THE RISE AND DECLINE OF THE BOMBAY SHIP-BUILDING INDUSTRY, 1736—1850

Author(s): Cynthia Deshmukh

Source: Proceedings of the Indian History Congress , 1986, Vol. 47, VOLUME I (1986), pp.
543-547
Published by: Indian History Congress

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44141601

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 THE RISE AND DECLINE OF THE BOMBAY
SHIP-BUILD] NG INDUSTRY, 1736-1850

Cynthia Deshmukh ( Bombay )

Tradition of Shipping and Ship-Building

1.1 India has had a tradition of shippng and ship-building for millenia.
Bounded by the sea in the south and a network of rivers in the north
and having had luxuriant teak forests which provided excellent material
for shipping and ship-building, nature had provided India with the
where-with-all to be a ship-building and seafaring nation. A ship with
a mast and a regular dockyard built of bricks are among the archaeo-
logical remains of the Indus valley Civilisation. A hymn in the Atharva
Veda records that the Indian boats which sailed over the waves, weré
broad in beam, spacious, comfortable and resplendent with strong
rudders and faultless. Akbar maintained a fleet which engaged in
trade, while Aurangzeb maintained ships which carried Haj pilgrims to
Mecca. The naval wing was an important branch of Shivaji's force
both for defence and attack. Ship-building in India became famous
in the nineenth century, when the Bombay Dockyard which was started
by the East India company built spips both for the Company and the
royal Navy, he query that naturally arises is why the nineteenth cen-
try wich witnessed the zenith of ship-building, also saw its total eclipse,
under circumstances when the Bombay trade itself was sufficient to
provide a carrier trade for indigenous shipping ?

The B®mbay Dockyard

1.2 The East India company which established its first factory in thé
western region in Surat, found a ship-building industry there. The
Copany recognisd the skill of Lowjee Nusserwanjee who was employed
in ship-building at Surat and invited him to Bombay where he was
employed in the Bombay Dockyard in 1736. Lowjee became the master

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 544

builder in 1748. He and his family continued in the capacity of

master ship-builders, during which time they built three hundred and
fifiy frigates, steamers and schooners for the Company, the Royal
Navy and for private owners. The Scaleby Castle, launched in 1798,
and the Buckinghamshire were famous ships built in Bombay for the
East India Company.
1.3 The ships built in the Bombay Dockyard, not only undertook
trans-continental journeys of the East India Company, but were used by
England in wars fought in China, Burma, Crimea and Persia. The Asia
and the Calcutta were ships built for the British navy and they played
important roles in sea battles in different parts of the world. The Asia
played an important part in the Battle of Navrino, when she was the
flag ship of Sir Edward Codrington. In appreciation of the services
rendered by the ship, Admiral Sir Puttney Malcolm wrote to his brother,
Sir Charles Malcolm, in India, "Tell our old friend Nowrojee, what a
glorious part the Asia played in the battle of Navrino, and how proud
I am of his success as a builder. The first warship built in Bombay
was the H.M.S. Cornwallis, which was bought by the British navy. She
was fighting fit twenty-two years later, when she took part in the Anglo-
American War. Its builder Jamshedji Bomanji Wadia had carved an
obscure inscription on the Cornwallis which said "this ship was built by a
damned black fellow."

1.4 The ships built in the Bombay Dockyard under the Wadia builders
were as strong as those built in Europe. They had the added advantage
of being built of teak, while the ships built in Europe where built of
oak. Teak has certain advantages over oak, as it is stronger than oak
and is not attacked by white ants and termites. Therefore, the Bombay
Dockyard received orders from different parts of the world. The Sir
Edward Hughes was built for the British India Steam Navigation
Company, which was an English company, whose vessels sailed between
England and China. The England was built for the Imam of Muscat in
1840 and the Seaforth was built for the government of Ceylon in 1841.
The largest of the ships launched in Bombay was the Ganges , a frigate
of 2,289 tons.

The Downfall of the Bombay Ship-building Industry

1.5 The Bombay Ship-building industry was subordinated to the

interests of the ship-building industry in Britain. The shipping and

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 545

ship-building lobbies in England were powerful pressure groups in the

British electoral system. No political party in England which intended
to fight an election could afford to ignore the economic aspirations of
this class, without running- the risk of loosing their electoral support.
These lobbies could bring pressure on the British Government and the
Government of India to shape the Indian economic policies for the
development of British shipping and shipbuilding industry, even though
these policies led to the ruin of Indian shipping and shipbuilding.

