Available Online at http://www.recentscientific.com International Journal of CODEN: IJRSFP (USA) Recent Scientific International Journal of Recent Scientific Research Research Vol. 12, Issue, 01 (E), pp. 40718-40721, January, 2021 ISSN: 0976-3031 DOI: 10.24327/IJRSR Research Article DEVELOPMENT OF THE BHUTAN WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF INDIA FROM COLONIAL TO POST-COLONIAL PERIOD Ananta Das DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.24327/ijrsr.2021.1201.5751 ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT The small Himalayan nation of Bhutan has attracted considerable international attention due to its Article History: unique development with the assistance of India. Gradually, India was leading contribution to build th Received 06 October, 2020 up the Bhutan as a great peaceful nation with provide knowledge of technology, biomedicine and th Received in revised form 14 Foods. However, the process of democratisation in Bhutan is confronted by several internal socio- November, 2020 cultural, political and economic forces. This paper tries to understand the major development of rd Accepted 23 December, 2020 Bhutan with the assistant of India from Colonial to post-colonial period, the present paper tries to th Published online 28 January, 2021 read the two contradictory images that were being produces by two government reports to understand the dichotomy over the several causes of development of Bhutan as a peaceful country in Key Words: the Asia. The Political development brings by the assistant of India. Commercialism, Relation, Development, Methodology of the study: Method of the writing of this paper is descriptive with applying Treaty, Colonialism, Biomedicine, Post- historical analysis. Data has been collected from different secondary sources like books, research colonialism. papers, research thesis, newspapers, souvenirs etc. Copyright © Ananta Das, 2021, this is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. INTRODUCTION Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of Indian and King Jigme DorjiWangchuck of Bhutan, gave a new thrust to this ancient Bhutan, a landlocked multi-ethnic country, situated in the lap relationship. With the sensitivity, wisdom and vision, they of the Himalayas, has drawn the attention of social scientists forged new bonds of trust and confidence. Relation between the around the world mainly because of its ongoing developmental two countries have reached new heights of amity and activities, cultural nationalism and the process of cooperation under their able successors. The first significant democratisation. Democratisation in Bhutan was initiated by event after the departure of the British from India was the the monarchy itself in the second half of the twentieth century conclusion on an equal footing by India and Bhutan of a Treaty when its neighbours initiated the policies for socioeconomic of Friendship on the 8th August, 1949. This treaty laid down the and political modernisation. India’s independence in 1947 and basic framework for a mutually beneficial relationship between its planned development strategy plus the emergence of the two independent States (Letho, 1994). communist People’s Republic of China in 1949 and its move towards a new identity induced King Dorji Wangchuk (1952- The Geo-Political and Geo-strategic position of Bhutan a 1972) to initiate a policy of political and economic landlocked Himalayan Kingdom covering area of 46000 sq km. modernisation in Bhutan (Barman, 2009). Its maximum extent (East-West) of 300 km and maximum depth (North-South) of 170 km. Bhutan shares common Bhutan is situated to the south of the Tibetan Autonomous borders with India and China, two giant nations in the post- Region of China, bordering the Sikkim, Bengal and Assam second World War (1939-1945 AD) scenario. In addition to it, region of India. The current population of ca. 1.2 million, most it is situated in close proximity to Nepal and Bangladesh with of Tibetan Buddhist and become the first ruler of the modern some geo-strategic possibilities. The northern part of Bhutan Bhutan. Relation between India and Bhutan during the past lies within the Great Himalayas. In some places the mountain four decades is a model of good neighborly relationship. It is an ranges have a height of more than twenty-four thousand feet. In ideal example of what enlightened and far-sighted leadership summer, valleys at elevations of twelve thousand feet are used can achieve. It is rare in this world for a big country like India for grazing. The Black Mountain range forms the watershed and a small neighbor like Bhutan to develop such close and between the Sankos and the Manas rivers. It divides Bhutan friendly relations. The age-old ties between India and Bhutan into two geographic sub divisions both administratively and has been condition by bonds of shared history, geography, ethnographically. In