Encyclopaedia of Eminent Thinkers: The Political Thought of Dadabhai Naoroji

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This volume makes a comprehensive study of the political thought of Dadabhai Naoroji. Providing rich insights into his life and personality, it discusses at length his economic as well as political nationalism, his theory of drain, and his focus on India's national as well as per capita income and poverty through linking foreign trade with drain. It also analyses his contribution towards India's struggle for independence.

Dr. (Miss) Ashu Pasricha is a faculty in Gandhian Studies at Panjab University, Chandigarh. She has many books to her credit including Gandhian Approach to Integrated Rural Development; Public Administration: Discipline and Dimensions; Peace Studies: Discipline and Dimensions; WTO, Self-reliance and Globalisation; and Gandhi's Concept of State and Power. Also, she has published a number of research papers in various Indian and foreign journals of repute.

The early history of the Indian National Movement is studied with a few precious jewels of Indian liberals who had toiled and worked hard with great vigour and devotion for emancipation of India, and contributed considerably to India's freedom. Dadabhai Naoroji the Grand Old Man as he was popularly known, was amongst the first early Indian patriarchs of Indian nationalism. As a great nationalist leader he advocated the Indian interests and served India with 'undeviating purpose with complete selflessness and vitality of purpose'. He associated himself with the national organisation since its inception, and made efforts to further the Indian national cause till the sunset of his eventful life.

A liberal and moderate, he was the intellectual child of European liberalism. His great merit lay in being the interpreter of European liberal ideas to the people of India. As a liberal leader he believed in the British sense of justice and fair play. He admired the British culture, and believed that a link with Britain signified India's welfare. He had firm faith in the constitutional means of agitation which could fulfil the object of political advancement of India under British rule. By virtue of his spirited leadership he had the honour of chairing the Congress thrice in 1886, 1893 and 1906; and throughout his public life he held aloft the banner of the national organisation.

It is difficult to recall any Indian intellectual using a fairly empirical methodology to such a good macro purpose as Dadabhai Naoroji had done. Since he was well familiar with free trade doctrine of British classical economists and had conviction that the doctrine was in the interest of those entering into international trade; further since he knew that both sides in such trade gained in utility, he naturally devoted his attention to finding how India and Britain gained from exports and imports to each other. He applied his studiousness to collect and work out statistics and was rewarded by the conclusion that the trade relationship between the two was not to their mutual advantage. In fact, he found, that what to say of any advantage, the relationship was one sided and indicated unilateral transfer of surpluses from India to England for a fairly large spread of time. This gave him some clue to India's abysmal poverty at that time. The continuing drain of our resources through disadvantageous trade checkmated higher investment and capital formation and prevented any positive impact on the impoverishment of the Indian people.

**Contents and Sample Pages**