Summary:
British occupation of India began under English East India Company in 1764 (with successful victory at Battle of Buxar over Mir Qasim, Nawab of Bengal and Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II) and ended in 1947 with the independence of India and Pakistan. Because English East India Company had revenue as its reason of existence, British power focused on it to the exclusion of other aspects of its colonial subjugation - political, economic, military, legal, technological. In British eyes, South Asia was the crown jewel of her empire in terms of revenue collection. This book shows how British feverishly put in place rules and procedures without any understanding or input whatsoever from their colonial subjects. When challenges to their power arose, they doubled down on their self perception of enlightened despots. While it worked to the benefit of the English East India Company (aka swindlers' paradise) for some time, it devastated South Asia on a political, economic, military, legal and humanitarian basis. Seen in that light, British occupation of South Asia, ended up as a moral, political and economic failure of massive proportions.
The amount of lives lost during British occupation and the fact that major famines stopped after British left South Asia should stand as searing indictment of 'British Raj'. Taking into account major famines, the result of British negligence, policies and lack of countermeasures to mitigate the famines' severity resulted in 50 million deaths(which doesnt take into account the destruction of human potential in terms of malnutrition and diseases and which amounts to 273200 deaths per year or 31 per hour though Nazi Germany has them beat - 6 million deaths over 4 years or 171 deaths per hour). This does not take into account people killed as a result of other factors (British cruelty, wars across South Asia waged by East India Company). In the pantheon of genocidal regimes throughout history, Britain should take its rightful place alongside Soviet Union under Stalin, China under Mao and Germany under Hitler.
Analysis:
European power came to India via Portuguese in 1500s followed by Dutch in 1600s. While Portuguese focused on West coast for their power, the Dutch and English turned their eyes on the East and South. Because of geography, Western Ghats served as a wall for Portuguese who used their naval power to blockade coastal kingdoms and dominated the spice trade. The East coast of India is connected to the interior through rivers and as such English were able to spread their influence over a much larger area than Portuguese. English East India Company had been granted a monopoly on India trade by English Crown which the Company proceeded to enforce against their competitors (including independent English traders or 'pirates'). Mughals(Persian for Mongols) had governed India through alliances since 1500s and had put in place judicial and revenue collection systems that incorporated South Asia's inhabitants into their rule. East India Company's enforcement of trade monopoly cut into the revenues of Mughal empire which then proceeded to negotiate with East India Company. The Company did not like 'submitting' to Mughals and developed fortifications where European traders could engage in commerce without Mughal intervention. In a foreign land, they preferred to stay within their forts and arm themselves to the teeth. That led to misunderstandings between the South Asian merchants and Europeans. In one instance of trade negotiation gone wrong, East India Company marched in a military formation from Anjengo fort(where they conducted their pepper trade) to Attingal castle(where Queen Aswati and later Queen Amutambaran reigned) to pay their rent for the fort. Because of a misunderstanding during Shore Tuesday celebrations earlier, one of Attingal's prominent merchants had killed an European female and hence, the Europeans hoped to intimidate Queen Amutambaran. However, some of the local militias took matters into their own hands and massacred the inhabitants of Anjengo fort(Indians and Europeans). After English raised a siege of the Anjengo fort, Queen Amutambaran held out for some time and was saved because English were planning to engage the Marathas and so pulled their troops from the seige. In the end, Anjengo fort was abandoned as Queen Amutambaran couldnt hold her kingdom together as the local militias saw her as siding with the English.
In Early 1700s, West coast of India was dominated by Marathas ruled by Shahu(grandson of Shivaji) whose Peshwa(Chief Administrator), Balaji Vishwanath skilfully worked with other kingdoms to expand Maratha power. At the same time, Arabian Sea saw battles between Maratha sea power led by Kanhoji Angre who repulsed English, Portuguese and Sidi Kasim's (Ethiopian) attacks during the Anglo Maratha Wars of 1730s. With the expansion of European power in South Asia, the existing kingdoms went through a wave of consolidation. The major kingdoms were Bengal and Awadh to the East, Marathas in the West and Arcot and Hyderabad in South and Southeast respectively. All of them centralized administration and maintained good credit networks for merchants and good relations with countryside. Marathas ruled land and sea lanes around their kingdom. Mughal empire was land based and as such, English attempts to reduce land holdings of Mughal empire were quite successful.
