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INTRODUCTION

Th e historical literature on science in colonial India is a rich and expanding fi eld. However, while astronomy in earlier periods of Indian history has interested Indologists and Nehruvian scholars for some time, astronomy in the colonial period has attracted relatively modest attention, and indeed fostered little con-sensus. Th e existing literature on astronomy in colonial India includes works that see astronomical endeavour as part of the imperatives of the English East India Company, the principal agency of British rule in India until 1858. However, the historical literature also includes works that identify an interaction of tra-ditional (Indian) and modern (Western) astronomical knowledge, again within the context of colonialism. In general, earlier authors seeking to chart the advent of modern astronomy in India described the spread of Western science. How-ever, later authors stressed that astronomy in the colonial period could be about a coalescence of Indian and Western scientifi c ideas, and as such, representative of a dialogue within the colonial encounter. So, from a reading of this historical literature on astronomy in colonial India, it becomes clear that there are some fundamental, and as yet unresolved, questions. Th ese relate to how Europeans and Indians engaged with astronomy in colonial India, and how this changed over the period, and whether modern astronomy was just representative of dif-fusive Western science, or whether there was greater scope within its practice for a cognitive interface between Europeans and Indians.

Astronomy in Indian HistoryTh e most substantive corpus of literature on astronomy in India in fact relates to pre-colonial history, and one notable approach has been that of Indology. Sanskrit scholars such as David E. Pingree have delved into the details of the Jyotisavedanga (c. 500 bc) (the oldest extant astronomical text in India) and the Siddhantas (later astronomical treatises on reckoning time, computing celestial positions and other phenomena).1 Furthermore, the study of ancient manu-scripts, many of which were copied in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, has led to an emphasis on the transcultural nature of astronomy. Th ere have been refl ections on the interaction between Indian, Babylonian, Greco-Babylonian,

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2 Astronomy in India, 1784–1876

Greek and Islamic methods, with elucidation of the receptivity of Indian astron-omy to non-Sanskritic knowledge and even the infl uence of Indian astronomy on early modern Europe.2 Th e developments within these earlier periods of his-tory occurred within somewhat slower-moving geographical and social time; this, and the rigorous methods of ancient-language scholarship, has enabled the transmission of ideas to be explored in such a manner.

Th ere have been several more general expositions of pre-colonial Indian astronomy, with scholars oft en making use of S. B. Dikshit’s Bharatiya Jyotish Sastra (1896) and its information regarding notable Indian astronomers – Ary-abhata (476–550), Varahamihira (505–87) and numerous others – and their texts. Th ese histories have explored methods of reckoning time and computing celestial positions – perhaps the central concerns of traditional Indian astronomy since Vedic and Siddhantic times – as well as the development of astronomi-cal instruments in India.3 Th ere has also been elucidation of the importance of compendia other than the Siddhantas in Indian tradition. Indeed, there has been consideration of the Karanas (expositions containing mean longitudes for celestial bodies) and Kosthakas (tables for determining planetary position).4 Th e Sanskrit jyotihsastra in fact has connotations of both ‘astronomy’ and ‘astrology’, as the terms have come to be understood, encompassing ganita (mathematical astronomy) as well as samhita (omens) and hora (horoscopy).5 Indeed, Christo-pher A. Bayly notes that ‘even purist astronomical schools’ in India, associated with the observational astronomy of the Siddhantas, ‘established a modus viv-endi with astrology’.6 Scholars have hence remained aware of the need to talk about both ‘astronomy’ and ‘astrology’, when studying the history of astronomy in India. Indeed, astrologers continued to have a salient presence in interior parts of India through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Another means of investigating astronomy in Indian history has been rooted in Nehruvian approaches to science. While much of this scholarship took place aft er Jawaharlal Nehru’s death, its principles refl ected his beliefs about India’s past, present and future. Nehru submitted that so long as he thought in terms of facts and dates, disassociated from his life’s course, ‘history had little signifi -cance for me’. Indeed, he claimed that ‘Science and the problems of to-day and of our present life attracted me far more’. However, Nehru’s urge to ‘experience life through action’ encouraged him to understand the present more deeply. For him, that meant looking to the roots of the present in the past. Nehru’s self-styled discovery of India revealed the eclectic nature of its history and culture, with India forever ‘changing and progressing all the time’. Indeed, there were contacts with several cultures, and India ‘infl uenced them and was infl uenced by them’. Nehru also submitted that ‘Europe, which had long been backward in many matters, took the lead in technical progress’ and that ‘Behind this tech-nical progress was the spirit of science’. Yet even if ‘Science has dominated the

