Globalization and the British East India Company - Essay Example

Globalization and the British East India Company Globalization is a historical term used in referring to a process that is associated with the first movement of people from Africa to other parts of the world. The movement started with short distances and latter it graduated into longer distances. The movements were among merchants, migrants, or people who were taking their ideas, products, and customs to other places in the world or into a new land. The borrowing, adaptation, and melding of outside influences may be found in numerous places or areas of human life (Malik 3-5). However, the historical origin of globalization has ever remained a subject of debate among the historians. In most cases or usage, globalization is the period that began in the 1970s, where some scholars consider that this period began longer than historians exactly locate, and it encompassed all the extra-nation activities. The history of globalization has little to do with the British East India Company. It is regarded that the most proponent of the historical origin of globalization lies with Andre Gunder Frank. He was an economist and was as well associated with the independent theory (Malik 22). According to Frank, globalization began with the rise of global trading links between the Indus valley Civilization and the Sumer back in the third millennium B.C. What was considered archaic globalization had its existence in the Hellenistic Age, the period that was marked with commercialized development of urban centers, which marked the axial of Greek culture whose influences reached Spain from India. Other cities that felt the impacts of the early globalization include Roman Empire, Han Dynasty, and Parthian empire. The increasing commercial trade links between these powers were experienced in the Silk Road. This road started in China then stretched out to the boundaries of Parthian Empire and later moved to Rome (Malik 49). From the archaic period, globalization move to another phase that was described by Islamic and Mongol eras. During this period, the Muslim and Jewish traders and explorers founded trade routes that led to agricultural globalization, trade, knowledge, and technology globalization. This period was marked with the introduction and wide spread of crops including cotton and sugar that were cultivated almost all over the Muslim world, while knowledge spread widely to the Hajj and Arabic world that led to the cosmopolitan culture (Malik 27). The Mongol empire though had a destabilizing effect to the commercial centers with the Middle East and china; it significantly influenced or facilitated movement along Silk Road (Malik 153). Pax Mongolica of the 13th century was marked with the introduction of the first international postal service, and the rapid transition and spread of epidemic diseases including bubonic plague that substantially affected Central Asia. The Mongol era played a vital part in the globalization up to the sixteenth century; however, the largest trade systems were limited to the Eurasia (Malik 56). The Maritime Europe later replaced the Mongol period. The Maritime Europe phase, which was also known as proto-globalization was defined by the rise in the Empire of the European Maritime that took place in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The era saw the rise in the first Spanish and Portuguese Empires and later the rising of the British and Dutch Empires (Malik 77). In the seventeenth century, globalization was highly developed, and greater globalization organization became chartered companies. For instance, in the year 1600, the British East India Company was founded as the first multinational corporation. Later in 1602, the Dutch India Company was established. The British India Company was founded after the treaty of union as an early English joint- stock company. This organization was primarily formed to pursue trade with the East Indies; however, it ended up trading within the Indian Subcontinent and sometimes stretched its trades to China. Therefore, it is apparent that British India company has little to do with globalization. In other word, the history of globalization did not begin with the British East India Company (Malik 92). India's First War of Independence India's First War of Independence terminology is often used predominantly in India to depict or describe the 1857 Indian Rebellion that has been described by the outsiders as “revolt”, “uprising”, and “mutiny”. However, India's First War of Independence seemed to have developed more than a mutiny (Malik 97). This is because the manner in which the rebellion started the name Sepoy Mutiny was thereafter the standard name for the event of war. The conventions of this war rented the air for over one hundred years. Notably, the contemporary ‘ant-imperialists’ viewed the terms of this war as were based on propaganda that pushed it more to the action as opposed to the real actions with the boundaries of the war. That is, very few mutinous native soldiers pushed for the war (Malik 122). The historical books record that Karl Marx as the first western scholar to call the India's First War of Independence of 1857 as a “national revolt”, however; he categorically described the events using the term “Sepoy Revolt”. It is true that India's national war of independence or just a mutiny was an evented that occurred in the year 1857. The East India Company had managed to control almost the entire parts of India by mid ninetieth century. During this period, numerous uprising were facilitated by the first hundred years British rule in India. Isolated local characters characterized the war or the uprisings (Malik 99). The nobles who often refuse to accept the shifting or changing patterns of leadership or governance led some of these uprisings. They ever wanted to maintain and restore the already changed ways the system was ruled. However, the uprisings created and developed traditional ways of resisting off foreign rules, and this is what led to the 1857 revolt in India. Despite the fact the 1857 revolt was unsuccessful, its heroic efforts managed to eliminate the foreign rule that was the then face of Indian governance. The remarkable achievements of this revolt included the capture of Delhi that led to the proclamation of Bahadurshah as the Hindustan Empire. Additionally, it provided a rallying point for rebels through recalling the past imperial city pat glory (Malik 153). On May 10, 1857, the Meerut Soldiers refused to light the new Enfield Cartridge rifles. The soldiers among other civilian groups went on a rampage as they shouted the slogans ‘Maro Firangi K.’ They broke and opened the jails, they murdered European women and men, and they marched to Delhi and burned their houses (Malik 184). The following morning soldiers were seen matching; an action that signaled the local soldiers who intern joined the revolt. They collectively seized the city and declared the over eighty years old Bahadurshah Zafar, as the new Emperor of India (Malik 167). Within a period of one month, they captured Delhi as the Revolt spread over to different parts of the country including Lucknow, Kappur, Allahabad, Benaras, Jagdishpur, and Jhansi (Malik 174). The leaders from the British ranks were seized; therefore, the insurgent turned to the Indian society traditional leadership. At NanaSaheb, Kanpur, the son of Petshwa (adopted son), Baji Rao II, took the leadership of the forces. While numerous personnel were left in command of different places including Rani Lakshmi Bai commanding Jhansi, Begum Hazrat Mahal commanding Lucknow, and Khan Bahadur commanded Bareilly. Despite the successes of the rebellion that resulted to a commonly shared hatred for the alien rule, the revolt did not have any political perspectives or a defined future vision for the country or the then Empire (Malik 189). They all became prisoners of their own past who were fighting towards a common goal of regaining the lost privileges. Their fight for restoring their lost past incapacitated them to achieve or to usher in a new political order. The India’s First War of Independence was primarily fought in 1857. Gandhi’s Contribution to the Quest for National Independence in India Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in 1869 and died in the year 1948 when he was assassinated on his way from morning prayers. He managed to lead India successfully using to independence from the rule of the Great Britain. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi used non-violent principles to deliberate the India from the British colonization (Malik 232). He was born in India. His father was an influential local leader. He later went to London for education where he continued with legal education. He became a layer and later in 1891, he returned to India. He tried to study law in India but was unsuccessful; therefore, in 1893, he moved to South Africa, Natal and worked in a law firm. While in South Africa, he faced devastating racism against Indians. He among other Indians was barred from boarding the first class railroad car. Notable, one day he was removed from a first class compartment of the railroad, despite the fact that he had the ticket. Since that day, he bowed to eradicate out apartheid from the face of the world (Malik 245). Gandhi used law as a tool of fighting terrible injustices that were faced by the local Indians. He as well began to formulate methods of fighting political injustices. His methods were founded on a non-violent manner that included boycotts, writing letters and pamphlets, non-cooperative, and passive resistance. He later called his techniques as Satyagraha that means, “Instance on truth.” After receiving quantified amount of pressure on Gandhi and his supporters, the government of South Africa adhered to the same compromises. In 1914, Gandhi returned to India after his success in South Africa (Malik 250). The return was to attain or fight for human dignity within his country, India. At the age of forty-five year, he entered the India politics with the aim of attaining the Indian independence. Gandhi continued with his use of non-violent principles with the aim of facing the British government outside India. He managed to organize boycotts with British goods, he led peaceful marches, urged, and fastened mass defiance to many errands that were conducted or governed by the British laws. Later in the year 1922, Gandhi was arrested and for a period of two years, he was charged with civil disobedience. During his imprisonment, Jawaharlal Nehru then led the independence movement (Malik 274). Indians attained their independent on August 15, 1947. The country had been under the British colony since the year 1947. The fighting for independence worsened, and this led to the split of India into countries. The split occurred in 1948, only a year after independence (Malik 240). The two countries that emerged include India that was mainly Hindu and Pakistan, the east and the west that was mostly Muslims. The eastern Pakistan is currently a separate nation called Bangladesh. However, Gandhi was against the India partitioning, and he was very upset at the violence that erupted between the two religious groups. He later fasted over the protest that led to a widespread violence between Muslims and Hindus; in some ways, it helped by shaming both sides of the divide. However, the conflict continued for someday. After the independence, Jawaharlal Nehru be the Indian prime minister; although, Gandhi had the intensions of India retaining its traditional Village Economy (Malik 298). Jawaharlal Nehru and Gandhi disagreed on the topic and prime minister began on the modernization of India by building railroads, factories, and modern roads. On January 30, 1948, Gandhi was assassinated. Nonetheless, his impacts influenced many generations afterwards including Martin Luther King, Jr. who used Gandhi’s non-violent protests to bring social change in the United States of America. Works Cited Malik C. S. Indian Civilization: The First Phase: Problems of a Sourcebook: Based on the Proceedings of a Seminar. India: Indian Institute of Advanced Study, 1971 . Print Read More