In 1739, Nader Shah invaded Delhi and defeated the Mughals and became the Mughal emperor. After some time, he left for Afghanistan taking the famed Mughal Peacock throne with him. Mughal Empire lost their credibility with this defeat and it broke credit networks that merchants relied upon and public finances that maintained the infrastructure. It also broke the treasuries in Southern India (who had accepted Mughal suzerainty) so that local kingdoms took to raiding their populace to raise revenue. English East India Company, sitting behind their well fortified locations,stepped into the breach and provided credit and expanded their support. They also had access to debt financing from London which made it easier to maintain an army and trading networks. Mughal Empire still reigned but in a shrivelled fashion in Delhi. In Bengal, Nawab Shuja Ud-din died 5 months after Nader Shah's invasion. He was replaced by his old servant, Alivardi Khan who proceeded to rule till he was 80 years old. Upon his death in 1756, power fell to the old Nawab's grandson Siraj Ud-Daulah. Arcot was fought over by Chanda Saheb, supported by the French and Arcot Nawab, allied with British.
Marathas lent their support to Arcot Nawab and he ended up winning over Chanda Saheb. English increased their revenue collection area every time their side became victorious.
Warriors from Afghanistan and Persia were once again pouring through the mountain passes towards Delhi so Siraj Ud-Daula tried to get English on his side by marching to Calcutta. Robert Clive marched to meet him and defeated Siraj Ud-Daula in Battle of Plassey in 1757 with help from Mir Jafar. Mir Jafar was replaced as the Nawab by Mir Qasim who, along with Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II, was defeated by British at the Battle of Buxar in 1764(The British Commanding General at Buxar was Hector Munro who enforced discipline among sepoys by blasting 20 of them with cannons). With this success, British became the revenue collectors of Bengal as well. Marathas suffered a grievous defeat at the hands of Afghans under Ahmed Shah Durrani at the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761. With the defeat of the major powers of Mughals, Marathas and Sikhs, British became the unquestioned power in South Asia but they saw themselves primarily as revenue collectors.
Robert Clive died of opium overdose in 1774. Warren Hastings became the first governor general from English East India Company in 1772. He was followed by Lord Cornwallis in 1787 after Cornwallis' defeat in the American War of Independence in 1781. Cornwallis put in place Permanent Settlement that led to a new system of revenue collection called the Zamindari system in areas under their control where property rights of landlords (Zamindars) were restored with the understanding that they would pay a fixed amount of money each month to English East India Company. There was no flexibility built into the system for the revenue collectors as a result of which many landlords ended up losing their lands. This also led to landholders and chiefs bribing the officials to be on the good side of the officials with respect to revenue judgments. As a result of the information imbalance, South Asians who worked with British in their enclaves were able to take over estates and lands that previously belonged to landed gentry.
With the defeat of Tipu Sultan in the Fourth Anglo Mysore war of 1798, British anointed the weaker Wodeyar family for the Mysore throne and became the revenue collectors of lands under Tipu Sultan. The fights waged by Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja in Kerala and Veerapandiya Kattabomman in Panchalankurichi were a direct result of the defeat of Tipu Sultan and loss of revenues from the Zamindari system. In the Poligar (Palayakkaarar) wars of 1799 - 1801, British continued engaging in cruel acts carried out in public to subdue any remaining resistance. With the final defeat of Marathas in the Battle of Assaye in 1803, English East India company changed the revenue collection system to ryotwari system where English would collect revenues from the ryots (peasants) directly without any intermediaries. Sir Thomas Munro who is generally regarded as the originator of the ryotwari system, claimed the villages were self sufficient units (which M K Gandhi would claim later as well) where power of the peasants had been usurped by Chiefs and Poligars.
