Abstract
This article reviews the “acquisition” of Pulau Pinang by Francis Light and the East India Company (EIC) in the year 1786. The discussion centres on the contested history of Pulau Pinang and the collective memory of the Malays. It reveals discussions between Francis Light and the sultans of Kedah on the supposed “acquisition” and sometime leasing of the island to the EIC. It is based on doubts casted by R. Bonney in his 1971 book Kedah 1771–1821: The Search for Security and Independence. This is supported by legal history and the exchanges in the Light Letters between Light and two Kedah rulers. The letters are kept at the Archives of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. This article reveals that there is no agreement of 1786. However the landing of Light at Tanjong Penaga in 1786 has been legitimised in the historiography prompt and proper. Seen from the absence of any treaty, the “acquisition” of Pulau Pinang by the EIC in that year is treated as “illegal”.
Highlights
The avatar of 1786 was the pivot that defines subsequent discourses on Pulau Pinang
Pulau Pinang was an integral part of Kedah as the East India Company itself acknowledged and by taking formal possession of the island on 11 August 1786, in the name of King George III of England, Light committed, by European standards, a breach of international law but cheated Sultan Abdullah as well
The arguments presented in this article express the issue of the justification of the acquisition of Pulau Pinang by Francis Light
Summary
The avatar of 1786 was the pivot that defines subsequent discourses on Pulau Pinang. These are reflected in mainstream thinking that the history of Pulau Pinang began from that year. The arrival of Vasco da Gama at the port of Calicut on the south-west coast of India on 27th May 1498 marked a turning-point in the history of India and Europe and subsequently of the Malay Archipelago with the fall of Melaka in 1511 and Francis Light’s thieving of Pulau Pinang island from Sultan Abdullah Mukarram Shah of Kedah in 1786. It financed the attempts to capture the glories of antiquity And this is a powerful explanation of the colonisation and dominations of Europe and the West over the rest of the world. This persisted in subsequent ventures to the Malay Archipelago.
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