Indian Army And The First World War

Drawing on untapped new sources, the first global history of the Indian Expeditionary Forces in World War I While their story is almost always overlooked, the 1.5 million Indian soldiers who served the British Empire in World War I played a crucial role in the eventual Allied victory. Despite their sacrifices, Indian troops received mixed reactions from their allies and their enemies alike-some were treated as liberating heroes, some as mercenaries and conquerors themselves, and all as racial inferiors and a threat to white supremacy. Yet even as they fought as imperial troops under the British flag, their broadened horizons fired in them new hopes of racial equality and freedom on the path to Indian independence. Drawing on freshly uncovered interviews with members of the Indian Army in Iraq and elsewhere, historian George Morton-Jack paints a deeply human story of courage, colonization, and racism, and finally gives these men their rightful place in history.

Third place in the 2022 SAHR Templer Best First Book Prize More than one million Indian soldiers were deployed during World War I, serving in the Indian Army as part of Britain's imperial war effort. These men fought in France and Belgium, Egypt and East Africa, and Gallipoli, Palestine, and Mesopotamia. In Indian Soldiers in World War I Andrew T. Jarboe follows these Indian soldiers--or sepoys--across the battlefields, examining the contested representations British and Indian audiences drew from the soldiers' wartime experiences and the impacts these representations had on the British Empire's racial politics. Presenting overlooked or forgotten connections, Jarboe argues that Indian soldiers' presence on battlefields across three continents contributed decisively to the British Empire's final victory in the war. While the war and Indian soldiers' involvement led to a hardening of the British Empire's prewar racist ideologies and governing policies, the battlefield contributions of Indian soldiers fueled Indian national aspirations and calls for racial equality. When Indian soldiers participated in the brutal suppression of anti-government demonstrations in India at war's end, they set the stage for the eventual end of British rule in South Asia.

Recasts the role of the Indian Army on the Western Front, questioning why its performance was traditionally deemed a failure.

Barkawi re-imagines the study of war with imperial and multinational armies that fought in Asia in the Second World War.

Though largely invisible in histories of the First World War, over??550,000 men in the ranks of the Indian army were non-combatants. From the porters, stevedores and construction workers in the Coolie Corps to those who maintained supply lines and removed the wounded from the battlefield, Radhika Singha recovers the story of this unacknowledged service. The labor regimes built on the backs of these 'coolies' sustained the military infrastructure of empire; their deployment in interregional arenas bent to the demands of global war. Viewed as racially subordinate and subject to 'non-martial' caste designations, they fought back against their status, using the warring powers' need for manpower as leverage to challenge traditional service hierarchies and wage differentials. The Coolie's Great War views that global conflict through the lens of Indian labor, constructing a distinct geography of the war--from tribal settlements and colonial jails, beyond India's frontiers, to the battlefronts of France and Mesopotamia.

This is the first cultural and literary history of India and the First World War, with archival research from Europe and South Asia.

'Essential to a proper understanding of the war and of our world of today' Michael Morpurgo 1.5 million Indians fought with the British in the First World War - from Flanders to the African bush and the deserts of the Islamic world, they saved the Allies from defeat in 1914 and were vital to global victory in 1918. Using previously unpublished veteran interviews, this is their story, told as never before.

The Period Covered In This Book Is The Most Constructive Period In The History Of The Freedom Movement In India. The Hindus, The Muslims, The Moderates And The Extremists All Came Closer And Stood On A Common Platform For The Fulfillment Of Their National Aspirations. This Period Is Particularly Significant For The Fact That It Paved The Way For The Foundation Of The Gandhian Era, Over Which The Super Structure Of The Real Freedom Movement Of India Was Raised. It Will Not Be Exaggerating To Say That If The First World War Opened Grounds For The Historic Movement Of Gandhiji The Second World War Aimed The Final Blow For The Ultimate Liquidation Of The British Rule In India. An Interesting Episode Has Been Explored In This Book For Those Who Are Keen To Follow The History Of The Growth Of Nationalism In Modern India.The Book Is Based On Materials Collected From Such Sources As The Private Papers Of The Governor Generals, Parliamentary Papers, Home Political Proceedings, Report Of The Army In India Committee, Indian Sedition Committee Report, Report On The Indian Constitutional Reforms, Indian Industrial Commission Report, Moral And Material Progress Reports, Report Of The Administration Of Lord Hardinge, Report Of Me Administration Of Lord Chelsford, Report Of The Indian Fiscal Commission And Other Official Reports, Proceedings Of The Indian National Congress, Writings And Speeches Of The National Leaders And Contemporary Journals And Newspapers.

Indian soldiers served in France from 1914 to 1918. This book is a selection of their letters. By turns poignant, funny, and almost unbearably moving, these documents vividly evoke the world of the Western Front - as seen through 'subaltern' Indian eyes. The letters also bear eloquent witness to the sepoys' often unsettling encounter with Europe, and with European culture. This book helps to map the imaginative landscape of South Asia's warrior-peasant communities.

This collection of seventeen essays based on archival data breaks new ground as regards the contribution of the Indian Army in British war effort during the two World Wars around various parts of the globe.