With East India Company lurching from crisis to crisis even after all the successes in India, British Parliament passed Charter Act of 1833 that centralized law making and finance and gave absolute power over revenue and administration to Governor General of India in Council. It also opened up appointment of officials on merit through exams. After the Indian War of Independence in 1857, English East India Company was disbanded and India was made a possession of the British Crown. British officers sought to catch up with other countries in infrastructure so they put in place a Public Works Department to bring together all physical infrastructure in a single organization. Because funds from British government were not forthcoming, British officers were forced to train South Asians for their participation in rail and irrigation projects. British also put in place Code of Civil Procedure and Code of Penal Law for all South Asian subjects. Lord Macaulay had locked himself away from any meaningful Indian contact in 1837 to come up with these legal codes and they were enshrined into law in 1858 and 1861. The legal codes were meant to ensure smooth functioning of the Imperial regime and not for addressing individual crimes (it still survives to this day in Indian Criminal Code as an archaic legal structure failing to address the needs of a modern nation).
With the opening up of legal profession, South Asians were able to participate in the economic and political life of their land and it started with the formation of Congress in 1885. In economic sphere, British banking houses did not invest in Indian enterprise as a result South Asians couldnt contribute to capital formation because of a lack of seed capital. Slowly, Swadeshi(indigenous) approach to finance, banking and textiles grew. The political space was home to multiple viewpoints of Lala Lajpat Rai(According to him, Indians should be proud of their past literature, culture (including those of the Mughals) and should eschew violence in fighting for their rights), Shyamji Krishnavarma(According to him, State should have a monopoly on power and asked Indians to follow the 'ethics of dynamite') and Gandhi(According to him, Swaraj was about moral and social regeneration than about modern systems of power). As more and more avenues opened up for South Asians to contribute, British officers lived in a cocoon of their own where they expected non-Europeans to follow their commands. In line with that, Viceroy Curzon (In his view, The highest ideal of truth is to a large extent a western conception), fresh from the successful display of Imperial power through the 1903 Delhi Durbar, proceeded to announce the Partition of Bengal in 1905. He followed it up with a monument building spree across India. After the conclusion of First World War, British government formed Simon Commission in 1928 to report on development of representative institutions in India (Dominion status had been granted to Australia, New Zealand, Canada in 1907). Congress countered it with Nehru report that was fashioned by a committee headed by Motilal Nehru, father of Jawaharlal Nehru. Muslim League and Congress diverged on their idea of representative democracy with the publication of the Nehru report. During protests against Simon Commission, Lala Lajpat Rai was beaten by British and died of a heart attack which led to Congress calling for an aggressive campaign to break British power (Gandhi disagreed saying that Congress should confine itself to constructive work and boycott to redress specific grievances).
With the onset of 1929 depression across the world, the economic conditions inside South Asia deteriorated as it was tied to the global trading system. British government made it worse by refusing to allow rupee to fully float against pound sterling and wanted New Delhi to take rupees out of circulation to maintain the fixed exchange rate. As a result, Viceroy melted down silver rupees, burnt paper notes and treasury bills to take money out of circulation. As a result of shrinking economies in the countryside, more people emigrated to cities in search of work. Calcutta's population rose from 1.2 million to 2.1 million from 1931 to 1941.
In 1935, Government of India Act allowed elections to provincial governments with the end goal of sharing power between British officers, elected representatives and rules of native kingdoms. Congress and Muslim League contested the elections and performed well. With the advent of Second World War, Congress quit the provincial governments when Viceroy declared India to be at war without consulting any political parties. Gandhi and Nehru were supportive of British war effort and were even prepared to resist Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose if Japanese invasion of India had succeeded.
Congress started Quit India movement in 1942 to force British to grant independence to India. With British dependent on American credit and muscle in the second world war, FDR demanded Britain grant Independence to India. Churchill refused(as was to be expected from him about all things Indian) and worsened the effect of Bengal Famine in 1943 by diverting much needed grain away from Indian shores and ignoring famine camps to provide work to the affected populace (as had been done before in previous famines - British were quite adept at famine camps having faced it repeatedly during their occupation) . 2 - 3 million people died as a result of that famine.
With the successful conclusion of Second World War, Britain moved to grant independence to India and Pakistan in August 1947 under the new Labor government. However, the British regime's priority during the transition was to safeguard the retreat of British soldiers and officers to ports and then to ships back home. As a result, riots during the Partition of India and Pakistan killed scores of people and left Britain's greatest legacy in South Asia in the form of the most disjointed and chaotically ruled societies of the world.
