There is an old adage that enjoins readers not to judge a book by its cover and yet I must confess to a twinge of annoyance when I saw the depiction of Indian soldiers of the Great War portrayed on the cover of Kate Imy’s Faithful Fighters. I presumed (wrongly) that the book dealt primarily with the history of what is today labelled as the “British Indian Army”. The cover depicts a group of British Sikh re-enactors dressed in WW 1 uniforms photographed in front of the Royal Pavilion in Brighton during the centenary commemorations of the Great War. Far from being a misplaced depiction, the image is, in many ways, at the heart of some of the central arguments presented by the author in the book and is, in fact, an excellent nuanced choice for the cover. Allow me to elucidate.
The Indian Army before 1947 was one of the most important elements of the colonial apparatus in India. The “sword arm” of the Raj served colonial interests not just in British imperial campaigns within the subcontinent but wider afield in Africa and Asia as well. Apart from being an imperial ‘fire brigade’ it also helped to “keep the peace” in internal security and frontier campaigns both within and on the borders of undivided India.
Long neglected by the majority of scholars within India who held the overly simplistic view that it was merely a mercenary force whose history and dynamics held little of interest beyond a litany of forgotten campaigns, the army as an institution which played an important part in defining the modern Indian identity is increasingly being subjected to the gaze of cultural historians. They look beyond the purely “military” aspects of its history but try to examine its cultural history and dynamics. Some of the recent work along these lines includes Martial Races (2004) by Heather Streets, India, Empire and First World War Culture (2018) by Santanu Das, and The Indian Empire at War (2018) by George Morton-Jack. Kate Imy’s Faithful Fighters is an important addition to this body of work.
The book is therefore NOT a military history of the Indian Army before 1947. It is instead an attempt to understand the development of the army of undivided India as an institution within the broader sociocultural context. The manner in which economic factors, religion, and nationalism influenced and shaped the identity of the Indian soldier during the colonial period have been examined systematically, and in detail. There have been recent attempts by the Indian military establishment to root out “colonial influences” from existing military practices, without really defining what these influences may be. This is in part due to an inadequate and partly superficial understanding of the historical processes that have shaped the culture of the Indian Army of today.
The book focuses on the four decades of the twentieth century from 1900 onwards. This was a very important period in the socio-political and military history of the subcontinent. It importantly examines the cultural legacies of the Indian Army and how the communities that formed its constituent elements during this period of rapid change, navigated the variegated pulls and pressures on their loyalty and identity. The author tries to examine these from a variety of perspectives, including masculinity, nationalism, colonialism/anti-colonialism, religion and culture. Of particular interest are the questions she raises regarding contemporary acts of commemoration by diaspora communities, and the controversies that still colour our understanding of military service during the colonial period.
The diversity of perspectives examined is reflected in the chapter Martial Masculinity in a Fascist Utopia, which looks, inter alia, at the fascist sympathies of many British army officers during the 1930s, the links between masculinity and a martial Hindu identity, and how the militarization of economic, political and cultural differences led ultimately to the violence of the 1940s. The author attempts an explanation of the imperatives that propelled Indians to seek military service, and the complexities they had to face and deal with once they had donned their uniform. Positive outcomes like upward mobility and financial gain were limited to a few while the options of the majority were limited by systemically inbuilt inequalities of “race, class, religion and (dis)ability”. In the concluding section, the author provides an insight into the manner in which the colonially engendered patterns of exalting militarism, violence and warfare in South Asia continue to have an impact in the lived realities of the region till today. This provides historians and sociologists with an opportunity to better understand the legacies of imperial militarism in a globalized world. The consequences of militarism and exclusion are reflected in the way military and civil identities shaped by the imperial project continue to negotiate power and citizenship.
The author covers a vast canvas but achieves what she sets out to do —provide the reader with a better and nuanced understanding of a very complex subject. Her work adds much to the historiography of the Indian Army and is highly recommended to social, cultural and military historians alike.
Sqn Ldr (Retd) Rana TS Chhina, MBE, is Secretary and Editor, Centre for Military History and Conflict Studies.
