Colonial era
South Asia 1757–1947.
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Multi Racial Multi Cultural Family in Ceylon
Sbarrkum recounts his mother’s multiracial family in Galle, mixing Sinhalese, Irish, Jaffna Tamil and Barbadian ancestry, and argues that children of mixed marriages belong to no single community and so…
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Book Review: Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan. Ikbal Shah and Idries Shah (of Sufis fame)
Omar Ali reviews Nile Green’s biography of Ikbal and Idries Shah, which presents the father and son as fantasists who invented aristocratic Sufi credentials. He accepts the case but notes…
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Why does the West get Immigrants and not Indigenous
Sereno Barr-Kumarakulasinghe argues that Western countries prefer immigrants to indigenous populations for the same reason the British brought undocumented indentured Indian labour to Ceylon: people without legal status are easier…
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Reading the Reader: On Ammar Ali Qureshi’s Views and Reviews
Furqan Ali reviews Ammar Ali Qureshi’s Views and Reviews, a collection of essays on Punjab’s history, Pakistan, Iran and Iqbal’s love of Persia, praising its range and its melancholy portrait…
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Why Pakistan Is a Colonial Project & India a Civilizational One
X.T.M argues that Pakistan is a colonial continuation built by divide and rule, that India is a civilisational project, that the term ‘South Asia’ reflects a London-drawn map, and that…
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South India Makes British India Hindu?
The author argues that had South India separated in 1947, the rest of British India would today be a Muslim-majority bloc, citing population figures, and suggests the South’s inclusion kept…
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The Myth of the British-Made India
Rebuts Francis Pike’s Spectator claim that the British created India and Nehru and Gandhi invented its unity. The author argues India is a civilisational unit older than the Raj, that…
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Cheap Catharsis, Expensive History
Argues that televised confrontations with Empire’s legacy, such as the General Dyer descendant on Sathnam Sanghera’s documentary, offer cheap catharsis in place of structural change. The author says they manage…
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Capsule Review: To Raise a Fallen People
Omar Ali recommends Rahul Sagar’s anthology of late-19th-century Indian writings on world affairs for its selections, not its editorial frame, which he says adds nothing. He singles out Anandibai Joshi’s…
