Bayly, C. "Rammohan Roy and the Advent of Constitutional Liberalism in India. 1800-30". Modern Intellectual History, Vol.4, No.1 (2005): 25-41.

Bayly, C. "Rammohan Roy and the Advent of Constitutional Liberalism in India. 1800-30". Modern Intellectual History, Vol.4, No.1 (2005): 25-41.

• Liberalism in the 1810s and 1820s often imagined forms of negative liberalism, but there was also a strong constructive trend throughout the period, advocating the construction of 'liberal societies' based on a free press, local representation, and an educated public. This form of liberalism was often conservative towards landed interests and supported a constitutional monarchy (26).
• To demonstrate the interconnectedness of liberal thought during this period, the author references a festival in Calcutta in August 1822 celebrating the 2nd anniversary of the Portuguese constitution. Both local newspapers at the time proclaimed the importance of the event and the role of Rammohan Roy in providing ideas for the revolution. The collection of guests at the celebrations also connected liberal reform in India and Portugal with broader liberal reforms across Europe (26-27).
• Because of its colonial nature, India had been deeply involved in the string of revolutions caused by the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars. The territories of Goa had been involved in a series of coups and counter-coups between liberals and agents of the reactionary monarchy in Rio de Janeiro for years (27).
• Just like how during the Napoleonic Wars, Indian elites conceived of themselves as part of the global liberal wave rising, they felt they were oppressed in its aftermath by the East India Company just as the Russians were by the Tsar and the Balkan peoples by the Ottomans. They saw the continued taxation and monopolism of the East India Company as part of a general trend of tyranny devastating liberalism after the Napoleonic Wars (28).
• Although far from representing the opinions of the vast majorities of mainly disenfranchised people during this period, the press did allow an international civil society to develop in the late 1700s, of which Rammohan Roy was a major and recognized member. He is mentioned by name in the Cadiz Constitution of 1812, and widely regarded as a major figure in liberalism, notably disproving British myths about permanent social stagnation in India (28).
• He was India's first 'public man', participating not only in liberal campaigns in India throughout his life, but also advocating for the Reform Bill in England, liberal revolution in France, and independence for Greece (29).
• Rammohan Roy was born into a family of Hindu Mughal officials in Bengal, although he soon became well acquainted with a number of British officials and Unitarian ministers in the region. He founded a reform society, the Brahmo Samaj, to make Hinduism more monotheistic and remove 'corrupt' practices like sati.  He learned a number of European languages and distributed his opinions via pamphlets and newspaper articles (28-29).
• The author argues the Rammohan Roy was deeply involved in a specific trend of constitutionalism liberalism popular during the 1810s and 1820s, and that his opinions of India's past and future can be partially linked to his conceptions of the European present (29).
• Rammohan Roy was convinced in global historical trends, and believed that liberalism could not succeed in India without the success of constitutional liberalism elsewhere. It was for this reason that he had such immense interest in European politics, and specifically the passage of liberal reforms in the UK (31).
• He hoped that a more liberal British Parliament would play a larger role in Indian legislation and erode the influence of the East India Company. Ultimately he hoped that Indians would fill up the executive and judicial posts in India, and replace the European-dominated civil service (31).
• Rammohan Roy conceived of Indian history as a long period of decline from a past of 'pure' Hinduism, which embodied the modern liberal causes he agreed with. He argued that if India had been 'liberal' in the past, it could surely become so again. He argued that a system of checks and balances was endemic to Hinduism because of the 'executive power' of Rajputs and the 'legislative power' of Brahmins. The laziness of the Brahmin had allowed the Rajputs to again wield power, precipitating a Muslim invasion and the establishment of continued despotism under the Mughals and now under the British East India Company (30).
• Rammohan Roy's narrative of Indian constitutionalism was a combination of Indian myth, a very 'Hindu-centric' reading of Indian medieval history drawing on contemporary histories by British orientalists (30).
• By creating this mythologized Indian history, Rammohan Roy located India alongside Italy, Greece, and other liberal revolutionary ideas. Just like Greek recollections of democratic Athens, or Iberian recollections of Cato, these acted as sources of legitimacy and indigeneity of liberal and constitutional ideas in India (30-31).
