Indian Immigrant: the Everyday Diplomacy of Public Health
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Entangled Citizens, Undesirable Migrants The Imprint of Empire and Afterlives of Indenture in Indian Diplomacy (1947-1962) Natarajan, Kalathmika Publication date: 2019 Document version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Document license: CC BY-NC-ND Citation for published version (APA): Natarajan, K. (2019). Entangled Citizens, Undesirable Migrants: The Imprint of Empire and Afterlives of Indenture in Indian Diplomacy (1947-1962). Det Humanistiske Fakultet, Københavns Universitet. Download date: 27. sep.. 2021 UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN FACULTY OF HUMANITIES ENTANGLED CITIZENS, UNDESIRABLE MIGRANTS THE IMPRINT OF EMPIRE AND AFTERLIVES OF INDENTURE IN INDIAN DIPLOMACY (1947-1962) PHD THESIS KALATHMIKA NATARAJAN Supervisor: Stuart Ward Date of Submission: 20/03/2019 Name of Department: Department of English, Germanic and Romance Studies Faculty: Faculty of Humanities, University of Copenhagen Author: Kalathmika Natarajan Title: Entangled Citizens, Undesirable Migrants: The Imprint of Empire and Afterlives of Indenture in Indian Diplomacy (1947-1962) Supervisor: Stuart Ward Date of submission: 20 March 2019 Number of words: 96,262 words ii ABSTRACT This thesis is concerned with recovering the figure of the migrant in Indian diplomatic history in the decades after independence. I do so by examining British-Indian diplomatic relations as a negotiation of the limits of citizenship and mobility encountered by ‘overseas Indians’ and postcolonial Indian migrants – two figures shaped by the histories and afterlives of the indentured labour system, and subject to the provisions of the 1948 British Nationality Act (BNA). The BNA‘s recognition of Indians as British subjects after independence had significant consequences for both long-settled and prospective migrants, producing Indians resident in British colonies and Commonwealth nations as ‘entangled citizens’ with multiple, contested claims to citizenship, while also providing prospective migrants with the right freely to enter Britain. Contrary to much of the literature that regards the Indian state’s relationship with its diaspora as a binary of exclusion/inclusion where 1947 marked a clean break, I show that the Indian diplomatic engagement with overseas Indians was complex, often paradoxical, yet continual. The status of overseas Indians shaped both India’s articulation of ‘reciprocity of citizenship’ as the basis of its Commonwealth membership, and the making of the 1955 Indian Citizenship Act. Moreover, the Indian state projected its diplomatic stature in terms of its ability to know, mediate and represent overseas Indian communities in British colonial territories. I argue that the Indian state regarded the ‘international’ as a sanctified space imbued with the afterlives of indenture qua caste, wherein lower caste and class migrants were considered unworthy of holding Indian passports and representing India in the international realm. These ‘unskilled’ migrants were deemed legatees of the dreaded ‘coolie’, a dual threat to British public health and India’s international reputation. Moving away from the dominant focus on the ‘high politics’ of conflicts and conferences, this thesis puts the people back into Indian diplomatic history. In so doing, it recognises the history of indenture as a constitutive element in the making of Indian diplomacy and locates the intersection of caste, class and race in Indian diplomatic discourse. iii RESUMÉ I denne afhandling sættes migrantens rolle som en central figur og omdrejningspunkt i indisk diplomatisk historie i centrum. Det gør jeg ved at undersøge britisk-indiske diplomatiske relationer, som gennem forhandling formede begrænsningerne for tilegnelse af statsborgerskab og mobilitet for ’oversøiske indere’ og postkoloniale indiske migranter – to kategorier, som på kompliceret vis var omfattet af bestemmelserne i den britiske nationalitetslov fra 1948, og som var formet af det indiske kontraktarbejdes mange historier og efterliv. Den britiske nationalitetslovs anerkendelse af indere som britiske undersåtter efter uafhængigheden i 1947 havde betydelige konsekvenser for migranter, som allerede havde været bosiddende udenfor Indien i en længere periode, samt for fremtidige migranter. Ifølge loven blev indere bosat i britiske koloniale besiddelser og andre lande indenfor Commonwealth regnet for borgere med en kompliceret status qua deres mange og omstridte krav på statsborgerskab. Samtidig gav lovens bestemmelser fremtidige migranter retten til fri indrejse i Storbritannien. I modsætning til meget af den eksisterende forskningslitteratur, som primært kigger på den indiske stats forhold til diasporaen gennem binære eksklusions-/inklusionsmønstre og hvor uafhængigheden