This article makes a case for using “orphan” as an analytical category in historicizing child rescue in nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries colonial India. It argues that child rescue efforts in the 19th century were tied to the concept of jati, and were therefore largely communitarian in nature. The paper contends that the category of “orphan” provides a fresh perspective on identity formation and community-building, demonstrating how orphans were instrumental not only for the British “civilizing mission” but also for the Indian nation-building efforts. It reveals how the category remains a potent tool for mobilizing communities and shaping public policy in modern India.
AdcockCS (2014) The Limits of Tolerance: Indian Secularism and the Politics of Religious Freedom. Oxford University press.
3.
AliFMRamBSVakils Lucknow (1921) to His Excellency the Governor in Council, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Nainital, Acquisition. Scarcity Department, File No. 11, September 1920, Uttar Pradesh State Archive (Hereafter, UPSA).
4.
AndersonB (1983) Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso.
5.
AnsellN (2016) Once upon a time: orphanhood, childhood studies and the depoliticization of childhood poverty in Southern Africa. Childhood23(2): 162–177. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568215589419
6.
AskelandL (ed) (2005) Children and Youth in Adoption, Orphanages, and Foster Care: A Historial Handbook and Guide. Bloomsbury Publishing.
7.
BalagopalanS (2002) Constructing Indigenous childhoods: colonialism, vocational education and the working child. Childhood9(1): 19–34. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568202009001233
8.
BarclayKStearnsPN (2023) The Routledge History of Emotions in the Modern World. Routledge.
9.
BashfordALevineP (eds) (2010) The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics. Oxford University Press.
10.
BaylyCA (1985) The pre-history of 'communalism'? Religious conflict in India, 1700-1860. Modern Asian Studies19(2): 177–203. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0026749x00012300
11.
BegamQ (1921) To His Excellency the Governor in Council, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Lucknow, Acquisition. Scarcity Department, File no. 11, September 1920, UPSA.
12.
BerryH (2019) Orphans of Empire: The Fate of London’s Foundlings. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
13.
BrayR (2003) Predicting the social consequences of orphanhood in South Africa. African Journal of AIDS Research2(1): 39–55.
14.
BetellieA (1996) Varna and Jati. Sociological Bulletin45(1): 15–27.
15.
CarrollL (1978) Colonial perceptions of Indian Society and the emergence of caste (s) associations. The Journal of Asian Studies37(2): 233–250. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0021911800093529
16.
ChakrabartyD (1981) Communal riots and labour: Bengal's jute mill-hands in the 1890. Past and Present91: 140–169.
DumontL (1980) Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste System and Its Implications. Chicago University Press.
22.
EnthovenRE (1922) The Tribes and Castes of Bombay. Government Central Press.
23.
EvansR (2011) ‘We are managing our own lives’: Life transitions and care in sibling-headed households affected by AIDS in Tanzania and Uganda. Area43(4): 384–396.
24.
Fischer-TinéH (2000) Kindly elders of the Hindu biradri': the arya Samaj's struggle for influence and its effect on Hindu-Muslim relations, 1880–1925. In: CopleyA (ed) Gurus and Their Followers: New Religious Reform Movements in Colonial India. Oxford University Press, pp. 107–127.
25.
Fischer-TinéH (2006). In: BatesC (ed) From Brahmacharya to Conscious Race Culture: ‘Victorian Discourses of ‘Science’ and Hindu Traditions in Early Indian Nationalism in Beyond Representation: Colonial and Postcolonial Constructions of Indian Identity. Oxford University Press, pp. 241–269.
HinchyJ (2019) Governing Gender and Sexuality in Colonial India: The Hijra, c.1850–1900. Cambridge University Press.
32.
IbbotsonAWEsqr. M.C., M. B. E., I. C. S., Deputy Commissioner, Lucknow (1920) To the Commissioner Lucknow Division, Lucknow. Acquisition of Land for Dayanand Orphanage at Nazirabad in Lucknow District (Hereafter, Acquisition). Scarcity Department, File no. 11, Uttar Pradesh State Archive (hereafter, UPSA).
33.
IraniVK (no date) The Jamshedji Nusserwanji Petit Parsi Orphanage, Golden Jubilee Memorial Volume, 1888-1938. J.N. Petit Parsi Orphanage Captain Printing Works.
34.
