Talk:Francis Light

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I moved this text here to be cleaned up, a bit of original research, wrong tone, I appreciate the contribution, but please don't sign your articles, and when it's cleaned up it should be inserted back in. Further much of it is a duplicate from History of Modern Penang - rectify this please. -- Natalinasmpf 22:06, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

" All great men have a history behind. So do some places. Capt. Francis Light, founder of modern Penang was verily a great man. Also great was Pulau Pinang, an Island lying off the Northwest coast of peninsular Malaya strategically located in the Northern part of the Strait of Malacca. The place made news in the mercantile world when Light, Captain in the English East India Company’s Marine, hoisted the Union Jack on the 11th of August, 1786 on the Island’s soil, which was later christened as George Town in honour of the British king, King George III, and later the island itself had come to be known as the Prince of Wales Island of which Light was made the superintendent. Greatness was neither thrust upon him nor was he made great it so happened that had was born to achieve success where other trusted British naval officers failed to secure a suitable trading-cum-military outpost east of Bay of Bengal on the India-China trade route where their ships could harbour for protection against the violent northeast monsoon, refit and refill. It was no mean success indeed for it gave the British a foothold in the Malay Archipelago to partake in the much sought-after oriental trade initially and to take over a major chunk of the prime territories in the region through colonization as the later history Would reveal.

Those were the days when the European East India companies were vying with each other for having a supremacy over spice trade for it was the lure of spices like pepper, cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, nutmeg and mace that brought them all to Southeast Asia as they all needed these spices to preserve meat during the long winer months (in the absence of refrigeration) as also to cater to their culinary tastes and for their medicinal values. Chinese tea, silk and porelain were also in demand in Europe and Britain wanted to use their lately acquired settlement of Penang as a springboard to export Malaya’s tin, gold dust, gambier, seeweed, rattan, ebony, sandalwood, tortoise shell, sharks, fin, edible birds, nests and Bengal’s (Indian) opium to China in exchange for tea, silk etc., as it was presumed that tea sale profits accruing in Europe by themselves would well cover the costs of administering the affairs of the English trading company.

China was not evincing any interest in barter of any British merchandise not to speak of Indian piece goods or the spices of the Molaccas. However, China was showing interest in bullion.

Viewed against the above background, the mission undertaken by Francis Light gains much significance. Light was a visionary even as far back as in April 1771, a year before Warran Hastings took over as the first Governor-General of India, when Light was 31 years of age and was serving as the captain of a ship owned by a Madras (India) based British firm of Jourdain, Sulivan and de Souza engaged in the local commerce of the eastern seas, Light was sent to Kedah by the said firm as its agent as the firm was interested in opening up trade. At that time the Sultanate of Kedah was a vassal state of Siam which was facing problems from the Burmese. Kedah itself was in trouble from the menace of Bugis (migrants from the Celebes in East Indies under the influence of the Netherlanders) and the enemic Burmese. Light could establish a good rapport with Sultan Muhammad Jiwa Shah of Kedah resulting in his becoming very friendly with the powers that be in the Sultanate. According to one version, Light had reportedly married the daughter of the Sultan thereby becoming even closer to the Sultanate. The Sultan sought British protection from his enemies and in return he was prepared to give the British a fortified station at the mouth of the Kedah river. Francis Light conveyed the Sultan’s offer to the British authorities who chose to have it investigated ignoring Light. Disappointed at the British moves, Light made Phuket (then known as Junk Ceylon) in Thailand his home for 14 years from 1772 where he carried on sea trade in partnership with James Scott, an old shipmate of his. Light learnt to speak Siamese and Malay fluently. Though living about 200 miles away, in the north, from Penang, Francis Light was constantly in touch with the Sultanate of Kedah during his trading expeditions.

Sultan Jiwa Shah passed away in 1773 and was succeeded by Abdullah Mahrum Shah with whom Light was constantly in touch and they were friendly to each other.

By a turn of events such as the imminence of Kedah’s involvement in a Burmo-Siamese was and the reported designs of the Sultan to free Kedah from Siam, Abdullah Mahrum Shah having abundant confidence in Light appointed him as his representative to negotiate with the English East India Company to provide military protection and monetary annual compensation for loss of trade to Kedah sultanate and in return take over the island of Penang. Light went to Calcutta and laid the proposal before the Acting governor-General of India John Macpherson who in turn obtained the consent of the directors of the company to take over the island. However, there was no specific assurance fro the company for provision of military assistance to Kedah. Nor was the proposal for paying monetary compensation to Kedah cleared. However, believing Light’s words that the Sultan’s proposal was under consideration of the company and the offer made by Light to pay the Sultan half the profits on the purchase and sale of tin, opium and rattan at the port of Penang in the meantime after the British take-over of the island, pending receipt of a firm reply from the company to the proposals of the sultan for British protection and payment of annual compensation to Kedah, Sultan Mahrum Shah allowed Light to occupy Penang island temporarily on the 11th of August, 1786.

Yet another turn of event-unfortunate thought it was-was that the company officially informed Light that it would not give military assistance to Kedah as sought by the Sultan earlier. The company only undertook to keep an armed vessal to guard Penang and the adjacent coast belonging to Kedah and there was no sum fixed for compensation of loss of trade. In June 1788 Light informed Sultan Mahrum Shah that the company refused his request for provision of military assistance angered and frustrated, the Sultan asked the British to vacate Penang island but to no avail. In a bid to capture the island by force, the Sultan prepared for a was with the British and fortified the forts at Prai with the help of Lanun (Malay) pirates numbering eight to ten thousand. However, British troops landed at Prai and routed the Malays besides burning the forts they had been constructing. The British gunboats attacked the Lanun ships and drove them away with quite some loss. Resultantly, the Sultan was left with no choice than to sign a treaty on the 1st of May, 1791 known as ‘The Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Alliance’ that allowed the British to legally occupy the island of Penang on payment of an annual rent of 6,000 Spanish dollars. Thus had passed into the hands of the colonizer (The British) the ‘Pearl Island’ of Penang for ever on that eventful day of the 1st of May, 1791. Turning hostile to the British, Sultan Mahrum Shah longed to develop Kuala Prai into a rival port to Penang but could not succeed as he passed away in 1798 ‘with an unfulfilled with’ Francis Light, who passed away 4 years earlier, did not show any animocity towards the Sultan-instead, he devoted all his attention to developing Penang as a worthy British naval base and a trading centre by bringing to bear on his work as the superintendent of the British settlement his vast and varied experience in maritime trade which he painfully gained by carrying on trading activities from Phuket for long years in association with his longtime friend James Scott. It was even believed that while working as the administrator of the Penang island, Light never ceased his personal trading activities a fact that goes to prove that above anything else, Capt. Francis Light was first a trader and then only anything else that he really was. Light ruled Penang for 8 years from 1786 to 1794. His government was just and he was popular with all races. His was a successful government. He declared Penang a free port facilitating unfettered flow of people and goods into and out of the island. The British company was paying Light low salary and was expecting Penang to cover it’s own costs which was for sure unreasonable notably in the initial years of it’s founding. Reason for Light carrying on his own maritime trade as the island’s superintendent was probably to defray the costs of his own maintenance. From the time Penang was founded till about a year before Light’s death, the General of India at Calcutta was Lord Cornwallis. In the last year of Light’s rule of Penang Sir John Jhore was the Governor-General to whom Light sent an account of the island’s inhabitants in his dispatch prior to his death in 1794 which will be discussed later in this note. Light was known to be most persevering. As an administrator he was, for sure, most capable. Some of his acts like giving free grants of lands, attracting overseas Chinese, Indians, Sumatrans and some Burmese to carry on cultivation and small trade, encouraging traders of all races to carry on their import-export activities in a secure, free and fair climate, developing a town after getting the jungles cleared in a short span of 4 years as being suitable for a cosmopolitan mix of people to inhabit the place and giving Penang a good start on the road to prosperity are all marks he left behind which will for ever go down in the annals of the island in golden letters. However, the single most memorable and pioneering contribution he made was inducing some European and a handful of Chinese enterprising traders to take to plantation of cash crops like sugar-cane, the export of whose produce to the Continent was to bring them windfall profits and causing migration of dependable and hard-working labourers from outside of peninsular Malaya to man such plantations. More of this aspect is highlighted elsewhere in this note as Light is being presented as the precursor of transforming native subsistence economy into export economy through emulation of which concept, precept and practice in other British colonies like Fizi, Trinidad and Tobago, Mauritius, South Africa etc., the British could a mass wealth as it evident from history.