• Rammohan Roy did not advocate complete self governance during the 1820s and 1830s, unlike some contemporary British radicals and the younger generation of Bengalis, as he maintained a distrust of popular politics. Instead he hoped that India could gain representation in the British parliament, allowing Indian representation to replace corrupt Company interests both in British and Indian administration (32).
• He was also very suspicious of colonial government and the tendency for tyrannies to emerge. Because of this, he opted for an American system of checks and balances on any exercise of government power that would make sure any government interventions were limited (32).
• Some radical elements of the British Whigs were advocating some form of Indian independence as early as 1832, but most liberal elites believed that such independence would only come in a distant future through the education and moral improvement of Indians (32-33).
• Liberal visions of India differed greatly during this period. Some of the more radical views, which imagined a future independence for India, look towards a Brazilian model of liberalism, with society ruled by a coterie of English ex-patriots and educated natives, eventually blending into a creole ruling class. Others argued for sovereign princely states subject to the British crown, while some Bengalis envisioned a society ruled by enlightened liberal landlords (33).
• Rammohan Roy was one of the first people to conceive of 'India' as a distinct historical and cultural space, a fact widely recognized during his time. He also led the reform of Hinduism towards a 'modern' religion that could be used to support a unitary national identity, which he intended to create as part of project to improve the Indian people (33-34).
• There were particular disputes between British and Indian liberals on the issue of juries, which under the Juries Act of 1825 had been given all investigative powers currently associated with them. These powers were not, however, extended to Indians on a variety of arguments including: refusal to convict high castes, inability to take a meaningful oath as non-Christians, and the degradation of the Indian mind from centuries of despotism (34).
• The presence of a jury system in India without a large supply of jurors caused a number of issues, compounded by the prohibition on mixed-race or India-borne Europeans from serving on juries. The ranks of juries instead mainly included sailors and minor Company officers. This was especially insulting because the colonies of Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Sierra Leone had all extended the jury pool much farther (35).
• Rammohan Roy led the Indian campaign for jury reform, demanding the expansion of jury rights to Indians. In addition to arguing the Hindus could take oaths without issue, he stated that India had always had juries, in the form of the panchayat, or five-man council that theoretical governed villages. He eventually managed to convince the Parliament of this, as they extended jury rights to Indians in 1828 (35-36).
• Indian liberals placed a particular focus on the necessity of the free press, even more so than free trade, as a means of improving society, precisely because the press in India was still autocratically regulated by the East India Company. The leading figures behind this campaign were James Silk Buckingham, a former sailor and radical liberal, and Rammohan Roy. As press censorship in India, lasting in extreme form between 1823 and 1835, prevent domestic agitation, Mr. Buckingham played a major role in mobilizing British liberals to call for the freedom of the press in India (36-37).
• Although ideas about press freedom clearly drew from a number of European sources, Indian liberals also claimed that India had a history of a free press holding the state accountable throughout the Mughal era (37).
• Liberal press outlets in India were targeted in particular, and those linked to Rammohan Roy especially, by Company censorship because they advocated opinions of a well-respect man who challenged not only Company rule in India, but in fact the aims of Tories in Ireland, Britain, and elsewhere (38-39).
• Rammohan Roy defended the necessity of a free press in India partially from drawing on European liberal notions of a free press constraining arbitrary power and notions of allowing for the improvement of the population. He also argued that instability would not result from press freedom, pointed at the loyalty of Indians to the British crown, particularly demonstrated through the large investments of Indian capital in British imperial projects (39).
• Although today regarded as one of the 'father of modern India', Rammohan Roy had a mixed legacy that has been especially used by the republic left of contemporary India. His contemporaries often viewed him as 'pseudo-Christian', whereas the next generation of reformers tended to disregard him as overly conservative, taking positions on independence and land reform considered anti-liberal compared to contemporary British politicians (39-40).
• The author notes that, although not particularly popular, all of the ideas that would emerge in later 19th and 20th Century discourses on India were already present in the 1830s. This included neo-conservatism, republicanism, radical independence, and the anti-landlord movement (40).