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Introduction 3

western world’, the ‘west is still far from having developed the real temper of sci-ence’.7 Th ough more recent Indology has stressed pluralism in India’s scientifi c history, Nehru in his time was also emphasizing the importance of pluralism to India’s present and future scientifi c development. India had to catch up with the West, but also bring its legacy of genuine scientifi c temper to the service of mod-ern science. While observational astronomy was known to be one of Nehru’s passions, there was signifi cant patronage for astrophysics and space technolo-gies in the newly independent India. At the same time, understanding the place of astronomy in Indian history, including the relative infl uences of India and Europe, was a means of looking to the future.

As part of the eff ort to elucidate the place of astronomy in Indian history, followers of Nehru’s secular approach sought to consider how European Orien-talists conceived of Indian astronomy in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Orientalist scholarship was complex in its methods and motivations, but broadly speaking its proponents were interested in philological studies of Indian history and culture (encompassing what we would recognize as scien-tifi c themes); Nehruvian histories of science in fact sought to fi ll the gaps left in the narrative they produced, demonstrating India’s age-old scientifi c pedi-gree and thereby serving a nationalist cause. Dhruv Raina explains that in 1959, the National Institute of Sciences of India (NISI), now the Indian National Science Academy (INSA), established a board to think about the task of writ-ing a history of sciences in India. In 1964, the Ministry for Scientifi c Research and Cultural Aff airs arranged a meeting of scholars, deciding that NISI would work towards setting up a National Commission for the Compilation of His-tory of Sciences. Th ere was at length no single, grand history of Indian science. However, an important product of this period was the foundation of the Indian Journal of History of Science in 1966. Raina draws attention to the dominant presence in the journal of historians writing about mathematics and astronomy. Yet the focus was on Indian antiquity, and the impression was that the history of science in India was about antiquarian studies.8 Th e sixth volume of O. P. Jaggi’s monumental History of Science, Technology and Medicine in India (1969–84), another example of the Nehruvian approach, traced Indian astronomy from its ancient origins to the colonial period. Th ere was exposition of the Vedic roots of astronomy in India, and mention of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Ori-entalist assessments of Indian scientifi c tradition.9 So, in spite of the ostensible emphasis on plurality in Nehruvian histories, the sense of transcultural engage-ment was more refl ected in the surveys of earlier periods of Indian history, in keeping with Nehru’s own thoughts about India’s recent decline. Th e Nehruvian project encapsulated the sense that modern science in India – including astron-omy – was the fruit of European learning, and there was an implicit sense that Indians in the colonial period were simply passive inheritors of Western science.

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4 Astronomy in India, 1784–1876

Th e Colonial ProblematicWith respect to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a handful of narrative histories – most of which are associable with the organs of Nehruvian scholar-ship – have considered the manner in which modern Western astronomy was instituted in India in the form of observatories. Yet, there has been little sense of transcultural engagement or Indian agency. Th ese studies have sought to exploit extensive source material in relation to the establishment of these observatories, but they have tended to be most concerned with identifying notable European astronomers and describing the instruments that they used. S. M. R. Ansari, for example, discussed the foundation of observatories at Madras under colonial offi cialdom and at Lucknow and Trivandrum under Indian princes, also touch-ing on colonial eff orts to establish observatories at Calcutta and Poona.10 More works in this vein followed, most notably from Rajesh Kochhar and Jayant V. Narlikar. Th ere was further discussion of the context in which modern astron-omy came to India, with reference to the demands of colonial navigation and surveying.11 Some consideration of modern astronomy in colonial India is also to be found in earlier contributions on surveying. As part of an extensive pro-ject spanning decades, R. H. Phillimore produced the epic Historical Records of the Survey of India (1945–54), largely a collection of biographical information and extracts from source materials.12 In the nineteenth century itself, there was a similar focus on modern astronomy in the context of its service to surveying in Clements R. Markham’s A Memoir on the Indian Surveys (1871); this has been an important point of reference for subsequent histories.13

