The age of Industrialisation
Topic-1
Dawn of the century
1900, E.TPaull produced a music book that had a picture on the cover page announcing the 'Dawn of the Century.
It showcased that the eastern world was still indulged in rhetoric and fiction while the Western world was progressive and technology oriented.
The picture featured new machines and technology as symbols of progress in the background.
Multiple other art products, for example, pictures like "Two Magicians", showcased wide differences between two parts of the world- Orient (the east) and Occident (the west).
This picture featured Aladdin, a fictional character as the symbol of the east and a mechanic as a symbol of the West.
Topic-2
Before the Industrial Revolution
Most people believe that industrialisation began with the establishment of factories.
Factories marked the beginning of the age of industrialisation.
However, evidence points to various processes which can be considered related to industrialisation, being carried out even with no factories. This phase was called Proto India tralisation.
The Coming Up of the Factories
Factories were first set up in England by the 1730s. The first symbol of the new era was cotton.
Its production boomed in the late nineteenth century due to a number of changes within the process of production.
Multiple inventions, like the cotton mill in the eighteenth century, increased the efficacy of each step of the production process (carding, twisting, spinning, and rolling).
They enhanced the output per worker and made the production of stronger threads and yarn possible.
Richard Arkwright invented the cotton mill
The cloth production which was otherwise spread all around the countryside could now be limited to the mill The mill enabled all the processes to be carried out under one roof and management.
It made possible stricter regulation over productivity of workers and control over the quality of the product.
Factories attracted the attention of the producers during the nineteenth century because they were unique and provided multiple facilities. Merchants
forgot the older centres of production- the bylines and the workshops.
The Place of Industrial Change
In late eighteenth-century Britain, cotton and metal industries were the most dynamic.
Cotton was the leading sector in the first phase of industrialisation up to the 1840s. Later, the iron and steel industry became popular.
With the expansion of railways, in England from the 1840s and in the colonies from the 1860sthe demand for iron and steel increased rapidly.
New industries could not easily displace traditional industries.
Only a limited workforce was employed in these industries.
A great portion of the output was still produced within domestic units.
The traditional industries became technologically advanced too but the process was slow.
Small innovations were the basis of growth in many non- mechanised sectors such as food processing building pottery, glass work, tanning, furniture making, and production of implements.
New technology was expensive and merchants and industrialists were cautious about using it and hence the technological advancement was very slow.
Cost of maintenance was very high and the machines broke down frequently.
Topic -3
Hand labour and steam power
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| Hand Labour |
There was no shortage of human labour in Victorian Britain. A large number of poor peasants and vagrants migrated to cities in search of livelihood.
Since Laborer's were available in abundance, wages were low On the other hand, machines were expensive The industrialists, thus, did not want to increase their capital investment.
The demand for labour was seasonal in most industries.
Hence, the industrialists usually preferred hand labour and employing workers for the season.
Machines were oriented to produce uniforms, and standardised goods for a mass market, but only handmade goods were refined with specific shapes and intricate detailing.
In mid-nineteenth-century Britain, for instance, hammers and axes were produced. These required human skill.
Life of the Workers
Jobs were easily available to people with greater social connections in the cities and factories.
But other workers had to wait for a long time in dire situations. Some workers stayed in night refuges that were set up by private individuals; others went to the casual wards maintained by the poor law authorities.
Seasonality of work meant prolonged periods without work for many workers.
Some workers were terminated without warning after the busy season was over.
Wages increased somewhat in the early nineteenth century. However, during periods of inflation, these wages did not support the workers.
For example, during the Napoleonic wars, prices rose exponentially and workers faced dire economic situations.
The number of days of work which determined the average daily income of the workers were irregular.
In periods of economic slump, like the 1830s, unemployment rates went up to anything between 35 and 75 per cent in different regions.
The introduction of new technology brought about the fear of unemployment among the people
Women who were making handmade garments attacked the newly introduced spinning jenny machines when they were introduced in the woollen industries.
After the 1840s, building activity intensified in the cities.
Roads were widened, new railway stations came up, railway lines were extended, tunnels were dug, drainage and sewers laid, rivers embanked and this helped to widen opportunities for employment.
In the 1840s, the number of people working in the transport industries doubled and doubled again in the next 30 years.
Topic-4
Industrialisation in the colonies
The pattern of industrialization was completely different among the colonies which were controlled and inhabited by developed nations.
Britain was the first industrialised nation and the pattern of its industrialisation was organic.
India. a colonialised country at that point industrialised according to how the British deemed it fit.
The Age of Indian Textiles Before the age of machine industries, silk and cotton goods from India dominated the international market.
The Indian variety was fine. Coarser cotton came from other countries.
Armenian and Persian merchants traded with merchants from Punjab to Afghanistan, eastern Persia and Central Asia Goods were carried through mountain passes.
Indian merchants and bankers financed production and carried goods and supplied exporters. Supply merchants linked the port towns to the inland regions, gave advances to weavers, procured the woven cloth from weaving villages, and carried the supply to the ports .
Big shippers and export merchants had brokers at the ports to negotiate the price and buy goods from the supply merchants operating inland. This network broke down by the 1750s.
The European secured concessions and monopoly rights to trade from local courts. Old ports began declining.
Credit dried up and local bankers became bankrupt. The value of trade fell heavily.
As old ports like Surat and Hooghly declined in significance, Bombay and Calcutta ports grew. With growth in colonial power, trade was controlled by European companies.
Old trading houses collapsed, those who wanted to still operate, operated within a network shaped by European trading companies.
What Happened to Weavers?
The consolidation of East India Company power did not result in a decline in textile exports from India initially. Indian fine textiles were in great demand in Europe before the British industries showed up.
Before establishing political power in Bengal and Carnatic in the 1760s and 1770s, the East India Company had found it difficult to ensure a regular supply of goods for export.
