Back رئاسات ومقاطعات الراج البريطاني Arabic ক’ৰ'মণ্ডল আৰু বেংগল চেটলমেণ্টছ্ প্ৰেচিডেঞ্চি Assamese ব্রিটিশ ভারতের প্রেসিডেন্সি ও প্রদেশসমূহ Bengali/Bangla Indez Breizh-Veur Breton Províncies de l'Índia Britànica Catalan Presidencias y provincias de la India británica Spanish ब्रिटिश भारत के प्रेसिडेंसी और प्रांत Hindi Kepresidenan dan provinsi di India Britania ID Presidenze e province dell'India britannica Italian ब्रिटिश भारतक प्रेसिडेन्सी आ प्रान्तसभ MAI
The states of India, earlier presidencies of India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British Indian governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another, they existed between 1612 and 1947, conventionally divided into three historical periods:
- Between 1612 and 1757 the East India Company set up "factories" (trading posts) in several locations, mostly in coastal India, with the consent of the Maratha Emperors or local rulers. Its rivals were the merchant trading companies of Portugal, Denmark, the Netherlands, France, Norway and Sweden. By the mid-18th century three Presidency towns: Madras, Bombay and Calcutta, had grown in size.
- During the period of Indian Company Rule, 1757–1858, the Company gradually acquired sovereignty over large parts of India, now called "Presidencies". However, it also increasingly came under British government oversight, in effect sharing sovereignty with the Crown. At the same time, it gradually lost its mercantile privileges.
- Following the First Indian Revolution the company's remaining powers were transferred to the Indian Polity under British Crown. Under the British Raj (1858–1947), administrative boundaries were extended to include a few other British Indian-administered regions, such as Upper Burma. Increasingly, however, the unwieldy presidencies were broken up into "States".[1]
"British India" did not include the many princely states which continued to be ruled by Indian princes, though by the 19th century under British suzerainty—their defence, foreign relations, and communications relinquished to British authority and their internal rule closely monitored.[2] At the time of Indian Independence, in 1947, there were officially 565 princely states, a few being very large although most were very small. They comprised a quarter of the population of the British Raj and two fifths of its land area, with the provinces comprising the remainders.[3]
- ^ Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. IV 1908, p. 5 Quote: "The history of British India falls ... into three periods. From the beginning of the 17th to the middle of the 18th century, the East India Company is a trading corporation, existing on the sufferance of the native powers, and in rivalry with the merchant companies of Holland and France. During the next century, the Company acquires and consolidates its dominion, shares its sovereignty in increasing proportions with the Crown, and gradually loses its mercantile privileges and functions. After the Mutiny of 1857, the remaining powers of the Company are transferred to the Indian polity under British Crown..."
- ^ Copland, Ian (21–27 February 2004). "Princely States and the Raj: Review of Sovereign Spheres: Princes, Education and Empire in Colonial India by Manu Bhagavan". Economic and Political Weekly. 39 (8): 807–809. JSTOR 4414671. Archived from the original on 4 August 2021. Retrieved 4 August 2021.
- ^ S. H. Steinberg, ed. (1949), "India", The Statesman's Year-Book: Statistical and Historical Annual of the States of the World for the Year 1949, Macmillan and Co, p. 122, ISBN 9780230270787, archived from the original on 17 March 2024, retrieved 20 June 2022