From the moment we walked outside the airport in Amritsar on Thursday night, we were accosted by people trying to work us for a few rupees. As is the case in Latin America, taxi drivers swarm you at the airport exit, asking prices far above the going rate. This is especially true if you look like a foreign tourist. It was already well past dark. It was hot and humid, and I couldn’t get Uber to work, so I just went along with the cab fare. The guy was only asking for six dollars for a 10km trip, after all. Did it make that much difference that the going rate was two or three? It did matter a little. Uber leads drivers right to your desired location. With language barriers and inaccurate Google Maps locations, taxi drivers sometimes leave you to find your own way once they get you in the neighborhood. That’s what happened to us.
I had been told by many people not to book motels online in India. “You need to see the room yourself,” they told me. I looked up a place online that seemed to meet minimum standards at an attractive price, and had the cabbie take me to (within a couple of blocks of) it. It had air conditioning, WiFi, and seemed clean enough. One disadvantage of doing it this way is that you don’t automatically get the posted price. I was getting worked again. I negotiated the price almost back down to the advertised rate. It was late, and again, we were talking about nickles and dimes.
This scenario played itself out time and again throughout India. I really got tired of being worked. Time and again on reflection, though, I felt a little ashamed for being disturbed by it. Everything is so cheap in India, and people are so poor, was I really haggling over 20 or 50 or 100 rupees? One hundred rupees translates to $1.20. The advertised rate for my room was $11/night. A meal went for about $3 in a restaurant and much less if you bought street food. I guess I got ripped off a few times, but it was for smaller amounts than I lost when my pants went through the laundry or what fell into the car seats. Buying a single 20 oz drink from a convenience store rather than a box store in the U.S. incurs a bigger penalty.
Poverty in India is real. Neighborhoods all over the country have random hanging tied together electric wires strewn about haphazardly. I nearly walked into a nest of about three dozen twisted wires with their exposed junctions as I stepped out of that first taxi in Amritsar. Skinny, undersized children with matted hair countless times came up to me in the street begging for 10 rupees… 10 rupees. Twelve cents. One poor fellow begging in the Amritsar train station when we left had one foot sticking about six inches out of the bottom of his torso, and was swinging himself around on that and his hand on the opposite side. As difficult as his life would be in the best of locations, imagine going through life with this disability in Amritsar, India. Rain washes who knows what down the streets. Piles of trash sit up and down nearly every street with dogs and cows and flies working them over. Once we saw a cow stretching her tongue out an incredible distance to lick some garbage that was sitting on top of a cement pedestal away from the birds who were eating it, right there on the side of a major street. There are streets even built over the tops of other streets in many places, dripping gunk occasionally on careless pedestrians below. Some ground level streets are big enough for cars, others only rickshaws, and a few are too small for rickshaws. Some rickshaws are motorized, others must be pedaled. Some poor fellow will peddle you a few kilometers for what amounts to a quarter.
In 2022, India surpassed China to become the most populous nation on the planet. It is a chaotic place. There are people everywhere. Most are going somewhere, many others are trying to take you somewhere, still others are trying to sell you something, and a pretty significant remainder are just laying there. We saw people sleeping on the street, on benches, on ledges, in the train station, and just about everywhere. Lines are non-existent. When you are waiting to get in somewhere, it’s every man for himself. People are constantly pressing against you, pushing past you, cutting in front of you, hitting you with their packs or bags if they have them. Most people just pack what they have in plastic sacks. The streets are jammed with cars, rickshaws, carts, wheelbarrow-like things, and people walking. Once during our visit, we got caught in a traffic snarl so bad, we couldn’t even walk through it. We were afoot, and eventually gave up and took a different route.
All of this destitution, chaos, and filth at least helps me understand to some extent Rudyard Kipling’s ardent support of British colonialism. He wrote that it was the burden of Western Civilization to shepherd the underdeveloped forward; to civilize them. He complained they didn’t always appreciate it. But it seemed obvious to him that dragging people like Indians into a modern economy and infrastructure was best for them, whether they wanted it or not. At first blush, it really does look like India could use some developmental help. Why wouldn’t they want to enjoy the economic benefits of British or anyone’s presence?
We didn’t have trouble getting where we needed to go on Friday morning. Our motel was within walking distance of several of the main tourist sites in Amritsar. We went first to the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial. This site commemorates the massacre of a few hundred Indians by the British Indian army. During the first world war, the UK implemented special wartime measures involving strict rationing of supplies and tightening restrictions on citizens. Indians expected these to be dispensed with as soon as the war was over. Instead, the Rowlett Act effectively announced their permanent adoption. Although the Rowlett Act was never implemented, one can imagine the sentiment it aroused. Protests ensued and several Europeans were beaten. Four were killed. A British officer with a provisional Brigadier General rank in the Indian service (this was distinct from the British Army) by the name of Reginald Harry Dyer was placed in charge of keeping the peace in Punjab where the protests were especially rowdy.
In early April, 1919, Dyer essentially placed the area under martial law. He forbade assemblies of more than four people, had troops forcibly end protests in a few places, and dealt with Punjabis with a particularly heavy hand. This only aroused deeper discontent. On April 13th, a group of around 10,000 Indians gathered in Jallianwala Bagh – some of them for a large religious festival, others to protest, many were probably there for both. Jallianwala Bagh was a rectangular enclosed area with only one entry and exit point. Dyer posted his Indian troops at the opening and without warning ordered them to open fire on the crowd. They continued firing until their ammunition was nearly exhausted. Estimates vary as to how many were killed, but the number was in the hundreds at least. Thousands more were injured. Some were killed in the press of people trying to escape somewhere. Another 120 were killed as they jumped into a well to avoid the bullets. Dyer’s troops marched back to their post, leaving the dead to decompose in the April sun. It was an atrocity in every sense of the word. The truth needed no embellishment.