Other Books of Interest:
Marathas 1600 - 1818 by Gordon Stewart
The Portuguese in India by M.N.Pearson
The Career and Legend of Vasco Da Gama by Sanjay Subrahmanyam
The Sea Hawk: Life and battles of Kanoji Angrey by Manohar Malgaonkar
Naval Resistance to Britain's Growing Power in India, 1660 - 1800: The Saffron Banner and the Tiger of Mysore by Philip MacDougall
The Illusion of Permanence: British Imperialism in India by Francis G Hutchins
Imprint of the Raj:How Fingerprinting Was Born in Colonial India by Chandak Sengoopta
Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World by Mike Davis
Atomic State by Jahnavi Phalkey
Copyright © 2017 Kunthavaiyin Kaathalan
British occupation of India began under English East India Company in 1764 (with successful victory at Battle of Buxar over Mir Qasim, Nawab of Bengal and Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II) and ended in 1947 with the independence of India and Pakistan. Because English East India Company had revenue as its reason of existence, British power focused on it to the exclusion of other aspects of its colonial subjugation - political, economic, military, legal, technological. In British eyes, South Asia was the crown jewel of her empire in terms of revenue collection. This book shows how British feverishly put in place rules and procedures without any understanding or input whatsoever from their colonial subjects. When challenges to their power arose, they doubled down on their self perception of enlightened despots. While it worked to the benefit of the English East India Company (aka swindlers' paradise) for some time, it devastated South Asia on a political, economic, military, legal and humanitarian basis. Seen in that light, British occupation of South Asia, ended up as a moral, political and economic failure of massive proportions.
The amount of lives lost during British occupation and the fact that major famines stopped after British left South Asia should stand as searing indictment of 'British Raj'. Taking into account major famines, the result of British negligence, policies and lack of countermeasures to mitigate the famines' severity resulted in 50 million deaths(which doesnt take into account the destruction of human potential in terms of malnutrition and diseases and which amounts to 273200 deaths per year or 31 per hour though Nazi Germany has them beat - 6 million deaths over 4 years or 171 deaths per hour). This does not take into account people killed as a result of other factors (British cruelty, wars across South Asia waged by East India Company). In the pantheon of genocidal regimes throughout history, Britain should take its rightful place alongside Soviet Union under Stalin, China under Mao and Germany under Hitler.
Analysis:
European power came to India via Portuguese in 1500s followed by Dutch in 1600s. While Portuguese focused on West coast for their power, the Dutch and English turned their eyes on the East and South. Because of geography, Western Ghats served as a wall for Portuguese who used their naval power to blockade coastal kingdoms and dominated the spice trade. The East coast of India is connected to the interior through rivers and as such English were able to spread their influence over a much larger area than Portuguese. English East India Company had been granted a monopoly on India trade by English Crown which the Company proceeded to enforce against their competitors (including independent English traders or 'pirates'). Mughals(Persian for Mongols) had governed India through alliances since 1500s and had put in place judicial and revenue collection systems that incorporated South Asia's inhabitants into their rule. East India Company's enforcement of trade monopoly cut into the revenues of Mughal empire which then proceeded to negotiate with East India Company. The Company did not like 'submitting' to Mughals and developed fortifications where European traders could engage in commerce without Mughal intervention. In a foreign land, they preferred to stay within their forts and arm themselves to the teeth. That led to misunderstandings between the South Asian merchants and Europeans. In one instance of trade negotiation gone wrong, East India Company marched in a military formation from Anjengo fort(where they conducted their pepper trade) to Attingal castle(where Queen Aswati and later Queen Amutambaran reigned) to pay their rent for the fort. Because of a misunderstanding during Shore Tuesday celebrations earlier, one of Attingal's prominent merchants had killed an European female and hence, the Europeans hoped to intimidate Queen Amutambaran. However, some of the local militias took matters into their own hands and massacred the inhabitants of Anjengo fort(Indians and Europeans). After English raised a siege of the Anjengo fort, Queen Amutambaran held out for some time and was saved because English were planning to engage the Marathas and so pulled their troops from the seige. In the end, Anjengo fort was abandoned as Queen Amutambaran couldnt hold her kingdom together as the local militias saw her as siding with the English.
