Urban Development Of Bombay During British Colonial Rule: 1661-1885

The research on the development of Bombay under the British rule,is part of the program of the Maritime Silk Route of South Asia cities.It is analyzed that Bombay evolved from seven islands scattered around the coastline frontier to a metropolis as a British colony.Bombay was gradually drawn into a British dominated world trade network under British rule,especially of the 19 th century Britain's industrial revolution and the prosperity of foreign trade.Bombay experienced a relatively hard start,slow development,to take shape,and finally to the formation of great city.The paper is divided into different stages.It can be divided into two different stages,namely the rule of the East India Company and the UK directly,according to the rulers.That is to say,until the middle of the 19 th century,the British India was actually run by the British East India Company.It is until 1857,after the Indian national uprising,that the British government did end the company's rule in India and put it under the British government direct management,crowned queen Victoria as the Empress of India.The paper put the East India Company period into three chapters while the British direct rule period as a fourth chapter.The first chapter mainly describes the process of Portuguese handing over Bombay to British and its preliminary course of development.The king rent out Bombay island to the East India Company.Since then,the development process of Bombay was mainly dominated by the Company which expanded Bombay castle into Bombay Fort,and thus laid the starting point of Bombay city and Bombay colony in the future.Especially the second governor Gerald Aungier built up an entity with reinforcement fort,better management,justice,rule of law,thriving business,peopling,etc.The second chapter deals with the Bombay's slow development period(1686-1794).In 1686,that the Company moving its headquarters from Surat to Bombay directly contributed to the rise of Bombay.As the company's headquarters settling in here,other business activity,maritime trade also moved here.In order to cope with the contesting of other western great powers,and to fight back of India Maratha attacks,Bombay Fort began to strengthen its military defense and became a military fortress,called“Kala Killa(black fortress)” by local Indians.Under the protection of the fortress,Bombay's commerce developed,and gradually formed the prototype of the town.The third chapter describes the formation of modern Bombay in the 19 th century.It began in 1794 when Governor-General George Dick appointed Civil Architect to determine the limit of the city of Bombay,to the end of the Company rule in India in1858.During this period,Bombay's development laid the true foundation of a town.The first half of the 19 th century gradually connected seven islands into an Old Bombay and continuing the landfill projects.The fourth chapter discusses the golden age of Bombay's development from1858 to 1885 under the British Raj.Bombay was not only an important cotton trade center,but also established its own textile industry which made Bombay to change from a relatively pure commercial city into a manufacturing city too.The cotton boom after 1861 American Civil War,direct pushed Bombay into the Golden Age.Bombay finally became a metropolis.In conclusion,Bombay transformed from an isolated and remoted island into an India's biggest city during 1661-1885,which was an organic part of the global economic and trade network system since the Great Discovery.Bombay was essentially a colonial city and acted as the window of the British exploitation of Indian continent.During this period of time the progress of Bombay city development is a strong cosmopolitan social and cultural phenomenon.