By Iman Ahsan
There’s a photo that features an emancipated man guarding his family from cannibals during the Madras famine of 1877 at the time of the British Raj in India. In it, the man looks like he’s in a black and white movie set about a skeleton that comes to life. He’s sitting on a chair, watching over his wife and child (who both look more like they’re from Disney’s movie Coco).
The Madras famine, also known as the “Great Famine” or the “Southern India Famine”, was a famine that spanned from 1876 to 1878 and resulted in the loss of at least 5.5 million lives because of crop failure. However, this was just one of the many major famines that occurred in India under British rule. The Bengal famine, the Orissa famine, and the Doji bara famine (also known as the “Skull famine”) were major famines that took millions of lives; the Doji bara famine was so severe that people died in such numbers that they couldn’t be cremated or buried. Despite these horrific tragedies, these famines are rarely ever covered in history classes.
The British were directly responsible for these major famines in India. The East India Company had killed off a handful of the textile industries in India, so Indians were forced to turn to agriculture, which made them dependent on the monsoon seasons of India. Additionally, prices were being raised to the point where rice and grain had become unaffordable for villagers, and 200 million pounds of rice were being exported over to Britain, so this was directly impoverishing the Indians.
Despite the British being responsible for the famines in not just India but also Ireland (the “Potato Famine”), history classes barely give coverage on the severity of the British rule. These tragedies were a catastrophe, yet, they were swept under a rug.
From taking courses like Global 1 and AP World, I expected to learn about macabre events like the Bengal famine, the Srebrenica massacre, and the My Lai massacre. However, these events were never even mentioned. From my experience, there was a brief mention of British rule over India (that brief mention being that the British ruled India for some time), and a very brief mention of the Yugoslav Wars. These events were huge and impacted the civilians of those regions, but why are these crucial events not covered in class? It could be argued that events like the Bengal famine and Srebrenica massacre had nothing to do with America, hence rendering it “invaluable” to learn in the American education system. However, the My Lai massacre was the mass murder of at least 500 unarmed South Vietnamese civilians by the United States troops. The My Lai massacre was directly caused by Americans, and the majority of the victims were women and children, yet, this topic wasn’t covered in any history class that I’ve taken.
In this day and age, we have the internet to gain more knowledge and information about numerous concepts and events. The only way that I’ve learned about these events was through the internet and my grandparents (who are from Pakistan and have lived through the Partition of 1947), which I find rather dismal to be relying on the internet for more information than school. When we’re at a point where we learn more from the internet/social media than our school, then our education system has essentially failed us. The purpose of the American education system is to keep the students informed about the past as well as the present, so we won’t go about and make the same mistakes as our ancestors have done.
Some may argue that the “past is in the past” so there’s no need to really learn about history and dwell on the past. However, learning history is essential. It keeps us informed about how past societies have been; how some past societies grew and developed and how others collapsed. It keeps us informed on the certain choices made and the certain actions committed that brought change either for the greater good or worse. Learning about history gives us the knowledge to understand the problems in the past, and possessing that knowledge allows us to analyze our current situations and work to solve current and future problems, as well as prevent issues from ever happening again.
Our schools have also been guilty for the simplification of events. Just the mere mention of British ruling at least 90% of the world isn’t enough. Not bothering to go into depth about the tragedies that some countries faced while under British rule is simplifying the severity of the British rule. The photographs taken of the emancipated civilians during the Madras famine are gruesome and disturbing to look at, but showing these photographs gives the audience a better understanding of just how dark and wrong the British rule over India was. Showing the darker, visually upsetting and disturbing photographs of historical events helps clarify the importance of the event and brings more attention to it. It helps people understand that these events aren’t something that can just be ignored or “brushed off”.
In order to truly move on from the past, we must acknowledge our mistakes. The My Lai massacre is tragic and also shameful for Americans. Our own troops were responsible for the slaughter of unarmed civilians, and as a country, we may not want to acknowledge that fault of ours because of how shameful and depressing it is. However, if we want to foster a better and more informed society, we must accept the truth and reflect on our past mistakes. This all starts with education.
Presently, the United States and the United Kingdom are the leading champions of human rights in the world, and this position has only been achieved through reflection by the respective leaders of the two countries. Now it’s time that our school system also introduces unpleasant and grim topics that are part of not only our history but from other parts of the world.
Simplifying historical events and sweeping them under the rug isn’t the solution. The more we continue to “sanitize” the truth, the more we progress backwards as a society and as a country. When our education system hides the truth from us, a generation of misinformed and ignorant people is created. If our history classes provide more coverage on both sides of the parties, we’ll be more informed and not as quick to support future conflict because we’ll know the grim reality that comes with it.
