Abstract
Untouchable Pasts: Religion, Identity, and Power among a Central Indian Community, 1780-1950
Highlights
Powered by the California Digital Library University of California is high, but there is a considerable flexibility in this "informal" relationship
David Hardiman has shed a great deal of light on the intricacies of this relationship
He begins his account in precolonial times and shows that a state dependent on land revenue collection relied throughout on the baniya as crucial intermediary
Summary
Title Untouchable Pasts: Religion, Identity, and Power among a Central Indian Community, 17801950. David Hardiman has shed a great deal of light on the intricacies of this relationship He begins his account in precolonial times and shows that a state dependent on land revenue collection relied throughout on the baniya (moneylender) as crucial intermediary. British colonial rulers made full use of the symbiotic relationship between peasant and moneylender, because it helped them to collect their land revenue They strenghtened the grip of the moneylender by introducing a law that had fortified the security of credit in their own country. Hardiman is careful in his use of these terms He agrees that India never produced a bourgoisie of the European type, and instead of speaking of the "subaltern" position, he stresses the "mentality of dependence on the superior provider" Hardiman greatly enriches the knowledge of his readers
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