Hume, John Chandler
Jr., Medicine in the Punjab, 1848-1911: ethnicity and
professionalisation in the control of an occupation. , Ph.D. thesis, Duke University, 1977. Brief
summary.
“Punjab medical
administrators, all of whom were British members of the Indian Medical Service,
gained control of the occupation of medicine in the province between 1849 and
1911. Medical administrators legitimized efforts to exclude or control other
groups in the occupation of medicine through the use of arguments based on
ethnicity and professionalisation. `The British Medical administrators curbed
the efforts of the local medical groups to gain a share in the medical service
of the province on the grounds that outside groups such as Bengali
medical practitioners were not suited to the Punjab environment. Similarly they
rejected the services of the indigenous medical practitioners such as Hakims,
labeling it as “unscientific.” This study outlines the efforts of the Indian
Medical Service officers to retain control of the senior medical administrative
positions in