A signifi cant theme in this strand of literature has indeed been the association of modern Western astronomy in colonial India with Eurocentric diff usionist models of science; some depictions have even suggested that Western science was unilaterally imposed in India. Matthew H. Edney considered trigonometri-cal surveying, in the service of which astronomy was invoked, as being ‘rooted in non-Indian mathematics’. He asserted that cartography was ‘quintessentially at once a scientifi c and a British activity’, representing the dominance of Enlighten-ment rationalism.14 Ian J. Barrow argued that maps were generated for European audiences and addressed expressly colonial needs in a distinct ideological set-ting. Hence cartography reconfi gured Indian history, as well as Indian land, into British history and British territory.15 Eurocentric diff usionist perspectives char-acterize modern science as either being forced on a tabula rasa or supplanting local knowledge. Moreover, as with the shortcomings of the Nehruvian project, Indi-ans are rendered little more than junior partners in modern science. As I seek to emphasize here, an exploration into astronomy in colonial India reveals a diff erent picture; it is possible to conceive of greater agency for Indians in modern science.

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Introduction 5

It seems evident that there needs to be greater exploration of how Indians responded to modern Western astronomy in India in the colonial period. Th ere have been some eff orts to approach science in colonial India from this perspective, though the concomitant engagement between Europeans and Indians has been understood more as a process of philosophical rationalization reconciling old and new forms of knowledge.16 In spite of its endurance, the ‘Orientalist triptych’ – recognizing the achievements of Hindus, stagnation under Muslims and pro-gress of the West – has come under increasing pressure. As David Arnold notes, most scholars are now reluctant to see Western science impacting on a stagnant India.17 In the context of astronomy, more recent historiographical interventions have stressed cross-cultural negotiation within Indian responses to Western sci-ence, both in the pre-colonial and colonial period. Christopher Z. Minkowski, for example, has elucidated the eff orts of pandits (elites learned in Sanskrit) to modify cosmologies from the Puranas (post-Vedic narratives) and Siddhantas in the light of the Copernican model of Western astronomy.18 Th ere has indeed been increas-ing stress on the role of pandits in producing knowledge regarding astronomy, with other scholars continuing to consider the cosmological accommodations of the nineteenth century and drawing further attention to the developing culture of the Sanskrit literati in older intellectual centres such as Benares.19

Some notable but brief characterizations of negotiation regarding astronomy in colonial India have demonstrated that Indian elites in fact used the encounter of modern Western astronomy and traditional Siddhantic astronomy to express early national consciousness. Th e focus here has been on developments under the Indian princes, with particular attention to Lucknow and Sehore, and largely centred on the issue of cosmologies that has emerged out of Sanskrit scholarship. Bayly noted that out of the eclectic engagement between Europeans and Indi-ans, there could be a reassertion of pride in Indian traditions.20 Gyan Prakash argued that there could be a renegotiation of power associated with Western ideas through pointing to their anticipation in indigenous traditions.21 It is clear, then, that the most challenging possibilities for interpreting the history of astronomy in the colonial period lie with the characterizations emphasizing dialogue. However, it is noticeable that the emphasis has tended to be on a philosophical engagement, with Indians seeking to rationalize the encounter between traditional and mod-ern science. Th ese characterizations do capture an important phenomenon, and there is scope to build on them in the light of further exploration of the source materials. Yet I also seek to demonstrate the extent to which Europeans and Indi-ans engaged with modern Western astronomy on a more practical level, in and around the institutions conventionally associated with diff usive Western science.

Among the ways in which the engagement – whether philosophical or practical – in and around the institutions of modern astronomy might be characterized, possibilities include the sorts of arguments regarding ‘hybridity’

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6 Astronomy in India, 1784–1876

presented by Prakash. So, modern astronomy might be seen as being reconfi g-ured to suit local needs. In postcolonial studies, this hybridity has been explained by scholars such as Homi K. Bhabha as a ‘problematic of colonial representation and individuation that reverses the eff ects of the colonialist disavowal, so that other “denied” knowledges enter upon the dominant discourse and estrange the basis of its authority’. It is also associated with ‘Th e menace of mimicry’, which in ‘disclosing the ambivalence of colonial discourse also disrupts its authority’.22 As for somewhat less subversive theoretical models, John Lourdusamy, for example, has elucidated the careers of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Bengali scien-tists who showed how new knowledge correlated with old knowledge as a means of preparing for modern science with self-confi dence. Among these scientists, there was a process of double-identifi cation with the West and India.23 Pratik Chakrabarti has also explored the eff ort to redefi ne and integrate colonial sci-ence in India. Amid confl icts and negotiations, Indians sought to locate modern science in the ‘cultural, social and political fabric of nationalist India’.24

