The document summarizes the history of textile and steel industries in India under British rule. It notes that the English East India Company initially came to trade Indian goods but later occupied India. British industrialization had a close connection to the colonization of India. Indian textiles, especially cotton, were renowned globally but British policies like the Calico Act restricted Indian textile exports. The Industrial Revolution in Britain decimated the Indian textile industry. The establishment of mills in India in the late 19th century marked a revival. Similarly, Wootz steel from India was renowned for swords but British policies led to the abandonment of iron smelting furnaces. The discovery of iron ore in Chhattisgarh and establishment of T

2.  The English East India Company came to India to trade in Indian
goods. Slowly it occupied our Nation and the pattern of trade
changed over the decades.
 The crafts and industries of India during British rule focused on
two industries-textiles and iron and steel.
 The industrialisation of Britain had a close connection with the
conquest and colonisation of India.
 In eighteenth century India was a leading nation in terms of craft
and trade but with industrial revolution, Britain came to know as
‘Workshop of the world’.
 With the growth of industrial production, British industrialists
began to see India as a vast market for their industrial products, and
over the years, manufactured goods from Britain began flooding
India.

3.  Around 1750, India was
the world’s largest
producer of cotton
textiles.
 Indian textile was
renowned both for its
fine quality and exquisite
craftsmanship.
 From the 16th-century
European traders began
buying Indian textiles for
sale in Europe.

4.  Muslin: The material was
first made in the city
of Mosul (now in Iraq), from
which it derived its name.
 The word muslin means any
finely woven textile used for
making cloth
Indian textiles were famous in Western markets under different names such
as ‘Muslin’, ‘Calico’, ‘Chintz ‘ & ‘Bandhna’

5.  Calico:
 The word Calico is a general name for all cotton textiles used for making
clothes.
 When the Portuguese first came to India in search of spices they landed in
Calicut on the Kerala coast in south-west India. The cotton textiles which
they took back to Europe, along with the spices, came to be called
“calico”.
 Chintz:
 The word chintz meaning a printed cotton cloth, is a term derived from the
Hindi word chhint, a cloth with small and colourful flowery designs.
o Bandanna:
 The word bandanna, which refers to any brightly coloured and printed
scarf tied around the neck of head, is derived from the Hindi word for
tying bandhna

7. The popularity of Indian textiles during the 18th century, worried the wool and
silk makers in England. They began protesting against the import of Indian
cotton Textiles.
Calico Act: In 1720, the British government banned the use of printed
cotton textiles in England. The law was called ‘Calico Act’.
At this time textile industries had just begun to develop in England.
The English textile producers found it difficult to compete with the
Indian textiles. Hence they prevented the entry of Indian textiles into
England.
To over come the stiff competition from Indian textiles in the European
market, the English weavers invented new machines to make cloth
cheaper.
In 1764, the spinning jenny was invented by John Kaye which
increased the productivity of the traditional spindles.

8. The spinning jenny is a
multi- spool spinning wheel.
The device dramatically
reduced the amount of work
needed to produce yarn. A
single worker was able to
work eight or more spools at
once.
In 1786, the invention of
the steam engine by
Richard Arkwright
revolutionised cotton
textile weaving.

9. Arkwright's achievement was to combine
power, machinery, semi-skilled labor, and a
new raw material (cotton) to create mass
production.
Cloth could now be woven cheaply and in
immense quantities.
However, Indian textiles continued to
dominate world trade till the end of the
eighteenth century.
The Dutch, the French and the English
trading companies made huge profits from
textile trade.
These companies purchased cotton and silk
textiles in India and paid for it in silver.
When the English East India Company gained
political power in Bengal, it stopped paying
for it with precious metals.
The company collected revenues from
peasants and zamindars used this revenue to
buy Indian textiles

11. Weavers specialised in weaving.
They passed their skills from one
generation to the next.
Some of the weaver’s community in India
were …
The tanti weavers of Bengal
The julahas or momin weavers of north
India,
Sale and kaikollar and devangs of south
India

12. Cotton was first spun into yarn.
This was called spinning and was done
by women. The charkha and the takli
were household spinning instruments.
The thread was spun on the charkha and
rolled on the takli.
A Charkha
When the spinning was over the thread
was woven into cloth by the weaver.
Weaving was mostly done by men.

13. The development of cotton industries in Britain
affected textile producers in India in several ways.
Indian textiles now had to compete with British
textiles in the European and American markets.
Exporting textiles to England became increasingly
difficult as very high duties were imposed on Indian
textiles imported into Britain.
In the beginning of the nineteenth century, English- made
cotton textiles were preferred to Indian goods.
Indian textiles lost their market in Africa, America and
Europe.

