The notion of citizenship goes beyond political representation, because citizenship rights imply a sense of identification with a nation. In French India, colonial subjects were already French nationals before they received electoral rights, because they belonged to the larger French imperial nation. Turning local males into electoral actors raised the issue of assimilating Indians into French civilization, which made the key aspect of French colonial ideology even more salient. For French officials during the Third Republic, the ideological work of assimilating French mores and developing a feeling of attachment to the French imperial nation was supposed to be carried out by encouraging local children to attend colonial schools and having a certain category of Indian males complete military service. It was intended that these two institutions – schools and the military – would transmit the national republican ideal of equality, secularism, and inclusiveness. However, education and conscription needed to be established in ways that would develop and support an ideal republican culture in French India.

A common language of communication was often believed to be necessary to develop a sense of belonging to the nation as well as participation in the life of the political institutions created by the Third Republic. As the governor of the establishments of French India, Etienne Richaud, stated in 1887, the goal of the colonial administration was ‘to popularize the French language’ through schools as a means to allow Indians to fully participate in the public life of the polis. He stressed that only individuals who could speak, read, and write French could be members of the general and local councils. He added that these language requirements would soon be extended to members of the municipal councils as well as to any position within the French colonial administration.