Knowledge as Power: A Historical Analysis of Foucault's Theory in the Context of Colonial India

Abstract

Using Michel Foucault’s concept of “knowledge as power” as its mode of analysis, the paper discusses the introduction of new imperial power-knowledge regimes in British India, particularly in the context of education, the census, and bureaucratic documentation. The study applies secondary research by examining colonial censuses (1872–1941), policy documents and scholarly literature. Results suggest how the English Education Act of 1835 and the Macaulay Minute institutionalised English education, institutionalised middleman in education and reinforced cultural hegemony. The census process under officials such as H. H. Risley rigidly divided the population into castes and followed an extreme form of casteism by stating that they observed the principle of rank and ascribed a strictly observed hierarchy, the lining up of castes from top to bottom of the caste hierarchy, and followed exactly the opposite procedure with unreliable motives. Quantitative data reveals a wide gender, caste and regional gap in literacy that justified selective colonial interventions and administrative domination. Drawing on Foucault’s notions of classification, surveillance and normalisation, these mechanisms illustrate how processes of knowledge production served the imperial project. The paper suggests that colonial knowledge systems transformed Indian society and are still felt in post-colonial governance and social formations.