TECHNOLOGY AND EUROPEAN COLONIALISM:

ITS ROLE IN DECIMATION OF HISTORICAL UNITY IN THE INDIAN

OCEAN

Dr. Mohammed Khalid

Dept. of Evening Studies
Panjab University,
Chandigarh.

Geographically, a region is regarded to be a part of earth's

surface where human activity and physical conditions combine to
form a pattern so distinctive that it marks off the area as different
from any other part of the world. A region does not look for
homogeneity in the sense of 'sameness', but instead tries to discern
a unifying pattern, which in fact may owe its distinctive character
to the contrasts that the region reveals. In addition to similar
features, differing characteristics of a region should be amenable to
assimilation. The utility of the term 'region' in world politics lies in
the fact that policy-makers within a given territorial area face a
number of interrelated problems that are distinct in form and
concept, and decisions are made in regard to the region keeping in
view those problems.

The geopolitical approach, accordingly, makes a distinction

between georaphical divisions that have global extent, and those
that have regional extent. Thus, there are 'Geostrategic' and
'Geopolitical' regions. A 'geopolitical region is a sub-division of
geostrategic region and "expresses the unity of geographic
features... contiguity of location and complementarity of resources
are particularly distinguishing marks of the geopolitical region... ."1
Resting on this view, Saul B Cohen anticipated the eventual

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emergence of Indian ocean as a geopolitical region2 which possesses
"globe-influencing characteristics."3

Third largest of the Oceans, the Indian Ocean has in its area
28 littoral states and many island states which are sovereign and
self governing.4 It has the largest and perhaps the most
heterogeneous combination of countries with states as large as
India and Australia and as small as Seychelles, has large and
growing economies like India and Australia and small like Maldives
and Comoros, has income per capita levels ranging from very high
like that of Australia or United Arab Emirates and low like
Mozambique, Tanzania, Madagascar and Bangladesh. Even though
these states display tremendous socio-economic, ethnic, cultural
and religious heterogeneity, the Ocean has bound them together
through the ages while affecting their historical developments in a
decisive fashion. In other words, the diversity and variations in the
geography, social organisation, culture, economy, historical
experiences, political development and structure of these people
and places is so stark as to be easily magnified to the point of
contestation of the unity of the Indian Ocean region. The
proposition that the Indian Ocean region is unmistakably
characterised by unity may seem difficult to sustain. But
interactive linkages of the various peoples and places of the region
binds and is acknowledged as a distinctive and incomparable
entity.

The historical perspective

Known in antiquity as Erythrean Sea, the Indian Ocean got

its present name from the Arabs who called it Bahr-e-Hind. They
began long voyages on its waters and established themselves in the
remote corners of the Far East.5 They knew very well the direction

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of winds between the tropics which helped their ships sail from the
west to eastern shores of the Ocean.6 In 2000 BC, the Egyptian
and the Persian empires extended their influence seawards in the
west, and later the Romans and the Arabs followed suit. In the East
from about the commencement of the Christian era, it were the
Indians, Malays and the Chinese who travelled the sea. The Ocean
was the scene of extensive commercial activity, for its littoral lands
produced raw materials especially the spices that were apparently
in great demand. The Indonesians crossed the Ocean to reach
eastern Africa and Madagascar. Arab and Persian navies became
predominant by the 9th century AD followed by the Chinese with
enormous fleets between the 13th and 15th centuries.7

The core areas of cultural expression also evolved on the

shores of the Indian Ocean: East Africa, the Middle East, the Indian
subcontinent, Southeast Asia, the Malay world etc. and these areas
constituted an important human chain of activity which pulsated
along the littoral of the Ocean. These included "the Astronesians,
and Malays who settled in Madagascar, the Indo-Aryans and
Dravidians who occupied Sri Lanka and Maldives, the aboriginals
who occupied the Andamans, Nicobars and Australia..."8

The Indian Ocean region had great centres of different faiths:

Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and also Christianity. These centres
radiated waves of influence and impulses. The movements of Parsis
(Zoroastrains) from Iran to Gujrat (India), Buddhism from India to
Sri Lanka and southeast as well as far east of Asia, the Hinduism
to Mauritius, Seychelles and other parts of the Ocean and Islam
from Arabian Peninsula to almost all the lands of its littoral. The
frequent travellers were the Muslims who had to go to perform Hajj
every year from all parts of the Ocean to Mecca (Saudi Arabia). The

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Hajj also fostered a great trade network.9 This unity, however,
started disintegrating as European imperial conquest led to the
founding of great empires as part of their imperial extension in the
various parts of the Indian Ocean littoral.

