Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book aims to contribute a new critical dimension on the meanings of 'colonial medicine'. It explores to what extent the development of Western-style medicine in the various Princely states can be characterized as 'colonial' – and, if so, what it is that makes it so. The book provides the basis for comparison between medicines in areas ruled indirectly by the British, in contrast to regions that were fully subjugated to Western colonial hegemony. It shows that there was as much variety in the quality and nature of Western medical provision in Princely states as there was in British India. The book investigates how the southern states of Mysore and Travancore and Orissa Princely states maintained strong links not only with British and British Indian medical practitioners and medical institutions, but also with the organizations in Germany, France, and the United States.