JeejeebhoyJRB (no date) Care of destitute orphans in Bombay, In: VafadarKIThe Jamshedji Nusserwanji Petit Parsi Orphanage, Golden Jubilee Memorial Volume,1888-1938. J.N. Petit Parsi Orphanage Captain Printing Works.
JonesKW (1976) Arya Dharm: Hindu Consciousness in 19th-Century Punjab. Manohar.
37.
JonesKW (1989) Socio-Religious Reform Movements in India in British India. Cambridge University Press.
38.
JonesKW (1994) The Arya Samaj in British India 1875–1947. In: BairdRD (ed) Religion in Modern India. Manohar.
39.
KakarS (1981) The Inner World: A psycho-analytic Study of Childhood and Society in India. 2nd edition. Oxford University Press.
40.
KannanD (2024) Contested Childhoods: Caste and Education in Colonial Kerala. Cambridge University Press.
41.
KasturiM (2010) All gifting is sacred’ the Sanatana Dharma Sabha movement, the reform of Dana and Civil Society in late colonial India. The Indian Economic and Social History Review47(1): 107–139. https://doi.org/10.1177/001946460904700104
42.
KedourieE (1970) Nationalism in Asia and Africa. Frank Cass.
43.
LeeuwSD (2009) If anything is to be done with the Indian, we must catch him very young: colonial constructions of Aboriginal children and the geographies of Indian residential schooling in British Columbia, Canada. Children’s Geographies7(2): 123–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/14733280902798837
44.
LydonJ (2019) Imperial Emotions: The Politics of Empathy Across the British Empire. Cambridge University Press.
45.
MaulawiSA (2015) Trans. In: The Holy Qur’An. Islam International Publications.
MeintjesHGieseS (2006) Spinning the epidemic: The making of mythologies of orphanhood in the context of AIDS. Childhood13(3): 407–430.
48.
MeintjesHHallKMareraD-H, et al. (2010) Orphans of the AIDS epidemic? The extent, nature and circumstances of child-headed households in South Africa. AIDS Care22(1): 40–49.
49.
MurdochL (2006) Imagined Orphans: Poor Families, Child Welfare, and Contested Citizenship in London. Rutgers University Press.
50.
MusgroveN (2024) Emotion as a tool for Humanising Histories of the Marginalised: a case Study of industrial schools in Colonial Victoria. Social History49(1): 53–77. https://doi.org/10.1080/03071022.2024.2281150
51.
NandyA (1983) The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self Under Colonialism. Oxford University Press.
52.
OlsenS (2014) Juvenile Nation: Youth, Emotions and the Making of the Modern British Citizen. Bloomsbury.
53.
PalsetiaJS (2005) Merchant charity and public identity formation in colonial India: the case of Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy. Journal of Asian and African Studies40(3): 197–217. https://doi.org/10.1177/0021909605055071
54.
PandeyG (2006) The Construction of Communalism in Colonial North India. Oxford University Press.
55.
PetersL (2009) Orphan Texts: Victorian Orphans, Culture and Empire. Manchester University Press.
56.
PlumMC (2015) Inscribing War orphans’ loses into the Language of the Nation in wartime China, 1937-1945. In: OlsenS (ed) Childhood, Youth and Emotions in Modern History. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 198–221.
57.
PrasadRSecretary of the Dayanand Orphanage, Lucknow (1920) To H. Rutledge Esqr. I.C.S. Deputy Commissioner, Lucknow,Scarcity Department, File No. 11, UPSA.
58.
RamaswamySFilippoO (2018) Charity and philathropy in south Asia: a preamble. Modern Asian Studies52(1): 1–3.
59.
RobinsonSJessicaP (2008) The question of genocide and Indigenous child removal: the colonial Australian context. Journal of Genocide Research10(4): 501–518. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623520802447818
60.
RoseHA (1911) Comps., vol.2, A Glossary of the Tribes and Caste of Punjab and North-West Frontier Province. Civil and Millitary Gazette Press.
61.
SamarendraP (2016) Local Jatis and Pan-Indian caste: the unresolved dilemma of M.N. srinivas. Contributions to Indian Sociology50(2): 214–239. https://doi.org/10.1177/0069966716635401
62.
SarkarS (1995) Modern India, 1885–1947. Macmillan.
63.
