A fine reading of the myth and reality of Indian soldiers under British Rule

The Testimonies of Indian Soldiers and the Two World Wars—Between Self and Sepoy is a misleading title. The book is neither a factual rendering of the sipahis’ testimonies nor a historical construct/reconstruct of the Indian Army—a creation of our colonial rulers to fight their wars. The book in fact is a deconstruct of not just the times that the author has trained his researcher’s lens on but an analytical reading into the minds and psyche of the many protagonists of the whole historical drama that went into creating the mythical sipahi persona. On a deeper level, it is a glimpse into the psyched consciousness of an India that is still living and believing the constructed reality of its Indianness created by its past colonial masters.

In the first section In Search of Colonial Negatives, Singh has a rather succinct passage: “The martialisation of soldiers becomes contiguous to the wholesale objectification and dehumanization of all Indians under colonialism.” The racist perceptions of Indian soldiers, a creation of the fertile minds of colonial masters, changed with each subsequent writer of the ‘Handbooks’ for the Indian Army, as each brought in his own perspective; none with any scientific, anthropological, physiological or historical roots. It is critical commentary on our collective slave mentality that till today we are still firmly entrenched in the mythical straitjackets of racial attributes created by our past rulers. We still seem to be justifying “the intellectual justifications of colonialism” living by the ‘role books’ created for the dehumanised Indian. A ‘recurring colonial fantasy’ the sipahis were treated as an abstract element in all the analyses of the writers to achieve their dream Indian soldiery. No narrative of the colonial period has given them a true voice—it is all translated, edited, transcribed and pruned to suit the purpose of the colonial rulers.

Singh makes it clear in the introduction itself that history cannot be a reliable source for real understanding of the sepoys. Yet, he painstakingly takes us through a body of historical references and narratives to unravel the real voice, mind and identity of the Indian soldier. Amid all the clutter of censored letters, courtroom depositions and interrogations, Singh tries to find the partial presence of the sipahi, maybe in a “pithy aside or a single sentence”.

The book is a fine piece of research work on a part of history that remains wrapped in layers of ambiguity. Read between the lines