Presidencies and provinces of British India information
1612–1947 British directly-ruled administrative divisions in India
"British India" redirects here. For the history of the British Empire on the Indian subcontinent, see British Raj. For the British East India Company's rule in India, see Company rule in India. For other uses, see British India (disambiguation).
"Provinces of India" redirects here. For the modern states, see States and union territories of India.
A mezzotint engraving of Fort William, Calcutta, the capital of the Bengal Presidency in British India 1735.
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another, they existed between 1612 and 1947, conventionally divided into three historical periods:
Between 1612 and 1757 the East India Company (EIC) set up "factories" (trading posts) in several locations, mostly in coastal India, with the consent of the Mughal emperors, Maratha Empire or local rulers. Its rivals were the merchant trading companies of Portugal, Denmark, the Netherlands, and France. By the mid-18th century three Presidency towns: Madras, Bombay and Calcutta, had grown in size.
During the period of Company rule in India, 1757–1858, the Company gradually acquired sovereignty over large parts of India, now called "Presidencies". However, it also increasingly came under British government oversight, in effect sharing sovereignty with the Crown. At the same time, it gradually lost its mercantile privileges.
Following the Indian Rebellion of 1857 the company's remaining powers were transferred to the Crown. Under the British Raj (1858–1947), administrative boundaries were extended to include a few other British-administered regions, such as Upper Burma. Increasingly, however, the unwieldy presidencies were broken up into "Provinces".[1] The EIC presidency armies were restructured into the British Indian Army.
"British India" did not include the many princely states which continued to be ruled by Indian princes, though by the 19th century under British suzerainty—their defence, foreign relations, and communications relinquished to British authority and their internal rule closely monitored.[2] At the time of Indian Independence, in 1947, there were officially 565 princely states, a few being very large although most were very small. They comprised a quarter of the population of the British Raj and two fifths of its land area, with the provinces comprising the remainders.[3] The British India Army formed the Indian Armed Forces which was further divided into the Pakistan Armed Forces following the partition of India.
^Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. IV 1908, p. 5 Quote: "The history of British India falls ... into three periods. From the beginning of the 17th to the middle of the 18th century, the East India Company is a trading corporation, existing on the sufferance of the native powers, and in rivalry with the merchant companies of Holland and France. During the next century, the Company acquires and consolidates its dominion, shares its sovereignty in increasing proportions with the Crown, and gradually loses its mercantile privileges and functions. After the Mutiny of 1857, the remaining powers of the Company are transferred to the Crown ..."
^Copland, Ian (21–27 February 2004). "Princely States and the Raj: Review of Sovereign Spheres: Princes, Education and Empire in Colonial India by Manu Bhagavan". Economic and Political Weekly. 39 (8): 807–809. JSTOR 4414671. Archived from the original on 4 August 2021. Retrieved 4 August 2021.
^S. H. Steinberg, ed. (1949), "India", The Statesman's Year-Book: Statistical and Historical Annual of the States of the World for the Year 1949, Macmillan and Co, p. 122, ISBN 9780230270787, archived from the original on 17 March 2024, retrieved 20 June 2022
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