The history of Indian Ocean upto the end of the Second World
War has traditionally been divided into two broad periods; "pre-
Gaman" and "post-Gaman", with Vasco da Gama rounding the
Sosuthern tip of southern Africa in November-December 1497 and
his arrival at the port of Calicut in India on 20, May 149810 serving
the cutting point between the two periods. The pre-Gaman period
denotes the explorations by the ancient people of the Indian Ocean
region which had a thriving network of trade and people to people
links. The post-Gaman epoch is replete with advancing European
navies and other ships which gradually unraveled the largely self-
sustained and tightly interwoven economic, political and cultural
world of Indian Ocean.

The cut-throat competition, rivalries and manifold activities

of the European powers followed the Portuguese vanguard into the
Indian Ocean. It is explored in this essay the acquisition of science
and technology by the Europeans and the role technology played in
facilitating their expansion and subsequent subjugation of large
parts of the Indian Ocean lands. As a consequence the native
cultures, languages, economic systems, religious orientations
underwent a transformation and change for ever.

Rise of European Technology

By the end of the 13th century the medieval Europe had

begun to fade and majority of the characteristic institutions and
ideals of the Feudal Age began to decay. The new institutions and

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ways of thinking characterizing a changed civilization gradually
emerged. This period from 1300 to about 1650 is traditionally
known as the Renaissance and broadly signifies intellectual revival,
renewed interest in classical literature and art and in secular
learning.11 By the 15th Century, Italy had become the most
important centre of scientific discovery in Renanissance Europe.
The period witnessed nearly every major discovery of the 15th and
16th centuries notably in the field of astronomy, mathematics,
physics and medicine.

Virtually simultaneous with this, expansion of commerce and

voyages of discovery made merchants more wealthy than feudal
lords. Also the changes occurred making the transition from the
semi-static, localized, non-profit economies of the Middle Ages to
the dynamic, world-wide, capitalistic ones of the 15th and
succeeding centuries known as the "Commercial Revolution."12

Riding on the newly found vigour of commercial revolution

and new inventions the Europeans ventured out upon the trackless
oceans and in doing so they changed the world history. The nations
of Western Europe with their superior ships and guns opened the
new Oceanic Age "by their daring and ingenuity." The revolutionary
Western invention", holds Arnold J Toynbee, "was the substitution
of the ocean for the Steppe as the principal means of world-
communication."13 By 1660, in two centuries of exploration,
European ships had traversed practically all the oceans of the
world.14

These explorations were part of the general effervescence and

stirring of Europe. The magnetic compass, in use by Arabs,
Europeans, Scandinavians and the Chinese, helped make oceanic
voyages possible. Better instruments and better methods of

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determining a ship's position at sea were also fully in use by late
15th century. Advances in ship-building and allied maritime
technology were also accomplished by the Europeans.15 The
scientific revolution with its manifest technological content
facilitated making new instruments and tools. From 1500 to 1750
the Western technology emerged and enabled its possessors to
expand their influence over the whole known world. And the
'Industrial Revolution', 1750 to 1900, went a long way to congeal
and consolidate that influence, facilitating the Western hold over
the world.16 The most obvious fashion in which this happened was
through the European imperial expansion, and acquisition of
territories in the Indian Ocean which, on the one hand, furnished
the raw materials to fuel their growing industries, and provide
captive markets for the resulting products on the other. The local
economies were "restructured", to meet extra-regional imperatives-
most of them as peripheral suppliers of raw materials for the fast
industrializing Europe. "The resources for development of science
and technology and its linkage with manufacturing", says a
perceptive scholar of the subject.17

"Were provided by the Asian countries, which became

colonies or semi-colonies. The greater the resources
provided, the greater the development of industry which
led to demands for new knowledge.

