THIS monograph discusses how an ancien regime of circulation of people and goods through the subcontinent and its infrastructure were radically transformed in the course of the long 19th century, how an increasingly abstract relational space was provided in Orissa and how this circulatory regime ran from the final decades of the pre-colonial era in the late 19th century through the World War I. The study examines the transformation of that area of eastern India where the Oriya language is spoken by the majority of the people – an area largely co-extensive with the present state of Orissa. This region consists of coastal plains including the vast delta of River Mahanadi (which were annexed by the East India Company as early as in 1803) and extensive hill tracts in the interior (which continued to be ruled in the main by tributary kings and chiefs).
The first part of the monograph entitled ‘Space-Circulation-Infrastructure’, comprising Chapters 2 and 3, develops the concept of “produced social space into a theoretical framework consisting of seven working hypotheses,” with each developed and juxtaposed against the ideas prevailing in both colonial and post-colonial writings. Their relevance for the examination of South Asia’s social history of transport is briefly indicated by way of examples. Chapter 3 discusses a particular category of spatial practices, that is, circulation. It explores the conceptual field working around these practices and moves on to the problems of transport infrastructure, that is, to the built environments that are generated in response to the exigencies of circulation and conditions further circulatory practices.
The second part with six chapters presents the case study of the transformation of Orissa’s circulatory regime in the 19th century. Chapter 4 reconstructs the regional ancien regime of circulation, that is, the prevalent modes of transport as well as the spatial and temporal patterns of circulation at the time of Orissa’s annexation by the British East India Company in 1803 and during the early decades of colonial rule. Chapter 6 takes stock of infrastructural measures effected in Orissa during the first half-century of colonial rule after its annexation in 1803 and examines the historical context from which a more active ‘public works’ policy emerged in the mid-19th century, assessing in particular the role of the devastating 1866 famine in the policy change. Chapter 7 turns to the second half of the period under review and discusses the transformation of the circulatory regime in parts of Orissa under British administration in the context of a strong tendency words economic and social commercialisation. After reconstructing the changes in patterns of commodity in circulation since the 1860s and their unevenly distributed social effects, the chapter analyses the controversial debates on several infrastructural schemes. A case study of changes in the popular practice of pilgrimage demonstrates that the resulting reorganisation of social space also had unintended effects. Process of commercialisation provides the background for Chapter 8 which focuses on the information of the circulatory regime in the dependent ‘little kingdoms’ of Orissa’s interior. It traces the metamorphosis of ‘recalcitrant rajas’ into ‘improving rulers’ and the contradictory effects of the ensuing expansion of transport infrastructure, especially examining the transformation and reinvigoration of bethi (forced labour) – the traditional obligation of subordinated classes to unpaid and forced labour.
This book will interest all academic readership.
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