Tongsa to the east the people hail from religion, culture and tradition. Two towering statemen, Prime hills of Assam. To the west in Paro the population is *Corresponding author: Ananta Das International Journal of Recent Scientific Research Vol. 12, Issue, 01 (E), pp. 40718-40721, January, 2021 predominantly Tibetan in origin. A number of broad fertile May 1774 for Tibet via Bhutan. The aim of the mission was to valleys of central Bhutan constitute the cultural and economic report on both countries, to establish commercial links between core of the kingdom. These valleys are located at elevations Bhutan and Bengal, and to explore the possibility of a trade from five thousand to nine thousand feet. Among these the route through Bhutan to Tibet. Bogle and Hamilton reached Paro, Thimpu and Punakha valleys are well-known. Tashilhunpo, the home of the Panchen Lama, in December 1774 and stayed there for five months. Following Bogle’s The southern section of Bhutan slopes into Dooars plain. return correspondence between Hastings and the Lama Rainfall is excessive in this region. The hill sides have rich continued through the intermediary of Purangir, a Hindu vegetation. The narrow strip of Dooars plain have eighteen gosain, or pilgrim. Hamilton returned to Bhutan in 1775–1776 strategic passes through the Himalayan foot hills which lead and 1777 to strengthen contacts made with the Bhutanese and into mountainous central Bhutan. Most of the inhabitants in to mediate on frontier problems. In 1779 Hastings proposed central and northern Bhutan cling to Tibetan culture. The large sending Bogle on a second mission to Tibet in the hope that the number of Nepali settlers in southern Bhutan is Hindus. “In Panchen Lama might be able to assist in arranging a British eastern Bhutan culture has been considerably modified by the mission to Peking. This plan was thwarted by the deaths of the intrusion of elements from the Indo Mongoloid culture of Panchen Lama in Peking in 1780 and Bogle in the following Assam Himalayas”. The fixed facts of geography have given year. shape to fluid facts of politics in Indo-Bhutan relations through the ages. Later that year Cooch Behar, a small state on the southern borders of Bhutan, appealed to the Company for help against Indo-Bhutan Relation and Conflict with British Power the invading Bhutanese. The successful campaign waged by the The English East India Company was founded in 1600 and Company, and the intervention by the Panchen Lama of Tibet established itself in India soon afterwards. In 1765 the on behalf of the Bhutanese, led to the Bogle Mission to Bhutan Company took over the control of Bengal thus expanding its and Tibet in 1774 and the Turner Mission in 1783. Following territory to the borders of the Himalayan area. This marked the the conclusion of the first Anglo-Bhutanese War1, Bhutan was beginning of the development of relations with the Himalayan visited by several envoys of the East India Company—Bogle in States and Tibet, although information on these areas had been 1774, Alexander Hamilton in 1775 and 1777, and Turner in collected earlier by some agents of the Company such as John 1783. With the departure of Warren Hastings from India active Marshall. Although the first contact came through the survey relations with Bhutan virtually ceased until the British work of James Rennell, who penetrated to the borders of occupation of Assam in 1826. In this period Thomas Manning Bhutan in 1766, the early interest of the Company in the area passed through Bhutan on his way to Lhasa2 in 1811and Kishen was commercial. Its acquisition of Bengal coincided with the Kant Bose, an Indian official in the Company’s service, went conquest of most of Nepal by the Hindu Gurkhas under on a mission to Bhutan in 1815. The occupation of Assam in Prithvinarayan Shah. In 1767 Prithvinarayan invaded the 1826 greatly extended Britain’s frontier with Bhutan and from Newar States of the Nepal Valley which had close ties with this time border disputes and incidents occurred in both the Tibet. The resulting military operations and siege effectively Bengal and Assam Duars. There was also continuous internal disrupted the trans-Himalayan trade which passed through the strife within Bhutan. Missions were sent to Bhutan in 1837- Nepal Valley. The expedition was a failure, and the proposed 1838 under Captain R.B. Pemberton, and in 1863-1864 under commercial mission of James Logan to Nepal two years later Ashley Eden, but both ended in failure (Marshall, 2005). was abandoned with the fall of Kathmandu in 1769. The Indo- The ill treatment of the Eden Mission was the immediate cause Tibetan trade route through the Nepal Valley was now virtually of the outbreak of the Second Anglo-Bhutanese War3 in 1864. closed and the Company began to look towards Bhutan and During the colonial period, Indo-Bhutan Duars War (1864- Assam in the hope of finding alternative routes to Tibet.