This meant progress in science and technology and the

greater this progress, the greater the exploitation of the
semi-colonies and colonies."

By nature technology tends to be cumulative, accelerative

and it diffuses widely and quite rapidly from the country of origin.
But in the interaction between Europe and the lands of Indian

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Ocean the diffusion of European technology was not allowed to
occur deliberately, systematically and in fulfillment of the elaborate
imperialist design.

When the Europeans entered the Indian Ocean region the

trade here was by and large carried out by the Arab Muslims.
Naturally, the Europeans initially fought to outflank the Muslim
power. Slowly and gradually they got enmashed in the lucrative
trade network flourishing in the Region enough to establish
themselves here on a permanent basis. The Portuguese were
followed by the Dutch, the British, the French and others to share
this booty. Trade, enforced by the naval and military supremacy,
was the simple policy of the Portuguese. They shipped huge
quantities of spices -produced by the coastal and island portions of
the region- to Europe creating a world market of its kind

The British subsequently preferred to trade in cotton textiles,

luxury goods, indigo and saltpetre necessary for the manufacture of
gun-powder.18 Slowly, the local economies became substantially
dependent upon the sea-born trade19 as the Europeans vehemently
and decisively competed among themselves for the greater gains
and monopolies. To protect their coveted trade these powers
equipped their military strength and involved themselves in local
politics and power rivalries in their divide and rule policy which
further helped in promotion and expansion of their trade and
commercial interests. It became imperative for them to acquire and
occupy these territories. Thus it came about that the European
empires extended themselves to occupy the territories much bigger
then their sown size.

The second phase of industrial revolution also known as the

Second Industrial Revolution20 about the middle of the nineteenth

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century, marked over greater application of science and technology
to industry, accelerated the technological advance and capability of
the European powers exponentially. Together with the advances in
the chemical and metallurgical industries, electricity and gasoline
began to compete with steam as sources of power. Extensive
development of railways and steamship revolutionized the land and
sea transport just as telegraph, cable, telephone and wireless did to
communication. By the close of the nineteenth century the Afro-
Asian countries of the Indian Ocean region were left way behind
while inventions and science added to Europe's technological
superiority by the day.

The native cultural constraints, inertia, hide-bound traditions

and a host of other factors permeating these countries, the vested
interests of Europeans prevented indigenous technological effort
and advancement. Their obvious motive was to preserve the
existing conditions of these parts as it favoured them in their
commercial and other pursuits and develop them as captive
markets for consumer manufacturers resulting from the industries
of the metropolitan power. They allowed only such implantation of
science, technology and industry as would serve the imperial
purpose and strengthen their colonial design.

For example, India was a great manufacturing and

agricultural country. Indian textile and looms supplied to the
markets of Asia and Europe. After establishment of the British
power the Indian artisans were forced to work in the British East
India company, Indian weavers were forced to give away their
traditional crafts. Prohibitive tariffs excluded Indian silk and cotton
goods from England and English goods were admitted into India
free of duty or on payment of nominal duty.21 The invention and

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introduction of power-loom in Europe in 1785-86 completed the
decline of Indian industries. The same approach was followed to
destroy the Indian ship-building industry and agriculture. The
country was reduced to raw material producer, subservient to the
manufacturing industries of Britain.

This tendency and behaviour was duplicated in all the

colonies in the Indian Ocean region with certain local peculiarities.
The european masters harnessed and employed their technological
capability to sustain their multi-dimensional and multi faceted
superiority. They decimated the traditional systems of learning,
native values and conduct were overwhelmed and western values
were supplanted there in the name of modernisation. A new
culture, incorporating carefully selected components of
contemporary European civilisation that would promote
consumerism and native dependence, was sought to be introduced
through economic, legal, administrative, social and even political
systems. The occupied lands were surveyed -topographical,
hydrological, geodetic, geological surveys and so on- only to map
resources or augment advantage and strengthen metropolitan
power.