Further possibilities for characterizing the encounter in and around the institutions of modern astronomy include seeing disengagement, rather than engagement, and most controversially perhaps, seeing Europeans appropriating Indian knowledge. Th e concept of disengagement relates to characterizations of recalcitrance among Indian elites in the face of Western science, with Asish Nandy notably claiming that, amid the diffi culties of legitimately reconciling Indian culture with modern science, Indian scientists sought (but failed) to off er an alternative.25 On the other hand, there has been the suggestion that Indians tended to avoid fi elds of intellectual exploration that the British dominated because those areas never represented a ‘universal domain of free discourse’. Par-tha Chatterjee argues that a space was carved out for pure tradition, which could be reorganized as modern.26 Such scholars have therefore searched for authenti-cally ‘Indian’ elements to the science of Indian elites in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, their eff orts resonating with postcolonial histories that seek ‘to reclaim the “undistorted self ”’.27 Similar approaches to science and technology in colonial India have argued for the hegemonic imposition of a colonial episteme and eclipsing of pre-colonial achievements. Th e emphasis has been on repressive large-scale technologies or on the cultural discourses asso-ciated with science.28 As for appropriation, some scholars have gone as far as indicating that science in colonial India was about Europeans depicting Indian knowledge as their own. Sujit Sivasundaram implies that Indians could reclaim scientifi c knowledge which was in fact built on their eff orts.29 Th e idea of Euro-pean dependence on local knowledge has been explored further. Kapil Raj, for example, seems to locate modern science – he avoids any reference to ‘Western’ science – in a syncretism of Western and non-Western paradigms.30

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Introduction 7

In existing histories of science in colonial India, including those that have con-sidered astronomy, there has been a critical shift away from simply seeing Western science as being diff used from Europe to India. Instead, there is interest in explor-ing the manner in which Indians responded to the challenge of Western science. However, there arises the question as to whether the eff orts of Indians in rela-tion to modern astronomy can only be understood as a process of philosophical rationalization focusing on the relationship between ostensibly traditional and modern knowledge. Furthermore, there is the issue of whether modern astron-omy can only be redeemed if there is an identifi able syncretism of Western and non-Western paradigms within its practice (paradigms being defi ned by Th omas S. Kuhn as accepted exemplars of scientifi c practice off ering models for scientifi c communities).31 So, there is clearly a struggle to square notions of multidirectional and crosscutting scientifi c ideas with the recognizable pressures of a colonial situ-ation. Taking stock of the insights explored in the foregoing discussion, I aim to explore further the possibilities for characterizing the engagement between Euro-peans and Indians in relation to astronomy in colonial India.

New DeparturesIn the light of the historical literature on science in colonial India to date, the aim of this study is to make a contribution to debates about the nature of the cognitive interface between Europeans and Indians in science. Th ough astronomy has been considered to some extent in the literature, there is scope for further investiga-tion, especially with regards to the institutions of modern astronomy established in and around the coastal metropolises. Th e periodization and geographical scope must of course be demarcated, in order to bring precise enough evidence to bear on those debates. Furthermore, there are a number of vistas and a range of sources which need to be interrogated. In so far as the history of science is concerned, the basis for any investigation must be source-critical empiricism. However, more recent departures in the history of science in general have adverted to the impor-tance of sociological approaches, which have stressed a more constructivist view of science. It emerges that a more self-consciously interdisciplinary approach is of signifi cant potential. Using such an approach, at least in part, promises to off er a more textured and contextualized account of astronomy in colonial India, refl ect-ing the nuances of engagement between Europeans and Indians in astronomy while elucidating the impact of colonial politics on that interface.

