{"id":1273,"date":"2026-06-03T08:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T07:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/hasspgrblog\/?p=1273"},"modified":"2026-06-01T10:54:43","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T09:54:43","slug":"india-on-the-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/hasspgrblog\/2026\/06\/03\/india-on-the-line\/","title":{"rendered":"India on the Line: Communicating in Colonial India\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dr Shibani Das reflects on the experience of curating and creating a public exhibition as part of her PhD.<\/em> <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kenneth S Sheppard, Rustamji Sorabji Madon, Faizur Rehman, Joseph H Owens <\/em><\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These\u00a0officers in the Indian telegraph department between 1931-41 have stepped out of reference books stored within the India\u00a0Office\u00a0Records\u00a0in\u00a0the British Library to occupy\u00a0temporary spots on a wall in the west wing of the Queens Building, University of Exeter. These Anglo Indian, Parsi, Indian and Domiciled European men were born\u00a0and brought up in an India balancing on the precipice between colonial extraction and political independence. They sat at the forefront of communication technology in their times. Their location?\u202f\u00a0Behind a\u00a0transmitter\u00a0in a dusty telegraph office.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Claiming a larger space<\/em><\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kenneth, Rustam, Fairuz and Joseph\u2019s stories represent the multitudes of everyday histories that dissipate into the blur of archives viewed through the colonial lens. Their honorary place on the wall here in India on the Line: Communicating in Colonial India<\/em> might be the largest amount of space they have occupied in anyone\u2019s mind for decades.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A little\u00a0more is known about officers such as Conrad Reginald Cooke, Chief Engineer of the Pakistan Telegraph Department, who published an autobiography and had the good sense of enrolling his descendant and my colleague in the University of Exeter! His life in India,\u00a0his\u00a0career,\u00a0his\u00a0friendships\u00a0and\u00a0enmities provide a never-before-assessed glimpse into the day to day lives of technicians, telegraphists, cleaning\u00a0staff\u00a0and executive staff in a government department.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their work\u00a0changed\u00a0how time,\u00a0speed\u00a0and communication itself\u00a0were\u00a0experienced in the middle of the 20th century. Discovering Cooke\u2019s\u00a0autobiography also opened new methodologies of studying technology in\u00a0empire from a\u00a0bottom-up\u00a0approach, unveiling other sources such as M.S Kalyanasundaram and Charles Coverdale. It is these men who form the heart of\u00a0India on the Line<\/em>.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An exhibition born from collaborative research<\/em><\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I curated\u00a0the exhibition\u00a0as part of my PhD,\u00a0Race, Ethnicity and Telecommunications in Britain and its Empire<\/em>. The project was funded by the BT Group Archives, as part of the Science Museums and Archives Consortium (SMAC).\u202f\u00a0The\u00a0exhibition\u00a0introduces\u00a0a new perspective to how we\u00a0understand telegraphy and its role\u00a0as an Imperial powerhouse. The\u00a012 panels\u00a0include\u00a0a video game, a multi-lingual audio guide, two analogue games, an original art installation and photographs from the Science Museum Collection. These\u00a0whisk\u00a0the reader back to the 20th century and remind\u00a0them that no matter how revolutionary the technology, it is the human stories behind it that truly make technology\u00a0life-changing.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hurdles and delays in public engagement<\/em><\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Communicating\u00a0in<\/em>\u00a0Colonial India might have been slightly easier than communicating\u00a0about<\/em>\u00a0Colonial India in the United Kingdom today. Numerous hurdles\u00a0emerged\u00a0during the curatorial process.\u00a0A cut to the exhibition budget meant\u00a0all components\u00a0had to be developed in-house without compromising the quality of output. While my sister helped finalise the design elements, my mother and a friend\u2019s father translated and recorded the multilingual\u00a0audio guide. A friend\u2019s car helped transport the exhibition between venues while refreshments for attendees consisted of a quick stop at the local Aldi. Once the exhibition and its interactives were developed,\u00a0they were confronted with a\u00a0wall of institutional colonial discomfort. There were\u00a0delays\u00a0and\u00a0a\u00a0reduction of\u00a0accessibility to\u00a0the exhibit. Numerous\u00a0failed\u00a0attempts at diplomacy\u00a0gave\u00a0way to an exhibition that looked and felt\u00a0very different\u00a0from what I had imagined.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A warm reception to discomfort<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luckily for heritage communication, what I thought had very little to do with how the debut of the exhibition in London was received! We were fully booked out after our first week and had to extend opening hours to accommodate growing interest in the exhibit from both within and without BT Group. This was a testament to the public hunger for historically accurate but human storytelling, even if it is about conventionally \u2018uncomfortable\u2019 conversations.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A year later,\u00a0India on the Line<\/em>\u00a0returned to its home in Exeter thanks to the support provided by\u00a0Arts and Culture Exeter,\u00a0the Centre for Medical Histories\u00a0and Leila Dara, a doctoral student in Ethno-political studies at the university. It was launched on the 30th of April with a panel discussion titled, \u2018Technology and Empire: Then and Now\u2019 featuring Professor William Gallois, Dr Debra\u00a0Ramsay\u00a0and Dr Cemih Salek.\u00a0I\u00a0followed\u00a0the discussion\u00a0by\u00a0leading\u00a0a curatorial walk.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

India on the Line<\/em> is a part of a contested, conflicted and emotional conversation that is worth having. One wherein we remind ourselves that our historical past is as human as our present, in which technology brings us closer, drives us apart, influences how we live, eat and speak, and how we resist power and fight to retain our freedoms. Do come and explore the exhibitions and send feedback to\u202fsd720@exeter.ac.uk<\/a>.\u202f <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The exhibition is on display at the Queen\u2019s Building on Exeter University\u2019s Streatham campus from the 27th of April to the 4th of August 2026.<\/em>\u00a0Sign up here <\/a>for curatorial walks throughout June 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>
\n

Dr Shibani Das has recently completed her AHRC CDP funded PhD project, a cultural biography of telegraphy in colonial modern India from the 1920s to 1950. Her focus ranges from the everyday history of technology to gender and decolonizing the social history of Science in India. Shibani completed her Bachelor’s and Master’s in History from Delhi University, India before continuing her work with Delhi-based museums and heritage organisations. She has extensive experience working with museums to develop programs that enhance accessibility to students, neurodivergent audiences and the public in general. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Dr Das is taking up a new role as the PM Greenbaum \u2013 EP Abraham Curator of the Scientific Revolution and Industrial Age(s) at the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr Shibani Das reflects on the experience of curating and creating a public exhibition as part of her PhD.  Kenneth S Sheppard, Rustamji Sorabji Madon, Faizur Rehman, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1509,"featured_media":1277,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"[]"},"categories":[111,121,229,11],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nIndia on the Line: Communicating in Colonial India\u00a0 - SLIPWAY<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/hasspgrblog\/2026\/06\/03\/india-on-the-line\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"India on the Line: Communicating in Colonial India\u00a0 - 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