Nikhil Subbiah, History Major, C'16.

Nikhil Subbiah was a Study Abroad student from London and majored in History. 

"My project focussed on the development of sedition law in Colonial India, 1860-1900, and I worked with Faisal Chaudhry from the South Asia Studies Department. The project centred on the development of ‘sedition’ as a concept during the Raj but also as a tool used to silence possible dissent. Sedition, in a broad sense, came to mean written words that might incite uprising, rebellion or general disapprobation within the colonial populace. The term, as well as the penal code, still lives on in modern day India. Gandhi was, in the 20th Century, famously tried for sedition.  However, my thesis argued that what the term meant and its sentencing implications had reached a point of definition by 1900 that largely went unchanged (even to this very day). I used the Tilak trials to demonstrate how (in the case of the first trial) conceptions of the law were in flux and (in the case of the second) the law had effectively crystallized.

The most rewarding part of the research project was working with the trial records. The fusion of more ‘conventional’ political history and legal history was a new experience for me, but one I thoroughly enjoyed studying nonetheless. I was most surprised with the ways in which legal administrators managed to adapt laws with English heritage to a totally alien land.

I would really recommend participating in a research project –the projects help you to hone your critical thinking and interpreting data skills. I intend to pursue a career in law in the UK, so a legal oriented thesis was obviously to my benefit and will help with my future plans. Moreover, the critical thinking and data interpreting skills will be useful in my chosen career.

My advise to students is to get involved in research --get stuck in once you find a topic that you like, or a tutor that you think will suit you. I would also encourage students to think actively about where they will get the data for their research projects --as this may pose some limitations."