India After Independence: 1947-2000 by Bipan Chandra Read Free Book Online

and culture and in the absence of a minimum of prosperity or economic development and literacy as was the case in western Europe and the United States. It is this tradition which explains why multi-party democracy and civil liberties have met different fates in India and Pakistan, though both equally constituted colonial India. The political party (and its politics) that brought about Pakistan was not known for its defence of civil liberties, or its functioning on democratic lines, or its tolerance towards its political opponents. Democracy was no, a significant part of its political culture. Besides, the national movement and its political culture were weak precisely in the areas which came to constitute Pakistan.
    To conclude, over the years, the nationalist movement successfully created, an alternative to colonial and precolonial political culture based on authoritarianism, bureaucratism, obedience and paternalism. Its ideology and culture of democracy and civil liberties were based on respect for dissent, freedom of expression, the majority principle, and the right of minority opinion to exist and develop.
Economic Underpinnings of the National Movement
    The Indian national movement developed a complex and sophisticated critique of the basic features of India’s colonial economy, especially of its subordination to the needs of the British economy. On the basis of this critique, the movement evolved a broad economic strategy to overcome India’s economic backwardness and underdevelopment. This was to form the basis of India’s economic thinking after independence.
    The vision of a self-reliant independent economy was developed and popularized. Self-reliance was defined not as autarchy but as avoidance of a subordinate position in the world economy. As Jawaharlal Nehru put it in 1946, self-reliance ‘does not exclude international trade, which should be encouraged, but with a view to avoid economic imperialism.’ 4 At the same time, the nationalists accepted from the beginning and with near unanimity the objective of economic development towards modern agriculture and industry on the basis of modern science and technology—India, they held, had to industrialize or go under. They also emphasized the close link between industry and agriculture. Industrial development was seen as essential for rural development, for it alone could reduce population pressure on land and rural unemployment. Within industrialization, the emphasis was on the creation of an indigenous heavy capital goods or machine-making sector whose absence was seen as a cause both of economic dependence and underdevelopment. Simultaneously, for essential consumer goods, the nationalists advocated reliance on medium, small-scale and cottage industries. Small-scale and cottage industries were to be encouraged and protected as a part of the development strategy of increasing employment.
    Indian nationalists were opposed to the unrestricted entry of foreign capital because it replaced and suppressed Indian capital, especially under conditions of foreign political domination. According to them real and self-reliant development could occur only through indigenous capital. On the other hand, the nationalists averred that if India was politically independent and free to evolve its own economic policies, it might use foreign capital to supplement indigenous efforts, because of her vast capital requirements and need to import machinery and advanced technology from other countries.
    During the thirties and forties a basic restructuring of the agrarian relations also became one of the objectives of the national movement. All intermediary rent-receivers such as the zamindars and other landlords were to be abolished and agriculture based on peasant proprietors.
    An active and central role was envisaged for the state in economic development by the nationalists. Rapid industrialization, in particular, needed a comprehensive policy of direct and systematic state