With regards to periodization, the nineteenth century has attracted relatively modest attention in histories of astronomy in India. While the more narrative histories have considered the establishment of observatories during that period, mentioning astronomers and listing instruments, more interpretive accounts of the context in which Western astronomy came to India are possible. Th e period

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of Orientalist scholarship in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and the approach of Orientalists to Indian astronomy, has come under focus since the time of Nehruvian histories. However, there has been a disconnection between histories considering the signifi cance of that scholarly engagement with Indian astronomy and histories involving more descriptive studies of the institutionaliza-tion of modern Western astronomy in colonial India. Hence this work will revisit the late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Orientalist engagement with Indian astronomy, in order to consider the relationship between that scholarship and the establishment of observatories under colonial offi cialdom in India. So, I take as our nominal starting point the foundation of the Asiatick Society in Cal-cutta in 1784. As for the later nineteenth century, the nature of modern Western astronomy itself began to change with the rising prevalence of spectroscopic and photographic techniques. Th e end date of 1876 refl ects this shift , as well as bear-ing signifi cance in the history of science in India for marking the establishment of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS).

As for location, it is of great surprise that Bombay and Calcutta, two of the three most important cities to the East India Company, have received scant attention in existing histories of astronomy in colonial India. Th is is in fact a signifi cant lacuna, the redressing of which promises to elucidate the nature of colonial science and also the engagement between Europeans and Indians in around the institutions of modern astronomy in India. Th e existing narrative histories have off ered signifi cant details regarding the East India Company’s foundation of an observatory at Madras in 1786, as well as exploring the obser-vatories established at Lucknow and Trivandrum in the 1830s under Indian princes. Furthermore, there has been some mention of observatories at Calcutta and Poona. Yet there is more to be said about Calcutta, and the absence of Bom-bay altogether is an important omission. While Bombay is understood as the site of a magnetic and meteorological observatory from the 1840s, the historical experiences associated with the astronomical observatory prior to that demand exploration. Bombay (the presidency also encompassing Poona aft er 1817) and Bengal (the presidency also encompassing Benares up to 1833, when Bengal was split into the presidency of Bengal and the province of Agra, with the latter being renamed the North-Western Provinces in 1836) hence represent the main focus throughout this work. However, no study into astronomy in nineteenth-century India can ignore the signifi cance of Madras, or the princely states of Awadh and Travancore with their observatories at Lucknow and Trivandrum, and occasional concentration on these areas will serve to put matters in Bom-bay and Bengal into comparative perspective. Furthermore, there is important evidence to be considered from other parts of the subcontinent in elucidating astronomy in nineteenth-century India, and so, the geographical scope of the enquiry ought not to be overly circumscribed.

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Introduction 9

In relation to the vistas which must be explored, it is important to transcend the confi nes of existing histories of astronomy in colonial India. To understand the engagement between Europeans and Indians, there needs to be consid-eration of a number of themes. Th ough the philosophical type of engagement focusing on the encounter between traditional and modern astronomy has been discussed to some extent in existing histories, it is important to revisit some of those themes, with more nuances to explore. However, there is an even greater need to devote attention to the knowledge interface between Europeans and Indians regarding the practice of modern astronomy in and around the institu-tions established for it in the coastal metropolises. While scholars have touched on the relationship between European astronomers and Indian princes, Cal-cutta and Bombay (as well as Madras) have been neglected as sites of meaningful interaction. Th ere is a need to question whether Indian assistants in observato-ries were just menial labourers, or whether there was something more signifi cant involved in their endeavours. Th is also leads to a more extensive view of the role of astronomy in education in colonial India. Th ough scholars have discussed the nineteenth-century pedagogic ventures making use of Siddhantic and Western paradigms, the focus has tended to be on the older centres of Sanskrit scholar-ship, rather than the colleges of the coastal metropolises.

