The Great Hedge of India

Gary Arndt (0:00)

In the 19th century, the British Empire undertook one of history's most unusual construction projects. It stretched for thousands of miles across India, required thousands of workers to maintain, and was designed to prevent ordinary people from obtaining one of life's most basic necessities without paying a tax. Despite its enormous size and the resources devoted to it, almost all traces of it have disappeared, and few people today even know it existed. Learn more about the Great Hedge of India and why it was built on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

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By the mid 1800s, the British East India Company had controlled much of India for more than a century. The company had operated as a trading enterprise granted a monopoly by the British Crown. It gained extraordinary wealth from fine Indian fabrics and its control over the spice trade. A key turning point in the East India Company's rule came after the 1757 Battle of Plassey, which secured its control over Bengal and dramatically expanded its power to collect land revenues and impose direct taxes on the Indian population. To maximize revenues, the East India Company established monopolies and taxation systems for key commodities, particularly, for the purpose of this episode, salt. These policies varied considerably across India, with particularly restrictive controls established in Bengal. Under this system, the East India Company bought salt at rock-bottom prices and resold it to Indian and European markets at significant markups. It reserved some of the highest salt taxes for regions of India where it could not be harvested. And, just a reminder, salt is necessary for human life, and the human body can't manufacture it. In warm climates, particularly those in the tropics, salt is even more vital. In hot environments, the body cools itself by sweating. Human sweat isn't just water, it also contains salt. Without replenishing sodium and chloride, the body faces severe consequences, foremost among them, dehydration. These consequences also extend to livestock, particularly cattle, which are sacred in India. Cattle, foundational to India's rural economy, require salt licks and blocks to live and work. Throughout Indian history, leaders vigorously protested British efforts to weaponize salt taxation. Among them was Mahatma Gandhi, who criticized efforts to tax salt shortly before the Great Salt March of 1930 He noted, Next to air and water, salt is perhaps the greatest necessity of life. It is the only condiment of the poor. Cattle cannot live without salt. Salt is a necessary article in many manufacturers. There is no article like salt outside water taxing, which the state can reach even the starving millions, the sick, the maimed and the utterly helpless. The tax constitutes therefore the most inhuman poll tax that the ingenuity of man can devise. The battle lines were drawn. To the people of India, salt was a vital naturally occurring commodity that should be available to all without heavy taxes. To the British East India Company, salt was a lucrative lever of power regardless of the human cost.