The Indian Medical Gazette and the Imperial Mission in Mid-Nineteenth-century Colonial India

Colonial medical journals have often been sources for reconstructing the history of medicine, particularly regarding public health and sanitation. However, their specific role in enhancing the imperial mission is less clear. This article on The Indian Medical Gazette explores how the imperial narrative permeated its contents and enhanced its role in furthering the imperial mission of the British in India. This journal was one of the most influential in mid-nineteenth-century colonial India, with editors and contributors mostly drawn from the Indian Medical Service, the most powerful body of doctors at the time of imperial consolidation. The Imperial mission, implicitly and explicitly, permeated the journal. While there was professional debate on aspects of medical science, the support for the imperial goals was never questioned and indeed highlighted. The journal went to great lengths to justify the key role of the ‘medical man’ in building and consolidating the Empire. This article shows how a general medical journal, primarily a vehicle for propagating the latest research and views on professional knowledge and practice, could internalize and propagate the imperial mission in colonial times. Primary professional journal sources convey an immediacy in their narratives, which is useful for capturing the spirit of the times.