SatyaketuVVedlankarHLalBB (1984) Arya Samaj Ka Itihas. Ajay Press, Vol. 2.
64.
Scarcity Department (Sep. 1920) Acquisition. File No. 11, UPSA.
65.
Secretary Dayanand Orphanage (Sep 1920) To H.S Crosthwaite Esq ICS, Revenue Secretary, UP Government Acquisition. Scarcity Department, File no. 11, September 1920, UPSA.
66.
Secretary Dayanand Orphanage Lucknow (1921) To the Deputy Commissioner Lucknow, Acquisition. Scarcity Department. File no. 11, September 1920, UPSA.
67.
SenS (2005) Colonial Childhoods in India: The Juvenile Periphery of India, 1850-1945. Anthem Press.
68.
SenS (2007) The orphaned colony: orphanage, child and authority in British India. The Indian Economic and Social History Review44(4): 463–488. https://doi.org/10.1177/001946460704400403
69.
SharmaS (2001) Famine, Philanthropy and the Colonial State: North India in the Early Nineteenth Century. Oxford University Press.
70.
ShastriJC (1929) Anatha: Hinduon Ki Nalayki, Musalman Gundon Ki Shrartein Aur Anathalayon Ka Bhandaphor. Chand Karyalaya.
71.
SitholeyPAagarwalVVratS (2013) Indian mental concepts on children and adolescents. Indian Journal of Psychiatry55(suppl 2): S277–S282. https://doi.org/10.4103/0019-5545.105551
72.
SladenFFEsqr, I.C.S., Deputy Commissioner, Lucknow (1920) To the Commissioner, Lucknow Division, Acquisition, Scarcity Department, File No. 11. September 1920, UPSA.
73.
SladenFFEsquire, I.C.S., Deputy Commissioner, Lucknow (21 June 1921) To the Commissioner Lucknow, Acquisition of Land. Scarcity Department, File no. 11, September 1920, UPSA.
74.
SnowD (1991) Family, policy and orphan Schools in early colonial Australia. The Journal of Interdisciplinary History22(22): 255–284. https://doi.org/10.2307/205868
75.
SolandB (2015) Never a better home: growing up in American orphanages, 1920-1970. The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth8(1): 34–54. https://doi.org/10.1353/hcy.2015.0000
76.
Soni (2020) Learning to Labour: native orphans in colonial India, 1840s–1920s. Special theme. International Review of Social History65(1): 15–42.
77.
Soni (2022) Laying the foundation of the ‘Native’ Christian community: the church missionary society and its experiments with famine orphans and orphanages, 1840s–1920s. South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies45(5): 924–942.
SwainS (2015) Institutionalized childhood: the orphanage remembered. The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth8(1): 17–33. https://doi.org/10.1353/hcy.2015.0013
81.
SwainS (2016) Enshrined in law: legislative justifications for the removal of Indigenous and non-indigenous children in colonial and post-colonial Australia. Australian Historical Studies47(2): 191–208. https://doi.org/10.1080/1031461x.2016.1153119
82.
THM (1895) A Parsee Girls Orphanage. Times of India. (hereafter, ToI) 14 Aug, 5.
83.
ToI (1888a) The parsee orphanage. ToI, 29 June, 4.
84.
ToI (1888b) The native papers. ToI, 15 Oct, 6.
85.
VallgårdaKAA (2015) Tying children to god with love: Danish mission, childhood, and emotions in colonial South India. Journal of Religious History39(4): 595–613. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9809.12265
86.
VallgårdaKAA (2015) Imperial Childhoods and Christian Mission: Education and Emotions in South India and Denmark. Palgrave Macmillan.
87.
Van der VeerP (1994) Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India. University of California Press.
88.
Van der VeerP (2001) Imperial Encounter: Religion and Modernity in India and Britain. Permanent Black.
WattC (2005) Serving the Nation: Cultures of Service, Associations and Citizenship in Colonial India. Oxford University Press.
91.
WhiteDL (1991) From crisis to community definition: the dynamics of eighteenth-century parsi philanthropy. Modern Asian Studies25(2): 303–320. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0026749x00010696
92.
ZahidMA (2013) Islamia anjumans and educational development: perspectives on the 19th century British Punjab. Pakistan Journal of History and Culture34(2): 1–23.
93.
ZelizerVAR (1985) Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children. Basic Books.
