Cities, Cottage Industries and Industries of the British Period — Social Science STD 8 — Question
Gujarat BoardEnglish MediumSTD 8Social ScienceCities, Cottage Industries and Industries of the British Period5 Marks
Question
Answer the following question : State the development of textile industry during the British rule.
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Answer
During the British rule, textile industries was first established in Maharashtra and Gujarat. The first cloth mill was established in Mumbai in $1854 \ AD$. Thereafter. the first cotton mill was established in Ahmedabad on $30$ May. $1861$ by Shri Ranchhodlal Chhotalal Rentiawalla. Ahmedabad became the second largest manufacturer of cotton cloth after Mumbai in India. Just like the flourishing cloth production of Manchester city of Great Britain. the cloth industry of Ahmedabad also developed on a large scale. In those days there were about 106 cloth mills in Ahmedabad. So. Ahmedabad was known as the 'Manchester' of India. After the cloth mill started in Ahmedabad, textile industries were established in many other cities around India. Today, textile mills have been established in cities like, Coimbatore, Madurai. Solapur, Chennai (Madras), Puducherry, Kanpur. Kolkata, Panipat, Ludhiana, etc.Before the British rule, the art of weaving one's own cloth was prevalent in India. Creating sarees in various colours and attractive designs, as well as the complex weaving required for their borders used to be done at Solapur in Maharashtra and at Madurai in Tamil Nadu.
During the British era. the Indian textile industry and artisans like weavers, etc. had to face many difficulties along with excessive taxes. Since Indian cloth was made manually. it was expensive, while the machine-made cloth of Britain was quite cheap.
As a part of the freedom struggle, Gandhiji had started the 'Swadeshi' movement at one point of time. Due to the 'Swadeshi' movement, small-scale rural industries like handloom, hand-weaving, cottage industries and handicraft industries, etc. got a boost. Consequently, the textile industry of India developed.
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