While Britain was amassing the largest empire ever seen, her policy makers continued to believe that economic ties were a far more effective means of control than costly and provocative military domination. Fortunately for British empire-builders, the peoples they encountered were frequently divided amongst themselves, and lacked confidence in their ability to challenge British domination. This was not entirely the case with Japan's attempts to establish hegemony over Korea following the Russo-Japanese war (1904–05). Although there were serious political and regional divisions within Korea, these were subordinated to broad hostility towards Japan. Japanese technological superiority was seen as a hand-me-down from the West, and Korea's elite, raised in the Chinese tradition, was largely dismissive of Japanese cultural attainments. Even financially, Japan remained a small player in the international market, dependent for her own overseas development on New York, London and Paris. To win Korean converts, Japan had to introduce rapid, visible improvement. One means to support this aim was the idea of Asian unity underJapanese leadership. Failing this, she could enforce her actions with a sizeable, but expensive, military and police presence. However, the rhetoric of Japanese—Korean unity could not be overstressed in view of the burgeoning Western fear of an Asian resurgence. Moreover, the concept of Japan and Korea stemming from one family was unconvincing given the historical enmity of the two peoples. Consequently, Japan sought to diminish native antipathy and retain international sympathy by emulating Britain's exaple of discreet civilian control in Egypt.

Landless labourers often cultivate relations of patronage as part of survival strategies even though such relations severely curtail the scope for their emancipationin the long run. In the past decennia, however, the possibilities to maintain relations of patronage or get into new ones have been dwindling fast (Breman 1974). New forms of dependency, such as political clientelism, have proven to be relevant to only a selected minority. To which strategies for survival does the mass of the landless take resort in this situation? Are these more conducive to their emancipation than patronage relations?

The former rulers of Princely India present to many people a simple stereotype. Surrounded by pomp and luxury, they are thought to have headed autocratic and tradition-based regimes in which their word was law and their desires untrammeled, since they were considered to be in some way divine because of their descent from such deities as the sun and moon. Moreover this view, by implication, contrasts with the democratic regime which followed the accession and merging of their States into the Indian Union in 1948.

The Banias of eighteenth-century Surat, whom Michelguglielmo Torri earlier treated with indifference if not innocence, have invited his wrath since they were brought into focus by the publication of my essay on the Banias and the Surat riot of 1795. In his ‘rejoinder’ to my article, he seeks to wish away their existence altogether (to him there was no specific Bania community, the term merely signifying traders of all communities engaged in the profession of brokerage), and seeks to provide what he regards as an ‘alternative’ explanation of the Muslim–Bania riot of 1795. the Muslim-Bania riot of 1795. It shall be my purpose in this reply to show that his alternative explanation is neither an alternative nor even an explanation, and is based on a basic confusion in his mind about the Banias as well as the principal sources of tension in the social structure of Surat. I shall treat two main subjects in this reply to his misdirected criticisms. First, I shall present some original indigenous material as well as European documentation to further clarify the identity, position and role of the Banias, whom Irfan Habib in a recent article has identified as the most important trading group in the trading world of seventeenth and eighteenth-century India. It is also my purpose to show how the social order of Surat operated under stress by presenting some archival material, the existence of which Torri seems to be completely unaware of, on the Parsi-Muslim riot of 1788.

During the second half of the eighteenth century, Surat was still a large city and an important centre of trade. One of the most successful sectors of its merchant class was made up by shroffs, namely businessmen specializing in money-exchanging, money-lending and the giving and discounting of bills of exchange. By the late 1770s, the fortunes of the shroffs, who were mainly Hindu, were on the rise. According to knowledgeable observers, the Hindu businessmen, but most particularly the shroffs, had become the wealthiest sector of the Surat merchant class.

In January 1932 Wang Ching-wei and Chiang Kai-shek came to an agreement and formed a joint leadership in the Kuomintang (KMT) Government. The alliance between the two men lasted until December 1938 when Wang defected to the Japanese side during the Sino-Japanese War. Chinese historians often term this period as the era of ‘Wang-Chiang cooperation’ (Wang Chiang ho-tso). In fact, this was not the first time when these two men came to ally with each other in the party. The first time when Wang and Chiang formed a joint leadership was in August 1925 after the assassination of Liao Chung-k'ai. The death of Liao at that time had great repercussions throughout the party and both Wang and Chiang eventually emerged as the beneficiaries in the ensuing power struggle; for a time they jointly ruled the party. However, this alliance did not last long. The outbreak of the March Twentieth Incident in 1926 made Wang Ching-wei decide to let Chiang have his way and he later led a self-imposed exiled life in Europe. It was not until April 1927 when the KMT was seriously divided on the communist issue that Wang went back to China. Immediately after that was a split in the party with Wuhan and Nanking as the two rival centres, each of which claimed to be the legitimate Party Central. Wang and Chiang respectively became the leaders of these two Party Centrals.

One may argue that it [i.e., dowry] is nothing but a gift of love and affection by the bride's father who is not obliged to give any share to his daughter by birth. Now, however, the law of succession has been changed, giving equal right of inheritance to the daughter along with the son under the Hindu Succession Act, 1956.

The weakest hold of the Indian National Congress in the colonial period was in the province of Punjab. The strength and domination of the National Unionist Party and the limited support and response afforded to the various nationalist movements highlight the weakness of the Congress especially in its southeast region, now known, after being carved out as a separate state on the 1st of November 1966, as Haryana.