The role of the British colonial state in exploiting India's resources and its impact on the environment is the topic of this dissertation. More specifically, I show that the colonial state in India by the 1840s played an important role in promoting resource extracting infrastructural projects such as the railways and that the latter led to deforestation.; There were two major mechanisms by which the railways caused deforestation. The railways needed wooden sleepers for their lines and firewood for their operation which were primarily obtained from India's forests. I analyze these mechanisms both at the all-India level and at the provincial level in the Punjab for the period 1853–1884, by examining a variety of historical documents. These include colonial records, correspondence, contemporary journals, newspapers and books.; The deforestation led to timber scarcity for the railways in the early 1860s both at the all-India level and in the Punjab. This crisis threatened the continuous and cheap supply of timber for the railways. I analyze the role played by the state in addressing the timber crisis. In particular, I look at forest conservation measures taken by the state. I show that these measures were exploitative, i.e. they, through maintaining timber supplies for railways and other resource extraction projects, aided the efficient extraction of resources, rather than ecological . Consistent with this claim is the evidence I provide that the state implemented forest conservation only when a timber scarcity threatened to stop railway construction/expansion and operation. Also, when its conservation measures failed, the state obtained sleepers and firewood from outside British India in order to ensure the continuous operation of the railways.; There is an additional aspect of the timber crisis and the state's role in addressing it. For the state to implement forest conservation and other measures, deforestation had to be observed, measured and analyzed by scientists. I examine the extent to which and how one such scientist, Dr. Hugh Cleghorn was able to influence forest conservation policies.
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