In Early 1700s, West coast of India was dominated by Marathas ruled by Shahu(grandson of Shivaji) whose Peshwa(Chief Administrator), Balaji Vishwanath skilfully worked with other kingdoms to expand Maratha power. At the same time, Arabian Sea saw battles between Maratha sea power led by Kanhoji Angre who repulsed English, Portuguese and Sidi Kasim's (Ethiopian) attacks during the Anglo Maratha Wars of 1730s. With the expansion of European power in South Asia, the existing kingdoms went through a wave of consolidation. The major kingdoms were Bengal and Awadh to the East, Marathas in the West and Arcot and Hyderabad in South and Southeast respectively. All of them centralized administration and maintained good credit networks for merchants and good relations with countryside. Marathas ruled land and sea lanes around their kingdom. Mughal empire was land based and as such, English attempts to reduce land holdings of Mughal empire were quite successful.
In 1739, Nader Shah invaded Delhi and defeated the Mughals and became the Mughal emperor. After some time, he left for Afghanistan taking the famed Mughal Peacock throne with him. Mughal Empire lost their credibility with this defeat and it broke credit networks that merchants relied upon and public finances that maintained the infrastructure. It also broke the treasuries in Southern India (who had accepted Mughal suzerainty) so that local kingdoms took to raiding their populace to raise revenue. English East India Company, sitting behind their well fortified locations,stepped into the breach and provided credit and expanded their support. They also had access to debt financing from London which made it easier to maintain an army and trading networks. Mughal Empire still reigned but in a shrivelled fashion in Delhi. In Bengal, Nawab Shuja Ud-din died 5 months after Nader Shah's invasion. He was replaced by his old servant, Alivardi Khan who proceeded to rule till he was 80 years old. Upon his death in 1756, power fell to the old Nawab's grandson Siraj Ud-Daulah. Arcot was fought over by Chanda Saheb, supported by the French and Arcot Nawab, allied with British.
Marathas lent their support to Arcot Nawab and he ended up winning over Chanda Saheb. English increased their revenue collection area every time their side became victorious.
Warriors from Afghanistan and Persia were once again pouring through the mountain passes towards Delhi so Siraj Ud-Daula tried to get English on his side by marching to Calcutta. Robert Clive marched to meet him and defeated Siraj Ud-Daula in Battle of Plassey in 1757 with help from Mir Jafar. Mir Jafar was replaced as the Nawab by Mir Qasim who, along with Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II, was defeated by British at the Battle of Buxar in 1764(The British Commanding General at Buxar was Hector Munro who enforced discipline among sepoys by blasting 20 of them with cannons). With this success, British became the revenue collectors of Bengal as well. Marathas suffered a grievous defeat at the hands of Afghans under Ahmed Shah Durrani at the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761. With the defeat of the major powers of Mughals, Marathas and Sikhs, British became the unquestioned power in South Asia but they saw themselves primarily as revenue collectors.
Robert Clive died of opium overdose in 1774. Warren Hastings became the first governor general from English East India Company in 1772. He was followed by Lord Cornwallis in 1787 after Cornwallis' defeat in the American War of Independence in 1781. Cornwallis put in place Permanent Settlement that led to a new system of revenue collection called the Zamindari system in areas under their control where property rights of landlords (Zamindars) were restored with the understanding that they would pay a fixed amount of money each month to English East India Company. There was no flexibility built into the system for the revenue collectors as a result of which many landlords ended up losing their lands. This also led to landholders and chiefs bribing the officials to be on the good side of the officials with respect to revenue judgments. As a result of the information imbalance, South Asians who worked with British in their enclaves were able to take over estates and lands that previously belonged to landed gentry.