When Mahrum Shah passed away in 1798, he was succeeded by Diauddin Mukarram Shah as the Sultan of Kedah. That was the year when Lord Wellesley took over as the Governor-General of India and the superintendent of Penang then was Major Macdonald, who was succeeded the next year by Sir George Leith whom the British designated as Lieutenant-Governor Sir George negotiated with Sultan Mukarram Shah for the British taking over the territory lying on the west coast of Kedah opposite Penang island and could successfully strike a deal by singning a treaty in the year 1800 when Kedah ceded the territory to the British by accepting an annual payment of 4,000 Spanish dollars additionally from the British. This territory was named as Province Wellesly in honour of the then British governor-General in India. The territory had a rich fertile soil where much cultivation could be carried on including plantation of commercial crops that would help Penang to export the produce abroad for profit. Further, acquisition of the territory by the British greatly helped in strengthening the security of the island of Penang as also its ships from being attacked by sea pirates, who for long in the past were notorious in the area. The overland new territory made Penang more secure from possible invation by outsiders via land route. Thus the rapport established by Capt. Light, who spent a major part of his adult life in the region including India, with the Sultanate of Kedah way back in 1771 seems to have paid off in more than one way, namely it not only helped the British to have their first naval base between Bombay and Canton but, with the turn of events in due course, it also helped the British to annex from very same sultanate later a valuable aroble land which together with other cultivable lands decades later in Perak, Negri Sembilan, Selangor and Johor gave the nation its potential wealth through the cultivation of cash crops like sugar-cane, oil-palm and coffee apart from, of course, the most money spinning rubber.

History has it that in about a year after it’s founding, Penang was flourishing as an entrepot port for Southeast Asia with the flow of goods to it from Britain and the nations enroute in South Asia and Southeast Asia, from the East Indies, China and various parts of the Malay peninsula through the free trade system established by Light.

Availing the gree grants of land offered by Light a huge number of Chinese came from fujian province and settled there as traders, merchants, farmers, shopkeepers, tin miners and artisans. The present to –day in Penang of 2 of world’s largest tin smelters speaks volumes about the great strides of progress made by the Chinese in tin mining right from the early days of the founding of Penang. Some Chinese got engaged in the production of sugar-cane along with some enterprising British capitalists. Several Chinese got engaged in production of gambier, pepper, vegetables and fruit. A major portion of these Chinese migrants chose to stay back and settle down in the island £ or good instead of returning home in south China pro-bably because of some insecurity in the face of civil disturbances frequently obtaining there. May be that’s the most valid reason for Chinese outnumbering native Malaya or other races in Penang. While initially export of pepper was found to be very encouraging, in due course sugar-cane production became more popular and it became more prominent in Province Wellesley from where it had spread to Perak, the so-called ‘Tin state’ .Thus pepper, tin and sugar seemed to have contributed to Malaya’s initial wealth which helped in transforming the very architecture of the land through the clearing of jungles, reclamation of land, laying of roads and much later railway lines) linking the plantations and mines to newly-developing urban centres Part of the initial wealth was being used for the crea-tion of better civic amenities, medical facilities, under— taking of public works, starting of schools etc.

Interestingly enough, even before all the above deve-lopment was taking place in Penang and elsewhere in Ma-laya,11 years after the death of Light, based on impressions given by Lord Wellesley about all—round progress Penang was able to achieve as a naval base, as a trading centre, as a multi-racial society and so on, Penang was made by the British as a Presidency the fourth one in India after Bombay, Madras and Bengal )in the year 1805 when Philip Dundas was posted as Penang’s Governor. Also posted there were 3 Councillors and a host of bureaucrats. Thomas Stam-ford Bingle Raffles took over, by transfer on promotion, as the Assistant secretary to the Government of Penang at the end of that year. A couple of years later he was pro-moted as Secretary to the Government of Penang and continued there as such until the Dutch stronghold in Java, Batavia, was taken over by the British on 11th of September, 1811 when the Governor—General of India Lord Minto himself along with Raffles and others led the expedition at a time when the Nepoleonic wars were going on and Raffles was posted as the Lt.Governor of Java and Sumatra with Batavia as headquarters—the British having temporarily occupied all the territories of the Netherlanders in the East pending the end of wars between the French and the watch. Around this time, Penang was well on its way for decline as it lost free port status years earlier with the impo-sition of import and export duties for want of revenue after the closure of opium, tobacco, pork and other revenue farms and with traders taking their cargo ships to the East Indies via sunda straits skipping Penang to avoid payment of duties resulting in Batavia becoming prominent trading centre.