The French, Dutch, Portuguese traders along with local traders competed in the market to secure woven cloth.
Weavers and supply merchants could bargain and sell the produce to the best buyer. Prices were very high.
After asserting a monopoly right to trade, The East India Company eliminated competition controlled costs, and ensured regular supplies of cotton and silk goods.
The Company tried to eliminate the middlemen and establish a more direct control over the weaver
Manchester Comes to India
Irrespective of the fine quality of goods produced by Indian producers, by the beginning of the nineteenth century exports from India began declining.
As cotton industries developed in England, industrial groups pressurised the British government to impose import duties on cotton textiles.
This was to preserve and boost the trade of Manchester goods in Britain against competition from foreign goods.
They forced the East India Company to sell British manufactures in Indian markets.
Hence, Indian exports to Britain reduced drastically while imports multiplied.
The export market collapsed and the local markets shrank due to imports from Manchester creating double problems for cotton weavers.
Imports were cheap due to mass mechanic production and indigenous products could not compete with them.
Weavers could not get sufficient supply of raw cotton of good quality.
As the American Civil War broke out, cotton supplies from the US were cut off and Britain had to turn to India.
Exports of raw cotton increased and prices shut up
Topic-5
Factories come up
The Early Entrepreneurs
(1) Industries were set up in different regions by varying sorts of people. From the late eighteenth century, British in India began exporting opium to China and tea from China to England.
(2) Indian industrialists began providing finance, procuring supplies, and shipping consignments. They had a vision of developing industrial enterprises in India.
(3) Dwarkanath Tagore indulged in trade in China and set up six joint-stock companies in the 1830s and 1840s. His businesses failed but other Chinese industrialists progressed
(4) In Bombay, Parsis like Dinshaw Petit and Jamsetjee Nusserwanjee Tata earned through exports to China, and from raw cotton shipments to England.
(5) Seth Hukumchand was another such industrialist along with the family of GD Birla.
(6) Capital was accumulated through other trade networks. Merchants from Madras traded with Burma, others traded in the Middle East and East Africa,
Where did the workers come from?
With the expansion of factories, the demand of workers increased.
Workers were being recruited Those peasants and artisans who were out of work.
I went to the industrial centres in search of work Millworkers moved between the village and the city returning to their village homes during harvests and festivals.
Workers travelled great distances in the hope of work in the mills.
Getting jobs was always difficult despite the multiplication of mills and increase in the demand for workers.
Job opportunities were always lesser than the number of applicants. Entry into the mills was also restricted.
European managing agencies favoured certain kinds of products.
They established tea and coffee plantations, acquiring land at cheap rates from the colonial government; and they invested in mining. indigo and jute.
These products were cultivated for export purposes.
Indian businessmen avoided competing with Manchester goods in the Indian market.
Early cotton mills in India produced coarse cotton yarn (thread) and the imported yarn was of superior variety.
The yarn produced in Indian spinning mills was used by handloom weavers in India or exported to China.
By the first decade of the twentieth century, a series of changes affected the pattern of industrialisation.
The Swadeshi movement gathered momentum and people boycotted foreign cloth.
Industrial groups forced the government to increase tariff protection and grant other concessions to protect their collective interests.
Moreover, the export of Indian yarn to China declined since the produce from Chinese and Japanese mills flooded the Chinese market.
The industrialists shifted their focus to cloth production. Cotton piece goods production.
Small-Scale Industries Predominate
Large industries formed only a small segment of the economy while factory industries grew steadily Most factories were located in Bengal and Bombay.
Small-scale production dominated the rest of the country. Only a small proportion of the total industrial labour force worked in registered factories, others worked in unregistered shops and small factories.
Topic-7
Markets for goods
(1) Advertisements make presentable and essential. products appear
(2) Advertisements appear in newspapers, magazines, hoardings, street walls, television screens.
(3) Advertisements have played an essential role in expanding the markets for products and in shaping a new consumer culture from the beginning of the industrialisation.
Manchester industrialists put labels on the cloth bundles to make the place of manufacture and the name of the company familiar to the buyer and also as a mark of quality.
Labels were also made to carry pictures to persuade and impress the consumers.
Images of Indian gods and goddesses regularly appeared on these labels to make the consumers feel familiar with the producer.
Manufacturers printed calendars to popularise their products since they were used by a wider consumer base from every class and section of the society.
Figures of important personages, of emperors and nawabs were also used on advertisements and calendars as quality assurance.
Advertisements also became carriers of the nationalist message of swadeshi.
Definition
E.T. Paull:
Music producer who produced an album with the image "Dawn of the century on the Cover" .
James Watt :
A Scottish inventor, mechanical engineerand chemist who improved on Thomas New comment 1712 steam engine, patented that and made it fundamental to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution.
Newcomen: An English inventor who created the atmospheric engine, the first engine in 1712 practical fuel-burning.
Richard Arkwright:
An English inventor and a leading entrepreneur during the early Industrial Revolution who created the cotton mill .
Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy:
He was a Parsi weaver and was involved in trade with China and shipping
Dinshaw Petit:
He was a Parsi entrepreneur and founder of the first textile mills in India. He was the grandfather of Rattanbai Petit, who was the wife of the founder of Pakistan Muhammad Ali Jinnah.
Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata:
He was an Indian pioneer industrialist, who founded the Tata Group, India's biggest conglomerate company. He established an iron and steel plant in Jamshedpur
Dwarkanath Tagore:
The first Indian industrialists to form an enterprise with British partners .He was the grandfather of Rabindranath Tagore He invested in shipping, shipbuilding mining, banking plantations and insurance
G.D. Birla:
Ghanshyam Das Birla was a pioneering Indian businessman and member of the Birla Family