ABSTRACT
Chapter 1 seeks to demonstrate that liberalism evolved in India at the patronage of the colonial authority. Drawing on the ideas of select British thinkers espousing liberal constitutionalism, the chapter argues that the civilizing zeal of the rulers appears to have governed their priorities in India as soon as India became a British colony. Serious differences notwithstanding among those who shaped the cognitive understanding of colonialism, there was hardly a formidable opposition to the continuity of colonial rule till when the British paramountcy was severely challenged by the nationalists. Besides the obvious economic gain, India as a colony was also a laboratory for testing some of the interesting ideas which were considered to be integrally connected with the fundamental civilizing mission of the colonizers. This was never seriously questioned and the leading thinkers, despite their concern for liberty, fraternity and compassion, appeared to have endorsed the colonial practices as being needed to elevate the colonies to an improved state of being civilized. A threadbare analysis of the ideas that the British liberal thinkers pursued, the chapter helps us understand the context in which liberalism became a source of empowerment for the colonized.
