Kingship and Political Practice in Colonial India

In a cultural history which considers the transformation of south Indian institutions under British colonial rule in the nineteenth century, Pamela Price focuses on the two former 'little kingdoms' of Ramnad and Sivagangai which came under colonial governance as revenue estates. She demonstrates how rivalries among the royal families and major zamindari temples, and the disintegration of indigenous institutions of rule, contributed to the development of nationalist ideologies and new political identities among the people of southern Tamil country. The author also shows how religious symbols and practices going back to the seventeenth century were reformulated and acquired a new significance in the colonial context. Arguing for a reappraisal of the relationship of Hinduism to politics, Price finds that these symbols and practices continue to inform popular expectation of political leadership today.

In this 1996 cultural history which considers the transformation of south Indian institutions under British colonial rule in the nineteenth century, Pamela Price focuses on the two former 'little kingdoms' of Ramnad and Sivaganga which came under colonial governance as revenue estates. She demonstrates how rivalries among the royal families and major zamindari temples, and the disintegration of indigenous institutions of rule, contributed to the development of nationalism and identity amongst the people of southern Tamil country. The author also shows how religious symbols and practices going back to the seventeenth century were reformulated and acquired a new significance in the colonial context. Arguing for a reappraisal of the relationship of Hinduism to politics, Price finds that these symbols and practices continue to inform popular expectation of political leadership today.

List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; Glossary; Introduction; 1. Honour, status and state formation in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Maravar country; 2. Cosmological fragmentation in the public sphere; 3. Domain formation in mid-nineteenth-century Ramnad; 4. Human and divine palaces in the fragmentation of monarchical cosmology; 5. Ritual performances, the ruling person and the public; 6. Raja Baskara Setupati and the emergence of a new political style; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.

In this 1996 cultural history which considers the transformation of southern Indian institutions under British colonial rule, Pamela Price focuses on the two former 'little kingdoms' of Ramnad and Sivaganga which came under colonial governance as revenue estates.