The Proudest Day: India's Long Road to Independence

by David Fisher, Anthony Read

In 1835, Lord Macaulay, in his Minute on Indian Education, had prophesied that the eventual self-rule of India would be "the proudest day in British history." And yet when independence came on the stroke of midnight of August 14, 1947, events unfolded with a violence that shocked the world: entire trainloads of Muslim and Hindu refugees were slaughtered on their flight to safety -- not by the British, but by each other. Macaulay's dream had become a flawed and bloody reality. The Proudest Day is a riveting account of the end of the Raj, the most romantic of all the great empires. Anthony Read and David Fisher tell the whole epic story in compelling and colorful detail from its beginnings more than a century earlier; their powerful narrative takes a fresh look at many of the events and personalities involved, especially the three charismatic giants --Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah --who dominated the final, increasingly bitter thirty years. Meanwhile, a succession of British politicians and viceroys veered wildly between liberalism and repression until the Raj became a powder keg, wanting only a match.

Genres: History, India

590 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

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Reviews

[Karthik M · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good recommendation for those who want to join the story of India's Independence from the PoV of the principal characters involved.
Also, a good read for those who are willing to change their opinion of Gandhi.
This book portrays the inception of national consciousness in India and the link between the advent of press and an educated middle class in India, who would go on from being pro-empire to being part of a new class in a country not used to being under a single federation before.
With the keen research and typical Western taciturn about empire building, this book makes for a serious but enlightening read.

[Jbondandrews · Rating 3 out of 5]

While the book was reasonably written was disappointed to see that a rather silly mistake was made towards the beginning of the book. For some reason Read and Fisher said Akbar was Humayun's grandson when as is well known that that Akbar is in fact Humayun's son. This made it difficult to seriously appreciate the book.

[Christopher Saunders · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Proudest Day is a highly readable narrative of India's freedom movement, from the creation of the Indian National Congress in the 1880s through independence and partition six decades later. After starting with the Amritsar Massacre of 1919, authors David Fisher and Anthony Read flash back to the founding of the East Indian Company in the 1600s and its slow takeover of the subcontinent, emphasizing that British dominion over India was always fragile, often unplanned and after events like the Mutiny of 1857 full of mutual distrust and resentment. Admittedly, this book is very much a top-down political history: its main protagonists are familiar figures like Gandhi, Nehru and Jinnah, along with some lesser known nationalists and their British opposition. The author show the attitudes of Congress hardened due to broken promises and pigheaded intransigence by the Raj; where Home Rule under Britain might have been feasible in Congress's early days, after Amritsar it was no longer acceptable to the increasingly radicalized nationalists. The authors do a fair job navigating the titanic personalities involved, most with agreeable shades of nuance. Gandhi appears here as a combination of shrewd politician, sincere (if eccentric) ascetic and a man prone to tactical mistakes (Read and Fisher judge his 1922 nonviolence campaign as a mistake that helped delay independence) but who rarely lost sight of the bigger picture. Nehru is portrayed as an energetic man of strong convictions, fierce temper and pragmatism; Jinnah, the Muslim leader, comes off as a brilliant man whose concern for his coreligionists was heightened by a sense that his Hindu colleagues were condescending or slighting him at every turn. The British Viceroys and negotiators are shown as an uneven lot, from the sincere reformer Lord Irwin to the pigheaded Lord Linlithgow (whose heavyhandedness during World War II destroyed any willingness to compromise) and the vainglorious Mountbatten, whose mishandling of partition (the authors feel) made bloodshed inevitable. Read and Fisher also do a commendable job demonstrating how Gandhi and Nehru's nonviolent agitation were paired with occasional outbursts of violence, from terrorism to assassination to riots (and, during the war, Subhas Chandra Bose's Indian National Army fighting alongside Japan) that served as a foil. The authors find plenty of blame to spread for the bloody end of the Raj, noting that divisions between Hindu and Muslim activists were too deep-seated for compromise, and that the British by then just wanted to wash their hands of a mess they'd helped create. It's not a happy story, rendering the title a pointed irony; it's certainly not a work of deep or original scholarship. But as a readable, nuanced introduction to this thorny topic, it's one of the better options available.

[David Hill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some time ago I asked many of my Indian friends to recommend a book about 20th century Indian history. I got a lot of suggestions, but none exactly fit with my requests. The common theme of the recommendations was that they centered on Indian independence. After a fair amount of back-and-forth, I settled on this book. I have read other works by Read and Fisher and found them worthwhile.

This book essentially tells the history of the British Raj, with a particular focus on the issue of independence. What were the attitudes of the British leaders, who were the major Indian political figures, and how did they all interact. After a short prologue (telling of the Amritsar massacre), the text starts with the arrival of the British and within a hundred pages or so we come to the 20th century. This leaves roughly four hundred pages to tell the story of independence. The book ends rather abruptly with the day of independence, providing only a short epilogue about the violence of partition and telling us the fates of some of the main actors.

I knew almost nothing about this history. I knew, roughly, about Gandhi and Nehru and had heard of Mountbatten. But I'd never heard of any of the others. I assume this is a fairly even telling of the story; the authors don't seem to favor any particular viewpoint, showing us the good as well as the bad. And so, my opinion of Gandhi has changed. I'd seen the Ben Kingsley movie, which borders on hagiography. Of course, he was a just a man and had his faults. I now see Nehru as the key figure.

An additional note: It's obvious to me now, but wasn't when I began reading. This must also be the story of the formation of Pakistan. It's impossible to tell about India's independence without delving into Pakistan. "Twins separated at birth" is a poor way to phrase it, but it gives the idea.

After reading this book, I have a much better grasp of Indian history. But for me it's just a starting point. I will certainly dig deeper.

[DY Pathak · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent treatise on the independence struggle of India. The book runs through the struggle with minute details. The book starts with Indian history and as the present days are approaching it discussed the events in more details.

A must read for a person who wants to know the Independence history of India's freedom struggle.

Read this book when I was in Warrington UK and luckily got this book in the local public library.

[Vaibhav Pandey · Rating 3 out of 5]

its a biased account ,inclining more towards oppressors way rather than inclusive of all variables..it might be a good account of those indian years from british vantage point ,but it in no way paint a complete inclusive picture rather than a dichotomy.

[Mitesh · Rating 4 out of 5]

VERY SERIOUS AUTHENTIC STUDY OF INDIAN HISTORY BUT WITH STRONG PREJUDICE FOR MOUNTBATTEN

[Harmiclir · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comprehensive and well-written.