Though, in the process these lands got rail road, telegraph

and wireless networks, a particular type of education, a certain
kind of machinery and techniques, but on a limited scale and to
meet the needs of the occupying colonial powers. With the possible
exception of India, in no other country, proper modern educational
and research institutions were established by the European powers
till about the end of the Second World War. Talented and loyalist
favourites from these countries had to go the metropolitan country
for modern education and training.

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 During the hundred years, India was a Crown Colony, till
about 1945 had about 21 universities (1947), 459 arts and science
colleges (1947-48), 132 professional colleges and about 14
engineering and technological institutes. About 16.7% of its 356
million population was literate. All these educational institutes
hardly touched the common man who remained wretchedly poor
and uneducated.

The education scenario was totally dismal in other parts of

the region. For example Indonesia did not have a single University
till Dutch held them. The first University (National University) was
founded in 1949 after the Dutch had been ousted. The first
University established in Sri Lanka was in 1942, almost 150 years
after the British takeover of the Island, Malaysia had its first
University in 1962, University of Khartoum in Sudan came up In
1951, Asmara University in Ethiopia was founded in 1958, Somalia
National University at Magadiscio in 1954, Tanzania had its first
University in 1970 and Mozambiqe in 1962. As a result virtually
entire region had a bysmally low literacy rates, a factor which made
for the hold of the ritual of religion, myth and superstition rather
than reason, rationality or scientific temper.

They had no infrastructure, banking system, or other

financial institutions. The agriculture was in a bad state as crops
were dictated to the farmers according to the needs of metropolitan
industry. There was hardly any presence of manufacturing industry
in the region as every manufactured goods were imported from
Europe. Trade was entirely in the hands of the European power
and was highly imbalanced.

Most of the countries of Indian Ocean littoral, thus had lost

their identity and became merged into the occupying power. The

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language of these colonies was that of the colonial masters. The
cultural penetration of the West was so strong that the people
especially the urbanities forgot their own cultures, dresses, eating
habits etc. Even after getting independence, the countries of the
region transplanted or borrowed the political systems, models of
development, planning etc. from their former colonial masters.
During the last sixty years since the World War II ended and
Europeans retreated from Afro-Asia under the force of
circumstances, these countries have gradually and with great
difficulty come out of the shadows of the colonial yoke. Yet the
legacy of that dependence, nurtured for centuries, continues in
some form or the other, be it through the international financial
institutions, Cold War or the post Cold-War contemporary
globalisation process. However a sense of unity among the
countries around the Indian Ocean has lately resulted in the
formation of various regional organisations which may help in
future to create the same networks which were lost with the
European entry in the region in the 15th century.

References:

1. Cohen, Saul B: Geography and Politics in a World Divided,

London, 1975, pp. 64-65.

2. Ibid., p. 66.

3. William L. Dowdy and Russel B Trood, "The Indian Ocean: an

emerging geo-strategic region", International Journal,
Summer 1983, pp. 432-58.

4. The littoral countries of the Indian Ocean include South

Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia

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 Djibouti Sudan, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen,
Oman, UAE Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan,
India, Bangladesh, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia
and Australia. The island states include: Madagascar,
Comoros, Seychelles, Mauritius, Maldives and Srilanka.

5. Nambiar, D K: Our Seafaring in the Indian Ocean, Banglore,

1975, p.9.

6. See, Duing, Walter: The Monsoon regime of the currents in

the Indian Ocean, Honolulu, 1970, p. 31.

7. For details of this discussion see, Panikkar, K M: India and

The Indian Ocean, Bombay, 1971, pp. 32-36; _______: Asia
and the Western Dominance, London, 1953, pp. 24-67;
Toussaint, Auguste: History of the Indian Ocean, London,
1966, pp. 74-86.

8. McPherson, Kenneth, "Cultural Exchange in the Indian coean

Region: an historical perspective", ICIOS II, Vol. B p.4; J de V
Allen, "A Proposal for Indian Ocean Studies", in, Historical
Relations Across The Indian Ocean (Unesco) 1980, pp. 138-
42.

9. See, Allen, op. cit., pp. 138-39; Kaushik, D: The Indian

Ocean, A strategic dimension, Delhi, 1983, p.1; Banerjee,
Brojendra Nath: Indian Ocean, A Whirlpool of Unrest, New
Delhi, 1984, pp. 9-10.