With the defeat of Tipu Sultan in the Fourth Anglo Mysore war of 1798, British anointed the weaker Wodeyar family for the Mysore throne and became the revenue collectors of lands under Tipu Sultan. The fights waged by Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja in Kerala and Veerapandiya Kattabomman in Panchalankurichi were a direct result of the defeat of Tipu Sultan and loss of revenues from the Zamindari system. In the Poligar (Palayakkaarar) wars of 1799 - 1801, British continued engaging in cruel acts carried out in public to subdue any remaining resistance. With the final defeat of Marathas in the Battle of Assaye in 1803, English East India company changed the revenue collection system to ryotwari system where English would collect revenues from the ryots (peasants) directly without any intermediaries. Sir Thomas Munro who is generally regarded as the originator of the ryotwari system, claimed the villages were self sufficient units (which M K Gandhi would claim later as well) where power of the peasants had been usurped by Chiefs and Poligars.
With East India Company lurching from crisis to crisis even after all the successes in India, British Parliament passed Charter Act of 1833 that centralized law making and finance and gave absolute power over revenue and administration to Governor General of India in Council. It also opened up appointment of officials on merit through exams. After the Indian War of Independence in 1857, English East India Company was disbanded and India was made a possession of the British Crown. British officers sought to catch up with other countries in infrastructure so they put in place a Public Works Department to bring together all physical infrastructure in a single organization. Because funds from British government were not forthcoming, British officers were forced to train South Asians for their participation in rail and irrigation projects. British also put in place Code of Civil Procedure and Code of Penal Law for all South Asian subjects. Lord Macaulay had locked himself away from any meaningful Indian contact in 1837 to come up with these legal codes and they were enshrined into law in 1858 and 1861. The legal codes were meant to ensure smooth functioning of the Imperial regime and not for addressing individual crimes (it still survives to this day in Indian Criminal Code as an archaic legal structure failing to address the needs of a modern nation).
With the opening up of legal profession, South Asians were able to participate in the economic and political life of their land and it started with the formation of Congress in 1885. In economic sphere, British banking houses did not invest in Indian enterprise as a result South Asians couldnt contribute to capital formation because of a lack of seed capital. Slowly, Swadeshi(indigenous) approach to finance, banking and textiles grew. The political space was home to multiple viewpoints of Lala Lajpat Rai(According to him, Indians should be proud of their past literature, culture (including those of the Mughals) and should eschew violence in fighting for their rights), Shyamji Krishnavarma(According to him, State should have a monopoly on power and asked Indians to follow the 'ethics of dynamite') and Gandhi(According to him, Swaraj was about moral and social regeneration than about modern systems of power). As more and more avenues opened up for South Asians to contribute, British officers lived in a cocoon of their own where they expected non-Europeans to follow their commands. In line with that, Viceroy Curzon (In his view, The highest ideal of truth is to a large extent a western conception), fresh from the successful display of Imperial power through the 1903 Delhi Durbar, proceeded to announce the Partition of Bengal in 1905. He followed it up with a monument building spree across India. After the conclusion of First World War, British government formed Simon Commission in 1928 to report on development of representative institutions in India (Dominion status had been granted to Australia, New Zealand, Canada in 1907). Congress countered it with Nehru report that was fashioned by a committee headed by Motilal Nehru, father of Jawaharlal Nehru. Muslim League and Congress diverged on their idea of representative democracy with the publication of the Nehru report. During protests against Simon Commission, Lala Lajpat Rai was beaten by British and died of a heart attack which led to Congress calling for an aggressive campaign to break British power (Gandhi disagreed saying that Congress should confine itself to constructive work and boycott to redress specific grievances).
With the onset of 1929 depression across the world, the economic conditions inside South Asia deteriorated as it was tied to the global trading system. British government made it worse by refusing to allow rupee to fully float against pound sterling and wanted New Delhi to take rupees out of circulation to maintain the fixed exchange rate. As a result, Viceroy melted down silver rupees, burnt paper notes and treasury bills to take money out of circulation. As a result of shrinking economies in the countryside, more people emigrated to cities in search of work. Calcutta's population rose from 1.2 million to 2.1 million from 1931 to 1941.
In 1935, Government of India Act allowed elections to provincial governments with the end goal of sharing power between British officers, elected representatives and rules of native kingdoms. Congress and Muslim League contested the elections and performed well. With the advent of Second World War, