With scanty information available on the history of the French in India, a lot needs to be done to study the relationship between local population and the State, says Akhila Yechury, School of History lecturer in the University of St. Andrews, U.K.
“All of what has been done in documenting the history of the British India is waiting to be done for French India. Yes, they were small but they also had their systems and policies; people were politicised, there was a question of subjectivity and citizenship. Besides, there is also the social relationship and questions of caste in a different state that needs to be explored,” she said.
In the presence of an unconscious bias among historians against writing comprehensive histories of the French and Portuguese in India, she feels that there is now an effort to write broader histories.
Role of local literature
Stressing the need for local historians, she adds: “Local languages are very important in writing these histories and local people should come forward to write them. We cannot write the history of Puducherry by simply looking at the French archives alone. We have to find other archives and materials available in Tamil, French and English languages.”
‘Sparse resources’
On the challenges in writing the history of French settlements, she says that the relevant resources are spread across different places and are in different languages. The resources available about the French rule in the Regional Centre of National Archives in Pondicherry or IFP or Pondicherry University are scarce and not enough to write a detailed history.
“One should know English, French, Tamil, Bengali, Telugu and Malayalam to source the materials to document the history of French rule in India. While Tamil, French and British archives provide information about their forays and dealings, knowing the local languages is important to record the history in detail. This is the biggest issue in this study apart from the scarce materials available in the archives,” she said.
Beyond mainstream
She believes that if we stepped outside the mainstream histories, we could then start telling the stories of the French in India.
“I think it is really crucial in the present political climate. It seems like people are forgetting how conflicted and tension ridden the formation of Indian identity has been and how many issues have been dealt with successfully and unsuccessfully in the process of nation formation. People are forgetting that French settlements are part of that history of a negotiation with the nation and belonging to a nation, being part of it while also being different in many ways.”
“That is what India is essentially. There are so many differences, imposing one scheme on all of them is something we should now be thinking of countering,” Ms. Yechury said.
