Author: Amaresh Misra
Publisher: Rupa
Year: 2005
Language: English
Pages: 120
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8129107856
Description
On March 29, 1857 a Brahmin sepoy shot at a British officer in Barrackpore, Bengal. The incident was not the first of its kind-or the last. Two months later the British East India Company faced a major civil rebellion and political insurrection/restoration, accompanied by military mutinies in North India. The event ended British cultural hegemony, revived Indian-ness and kept alive an alternative Asiatic perspective-western authors still call it the Mutiny but for Indians it was the First War of Indian Independence.
This is the first book, which deals with Mangal Pandey, the Barrackpore Brahmin sepoy’s the true story. It reveals unseen aspects of colonial India: the colors of the landscape, the dram of the contonments, conflicts of love, loyalty and valour, heroism, the modernity of the peasant, laws of rebellion and political intrigue, amidst the looming specter of an Asiatic upheaval. Written from an Indian perspective, marshalling indigenous archival material, the book ruptures all previous, exotic-oriental-Anglicist notions of Asiatic-Indian men and events.
REVIEWS
Mangal Pandey was not impulsive. Much had brewed in his mind before he ignited the pulse of the people to revolt. The legacy of Mangal Pandey must live to keep India’s composite culture alive.
-Gulzar
Contents
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
MANGAL PANDEY'S EXECUTION ORDER
PROLOGUE
The North Indian Brahmin Ethos
Mangal Pandey-His Early Life
Mangal Pandey-The New Sepoy
Barrackpore to Barrackpore
The Calcutta-Patna Conspiracy
A Time of Distress
The Indian Hero
EPILOGUE
INDEX