During the period of 5 years he stayed in Java, Raffles tried his best to develop British. trading activities and also his rule earned the reputation of being a ‘reform and humanitarian” government. However, When the East Indies were restored to Netherlands by Britain in 1816,aaffles left for England where he was knighted for good work done but his employers, The directors of the English East India Company, could not take kindly to him where it seemed to them that profit to the company was lost because of the humanitarian policy adopted by Raffles in Java who was known to have hated the Dutch to the detriment of the company’s interests. The Governor-general of India ,Lord Francis Rowden Hastings also shared the views of the company’s Directors. Resultantly, Raffles was posted to the least important British settlement of Fort Marlborough at Bencoolen in the western coast of Sumatra in 1817 as Lt. Governor. As it was far away from the trade routes, it was mainly functioning as a penal colony since it could not successfully produce pepper as planned and it became a loss to the .English East India company Raffles tried to improve the settlement by freeing slaves and abolished gambling. However, there was precious little that Raffles could do either to have pepper produced for export or carry on any trading activities there. however, with his sound knowledge of the Malayo-Indonesian region, Raffles was very keen to establish a British trading-cum-military outpost in India-China trade route and prominent on his mind was the strategically located but virtually disbanded island of Singapore that had a natural harbour which was under the ownership of the Sultanate of Johor that had Dutch influence over it at the time but the Dutch had shown no interest in taking over Singapore. Coincidentally around this time Raffles received a call from Governor— General Francis Roudon-Hastings to meet him in Calcutta. Raffles left for Calcutta in October 1818 and met Lord Hastings and put his ideas across to him for locating a naval base at a strategic port in the Malay region. Lord Hastings was convinced of the need and initially gave his nod and Raffles reached Penang late in December and despite non-cooperation of Governor Bannerman of Penang, he made necessary arrangements to sail in search of a suitable post. Boarding ‘Indiana’ with enough arms and ammunition, enough Indian sepoys and picking up Col. Farquhar, who had lately relinquished charge as resident of Malacca after Briton handed it back to Netherlands, Raffles directly reached the shores of Singapore on the 29th of January9 1819 little knowing that Lord Hastings had changed his mind about location of the naval base after Raffles left him. After negotiating with Temenggong Abdul Rahman (head of the Singapore islaad1native chief / Police head) and after installing Tengku Long as the Sultan of Johore and persuading him to allow the British to occupy the Singapore island on payment of 5000 dollars to the Sultan and 3000 dollars to the Temenggong annually as compensation ,Sir Stamford Raffles took over the island and raised the union Jack on its soil on the 6th of Feb-ruary,1819.Singapore became a full—fledged British settle-ment in 1824 when Singapore’s second resident William Crawfurd purchased it outright from the Johore Sultanate following the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of the same year. Raffles steps to make Singapore a trading entrepot par exce-llence which had to diversion of Penang’s trade to port of Singapore resulting in total decline of Penang as a British trading centre. Merging the capital of erstwhile Islamic empire, Malacca, with the British developed towns of Penang and Singapore into one administrative unit, the colony of Straits settlements was formed in 1826 with its British. Governor stationed at Penang and Malacca and Sin-gapore having a British resident each. The Government of the Straits Settlements was responsible to the Governor-General in India at Calcutta.

However, with rise of Singapore, in a short span, as a significant trading centre in the Malay region, the headquarters of the Governor of the straits settlements was moved from Penang to Singapore in 1932 and from then on the island-city has had a British governor for a record 127 years upto 1959 when Singapore became self-independent with a democratically elected Prime Minister (London educated Barrister Lee Kuan Yew of the peoples’ Action Party) when the British Governor was replaced at long last by a native Malay Enche Yus of Bin Ishak who was made Singapore’s first-ever Yang di-Pertuan and , Malacca and Penang became part of the newly-formed Malayan Union in 1946 along with the 9 Malay states, headed by a Governor (a British man) the executive and legislative councils in the states would assist the Governor. The Malayan Union was replaced by the Federation of Malaya in February, 1948 with the same 9 Malay states and Malacca and Penang as the constituents with a British High Commissioner heading the Federation, who would be assisted by an Executive Council and a Legislative Council. With growing nationalism and a bloodless battle against the British rule, Malaya obtained its independence on the 31st of August, 1957. The British educated aristocrat and a Lawyer, Tengku Abdul Rahman was democratically elected as the first Prime Minister of Malaya while the head of the state was to be the yang di-Pertuan Agong who would be elected by and from the 8 Sultans ( of the 9 states of Malaya) for a 5-year term. However, Malacca and Penang continued to have British Governors. The Parliament of Malaya had a Lower House and an Upper House. Malaysia came into being on the 16th of Septermber, 1963 when Penang had its own State Assembly and a democratically elected Chief Minister – the Sultan headed the state. So much for now and here about the historical background of Pulau Pinang and the nation it formed part of . This note purports to focus attention on the work of its founder in modern times and the seeds laid by him for making a contribution not only for the benefit of Malay soil but for the benefit of other British colonies in their initial stages of growth which eventually brought in later years contributed to potential wealth of Malaya and other colonies.

In a dispatch to the Governor-General in India in 1794* before his death, talking about the settlers in Penang, Francis Light said that the Chinese constituted the most valuable and largest group acting as traders, carpenters, masons, smiths, shopkeepers and planters. He spoke about Chulias (people from several ports on the Coromandel Coast of India) as having been engaged in shopkeeping and as coolies, several of them having moved to Penang from neighbouring Kedah. He also mentioned that vessals from the coromandel coast were bringing to Penang every year 1500 to 2000 men who by traffic and various kinds of labour were obtaining a few dollars with which they were returning home and were being succeeded by others. Both the Chinese and the Indians were living with women and children, he added. He referred to a small section of Siamese and Burmese, who, he said, were employed in cultivation in the island. He further stated that the Island had a few families of Arab Muslims engaged in trade with other countries. He also noted that a large number of Buginese used to frequent the island on boats laden with produce of Eastern Islands which had a great value. His view about the native Malays was that they were content with paddy (rice), fruit and sugar-cane cultivation and that some Malays were known to be sea pirates. Apart from all these people, among the locals there were European settlers engaged in shipping and trading. The above dispatch does throw some light on the kind of life Light visulised in the settlement and the vision of Light as regards putting people to gainful employment in land tilling vis-à-vis economy in its more broader sense. Hence the need now and here for piecing things together with a view to reconstructing the real picture of this British settlement as obtaining during Light’s rule and also the fruits that came up much later in Malaya and elsewhere in British colonies with seeds sown by Light like those millions of rubber trees that bloomed from out of a few seedlings received from Brazil in Perak via Calcutta and Singapore which were sown at the instance of the far-sighted Hugh Low (the British resident) in late 1870s and early 1880. As the popular adage goes, a thing well begun is hald done. So also the twists and turns Capt. Light gave to Penang’s agrarian economy had eventually given birth to money economy and subsequently to market economy from which the British colonial administration took the cue and introduced the cultivation of the cash crop of sugar-cane along with other commercial crops in its possessions in Fiji, West-Indies, South Africa, Mauritius and so on following the same pattern that was originally devised by visionary Light i.e. inducing a section of European traders to take to plantation work by utilizing cheap labour much of which came through the Indian emigrants. In due course these plantations brought profits to the European investors in two ways, namely (1) making profits through arranging production of cash crops in plantations using cheap labour and (2) through the export of such produce usually produced in consonance with demand from abroad-to the countries in ned of it. According to historical sources, initially it was sugar that contributed to Malay’s potential wealth during the first half of the nineteenth century through its export to Europe along with, of course, tin while rubber boom from around the end of the nineteenth century till about the middle of the twentieth century save during the slow-down WW11 period brought windfall riches to Malays. Nonetheless, the fact remains that Francis Light of Penang was doubtless the precursor of sugar plantation movement which through its spread to Province Wellesley and Perak could create enough wealth for the creation of public amenities, laying of roads and communications network, springing of many an urban centre and starting of educational, medical and other peoples’ welfare measures the first school ever to come up in entire Malay peninsula took its birth in Penang. So did many modern businesses take roots in Penang from where several entrepreneurs moved to the upcoming urban centre like Sinapore, Kuala Lumpur and Johor Baru etc. Penang, owing to a variety of reasons including rise of Singapore, might have declined in importance with the passage of time. But the British developed islands’ contribution in spearheading the movement of building up a network of sugar-producing plantations in 3 states which helped the whole peninsula to find alternate sources of creating wealth apart from re-exports cannot be brushed aside as either a passing one or as being not so voluminous as to be taken into account while tracing stage-by stage progress of Malay’s potential wealth in modern period. Not should the man who laid the seeds for production of this ‘hot’ commodity i.e. sugar, Capt. Francis Light, be looked upon as just an official of the British trading company on a routine posting in Penang, who did precious little to develop trade at the port and passed away peacefully after a 8-year routine rule of the island. He was certainly much more than all the as is elucidated later in this note and the statue of Francis Light that stands tall in George Town to-day should in the years to come be a constant reminder to people of a man who gave much wealth to some of the sugar-rich countries of to-day that were once British colonies by laying the seeds for such production in the British settlement he was heading. The statue should also remind people of a man who attracted a large number of overseas Chinese to the island by giving free grants of land and encouraged not only the production and spread of tin to neighbouring states but also ensured its export bringing much wealth. Yet another reminder people can take from the statue is of a man who attracted thousands and thousands of Indian coolies to man the plantations a concept accepted by the British colonial administration as being most practical and helpful in developing cash crop cultivations particularly of sugar-cane in other British settlements settlements such as Singapore, West Indies, Mauritius, Fiji, South Africa etc., starting from early nineteenth century onwards where to-day the progeny of those Indian coolies of yesteryears are leading decent lives as Indian diasporic communities, some of whom having held such high political posts as Head of State, Prime Minister, Minister besides plum civilian posts and high ranks in defence forces and prestigious positions in various professions, as diplomats/bureaucrats.

