ABSTRACT
Imposition of railway time discipline is considered to be one of the most important aspects of the introduction of railways in colonial India. Railway timetables are assumed to have imposed an unprecedented time discipline on colonial India by introducing an inflexible travel-discipline that in turn also brought Indians within the ambit of ‘colonial time’; thereby disciplining the latter. But were railway timetables as successful in imposing their regime on Indian society as currently claimed? Using new evidence this chapter interrogates the ability of railway timetables to impose time and travel-discipline in colonial India.