As Secretary of State for War, Winston Churchill condemned Dyer’s actions. So did the House of Commons. The House of Lords praised him for defending British India. Dyer was forced to retire, but not sentenced to any sort of criminal punishment. The memorial presentation, as might be expected, canonized those who died as martyrs for India’s statehood. And it is true that Jallianwala Bagh accelerated the growth of sentiment for full Indian independence rather than just more autonomy under British rule. But the presentation gave no thought to what could have provoked or led to the massacre, other than attributing it to pure British evil. The protesters are described as peaceful, when recent riots had already killed and injured quite a few people. Britain is portrayed as being unapologetic and completely unsympathetic. They even kick around old Rudyard Kipling, who, in all honesty had nothing to do with the incident. They attribute the House of Lords’ statement to him, claiming he called Dyer “the savior of British India.” They also accuse Kipling of leading a £2,600 fundraising effort for Dyer after he had been drummed out of the service. It was a pro-colonial newspaper that actually did this. Kipling did make a contribution, but it was a measly £10. When because of his reputation for supporting British colonialism, Kipling was asked to provide some quote to be used at Dyer’s funeral in 1927, all he contributed was a rather cautious, “He did what he thought was best.”
There was plenty of wrongdoing to point out at Jallianwala Bagh. There was no reason to bring Kipling into it, other than that he has become the academic world’s whipping boy in its postcolonialism fetish. Go ahead and kick Dyer. Kick the British Indian Army. Largely made up of Sikhs and other Punjabis, they get off without any censure in the museum presentation. Kick the House of Lords for not only defending Dyer, but lauding his actions. The procurators even punch at Churchill, one of Dyer’s strongest critics, for British Indian policy during the war.
If there is something to criticize Kipling for, it isn’t his tepid response to Jallianwala Bagh. It is his warped view of how peoples and civilizations develop. Kipling was no hater of India. He was born there, and loved it dearly. He just didn’t understand how Indians could succeed economically and developmentally in a timely manner without assistance. Was he wrong? Well, English colonialism did not turn out to be an effective remedy for India’s ailments. Why was he wrong? I really think it is just as simple as understanding that no one wants to be told what to do. Just as individuals can’t be dragged toward economic advancement against their will, so also societies must advance of their own volition to have the national pride and self worth that comes with achieved successes.
Consider Jacob Riis, the Danish activist for urban reform in the United States back around the turn of the 20th century. Immigration was booming. Immigrants packed themselves into squalid conditions in New York tenements, trying to squeeze as much money out of their earnings as they could to send home or to advance their families’ start it America. A brilliant photographer, Riis brought the living conditions many immigrants endured to the attention of Progressive Era social activists and urban reformers. Many changes were made to building codes and inspection authorities were created to enforce them. Limits were placed on how many families could be packed into an area. The problem with all of this was that there was a market for these squalid conditions, and a reason why people were willing to put up with them, at least in the short term. They were trying radically cut down their expenses, not because they liked living in squalor, but so that they could climb out of the squalor. What were the effects of Riis’s efforts? All of those changes made urban housing substantially more expensive. More tenants were hurt by the subsequent rise in housing costs than the difficult living conditions. The bottom line: government mandated advancement nearly always comes slower and with unintended side effects. When people want to improve their living conditions, they will do it on their own. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.
The problem with British colonialism in the late 19th century was that it was trying to force economic development on people.1 Very few people view anything they were forced to do as an improvement. When Indians resisted or protested, the British responded by making them do more things they didn’t want to do. Both sides doubled down on their responses until Dyer’s absurd overreaction at Jallianwala Bagh in 1919. It is probably true that Indians would never on the whole be satisfied without complete independence after such an incident. Reading the historical presentations both at Jallianwala Bagh and the Partition Museum, I was left with the impression that British colonialism left one other unfortunate scar on India – a victim’s mentality. Perhaps it was just those who have ownership of telling India’s historical tale. Maybe not everyone feels that way. Indians were victims of Dyer’s crime. It’s fair to assign blame to the British government as a whole, but the presentation extends blame to every British citizen they can name regardless of their role in – or even condemnation of – the terrible event at Jallianwala Bagh. This would be even more evident when we visited the Partition Museum.
We got our first taste of one other distinct part of our Indian experience at Jallianwala Bagh. While we were there, at least half a dozen families or groups wanted to take selfies with us. At first I thought it was just that they all thought Caleb was a cute, blondish kid. But they wanted to take photos with me, too. By the time we left India, I had taken photos with more strangers than the president. Just about anyone who spoke some English was excited to try it on us as well. Across the board, India is an extremely welcoming place. It is odd to say that about a place where you get swarmed with swindlers as soon as they see you’re a foreigner. It is even more strange to have such a warm welcome at a place where you could be mistaken as one of the perpetrators of a mass murder. There were a couple of people who looked a little askance at us, apparently not knowing we were American rather than Brits – I mean, we fought a war for our independence against them – but these were rare exceptions that we never once saw again after we left the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial. Even there, most people were genuinely excited to have America visitors interested in visiting and learning about their country. It was heart warming, and the most cherished memory I have of my time in India. I have never felt more welcomed.
(Continued)