It may be worthwhile recalling here that the economy of Pulau Pinang are Light took it over was subsistence economy in the sense that the natives engaged themselves in the cultivation of paddy or vegetables or in fishing activities which kept them going by and in those days people were taking recourse to barter system for the exchange of goods and services like for instance ryots used to give paddy or vegetables to professionals like barbers, washermen, weavers and other artisands / other classes of people for services rendered when monetary system was not in vogue. As such the economy was barely involved with cash income. In a way it was a life of pre-capitalistic stage of economy which means hitherto people were not coming in contact with economy of the external world. As a more civilized Britisher possessing rich and varied experience in external trade having carried for several years shiploads of rice and other commercially valuable produce of the Malay states to ports of India and elsewhere, Light targeted export economy for the lately acquired British Penang as the rightful means to provide better life there, because export economy alone had the wherewithal to exploit nature and manpower for profit. He knew pretty well that it was only through the creation of wealth that the settlement could thrive self-sufficiently since the company he was representating was unwilling to provide budget needed for administrative costs and maintenance costs of the island. He had already declared the place a ‘Free’ port. He introduced market economy which attracted foreign/trans-continental traders and merchants like the European capitalists, Arab Moorees, Indian Muslims and Chulias, traders of Burma, Cochin-China and East Indies, Chinese merchants and so on. Francis Light for one felt that wealth could be created not by continuing production of non-commercial crops but by raising cash crops taking advantage of the vast expances of the hinterland and the favourable climatic conditions for their production export of which to far-off lands across the high seas where there existed demand for them would fetch monies needed therough entrepot trading. And, when Light started translating his ideas into action, soon there started arriving vessals bringing bullion and other British goods from Europe, cotton piece goods, indigo and opium from India, rice, pepper and other spices and eatables from the East Indies and silk, tea and porcelain from China and so on. From other ports in the Malay peninsula were being brought whatever items that could be barted at George Town port. However, Light noticed that the re-export activities were bringing only part of the income needed including income accruing from auction of ‘Farms’ (like opium, tobacco, pork etc.) fro the island’s maintenance. So naturally Light’s preoccupation was mainly to toy with his ideas relating to transformation of subsistence economy to export economy.

As such, with every passing day, Light’s concern was to develop cultivation for financial gain, which meant his moving over to an economy of money, exploitation of nature, export of merchandise and making profits. His cordial relations with the Sultanate of Kedah and the neighboring Malay states could be encashed for good by introducing ‘plantation’ culture in the island which, when found to be fetching profits through export of cash crop produce was likely to be emulated by the neighboring sultanates, thought Light. Tin was found to be one ready medium of exchange initially before plantation culture came into being. Hence its mining was encouraged much resulting in fresh arrivals of large number of Chinese with women and children who settled down in Penang, Kedah, Perak and Sungei Ujong. Next he thought of developing cash crops like pepper and sugar-cane. While some emigrants from the South Chinese provinces of Kwangtung and Fukien did take to sugar-cane and pepper cultivation, the native Malays had shown no interest. However, some Indians who moved to Penang from Kedah and Perlis besides few European capitalists came forward to undertake plantation work. But ultimately it was the Britishers-themselves traders who diversified their activity who started off in a big way and dominated the scene by establishing commercial plantations taking advantage of the offer of free grants of land made by Sir Light. What they needed most was cheap and reliable labour to man their sugar plantations mostly. The native Malays were not coming forward to work for wages. Chinese were showing more interest in tin mining. Under the circumstances, it was Francis Light the thoughtful man who came to their rescue. He had set his sighs on the south Indians as the most suitable workforce to help the British planters. According to Sandhu the period of modern Indian immigration into Malaya dates back from the foundation of Penang in 1786.