14. Thousands of weavers in India did not have any work.
Bengal weavers were the worst hit.
English and European companies stopped buying Indian
goods.
During the 1830s British cotton cloth flooded Indian markets.
In the 1880s two-thirds of all the cotton clothes worn by Indians
were made of cloth produced in Britain.
This affected the entire textile industry in India.
Thousands of rural women lost their lobs.

15. During the national movement, Mahatma
Gandhi urged people to boycott imported
textiles and use hand-spun and hand-woven
cloth.
Khadi gradually became a symbol of nationalism.
The charkha came to represent India, and it was
put at the centre of the tricolour flag of the Indian
National Congress adopted in 1931.

16.  In 1854, the first cotton mill in India was set up as a spinning mill
in Bombay.
 By 1900, over 84 mills started operating in Bombay but colonial
government did not support the mill advancement by denying the
import duty on British good.
 In 1861 the first mill in Ahmedabad was started.
 In 1862 the first mill in Kanpur was started.
 The textile mills faced some problems initially
 The mills found it difficult to compete with the cheap textiles
imported from Britain.
 In most countries, governments supported industrialisation by
imposing heavy duties on imports.
 The first major boost in the development of cotton factory
production in India was during the First World War. During this
time textile imports from Britain declined and Indian factories were
called upon to produce cloth for military supplies.

17. Mumbai Textile Mills Manchester of India: Ahmedabad

18.  Tipu Sultan ruled Mysore till 1799. He fought four wars with the
British and died fighting with his sword in his hand. Tipu’s swords
are now part of valuable collections in museums in England.
 Tipu Sultan’s Sword:
 The swords were special as they were incredibly hard and the sharp
edge could easily rip through the opponent’s armour.
 This quality of the sword came from a special type of high carbon
steel called Wootz. Wootz was produced all over south India. Wootz
steel when made into swords produced a very sharp edge with a
flowing water pattern.
 This pattern came from very small carbon crystals embedded in the
iron.

19.  Wootz Steel:
The Wootz steel was produced all over south India by Mixing iron
with charcoal in small clay pots kept in smelting furnace. By
intricate temperature control of the furnace, steel ingots were
produced.
 Making of Tipu Sultan’s Swords:
Francis Buchanan toured through Mysore in 1800, a year after
Tipu Sultan’s death. He has written about the technique used to
prepare the swords.
Wootz steel was produced in many hundreds of smelting
furnaces in Mysore.
In these furnaces, iron was mixed with charcoal and put
inside small clay pots.
Through an intricate control of temperatures the smelters
produced steel ingots that were used for sword making

20.  Abandoned Furnaces in Villages:
As the British establish political power in India the production of
Wootz steel stopped and iron smelting furnaces were abandoned.

21.  one reason was the new forest laws. when the colonial govt.
prevented people from entering the reserved forests, the iron
smelters could not find wood for charcoal and could not get iron
ore.
 Defying forest laws they often entered the forests and collected
wood secretly but they could not sustain their occupation on this
basis for long. after much effort they were allowed but had to
pay great taxes which often reduced their.
 By late 19th century iron and steel was being imported from
Britain .This inevitably lowered the demand for iron produced
by local smelters.
 Ironsmiths in India began using the imported iron to
manufacture utensils and implements. This lowered the demand
for iron produced by local iron smelters.

22.  In the year 1904 American geologist Charles Weld and
Dorabji Tata discovered iron ore in the Rajhara hills of
Chhattisgarh. The Agaria community were native
inhabitants of this region.
 Rajhara Hills had one of the finest ores in the world.
 The Tats were not able to start their Iron and steel factory
near the Rajhara Hills as the region was very dry. The steel
factory needed plenty of water.
 A few years later a large area of forest was cleared on the
banks of the river Subarnarekha to set up the factory. The
industrial township was named Jamshedpur after Dorabji
Tata’s father Jamsetji Tata.

23.  The Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO) that came up in
Jamshedpur began producing steel in 1912.
TISCO was set up at an opportune time.
All through the late nineteenth century, India was importing steel
that was manufactured in Britain.
Expansion of the railways in India had provided a huge market for
rails that Britain produced.
British experts in the Indian Railways were unwilling to believe that
good quality steel could be produced in India.
In 1914 the First World War broke out. Steel produced in Britain now
had to meet the demands of war in Europe.

24. Imports of British steel into India declined dramatically and the Indian
Railways turned to TISCO for supply of rails.
As the war dragged on for several years, TISCO had to produce shells and
carriage wheels for the war.
By 1919 the colonial government was buying 90 per cent of the steel
manufactured by TISCO.
Soon TISCO became the biggest steel industry within the British Empire.
The iron and steel and cotton textiles industries expanded only when British
imports into India declined and the market for Indian industrial goods
increased. This took place during the First World War and after.
As the independence movement gathered strength the industrial class became
stronger.
The British government struggled to maintain its control over India. It had
to give in to the many demands of the rising Indians in the last decades of
its colonial rule.