Th e exploration of these various themes associated with astronomy in colonial India demands a wide-ranging use of historical sources, and there are diff erent types of offi cial and personal material which might be brought to bear. Th e journals of the learned societies of Bengal and Bombay contained numer-ous contributions on astronomy (and astrology). In addition, there is a need to explore the (multiple) meanings of physical objects associated with Indian and Western traditions, variously created and preserved by diff erent historical actors, and there was also a plethora of calendars and almanacs produced in this period. With regards to the institutionalization of modern Western astronomy, the existing narrative histories have sought to draw on East India Company records, with regards to Madras in particular. Yet while compendia of obser-vations have attracted attention, there has been less focus on the fi ne grain of offi cial correspondence and reports, and their discursive practices. Th ere is more to be understood about the reasons for which observatories in Bombay and Cal-cutta were founded, staff ed and equipped. In addition, there is more to be said about the practical engagement between Europeans and Indians in and around these observatories. Th e existing literature has tended to ignore the experien-tial texture of astronomy. However, personalized accounts can be gleaned from this offi cial material, as well as from contemporary articles and publications. Th e focus on education brings a logical extension of the use of this sort of source. Th e spotlight falls on material elucidating the establishment of colleges in which astronomy was taught, as well as on signifi cant texts used in them.

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10 Astronomy in India, 1784–1876

Being anchored in the discipline of history, this present work naturally seeks to put astronomy in colonial India into its appropriate context through explo-ration of the identifi ed themes; the history of science is, of course, all about understanding the setting in which scientifi c knowledge is generated. However, as a discipline, sociology, with its focus on the collective aspects of human con-duct, has tended to interrogate scientifi c contexts with even greater intricacy. Th is has been refl ected in the more recent thrust of science and technology stud-ies (STS). In traditional sociology of knowledge, there was interest in how far social factors impacted upon the processes by which scientifi c knowledge was produced, and such concerns have been evident in histories of science for some time. But the sociology of scientifi c knowledge (SSK) has gone even further, looking to show that scientifi c knowledge itself was social in its constitution.32

In emphasizing the social and cultural factors associated with scientifi c practice, the ‘Strong Programme’ of the Edinburgh School usefully considered the ‘structure’ of scientifi c communities and the ‘interests’ of the people within those communities (Kuhn’s internalism discounted the signifi cance of social contexts). Th e stress on structure and interest refl ected the importance of ‘mac-rosocial’ factors in the making of scientifi c knowledge.33 More recently, ideas of ‘co-production’ have continued to refl ect the sense that the production of sci-entifi c knowledge is inextricably linked with social phenomena; in other words, science is made by societal forces and in turn is the making of forms of social life.34 In treating evidence associated with observatories and colleges, it is impor-tant to bear in mind such insights. Th ere has to be elucidation of the societal forces and macro-social factors associated with those institutions.

Yet, some scholars identifi able with the broad spectrum of SSK approaches have focused even more closely on the actual content of science. Th ey have indeed sought to interrogate the cognitive forces and ‘“micro” social’ factors involved in the construction of knowledge.35 Th e various conclusions of the sociologist Bruno Latour, focusing on experimental practice in laboratories and in the fi eld, have been controversial, but it is his sort of methods that are most illuminating.36 Indeed, Latour is widely known for demonstrating the ethnomethodologist’s focus on ‘the range of “small” face-to-face interactions’ in grassroots scientifi c practice.37 Th e constructivist view of science promises to reshape the manner in which engagement between Europeans and Indians in relation to modern astronomy in the colonial period can be conceived. Th e stress on knowledge as something forever being made as a human product, rather than just ‘existing’, is something that histories of science in colonial India have in large part neglected. Kapil Raj has usefully drawn attention to the importance of SSK and made claims to using its approaches.38 However, it is arguable that his implication of Europeans appropriating Indian scientifi c knowledge does not quite adhere to its principles. Th ere have also been eff orts to approach the history of science with the support of distinctly anthropological methods. For example, Alex Soojung-Kim Pang has sought to explore Victorian solar eclipse

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Introduction 11

expeditions with reference to the ‘emotional texture of science’, refl ecting its ‘postconstructivist’ element.39 In such histories, the eff ort to off er thick descrip-tions overrides the importance of complex epistemological issues. However, while acknowledging the value of placing emphasis on the human experiences behind science, there is still more to be meaningfully understood about the con-structivist element.