Thus began the saga of migration of South Indian ill-to-do manual labourers to the Malay sugar-cane plantations. They comprised the ‘Adi Dravidas’ vastly. These are lowly-born, down-trodden people inhabiting the hinterlands of the Tamil country and Andhra Desa who, encountering conditions of poverty for want of work round the year for their sustenance, took the call from Malayan planters as a blessing in disguise and were making a beeline at 2 or 3 ports on the Coromandel post to be whisked away to Penang in Indian vessals known as ‘Kappalu’ in the initial stages from where the planters’ representatives used to pick them up and take them to their respective plantations located not only in the ‘Pearl of the Orient’ island but also to the neighboring Province Wellesley and Perak to Penang and Province Wellesley came Indians to work in the harbour and in sugar, pepper and gambier plantations confirms Arasaratnam. These workers, who had experience in agricultural operations in India in general, were getting used to plantation work in Malaya fast. And, as they used to travel alone to Malaya leaving their families behing in India, they were able to devout their whole time tending cash crop of sugar putting in long hours of work thereby fetching increased output and more profits to the investors. They had come to be known as “married bachelor’s’ in the Malayan circles. Their loyalty and hard work won favour not only from the palnters but also from the exporter of this precious commodity of sugar. they were being provided with living quarters by the planters. Some enterprising Indians could set up shop close to plantations serving ethnic foods. The pattern obtaining was that the Europeans were the directors of production while the emigrants were mostly coolies and some petty traders-cum-shopkeepers. Some native Malays were found selling ‘Satay’ that became a delicacy for the settlers. These settlers were also introduced to and enjoying some traditional Chinese dishes that consisted of rice plus some sea foods. It was indeed a treat for the settlers in an alien land and that too at in pensive costs. That way the Indian coolies found time fleeting like a song and they were giving their best earning in return enough money to live by and also save substantially for taking back home at the end of their tenure of 2 or 3 years of stay in Malaya. Unlike the Chinese emigrants, these Indians never preferred to stay back on the Malayan soil-they were always content with the savings and preferred to join their families back in India. Their savings in plantations amounted to such huge sums of Indian money when converted that they felt it would take a lifetime of work to earn so much in Indian conditions of labour. Among the Indian migrants in those days was a class of people hailing from the Kaveri delta areas (mostly from the Ramnad district of Madras province in south India) known as ‘Nattukottai Chettiars’ who were by occupation traditional money-lenders. Their presence in Penang and elsewhere where plantations sprang up came in handy for the plantation owners (mostly Europeans) and Chinese tin miners and merchants as these Chettiars were advancing required working capital in the absence of any banks worth the name in those days. They were also financing some needy traders of all races. A feature worth our attention here about the south indian labour recruitment, migration in those early days of sugarcane cultivation was that while the Tamils were coming alone to work in Malaya leaving their wives and children back in south . India, the Telugu speaking people of the northern Coromandel Coast were coming to Penang as ‘Family units’. As these Thelugus were living in the plantations along with their wives and children, several of them preferred to stay back in Malaya instead of re-turning to India after their ‘labour contracts’ ended. They used to move to other plantations and take up work afresh. That’s perhaps the main reason why Perak even to this day boasts of hating a large section of Thelugus among its citizens and Telok Anson is their nerve centre. Though they bear the looks of Tamils outwardly, they stick to their own centuries old cultural and social practices. Later history of Malaya shows us as to how out of over 15,00,000 south indians who migrated to and worked in Malayan plantations, more than three-fourths had gone back to south India and they were almost Tamil while some of them perished on the Malayan soil for a number of reasons that include mal—nourishment, sickness, hard toil and the like. A major chunk of indian Malaysians of to-day are native-born through reproduction. Francis Light was a magnanimous person with a much broader outlook towards people of all races who can be compared to Emperor Akbar of India in many respects in-cluding his marrying a Non-muslim Hindu Rajput princess openly exhibiting his love for secularism. So also Light allowed all the freedom asked for by people of various faiths to have the. edifices of their places of worship raised resulting in virtually every plantation of sig-nificance in the island and elsewhere in western Malaya having a make-shift Hindu temple that almost acted as a sanctuary for the migrant labourers to derive spiritual support to live and work in a foreign land besides serving as a place for them to congregate and carry on religious, cultural and social practices .In later decades regular Hindu and Chinese temples came up in all important urban conglomerations of western Malaya. The credit of having allowed such religious freedom in an otherwise Islamic country should rightly go to Capt. Light-though he wasn’t there to see resultant growth. The founder of modern Penang was, above any thing else, most humanitarian in his outlook. This fact is amply borne out by the fact that after having got the jungles cleared and a new town built in about 4 years, he made provision for the living quarters of every race thereby creating a sense of ethnic security among the settlers and freshly arriving migrants are allowed tax-free import of ethnic foods and goods needed by the Chinese , Indians, Buginese, Bowanese, Burmese, Sumatrans and the Europeans. While discouraging anti—social activities like gambling and formation of secret societies, he encouraged social mingling and access of cheap foods to all people as being supplied by hawkers and peddlers. Services of the Chinese in this respect as also in importing and distributing various house—hold provisions and services are indeed laudable. It is also believed that sir light was the first pe-rson anywhere in the world in those days to think of pu-tting convicts to gainful employment. It is possible that among those who cleared the jungles and raised the town after Light took over the island there might have been some indian convicts who might have contributed their mite as manual labourers because Malaya are not known histo-rically to have undertaken such works either in Penang or in Singapore or elsewhere in Malaya.

An admirable aspect of Light’s personality was his establishing rapport with native-born people of the island despite their resistance to give up traditional farming and fishing activities and their unwillingness to catch up with the trends of development envisaged for trans-forming economy. The natives even parted with their lands with an open heart for being converted as plantation sites.

All said and done, Light’s prime contributions lay in introducing export economy by developing plantations and in helping traders to export commercial products for profit through free trade. It was, of course, the Europeans who controlled most of the profit money no European was a farm hand/labourer or a retail seller thus was set the trend of colonial profit economy at the heart of which was production for export-production of sugarcane by the Europeans and production of tin by the Chinese. Light found certain advantages in their production like fertility of the islan’s soil, little seasonal change unlike in the west and elsewhere in the other continents, a wide range of crop possibilities, cheapness of labour supply and wealth of mineral(tin)deposits in the subsoil. And, what is more, the rainfall was good all through while the climate was warm enough for cash crop cultivations. Viewed against this background Light could be thought of as the PRECURSO& OF CASH CROP CULTIVATION IN MALAYA WHOSE EXAMPLE WAS LATER FOLLCMED BY THE BRITISH. IN SOME OF THEIR OTHER COLONIES. It was through the way shown by Light that in later decades there came up in Malaya tapioca, coconut, oil—palm, tea, coffee plantations and rubber estates and through export of which products, including sugar, Malaya could become economically prosperous and strong long, long after Francis Light had quit planet earth-LEAVING A MARK BEHIND, OF COURSZ. Light was verily a visionary. He could foresee demand from Europe and just developing north America for supply of raw materials and also products like Tin, sugar and the produce of Malay Archipelago to cater to the requirements of the lately begun first industrial evolution in England and elsewhere in Europe to develop their mechanised industries. That’s why he dreamt so much about plantation cultivation, tin mining and export economy. Though his rule was short lived for 8 years only, his successors in British administration could well understand his dream and they all they all endeavoured to transform his dream into a reality—they included a galaxy of committed Britishers, more prominent among them being Sir George Leith who acquired Province Wellesley for the British, Sir Thomas Stamford Bingle Raffles who founded modern Singapore and developed the port as the ‘Emporium of the jsast’ , ‘Rubber aidley’ who was the Superintendent of the Botanical Garden in Singapore and who first introduced rubber production in that island, Sir Hugh Low who when he was Resident of Perak was instrumental in spreading rubber production in various Malay states where indians after decline of demand for sugar moved over as tappers or estate labourers .All this boils down to one conclusion: LIGHT MIGHT NOT HAVE LIVED TO SEE HIS DREAM COME TRUE RESULTING IN FALL OF PENANG AND RISE OF SINGAPORE. BUT WE SHOULD NOT LOSE SIGHT OF THE FACT THAT IT WAS BY FOLLOWING LIGHT’S PHILOSOPHY THAT RAFFLES COULD MAKE SINGAPORE AND ENTREPOT TRADE CENTRE PAR EXCELLENCE, THAT WEALTH OUT OF SUGAR AND COFFEE CAME TO MALAYA THROUGH SEEDS SOWN BY LIGHT AND THAT HUGH LOW’S INSPIRATION TO DEVELOP RUBBER INDUSTRY CAME FROM THE SPIRIT OF SIR FRANCIS LIGHT. So Light’s was no mean an ac-hievement. He laid the columns on which the edifice of Malaya’s potential wealth was built in stages many, many decades later. It may be noted here and in this context that a significant contribution came from the Chinese section of the local populace in Penang in that they not only turned to capital formation through their specialised skills the mining of tin from the bounty of mother earth-an industry in which the only other race that participated much, much later being the Sardarji community of the in-dian Sikha-but some of them also acted as middlemen merchants (functioning more or less in the nature of agency house ) for foreign traders engaged in export-import activities. Their contributions lay in shipping merchandise for various destinations like China, East Indies, India and Europe which their Chinese other nationality counterparts used to receive and hand over to the importing traders concerned in those countries their the Chinese merchants’ ) ships, on return voyages, used to collect goods from ports in above countries meant to be unloaded at the port of Penang and they used to hand over such goods to the impo-rting traders concerned in the island of Penang. For the services rendered this way, the Chinese merchants were receiving commissions.

