3 - Citizens and the City

Summary

Focussing in particular on urban centres in present-day Sindh and UP, Chapter 3 explores key dynamics involved in the development of citizenship that connected with this control of ‘public goods’, including food and civil supply, in relation to both the politics of prices and price controls and debates about food and civil supply administration. It highlights the extent to which supply and control of goods became an important means through which ideas about citizens’ relationship to the state were articulated and played out. Its second section then considers popular discourses surrounding government corruption which emerged from the mechanisms involved in the supply of goods. This examination of popular views of corruption extends into a discussion of how particular scandals developed in the press, and their broader meaning for ideas about citizenship rights, concluding with consideration of cross-border smuggling as an ‘anti-national’ problem in the early 1950s.