The history of economic change in colonial and post-colonial Punjab is well-studied, at least for the period from c. 1880, when Punjab became a major producer of relatively low-value-added crops, such as cereals, raw cotton and sugar. This article argues that the colonial state’s intervention in the economy in the 1840s to 1870s—the decades of the British colonial conquest of Punjab and the early administration in the province—should not be seen as a prelude to later developments. Specifically, this article argues that state policy proceeded by trial and error, that the state worked through a seemingly private organisation—the Agri-Horticultural Society—to trial a scheme that sought to re-model Punjab as a producer of higher-value-added commodities for the global market such as silk following the precedent of colonial Bengal, and that the resultant failure of these experiments contributed to the changes in policy and the pattern of development from the final-quarter of the century. In studying the Agri-Horticultural Society’s silk experiments, furthermore, this article also sheds light on the history of the early colonial state and the history of sericulture in Punjab.

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India and the Silk Roads is a global history of a continental interior, the first to comprehensively examine the textual and material traces of India’s caravan trade with central Asia. But what was the fate of these overland connections in the ages of sail and steam? This book brings the world of caravan trade to life—a world of merchants, mercenaries, pastoralists and pilgrims, but also of kings, bureaucrats and their subjects in the countryside and towns. Their livelihoods did not become obsolete with the advent of ‘modern’ technologies and the consequent emergence of new global networks. Terrestrial routes remained critically important, not only handling flows of goods and money, but also fostering networks of trade in credit, secret intelligence and fighting power. With the waning of the Mughal Empire during the eighteenth century, new Indian kingdoms and their rulers came to the fore, drawing their power and prosperity from resources brought by caravan trade. The encroachment of British and Russian imperialism into this commercial arena in the nineteenth century gave new significance to some people and flows, while steadily undermining others. By showing how no single ruler could control the nebulous yet durable networks of this trading world, which had its own internal dynamics even as it evolved in step with global transformations, this book forces us to rethink the history of globalisation and re-evaluate our fixation with empires and states as the building blocks of historical analysis.

In the early twentieth century, the Salvation Army in British India transformed its public profile and standing, shifting from being an organization seen by the state as a threat to social order, to being partner to the state in the delivery of social welfare programmes. At the same time, the Army also shaped discussion and anxieties about the precarious position of India's economy and sought to intervene on behalf of the state—or to present itself as doing so—in the rescue of India's traditional industries. The Army was an important actor in debates about the future of traditional industries such as silkworm rearing and silk weaving, and was able to mobilize public opinion to press provincial governments for resources with which to try to resuscitate and rejuvenate India's silk industry. Although the Army's sericulture initiatives failed to thwart the decline of India's silk industry, they generated significant momentum, publicity, and public attention, to some extent transforming the Army's standing in British India and beyond.