Yet another notable contribution that the original Chinese settlers of Penang made was in respect of impo-rting foodstuffs and other daily necessities and selling them to the settlers of the new settlement. Several of them were running hawker centres1eating houses island-wide ser-ving cooked foods that eventually became the favourites of people of all races in the island in the initial 4 years after it’s founding by Light, labourers and small businessmen, particularly Indians, living on low incomes, needed a wide array of ethnic items that included food and clothing. The credit of having catered well to the day-to- day needs of such people should go to the early-day Chinese of modern Penang, a service that included meeting special needs of women and children. And, the prices charged were suiting the pocket of wage-earners. The local Malays also found it to their advantage to buy from the Chinese the foods and goods they needed in their daily routine. These original Chinese settlers specialised in the production of gambier that was in demand in China. They were also producing pepper and sugar-cane meant for export to the western countries. Several of them were engaged in the production of different varieties of fruit and vege-tables to meet the daily needs of local population. How-ever, unlike in Singapore after Raffles founded it where a section of the south China migrants were known to have got themselves engaged in the hard toil of house-construc-tion, laying of roads, building of other public structures including many Chinese women labourers, here in Penang the Chinese emigrants were not known to be participating in work at jungle-clearing, land reclamation or construction sites. These Penang Chinese were hard working and were willing to share the joys and sorrows with fellow-Chinese. They were always willing to lend a helping hand to the needy and deserving Chinese including those freshly arr-iving seeking fresh pastures in the newly founded British station that was fast developing looking like any other British town with it’s distinct. Gothic and Anglo-indian structures, some of which greet the visitors in the island even now. The Chinese amply believed in ancestral worship and were very religious minded like their Indian brethren in Penang and the island to this day boasts of having preserved one of the oldest Chinese temples in the region. The Chinese population of Penang in later decades grew by leaps and bounds and the life locally became so cosmopo-litan that the local Malays, who longed to continue their semi-rural way of life, ended up slowly as a minority with quite some resentment in an obvious Anglo-Chinese town that Penang had seemingly emerged as. Among other contributions made by Penang’ a founder, in a handful of years though, relates to encouraging indian traders, shop-keepers, peddlers, other businessmen and tra-ditional occupation practitioners like barbers, carpenters, artisans, washermen etc by providing them with required living quarters and facilities to carry on their occupa-tions in a multi-ethnic society with ease and without any hassles also ensured that the migrant Indian coolies encountered no insurmountable problems and laboured to eke out their livelihood with dignity. He also welcomed the Nattulottai Chettiar community with open arms as their services were found to be most needed in a scenario where Light was visualising transformation of subsistence economy to that of export one in due course. He was known to be willing to talk to any indian trader or merchant wanting to seek his counsel. several Indian traders and merchants, including ethnic food vendors ,who moved over to Penang during the times of Light with the fond hope of availing growth opportunities in the advanced British administered settlement were shown their due places and treated with respect by the island’s administration. This set of people were all South Indians and almost Tamil save some Thelugus. They came from neighboring Kedah, Perlis and Perak states mostly besides those coming from the Coromandel Coast seeking better economic opportunities.

It is possible that of those who moved to Penang from other Ma-lay states, many could have been the great grandchildren of those indian settlers of the erstwhile Malacca empire which in the early decades of its founding in the fifteenth century reportedly attracted many south indian traders, mer-chants, artisans, semi-skilled and skilled workers and so on some of whom were reported to have become so well to do that they found places in the elite of the society of those days. However, with Islamisation of Malacca some of them or their progeny might have moved residence to se-lect areas in Perak, Perlis and Kedah where they might have established themselves as settlers continuing their faith in the religion of their forefathers Hinduism-leading peaceful lives. Some who moved to Penang from these Malay states could have been first generation immigrants, too . in any case, a thing to be taken note of here is that Light could see in this section of indian migrants, as he could see in the Chinese migrants that took to tin mining and cultivation of gambier, pepper and sugar-cane, prospective contributors to the economic transformation he was drea-ming about.

Talking about enterprising indians of Penang, many of whom migrated to Singapore after decline of Penang as a sea port of any prominence, one is prone to be reminded of the illustrous . Naraina Pillai, who had the first Hindu temple in modern Singapore- Sri Mariamman Devasthanam built in 1827. Imbued with leadership qualities, Pillai had quite some following in Penang’s Indian community and thus he attracted the attention of Sir Stamford Raffles after he founded Singapore and returned to Penang during the mi-ddle of February, 1819.Along with some others, Raffles to Pillai with him to Singapore during his second visit in nay, 1819, where tillai started his life as an employee which fecilitated his coming in contact with a cross se-ction of Singapore’s fast growing Indian community that comprised peddlers, food suppliers, skilled personnel, some traders while from 1825 onwards it included a large number of Indian convict labourers, who arrived from the British settlement of Fort Marlborough in western Sumatra via Penang and some from India directly. Thus Pillai had come to be treated as the ‘Father of Indian Community of Singapore’ as most indians rallied behind him admiring his leadership qualities. Pillai was also known to be philanthropic in his outlook . Kie is known to have started organising social, cultural and also religious activities for the Hindu community and he reportedly started the first school in Singapore for the children of indian community, of which the Thelugus lived as family units while most Tamils were not having their wives and children in Singapore. These Thelugus seemed to have migrated to Singapore of early days from Penang having been attracted by better economic apportunities. Fascinated by the outlook and work of Sir Francis light for the welfare of Pen-an-gians, Pillai dedicated his life in Singapore for commun-ity welfare and his most noteworthy contribution related to his bringing indian brick-layers, masons, carpenters etc., from Penang to Singapore for building Sri Mariamman temple using free and devout services of Indian volunteers ,se-veral of whom were the famous indian convict labourers the very ones who later built the Istana, St. Andrew’s Cathedral, several of Singapore’s best known roards and br-idges for among those convicts were a couple of trained Overseers who could make the drawings and oversee construction. This very same temple eventually became so popular among indians, some local Chin6se and foreign tou-rists that the Government of Singapore declared this temple as a national monument in the year 1973. Like Francis Light laying seeds for transformation of Malaya’s economy, Pillai also laid the seeds by having this temple built for the propagation of Mother-Goddess worship in peninsular Malaya which was till then not familiar with the local Hindu community. Soon Sri Mariamman temples sprang up wherever south Indians lived or worked in Ma-laya, including in virtually in every plantation or estate. Because of freedom allowed by Light all races could pra-ctice their respective religious faith and thus was ac-hieved ‘Social Stability’ in an otherwise multi-racial society that Penang was. Taking cue from Light, Sultans of various other Malay states also permitted the building of Sri Mariamman Hindu temples besides other hindu deity temples. What is more, Pillai was instrumental in starting the tradition of observing hindu festivities like Thimithee, Deepavali, Navarathri etc., which were in later de-cades followed by observance of the most popular south Indian Thaipusum festival. These observances seemingly created a kind of ‘Religious fervor’ among hindus living on the Malay soil besides providing them a sense of se-curity and opportunities for getting together.