1.6 As a matter of fact, Britain was an old hand at framing shipping

legislation which discriminated in favour of British ships. As early as
1651 Cromwell's famous Navigation Act was passed which laid down
that "No goods, commodities, or manufactures or produce, of Asia or
America should be imported into England, Ireland or the American
colonies, except in ships built in Britain, owned by British subjects and
of which the Captain and at least sevevty-five per. cent of the crew were
British subjects. It was only two centuries later when steam and iron
had replaced wood, because of the advance of the industrial revolution,
that Britain felt sufficiently confident to withdraw this legisation. But
she soon realised that she had made a mistake, for new inventions and
changes in technology introduced in one country could be copied by
another. Between 1839 and 1857 nearly a score of iron and steam vessels
were built even in the Bombay Dockyard, which announced to the world
that Bombay had entered the age of steam, and would now use iron for
ship-building. The Firoze , a ship of 1450 tons which played an impor-
tant part in the British naval campaign» in Indian and Burmese waters.
The steam propelled flotillas of the Indus, the Tigris and the Euphrates,
were built in the Bombay Docks.

1.7 Accordingly, a hue and cry was raised in Britain against ships built
in India. The arrival of Indian products in ships built in India, at
London, created a sensation among the shipping monopoly of Great
Britain. The ship-builders of the port of London took the lead in
creating the cry of alarm. They declared that their business was on the
point of ruin and the families of shipworkers in England would certaialy
be reduced to starvation. Therefore in 1814 the British Government
passed a law which said that, Indian sailors even though they were
subjects of his majesty in England, shall not be deemed tobe British
mariners, and any ship even though British which fcad not on board

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 546

three-fourth of its crew, British mariners, per hundred registered tons,

would be liable to forfeiture and no ship was to enter the port of
London whose master was not a British mariner.

1.8 After this the Government of the East India Company, in India
adopted policies which resulted in the ruin of Indian shipping and con-
squently the ruin of the Bombay ship-building industry. The Govenment
adopted the policy of tarrifT discrimination. In 1811 Fort William of
Bengal promulgated seperate rates of import duties on goods carried by
British and non-British ships. The rate for the former was 7.5 percent,
while that of the latter was 15 percent. Madras and Bombay followed
suit in 1812 and 1813 respectively. This practice continued till 1875.
The tariffs were no doubt primarily directed against French and Dutch
shipping, but the governments of these countries vigorously protested
and the discrimination against them was withdrawn. Finally Indian
ship swere the only victims of the discriminatory legisation. The over all
effect of the different colonial laws was the destruction of not only
Indian shipping and ship-building, but the maritime profession itself,
with the corresponding effect on the Bombay dockyard.

The Conference System

1 9 From 1875 British shipping companies held a series of conferences

ihe object of which was to safeguard British shipping. The Conference
system filled the cup of gall of Indian shipping and ship-building to
the brim. The Conference of 1877, adopted the method of paying
deferred rabates for goods shipped in Vessels of British shipping lines.
This was an ingenous device to ensure continued patronage of parti-
cular British shipping companies. Light is thrown on the modus oper-
andi of this system and how it brought Indian shipping to a stand still
by the fate which befell the Tata line, started by Jamshetji Tata in
1894. The Tata enterprise was started because of the heavy freights
which the companies started by Tata had to pay to the P and O for the
carriage of yarn, from India to the Far East. Tata therefore decided to
start a line to cater to Indian interests. The freight charged by the
Tata line was twelve rupees per ton of forty cubic feet of space, against
the P & O of nineteen rupees. The P & O accordingly embarked on a
freight war and reduced charges to one rupee eight annas per ton and
even offered to carry cotton free to Japan. The reduced freights were

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 547

offered in the form of a deferred rebate, to those shippers who had not
shipped goods between Japan and china and Bombay, in a vessel belon-
ging to the line started by Tata.

1.10 The freight was started by the P & O sounded the death knell, of
this indigenous line. Tata therefore submitted a memorandum to the
Secretary of State for India, petitioning him to set matters right. The
petition said "With scores of liners, English and foreign plying these
waters which that petted and much glorified company can afford and
perhaps find it good policy to tolerate in these waters, it is only jealous
of a small enterptise like ours. While it can lovingly take foreigners
and possibly future enemies to its bosom, it discards the poor Indian
for whose special benefit it professes to have come to India and from
whose pocket it draws the greater part of its subsidy."

Conclusion

1.11 Tata's experience was a warning to other Indian enterprises aga-

inst entering the shipping and ship-building industry. Thus Indian shipp-
ing and correspondingly Indian ship-building had to bow gracefully out,
while foreign liners of the P & O and the B. I Companies sailed majes-
tically along the Indian Littoral. Indian shipping got restricted to a
meagre coastal trade between smaller coastal ports along the Indian
sea-board. Sir Wiliiam Digby wrote in prosperous British India " "The
ancient occupations of the people on the sea and land have been des-
troyed. The ships which now carry India's coastwise trade are stea-
mers built in Britain. We are literally draining India dry."

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