i 1947 markerer et klart brud, viser jeg, at det indiske diplomatis omgang med oversøiske indere var mere kompliceret, ofte paradoksal, og vedvarende. De oversøiske inderes status påvirkede nemlig både Indiens betoning af gensidig anerkendelse af statsborgerskab som forudsætning for landets medlemskab af Commonwealth, samt tilblivelsen af loven om indisk statsborgerskab i 1955. Dertil kommer, at den indiske stat byggede sit diplomatis status på en antagelse om, at det skulle kunne indsamle viden om, mediere på vegne af, og repræsentere oversøiske indiske befolkningsgrupper i britiske kolonier. Jeg argumenterer for, at den indiske stats opfattelse af den internationale arena som et ophøjet rum, hvor lavkaste- og underklassemigranter blev anskuet som uværdige besiddere af indisk pas og uværdige repræsentanter for Indien i den internationale verden, var præget af kontraktarbejdets og kastesystemets dybe historiske spor. Disse ufaglærte migranter blev anset som den frygtede kulis arvtager, der på én og samme tid udgjorde en trussel mod den offentlige sundhed i Storbritannien og Indiens internationale omdømme. Afhandlingen udfordrer den fremherskende forskning i indisk diplomatisk historie og dens fokus på højpolitiske konflikter og konferencer ved i stedet at placere individer og mennesker centralt. På den måde anerkender afhandlingen kontraktarbejdets historie som et afgørende element i tilblivelsen af indisk diplomati, og lokaliserer kaste, klasse og race, som et centralt spændingsfelt i indisk diplomatisk tæ. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been completed without the endless enthusiasm, patience and support of my supervisor Stuart Ward. His creativity and attention to detail has been inspiring, and made the daunting process of writing this thesis a lot more rewarding and enjoyable. Most of all, thank you Stuart, and Lill, for your generosity in making me feel so at home in Copenhagen. I am grateful to the Department of English, Germanic and Romance Studies at the University of Copenhagen for their generous scholarship and financial support. Being part of the Embers of Empire project has significantly influenced the ways in which this project has evolved and I am thankful for the feedback and company of my fellow project (m)embers: Ezequiel Mercau, Astrid Rasch, Christian Damm Pedersen and Harriet Mercer. Special thanks to Christian for translating my abstract to Danish and to Harriet for many illuminating conversations on everything from citizenship legislation to cricket. Ever since my postgraduate days at Royal Holloway, Yasmin Khan has been a constant source of support and inspiration. I have learnt much from her research and have benefitted greatly from her thoughtful comments about some of the chapters of this thesis. I am also thankful to Sankaran Krishna, whose encouraging reading of my initial ideas about caste and Indian diplomatic history pushed me to think more critically about these themes. His own work on these topics (and much beyond) has been a major influence. I am amazed by the ways in which conversations with Medha on Indian history, politics and foreign policy – long before either of us began our PhDs – have shaped so much of the form that this thesis has taken. Throughout many joint papers, archival expeditions, conference submissions, and memorable journeys across continents, I could not have asked for better company. Amit Julka’s poignant Urdu and Punjabi translations have also helped me understand the migrant experience better. Early versions of these chapters were presented at a number of invigorating conferences organised as part of the Embers of Empire project and beyond. I am thankful to all the participants for their feedback and expertise. Several nascent ideas were finetuned thanks v to the keen engagement of the participants of the Princeton South Asia conference. My excellent co-panelists at the British International Studies Association conference, Alexander Davis, Medha, Sharinee Jagtiani, and Vipul Dutta, have also helped me think through the politics and silences of the diplomatic archive. Vineet Thakur, Kalyani Ramnath, Cees Heere, and Alexander Davis have kindly shared their fantastic work with me (some of it soon to be published). I am also grateful to Richard Toye for a visiting fellowship at the University of Exeter. My archival research has depended on the support of the staff at the British Library, Wellcome Library, Wolfson Centre for Archival Research, National Archives at Kew, National Archives of India, and Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. Ms Jyoti at the Nehru Memorial library in particular made access to archival material efficient and easy. Amba Srinivasan, Preethi Ramamoorthy, Sunitha Sekar, and Janane Venkatraman have made every archival trip back home memorable. I cannot imagine navigating academia