Essay Example on The Punjab was one of the largest states of India

The Punjab was one of the largest states of India and under the only local ruler Ranjit Singh Punjab had its territorial boundary from Peshawar till Delhi which came under Punjab jurisdiction after the fall of last Mughal emperor and had Kashmir under it which later separated as Delhi so still Punjab was the one largest Province of British India Punjab was the last province to come under the colonial rule and this annexation was result of two plausible reasons one that British require this land economically because in the mid nineteenth century the unrest in the America cause decline in the exports of cotton to Britain so British industries require an alternate option for their cotton and other raw material which British thought that Punjab land should be utilized for that purpose and secondly for the security purpose because this land had always been a gateway for the invader in the past These two reasons were very right in their respective places and these two reasons had a great influence in the upcoming policies of British in Punjab Punjab had a different experience with the colonialism having peace and vigorous development and the reason of this development is the canal and canal colonies in the western Punjab which constitute the Punjab of Pakistan today British annexation of Sikh ruled Punjab took place in 1849 after capturing almost whole of the subcontinent 

In Punjab the colonial power introduced many new economic political and social projects but one single project whose planning may seem economically operated politically but had social consequences was the Punjab Canal Colonies Construction of Canal Colonies The canal colonization in the western Punjab initiated in 1885 and this scheme was carried out till the last days of British in this land as administrators These canal colonies differ from the canal projects in other part of India because they were constructed in the barren and waste land whereas in other part of India like in United province the canal were constructed for irrigation in already settled tracts So the canal colonies were situated in the area which was barren and the utilization of this area was sparsely inhabited by cattle graziers and camel owners so acquiring this land was not an issue for the British The towns and villages before British came here were generally on the banks of the rivers and so the land by the sides of the rivers was irrigated and very less land else than that was irrigated because either it require rainfall or wells to provide water so it was a hard task to provide water to large land through wells hence this projects changes the landscape of Punjab from a barren land it became the most territory of India The canal colonies project constitute nine canal colonies settled in the newly irrigated land through newly constructed canals out of these canals colonies four were major in term of size namely Chenab Jhelum Lower Bari Doab and Nili Bar other five smaller colonies namely Sidhnai Sohag Para Chunian Upper Chenab and Upper Jhelum all having land less than 400 000 acre land the colonies here does not mean cities or towns but the area irrigated through construction of canals All of these canals and colonies were situated in western Punjab that is today Punjab of Pakistan These colonies were situated in the different doabs and in multiple cities because of their large land holdings 

The Chenab colony one of the largest was colonized during 1892 1905 then in 1926 30 in Rechna doab and covers the districts of Gujranwala Jhang Lyallpur now Faisalabad Lahore and Sheikhupura The Jhelum colony was colonised during 1902 06 in Jech doab and in cities Shahpur and Jhang Lower Bari Doab which was started in 1914 and ended in 1924 in Bari Doab and covers areas of Multan and Montgomery now Sahiwal and the last project and one of the largest named Nili Bar colony started in 1926 and was not finished but the British rule did was situated in same Bari Doab and same districts Multan and Sahiwal where already Lower Bari colony was situated The smaller colonies were also constructed alongside these large colonies like Sidhnai in Multan Sohag Para in Sahiwal and Chunian in Lahore were constructed in Bari doab where large colonies such as Lower Bari doab and Nili Bar were present and constructed during years 1886 88 1886 88 and 1896 1898 respectively Other smaller colony such as Upper Chenab was situated along Chenab colony in Rechna doab in districts Gujranwala Sialkot and Sheikhupura during 1915 19 The last colony to be discussed is Upper Jhelum along Jhelum colony in Jech doab in Gujrat during 1916 1921 This was the land colonization pattern of British in Punjab which seems very much beneficial and in fact was in term of increase of irrigated land which increased production of this land but the paper will also discuss how these newly irrigated land was distributed which actually created the social and political hazards for this land in the coming time