10. Henry the navigator, prince of Portugal, initiated the first

great enterprise of the Age of Discovery -The search for a sea
rout east by south. These expeditions were further
encouraged by king John II. After many sacrifices and
unsuccessful attempts, finally captain Vascodo Gama under

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 instructions to the reach Calicut on India's west coast, led a
magnificent voyage around the Cape of Storms (which he
renamed as Cape of Good Hope) helped by an Arabian pilot
and reached Calicut. See Cncyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. 7,
1974, pp. 1039-41; the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol.
21, 2002, pp. 182-83; Lexicon Universal Encyclopedia, Vol. 9,
1987, p. 24.

11. For discussion on Renaissance see, Bull, George:

Renaissance, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1968; Rice,
Eugene F: Foundations of Early Modern Europe 1469-1559,
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1970; Lucas, H S: Renaissance and
the Reformation Harper, New York, 1934.

12. The Commercial Revolution was a period of European

economic expansion and mercantilism, which lasted from
about 1520 to 1650. Vayages of discovery in the 15th and 16th
centuries allowed European powers to build a vast net work
of international trade. See for details, Robert, Bermer.
Merchants and Revolution: Commercial change, Political
conflict and London's Overseas Traders, 1550-1653, Verso,
London, 2003; Marshall, Michael, "From Mercantilism to the
'Wealth of Nations'," The World, Vol. 5 (Special Edition) 1999.

13. Cited in, Ferguson, W K and Bruun, G: A Survey of European

Civilization since 1500, Boston, 1958, p. 495.

14. For full discussion of this portion See, Ibid, pp. 323-53, 373-
87, 451-65, 474-80; Burns, E M and Ralph, P L: World
Civilizations, From Ancient to Contemporary, New York,
1958, Vol. I, pp. 482-605.

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15. See, Sarton, George: A History of Science (London) 1959, p.
ix; Brinton, Crane, et al: A History of Civilization, Vol. I,
Englwood Cliffs, 1960, p. 564; Copggin, Philip A: Technology
and Man, Oxford, 1980, pp. 39-41; Judd, Gerrit P: A History
of Civilization New York, 1966, p. 308; The Illustrated Science
and Invention Encyclopedia, New York, 1976, vol. 5, p. 624.

For a discussion of revolution in design, size and

rigging of ships, simultaneously with advances in
navigational aids, equipment and techniques in the 15th-
16th centuries, see, Britannica, op. cit., vol. 16, pp. 158-59,
vol. 18, pp. 34-35; Caxton's History of the World, London,
1969, vol. 8, p. 44.

16. The Industrial Revolution first occurred in Britain and later

slowly and marginally spread to continental Europe and
North America. It empowered Britain with the inventions of
wind mills, steam engines, locomotives, steam turbines, Otto
cycle, diesel engine, hot-air engines, machine tools and
medicine and medical equipments, road and transport
vehicles, See Britannica, 2002, op.cit., pp. 453-460.

17. A Rahaman, "The interaction between science, technology

and society: historical and comparative perspectives",
International Social Science Journal, Unesco, 1981, vol. 33,
no. 3, p. 510.

18. See for making of gun powder, Britanica, 2002, op.cit, p. 449-
50.

19. Dutt, R C: The Economic History of India, Under Early British

Rule, 1757-1837, Vol. II, London, 1901, Seventh (1950)
Edition, p.x.

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20. The term "Second Industrial Revolution" has been used
especially to describe British industrial development denoting
an age of steel and electricity. It began in the 19th century as
new industries were created with the development of steel
manufacture and the expansion of railway systems. See, The
Encyclopedia Americana, (International Edition), Vol. 15,
1995, pp. 122-127; Lexicon Universal Encyclopedia, Vol. 11,
1987, pp. 158-160.

21. A detailed discussion on the decline of Indian industry under

the British rule can be found in, Dutt, R C Economic History
of India, Rautledge and Kegan Paul, 1960; _____: Civilization
of India, Hanson, London, 1958.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

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