The Formation of the Colonial State in India ─ Scribes, Paper and Taxes, 1760-1860

This book offers a new way of investigating the process of colonial state formation, by looking at how the early colonial state in India was able to harness and extract vast amounts of agrarian wealth in north India between the 1770s and 1840s.

The book discusses how the colonial state’s origins in the formation of early agrarian revenue settlements exacerbated an extant culture of proto-bureaucratic organisation, and how the success of British power was shaped by this extant paper-oriented revenue culture. It goes on to examine how the service and cultural histories of various Hindu pensmen/scribal communities fit within broader changes in political administration, taxation, traditions of learning, and a shared Indo-Islamic administrative culture. The book argues that British power after the late 18th century came as much through bureaucratic mastery and paper as it did through military force and commercial ruthlessness.

Providing a detailed account of how agrarian wealth provided the bedrock of colonial state’s later patterns of administration, the book is a unique contribution to studies of South Asian History, Governance and Imperialism.

Hayden Bellenoit is Assistant Professor of History at the US Naval Academy, USA.