British
once and for all.
But they were comprehensively
defeated by the much smaller force
of Major Hector Munro.
This victory sealed the fate of the
Indian continent once and for all.
The EIC could have marched into
Delhi and become the new Empire
for India. But they chose not to,
preferring ‘Power without
Responsibility’.
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• The revenues that EIC officials were collecting were being
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rapidly repatriated back to Britain (and into their own bank
accounts) - this left the Indian officials with no means to pay
for their judicial system.
From the British government's point of view, this was leading
to an extremely bad press. The EIC officials were getting rich
from this system while the EIC itself was not making any
money at all.
By the 1770s the EIC were unable to pay for the use of
British armed services and then had to ask the British
government for a one million pound loan to keep the
company going.
Many people in Britain saw that, while the officials returned
home wealthy, the tax payer was having to bail out the
company itself. (Sounds familiar?!)
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• One condition of the grant was that the government
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got involved and tried to stamp out corruption .
The EIC had successfully used its influence to avoid
direct Crown rule in India.
But EIC was still more concerned with revenue
collection than for the betterment of civil society in
the sub-continent, and trade, their original function,
very much took a back seat.
This way of making money made perfect sense to
them, but liberals in Britain were far from happy as
they saw that India was being drained of funds and
their people were suffering. [This was about the time
when anti-slavery was becoming an issue and
treating native peoples badly was seen as
blameworthy if not downright wicked.]
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• The result was the creation of a 'Board of Control' in
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1784 whose president was a member of the Cabinet
and was directly answerable to parliament.
This Act still left the day to day running of the
provinces to EIC officials - however it was clear that
the British Government was being drawn further and
further into the administrative affairs of India.
It was not until Lord Cornwallis became Governor
General of Bengal, who ushered in a period reform,
that things began to be sorted out.
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Homework
• Robert Clive was seen in different lights at
different times by different people. Some
times he was seen as a hero and at others
judged to be corrupt and greedy.
• (a) Research at least
 3 positive things Clive did
 3 negative attributes.
• (b) Decide whether he was on balance a
constructive influence or not and in a short
paragraph explain the reasons for your
decision.
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