NEW! River of Sorrow: Environment and Social Control in Riparian North India, 1770-1994

Christopher V. Hill

In this analysis of colonial attempts to control and manage the agrarian region surrounding the Kosi River, Hill argues that colonial ecological, political, and social policies were inextricably intertwined. The colonial administrators set about "improving" India�s physical environment, just as they "improved" its social and political climate. In so doing, they were ill-prepared to understand, let alone administer, a river such as the Kosi�which traced a violent and erratic course out of the Himalayas, "carrying thousands of tons of silty sand and destroying everything in its path." The ecological paternalism imposed by the colonial governors introduced social and revenue policies that were to have a profound effect on the peasantry that continues to this day.

Ordering Information through AAS, or through Amazon Books. See - Am. Historical Review
Monograph 55. ISBN 0-924304-36-7. 1997, 216 pages, cloth. List price: $33 (AAS Members: $26.50)

Return to Ideas and Writings on South Asia