[.ca] The Great Hedge of India: The Search for the Living ... (ISBN 0786708409)

What next from the British Raj?:
First we had THE GREAT ARC, a story about the immense project to map the arc of the meridian in India. Now we learn that the British army and the government built a 1500 mile long GREAT HEDGE OF INDIA as part of a customs wall to keep out smugglers of salt. As is to be expected with popular history books on such arcane subjects eccentricity abounds. Also fairly typically of such stories the quest becomes a bit of an obsession for the author. Moxham tells us that at first his search was casual and on a whim. Eventually his desire to find some remnant of the great hedge caused him to make repeated visits to India, learn Hindi, become a useful navigator using GPS tools and techniques, and spend years poring over maps and charts of colonial India. Was it worth it? Much of that depends on the reception of this book but Moxham has the satisfaction of finally finding a remnant of the hedge. We learn this near the end of the book and there's a photograph of a rather nondescript clump of thorny bush that proves it. Finding a bit of the hedge closes the chapter on one aspect of this book. This wraps up the book as a travelogue of Moxham's personal treks through present day India and his imaginary journeys through the time and space of India under the Raj. On another level as a historical account the book is a bit thinner. The facts of the hedge are known. It seperated northern India into two almost equal parts and was designed to prevent salt from being smuggled in from Gujarat and Maharashtra states in the west and sugar from leaving the north. Eventually as part of a custom line it would run from Rawalpindi in the north-west (in present day Pakistan) to Orissa state on the east coast. Because of the various climatic zones it traversed the hedge was made up of different plants. Prickly pear, thorn brush, and bamboo were used. It was over 8 feet high and 5 feet wide with occassional openings marked by a large tamarind tree under which sat a customs shed. It was an impenetrable barrier except for the spots where smugglers had set fire to a few clumps or rats had gnawed away some roots. Moxham tells us that both army and cats were deployed with the hedge eventually being manned by some 14,000 soldiers. We never learn how many cats were required. Moxham's coverage of history includes discussion of the East India Company and its maintenance of the Salt-Tax which consumed up to a fifth of a peasants annual income. The hedge and customs wall gave way in 1879 but the salt-tax remained (albeit at a much reduced rate) right up to the time of Ghandi who in fact used it as a symbol of what he was protesting against. Nobody still defends the Raj but Moxham nevertheless feels compelled to flagellate his country over its past. He says "British individuals, and most of all the East India Company itself, took vast sums out of India and spent it in Britain. India, which when the British arrived had been relatively well-off, became much poorer." This is no doubt true but balance is required and Moxham is not quite so strong in making the point that it was a Scotsman named Alan Octavian Hume who repayed India handsomely. Hume was the principal organizer of the Indian National Union in 1885 which became the Congress party, which later under Ghandi led India to independence. The truth is the Raj and it's deeds are history and guilt today over the past not only achieves nothing, it takes away from the enjoyment of the book. A point that supports this comes from a review of this book I read in one of India's daily newspapers. Of interest to the writer wasn't the stale facts of the Raj's misdeeds, but that it was an Englishman who had uncovered the fascinating story of the great hedge of India.

Entertaining and informative at every level:
The book is the story of an Englishman's chance discovery (actually rediscovery) of the construction of a barrier comparable to the Great Wall of China. The authors story of the search is an interesting part of the story, but the historical investigation of the barrier, the motivation behind it, the details n the effects of salt deprivation, the comparative analysis of salt taxation in Europe and China, all combine to make this one of the best reads I can remember. Highly recommended!

Absorbing book:
Like many students of Indian history, I thought I knew it all. Imagine my surprise when I came across "The Great Hedge of India," by Roxy Moxham and discovered that the British had built a living barrier of hedges between British India and the Indian States. That this British-built Hadrian Wall of sorts, referred to as the Custom Line by the British in India, was meant to curb smuggling of the lowly common everyday household ingredient-salt! Moxham first stumbled across a reference to the Great Hedge in a lowly footnote in a book (aptly titled) "Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official." That footnote became a full-fledged obsession for Moxham who spent countless hours and days in libraries hunting for more information on this living hedge. His quest takes him to various parts of India to hunt for this living "Customs Line." This is a must read book for anyone interested in reading about Indian history.

Absorbing Read:
Like many students of Indian history, I thought I knew it all. Imagine my surprise when I came across "The Great Hedge of India," by Roxy Moxham and discovered that the British had built a living barrier of hedges between British India and the Indian States. That this British-built Hadrian Wall of sorts, referred to as the Custom Line by the British in India, was meant to curb smuggling of the lowly common everyday household ingredient-salt! Moxham first stumbled across a reference to the Great Hedge in a lowly footnote in a book (aptly titled) "Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official." That footnote became a full-fledged obsession for Moxham who spent countless hours and days in libraries hunting for more information on this living hedge. His quest takes him to various parts of India to hunt for this living "Customs Line." This is a must read book for anyone interested in reading Indian history.

A great read!:
The book starts with a sort of quirky quest -- to find out more about a "great hedge"!! in India. The investigation leads into a deeper exploration of what the British presence in India was really all about. Anybody who is interested in India will want to read this book. For more reviews, look up the hardback edition of this book. At last count, there were 13 reviews there.