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Gifting and receiving: Anglo-Indian charity and its beneficiaries in Madras

London School of Oriental and African Studies. His present address is 118 Nether Street, London NI2 8EU, U.K.

This article attempts to further the study of gifting in India by examining both the donors and recipients of charity in a contemporary urban context. Considering the case of Anglo-Indians in Madras, many of whom have been the objects of philanthropy since the colonial period, it explores various dimensions of this activity today. For one thing, it notes the highly personalised character of charity, which contributes to the definition and realisation of a moral community of benefactors and their beneficiaries. For another, it seeks to demonstrate how the relief of poverty is a vital ingredient in the definition of Anglo-Indian leadership—as of leadership in India generally—and occupies a significant place in the discourse of community politics. Finally, it seeks to take account of the recipients of philanthropy, exploring some of the ways in which the ideologies and practices surrounding almsgiving bothfragment and unite the poor in their distress, and asks how those in a relationship of almost total economic subjection attempt to assert some control over the conditions of their dependency.

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