Water, Land, and the Politics of River-Development in Sind, 1898-1969
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Building the Empire, Building the Nation: Water, land, and the politics of river-development in Sind, 1898-1969 Timothy Daniel Haines A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Royal Holloway College, University of London. 1 Declaration of Work I, Timothy Daniel Haines, hereby declare that this thesis and the work presented in it is entirely my own. Where I have consulted the work of others, this is always clearly stated. Signed…………………………………………………………………………… Date………...................04 April 2011……………………............. 2 Abstract Major attempts to control the natural environment characterized government ‘developmental’ activity in twentieth-century Sind. This thesis argues that the construction of three barrage dams across the River Indus, along with a network of irrigation canals, enacted human control over nature as a political project. The Raj and its successor state in Sind, Pakistan, thereby claimed legitimacy through their capacity to benefit humans by re-modelling the landscape. These claims depended on an implied narrative of material progress, which irrigation development was expected to bring about, in a province considered technologically and socially backward. In allocating land that was newly made available for cultivation, government officials found an unprecedented opportunity to also re-shape agrarian society. As well as providing the means by which ‘ideal types’ of cultivator could be encouraged to proliferate, the development of Sind’s irrigation system was based on concepts of modernization that promoted increasing state intervention in agrarian life to render a ‘disordered’ society more easily governable. This trend was constrained, however, by successive administrations’ need to balance the lure of radical modernization against the powerful claims on new land of local magnates. The colonial belief in the agricultural, economic, and social benefits of large- scale irrigation projects was transplanted into the post-colonial state. The construction of irrigation works, the colonization of land, and their political implications before and after Independence are therefore analyzed, in order to demonstrate how and why the logic of large infrastructure schemes remained consistent. At the same time, differences in how successive administrations framed and enacted barrage projects are shown to have depended on contemporary 3 circumstances. In the process, the thesis sheds new light on the tensions between and within the central and provincial governments, demonstrating the contested nature of concepts of Imperial governance, nation-building, and material progress. 4 Table of Contents DECLARATION OF WORK ...................................................................................................... 2 ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................. 3 ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................................................... 7 A NOTE ON SPELLING AND NAMES ....................................................................................... 8 MAP OF PAKISTAN ............................................................................................................... 9 MAP OF SIND’S RIVER AND BARRAGES ............................................................................... 10 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................... 11 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 13 WATER IN SOUTH ASIA .............................................................................................................. 18 INTRODUCING SIND ................................................................................................................... 21 METHODOLOGY AND SOURCES .................................................................................................... 26 CHAPTER OUTLINE .................................................................................................................... 30 CHAPTER 1: THE JAMRAO CANAL AND THE BEGINNING OF SCIENTIFIC IRRIGATION IN SIND ........................................................................................................................................... 34 SIND BEFORE AND AFTER BRITISH ANNEXATION .............................................................................. 36 THE LAIKPUR CANAL .................................................................................................................. 42 THE JAMRAO CANAL ................................................................................................................. 47 COLONIZATION OF THE JAMRAO PROJECT ...................................................................................... 53 CONTROLLING IRRIGATION AND CULTIVATION ON THE JAMRAO TRACT ................................................. 68 CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................... 74 CHAPTER 2: THE SUKKUR BARRAGE AND SIND’S TRANSFORMATION ................................. 78 PLANNING THE SUKKUR BARRAGE ................................................................................................ 79 The 1912 Despatch .......................................................................................................... 82 The 1920 Despatch .......................................................................................................... 87 CONSTRUCTING THE BARRAGE..................................................................................................... 92 CEREMONIAL EVENTS................................................................................................................. 98 LAND DISTRIBUTION POLICIES .................................................................................................... 105 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................... 118 CHAPTER 3: FROM EMPIRE TO NATION: IRRIGATION AND GOVERNANCE DURING PROVINCIAL UPHEAVALS .................................................................................................. 122 THE SUKKUR BARRAGE AND SIND’S CONSTITUTIONAL STATUS .......................................................... 124 SEPARATION GRANTED: AGRICULTURE AND THE LEGISLATURE .......................................................... 130 WARTIME DEVELOPMENT SCHEMES ............................................................................................ 145 ‘PROGRESS’ AFTER PARTITION ................................................................................................... 151 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................... 159 CHAPTER 4: THE NATION-STATE VERSUS THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT .......................... 161 THE NEW BARRAGES ................................................................................................................ 162 FEATS OF ENGINEERING ............................................................................................................ 172 RATIONALIZATION OF RESOURCES: ONE UNIT ............................................................................... 183 5 DEVELOPMENT OF THE BARRAGE AREAS ...................................................................................... 187 DRAINAGE: SETBACKS IN ‘PROGRESS’ .......................................................................................... 195 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................... 207 CHAPTER 5: THE POLITICS OF LAND AFTER INDEPENDENCE .............................................. 210 BARRAGE LAND, REFUGEES, AND CENTRE-PROVINCE TENSIONS......................................................... 212 LAND IN EARLY 1950S SIND ...................................................................................................... 217 LAND UNDER THE ONE UNIT ADMINISTRATION ............................................................................. 226 COLONIZATION AND LAND REFORMS UNDER MARTIAL LAW ............................................................ 234 COLONIZING THE GUDU BARRAGE .............................................................................................. 253 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................... 256 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................... 258 EPILOGUE .............................................................................................................................. 276 BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................. 278 PRIMARY SOURCES .................................................................................................................. 278 (i) Private papers ....................................................................................................... 278 Oriental and India Office Collections (IOR), British Library, London ........................................ 278 (ii) Official records ................................................................................................