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Indigo---the Crop that Created History and then Itself Became History

Indigo, the blue dye, was extracted from plants in ancient times, some 5000-6000 years ago (3000-4000 BCE), both in the Old (Asia, Africa and Europe) and New (Americas) Worlds. It got its name Indigo, because it reached Europe from Indus Valley, India and later from other parts of India by the Portuguese and other European sailors. It was commercially encouraged and traded by the British, firstly by the cultivation of indigo plant and production of the dye in South Carolina, USA in mid18th century, which was then a British colony. However, this stopped after the British colonies in USA gained their freedom after American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). It was then that British East India Company (BEIC) started its production in Bengal and part of the current Bihar states of India and continued it until the second decade of 20th century. The managers of BEIC forced the farmers to grow indigo in place of food crops by attracting them with loans on virtually non-repayable conditions. This caused considerable tyranny and torture of farmers and finally led to the Nīl Vidroha (Nīl Revolt) of 1857, and forced the British Government to appoint a Commission of Enquiry, which confirmed the atrocities caused by the British East India Company. The British Government closed the East India Company and took command of the country’s rule in 1858. There was a second Nīl Revolt (Satyāgraha, the name given to this nonviolent revolt) in Champaran, Bihar launched by the Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi in 1917.Thus, indigo crop has been associated with and created quite a bit of history. Faced by high prices charged by the British traders for indigo dye, German chemists had already started their search for making synthetic indigo and Adolf Baeyer succeeded in synthesizing it in 1882. This was followed by research by other German chemists, namely, Johannes Pfleger and Karl Heumann in the first decade of 20th century. The synthetic dye was much cheaper and blew the final blow to the natural plant produced indigo dye and indigo crop became a part of history. Now most of the indigo dye used world-over is made synthetically. Nevertheless, in recent years some interest has arisen in natural indigo dye due to growing demand for organic clothes and natural dyes.