Here and now we must trace the influence of Light’s Philosophy of life and service orientation on yet another illustrous son of the British soil-a ‘Karma Yogi’ who was, like Light himself, born to make an everlasting con-tribution for the well-being of people of the Malay soil this particular Britisher is none else than the legendary Thomas Stamford Bingle Raffles, the founder of modern Si-ngapore .They both founded modern Malay settlements: Penang in case of Francis Light and Singapore in case of Stam-ford Raffles. They both had a dream to share and as years, decades, generations rolled by the native populace of those once British territories began to reap the fruit of their selfless sacrifices. They have had many a thing in common, more noteworthy of which are: (1)They both were born in England (2) They both had gone no further than Grammar sc-hool education in studies (3) They both Joined in service at tender young teen age, Light in the British Navy and Raffles as an extra clerk in the headquarters of the En-glish East India company at London (4)They both reached peninsular Malaya during their sojourns in service (5)They both learnt the mother-tongue of native Malays the hard way and became well conversant in Malay language (6) They both acquired an island each for the British east of Bay of Bengal to serve as a naval base (7) They both endeavored to develop the territories acquired as trading-cum—military outposts (8) They both had set foot on their respective island along with their wives and Indian sepoys-Light with his life partner Martina Ro-zells and Raffles with his second wife Sophia (9). They both gave a face lift to the places they occupied by having the Jungles cleared, land reclaimed and British type towns built in a planned manner (10)They both attr-acted traders from far and near like the Arab Moorees, Indian Muslims, Bugle, Sumatrans, Europeans and Chinese merchants by creating needed facilities for them to carry on their import—export trade like developing the harbour, arranging for warehouses and market places etc., (11), They both provided for living quarters for various races in their multi-ethnic societies while light had gone one step further and provided ‘Free Grants ‘ of land to the settlers, among whom those who benefited most were the Chinese tin miners and cash crop planters and the few European investors who started plantations (12) They both encouraged plantation of commercial crops with eyes on Europe for export to meet the needs of the first industrial Revolution that was on-going (13 ) They both introduced ‘Free Trade’ in the settlements (14) They both visualised transformation of subsistence economy into market economy with export-orientation (14)They both planned putting Indian convicts to gainful employment a system originally conceived by Light which was most exploited by Raffles in that the convicts built roads, bridges, buildings etc., which attracted the attention of other nations for possible emulation (15)They both attra-cted the south Indian money lenders, namely the Nattukottai Chettiars to Penang and Singapore respectively for financing trading and plantation, mining activities in early decades in the absence of banking companies (16) They both attracted the Chinese for gambier and pepper cultivation for export (17) They both thought of the cheap, survival labour from the lowly and down—trodden workers of the Coromandel Coast of India( mostly Tamils and few Thelugus) for developing the plantation industry much later grew into a great movement bringing exodus of such workers to the Malay plantations and rubber estates through the British—sponsored ‘indenture’ system from early 1830s and the ‘Kangany’ system from late 1870s

mostly from the ports of Nagapatnam and Madras (18) They both encouraged residence of non-commercial workers like people belonging to traditional occupations such as barbers, washermen, artisans and craft-persons, semi—skilled and skilled workers such as masons, brick-layers, carpe-nters, tailors, smiths and so on, hawkers, peddlers, food, fruit and vegetable vendors, petty traders, small businessmen , shopkeepers and the like to cater to day-to-day needs of the settlers in the two islands (l9)They both attempted to end old rivalries among the Malay sultanates and their traditional enemies by establishing rapport and friendly relations with the Sultanates from whom they acquired the islands Kedah in respect of Sir Raffles and Johor in respect of Sir Raffles) thereby ensuring prevalence of peaceful atmosphere in the territories which ,of course, was a pre-condition for developing import-export trade at the two ports (20) They both took steps to bring sea piracy in the Straits of Malacca and at the tip of the Malay peninsula under control which helped build con-fidence among traders for free movement of their cargo ships by providing armed coast guards (21)They both. en-couraged religious, social, cultural and linguistic practices, traditions of each race in the multi-racial so-cieties of Penang and Singapore by freely allowing them to raise their own places of worship (22)They both orga-nised public works and other services for the common good of local populace (23) They both visualized good education for children of the settlers(the first ever free school in Malay Peninsula having been opened in Penang while Raffles himself started the first school in modern Singapore); (24)They both were unkindly to gamblers and lazy residents of the islands (25) They both amply believed in free movement of goods and services as the ablest means of creating wealth and thus the free trade they devised made both the islands prosperous over the years-Penang having Singapore still sticking to it even as of now (26) They both encouraged the Chinese merchants, European Agency Houses and entrepot trade as a revenue—builder for the English trading company (27) They both exhibited humani-tarian outlook in administering the affairs of their respective territories and in dealing with people inha-biting both the islands (28)They both proved to posterity beyond any doubt as visionaries who could visualise growth in both their territories at future times through the initiatives they took in their rule of the settlements (29) They both endured untold suffering, on and off, from fever in the mosquito-infested territories they worked for and finally (30) They both died as unhappy men Light, because he could not live to see his dream of de-veloping .Penang as an exemplary trading centre come true and Raffles because of the animosity shown and the treatment meted out to him by the Directors of the English East India Company disliking the humanitarian approach of it Raffle’s. Nonetheless, it may be gainsaid here and in this context that where Francis Light was unhappy and soar with trade not picking up at the port of Penang as envisaged, Raffles who kept on living for 32 years after the passing away of Light saw to it that the dream of his inspirer (in spirit) Light became a reality in another Malay port, namely Singapore, which even when Raffles was alive was fast emerging as an entrepot tr-ading centre par excellence: PITY IT WAS INDEED THAT. LIGHT THE VISIONARY WASN’T PHYSICALLY THERE TO. SEE 41 FOR HIMSELF.

