Contexts - The Rough Guide to Bali and Lombok - page 455

The completion of Dutch control
On April 28, 1908, Dutch troops in Semarapura witnessed a scene similar to the Badung
puputan two years earlier. Reports tell how the dewa agung stabbed his royal kris into the
ground expecting its power to rent the ground asunder or bring torrential rain to destroy the
enemy. Nothing happened and around two hundred members of the royal household commit-
ted suicide that day; the remainder were exiled. At this point the raja of Bangli realized a
pretext would soon be found to attack him and, in October 1908, requested that his kingdom
should have the same status as Gianyar and Karangasem and become a Dutch Protectorate.
When this was approved in January 1909, the whole of the island of Bali came under Dutch
control .
Colonial rule
The puputan s of 1906 and 1908 caused a stir in Europe and the United States and pressure
was put on the Dutch to moderate their policies. They ruled with a philosophy they called the
Ethical Policy , which was claimed to uphold Balinese values. Traditional rulers remained as
regents under Dutch authority, although not all of the old royal families were amenable to
this; in Buleleng, it was not until several generations after the Dutch conquest that an obli-
ging member of the royal family could be found.
Under the Dutch, engineers, doctors and teachers were introduced to the colony and Bali
was spared the less enlightened agricultural policies that had turned large parts of Java into
plantations. Big businesses were discouraged from Bali, although the steamship line KPM
began encouraging tourism on the island from 1924 onwards.
Lombok under the Dutch
The situation on Lombok deteriorated markedly following the Dutch victory in 1894, and
brought the population to the point of starvation more than once. The Dutch were determined
to rule profitably: they taxed the population harshly and introduced compulsory labour for
projects such as road-building. In addition to land tax, there were taxes on income and on the
slaughter of animals. These were initially payable in local currency, but eventually they were
demanded in Netherlands Indies currency (NIC). The Chinese rice-exporters were one of the
few groups on the island who traded in NIC, and increasing amounts of rice needed to be sold
to raise money for taxes. Consequently, a high proportion of food grown on the island was
exported, and local rice consumption dropped by a quarter. By 1934, it was estimated that a
third of the population were landless and destitute .
World War II and independence
Following the bombing of the US Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, Japan
entered World War II and moved quickly through Asia. The Japanese fleet arrived off Sa-
nur on February 18, 1942, were unopposed on their march to Denpasar and took control of