Th ese interdisciplinary perspectives, notwithstanding some conceptual problems, promise to help in characterizing the engagement between Europeans and Indians in astronomy in this period, in particular with regards to the practi-cal engagement in and around the institutions of modern Western astronomy. When considering the evidence associated with the observatories and colleges, it is important, in the manner of ethnomethodologists, to try and capture the small and mundane details of scientifi c practice whenever possible. In histories of science in colonial India, there is now some consensus behind the notion that ‘there was no simple, one-directional process of scientifi c and technological “transfer”, but rather a series of cross-cultural exchanges and interactions’.40 Th ere are an increasing number of interpretive works seeking to trace the transition between the pre-colonial and colonial periods, and authors stress the problem with seeing an alien science displacing an indigenous one.41 However, the means of characterizing the manner in which Europeans and Indians engaged in rela-tion to modern Western astronomy remains a challenge. Th e various models of hybridity or appropriation in existing histories of science in colonial India might be deemed insuffi cient in themselves, and sociological departures might help to address any shortcomings, in particular with regards to the more practical rather than philosophical types of engagement.

At the same time, there needs to be awareness of the signifi cance of colonial-ism, both with respect to the overall development of astronomy in colonial India and the construction of scientifi c knowledge. Th ere is the issue of hierarchies and hegemonies with regards to colonial and scientifi c modernity.42 Moreover, the picture of connectedness in the making of scientifi c knowledge has its lim-its; there needs to be an understanding, alongside ‘situated universality’, of how ‘politics intrudes into the process of knowledge production’.43 Ultimately, then, it is crucial to situate the subtleties of the engagement in astronomy in India within the context of colonialism’s power inequalities.

So, the aim of this book is to explore the changing forms of engagement between Europeans and Indians in relation to astronomy in India between 1784 and 1876. In the light of debates about colonial scientifi c knowledge, I seek to trace the evolving contexts in which knowledge of astronomy was developed in India and to provide a nuanced characterization of the resultant cognitive interface between Europeans and Indians in the colonial period. Th e defi ning fea-tures of this period – from the foundation of the Asiatick Society in 1784 to the establishment of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science in 1876 – saw Europeans exploring the history of Indian astronomy to assess its value to

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modern science, before establishing observatories and colleges to foster modern (Western) astronomy, while Indians turned to rethink how the history of Indian astronomy (and astrology) fi tted with modern science. Yet my main contention is that while recent historiographical interventions have drawn attention to the more philosophical forms of engagement (through which Europeans and Indians sought to assess the position of modern science vis-à-vis Indian culture), such a concentration has elided a much more practical engagement between Europeans and Indians in relation to modern astronomy in India (with actors from various backgrounds proving their competencies in a more pragmatic working culture). Th is latter form of engagement was not about a constant process of Indians rationalizing participation in modern science, or looking backwards while mov-ing forwards. In addition, it was premised more on collaborative and experiential constructions of knowledge, without express awareness of fi xed ‘Western’ or ‘Indian’ paradigms in astronomy. Th ere was evidence of such engagement in the observatory and in the fi eld, as well as in certain college settings, and in some parts of India more than others. However, racialized colonial institutions and attenuated educational schemas could at length hinder such possibilities, leaving the spotlight on the more philosophical forms of engagement.

Th e chapters elucidate these key themes, while progressing in a broadly chron-ological fashion. Firstly, Chapter 1 demonstrates how Orientalist scholars began interacting with traditional Indian astronomy (and astrology) in the late eight-eenth century, setting in motion a philosophical engagement between European and Indian scientifi c knowledge and raising the possibility of a practical engage-ment with the skills of Indian astronomers. Chapter 2 then considers how, even as scholarship based largely on astronomical texts defi ned the limits of engage-ment with Indians, Europeans began to concern themselves with the practical researches of modern Western astronomy in and around their new observatories in the coastal metropolises. Chapter 3 takes a closer look at the development of knowledge regarding astronomy, in the observatory and in the fi eld. Here it is shown, with particular reference to Bengal and Bombay, that European astrono-mers had to engage practically with Indian assistants in order to progress the work at hand, even though the prospects of institutionally developing such collabo-rative endeavour appeared to diminish. Chapter 4 returns to a slightly broader focus, examining how educational schemes encouraged diff erent types of engage-ment – some more philosophical, some more practical – between Europeans and Indians in astronomy. Lastly, Chapter 5 refl ects on how Indians in the later nineteenth century returned to some of the themes and conceptualizations of the Orientalist encounter with astronomy. Th is renewed emphasis on discursively characterizing the relationship between Indian and Western knowledge systems ostensibly marked a retreat from a more practical engagement; however, ongoing Indian participation in contemporary researches suggested otherwise.

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