There is an old adage that enjoins readers not to judge a book by its cover and yet I must confess to a twinge of annoyance when I saw the depiction of Indian soldiers of the Great War portrayed on the cover of Kate Imy’s Faithful Fighters. I presumed (wrongly) that the book dealt primarily with the history of what is today labelled as the “British Indian Army”. The cover depicts a group of British Sikh re-enactors dressed in WW 1 uniforms photographed in front of the Royal Pavilion in Brighton during the centenary commemorations of the Great War. Far from being a misplaced depiction, the image is, in many ways, at the heart of some of the central arguments presented by the author in the book and is, in fact, an excellent nuanced choice for the cover. Allow me to elucidate.
The Indian Army before 1947 was one of the most important elements of the colonial apparatus in India. The “sword arm” of the Raj served colonial interests not just in British imperial campaigns within the subcontinent but wider afield in Africa and Asia as well. Apart from being an imperial ‘fire brigade’ it also helped to “keep the peace” in internal security and frontier campaigns both within and on the borders of undivided India.
Long neglected by the majority of scholars within India who held the overly simplistic view that it was merely a mercenary force whose history and dynamics held little of interest beyond a litany of forgotten campaigns, the army as an institution which played an important part in defining the modern Indian identity is increasingly being subjected to the gaze of cultural historians. They look beyond the purely “military” aspects of its history but try to examine its cultural history and dynamics. Some of the recent work along these lines includes Martial Races (2004) by Heather Streets, India, Empire and First World War Culture (2018) by Santanu Das, and The Indian Empire at War (2018) by George Morton-Jack. Kate Imy’s Faithful Fighters is an important addition to this body of work.
The book is therefore NOT a military history of the Indian Army before 1947. It is instead an attempt to understand the development of the army of undivided India as an institution within the broader sociocultural context. The manner in which economic factors, religion, and nationalism influenced and shaped the identity of the Indian soldier during the colonial period have been examined systematically, and in detail. There have been recent attempts by the Indian military establishment to root out “colonial influences” from existing military practices, without really defining what these influences may be. This is in part due to an inadequate and partly superficial understanding of the historical processes that have shaped the culture of the Indian Army of today.
The book focuses on the four decades of the twentieth century from 1900 onwards. This was a very important period in the socio-political and military history of the subcontinent. It importantly examines the cultural legacies of the Indian Army and how the communities that formed its constituent elements during this period of rapid change, navigated the variegated pulls and pressures on their loyalty and identity. The author tries to examine these from a variety of perspectives, including masculinity, nationalism, colonialism/anti-colonialism, religion and culture. Of particular interest are the questions she raises regarding contemporary acts of commemoration by diaspora communities, and the controversies that still colour our understanding of military service during the colonial period.
The diversity of perspectives examined is reflected in the chapter Martial Masculinity in a Fascist Utopia, which looks, inter alia, at the fascist sympathies of many British army officers during the 1930s, the links between masculinity and a martial Hindu identity, and how the militarization of economic, political and cultural differences led ultimately to the violence of the 1940s. The author attempts an explanation of the imperatives that propelled Indians to seek military service, and the complexities they had to face and deal with once they had donned their uniform. Positive outcomes like upward mobility and financial gain were limited to a few while the options of the majority were limited by systemically inbuilt inequalities of “race, class, religion and (dis)ability”. In the concluding section, the author provides an insight into the manner in which the colonially engendered patterns of exalting militarism, violence and warfare in South Asia continue to have an impact in the lived realities of the region till today. This provides historians and sociologists with an opportunity to better understand the legacies of imperial militarism in a globalized world. The consequences of militarism and exclusion are reflected in the way military and civil identities shaped by the imperial project continue to negotiate power and citizenship.
The author covers a vast canvas but achieves what she sets out to do —provide the reader with a better and nuanced understanding of a very complex subject. Her work adds much to the historiography of the Indian Army and is highly recommended to social, cultural and military historians alike.
Sqn Ldr (Retd) Rana TS Chhina, MBE, is Secretary and Editor, Centre for Military History and Conflict Studies.