As history of Malaya would reveal, while Singapore kept on growing through re-export trade, Penang declined as a trading port by the end of the eighteenth century from 1801 to be more specific—because of, among others, three main reasons, i.e. (a)The ban imposed on gambling dens, opium farms, sale of tobacco, pork etc., led to loss of revenue to the state thereby making it difficult for the island’s administration to meet the running costs (b)The alternative method adopted of levying some import and export duties to defray maintenance costs meant partial loss of free port status of Penang resulting in vast majority of traders taking their ships to other eastern ports via Sunda Straits skipping the Straits of Malacca which dealt a death blow to Penang’s trade and (c )more importantly the founder, Francis Light, himself wasn’t around any more to bring the situation under control. On the top of it all, founding of Singapore by the British 18 years later led to diversion of trade in the Straits produce to the more strategically—located, convenient and Last rising Singapore. Added to all this, Penang could not function effectively as a naval base and also in controlling the menace of pirates who were for long in the history known to have been thriving plundering cargo ships bypassing the straits of Malacca. in any case, the fact remains that Nemesis had befallen the ‘Pearl of Orient’ island that Francis Light dreamt of Bhaping it to be and pity it was that the founder had to quit planet earth prematurely never, never and for ever to prevent the island from declining.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The basis for naming Sir Francis Light as the Visuliser of creation of Malaya’s potential wealth through transformation of subsistence economy to market economy lies on many and varied premises as elucidaed hereunder necessistating calling him an ‘Unsung Hero’ –one whose memory got to live on so long as the island lasts as suck.

The historical truth is that the English East India Company was founded at the behest of a band of British merchants who represented that the news brought by Francis Drake a few years earlier upon his return home from his arduous and adventurous voyage to the island of ternate in the East Indies raised fond hopes among the British merchant community that it would be to England’s advan-tage to take recourse to spice trade and benefit there from. That way began the long saga of Britain’s entry into the Malayo-Indonesian trading world where the Portuguese, the Dutch and the British vied with each other to gain supremacy over spice trade., The British also got interested in trading with China with bullion and Bengal’s opium in exchange for Chinese silk and tea. The Straits produce also became prominent in trading with China and as such there arose a need for the British to establish a naval base in India-China trade route where their ships could harbor, refit and refil. And thus began the hunt by English East . India Company for one. As providence would have it, it was given to Francis Light, Captain of a merchant ship of a British company located in Madras (India) to negoti-ate with the Sultan of Kedah and find one in the Strait of Malacca, i.e. the island of Pulau Penang, in 1771 but it took another 15 years for the British East India Company to obtain formal permission of the Sultanate to occupy the island in 1786 temporarily and in 1791 permanently through the signing of a treaty in exchange for an ann-ual remuneration of 6000 Spanish dollars payable annually by the said company to Sultanate of Kedah to compensate loss of trade. Sir Francis Light ,who hoisted the union Jack on the island’s soil (at Esplanade) on the 11th of August,1786 and who signed the treaty of 1791,however, did not live for long—he administered the affairs of the island only for 8 years till his death that occurred in 1894.As such he did not have much of an opportunity to develop the base and trade there to an extent as envi-sioned by the company he was serving. Nonetheless, his contribution for growth of company’s future activities in peninsular Malaya and elsewhere in some of the British colonies came from an unforeseen quarter, namely in tr-ansforming subsistence economies of native (host) countries prior to colonisation into export—oriented market econo-mies that eventually paved the way for creation of wealth in the long run.

When Light took over Penang, he was hit with an idea that added another dimension to the company’s trading activities in the region, namely: “WHY NOT THE BRITISH THEMSELVES PRODUCE IN MALAYA WHAT WAS NAMED BY EUROPE USING CHEAP LABOUR AND THEREBY DOUBLE THEIR PROFITS THROUGH THEIR EXPORTS TO ENGLAND/DISTRIBUTION IN EUROPE ?” Light asked himself and pat came the reply: ‘YES. THAT SOUNDS LIKE A THING WORTH TRYING.’ Some European investors came forward and started plantations producing sugar-cane, tapioca and coconuts using cheap migrant south Indian labour. A few migrant Chinese started pepper, indian labour. A few migrant Chinese started pepper , gambier and sugarcane plantations. Thus began the story of commercial plantations taking their roots which in much later period led to the setting up of coffee and oil. palm plantations and rubber estates in various Ma-layan states, using the same south Indian migrant cheap labour, which together brought needed wealth to Malaya for its transformation in a span of about a century and a half from a mostly kampong-clustered hinterland into a vastly urbanised nation inhabited by people having more of ‘Hayes’ than ‘Have nots’ with connectivity to comforts of modern life boasting of a developing economy. If Sir Stamford Raffles could transform a mangrove swamp that Singapore was into a cosmopolitan. town, he could do so inspired by the ‘spirit’ of Francis Light (as Raffles from 1805 to 1811 ,while working in Penang as Assistant Secretary in the initial 2 years and as Secretary to the Government of Penang for the next 4 years studied the philosophy and work culture of late Light thoroughly and dreamt of following in his foot steps one day when his turn to administer things came). If Sir George Leith could acquire Province Wellesley he could do so inspired by the philosophy of the late Light. If Sir Hugh Low could spread rubber industry that made Malaya wealthy, he could do so inspired by the ‘spirit’ of late Light.

Sir Francis Light, like all mortals, was dead and gone. Yet his spirit lingers on in the hinterlands of Malaya And thus ,defying laws of nature, Light is immortal. So is his spirit."

Place of birth

I've changed his place of birth because of what it says here [1] and [2] CarolGray 10:35, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 11:35, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Date of death

The inscription on Light's tomb says he died on 21 October. Is there any authoritative source placing his death at 25 October? Bubbha (talk) 07:43, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Burial Place of Sir Francis Light

The grave of Sir Francis Light lies in The Protestant Cemetery in Georgetown. The Catholic Cemetery can be accessed by walking through the Protestant Cemetery and going through the gate at the back of it. The two are quite distinct and divided by a wall. While not an authority on everything, Lonely Planet Malaysia confirms this and I have been there. The map of the cemeteries that are published on your page (http://www.ericewe.com/travel/catholic-cemetery-burial-place-of-captain-francis-light/) quite clearly shows the Catholic Cemetery on the other side of the wall which is also shown with a break (the gate) in it. Plaques at the entrance to the cemetery list Sir Francis Light as being buried in the Protestant Cemetery. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.168.20.224 (talk) 19:00, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Priory of Sion

I've removed mention of the Priory of Sion. This had no citation, and seemed highly dubious considering the Priory was established as a hoax in 1956. The original passage read like this:

"From 1759 to 1763, Light served as a Royal Navy midshipman and strongly believed was a Priory Of Sion, a secret society members and then left to seek his fortune in the colonies. From 1765, he worked as a private country trader."

If I'm mistaken, please revert, reword, and add a credible citation. Thanks. Meticulo (talk) 00:16, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

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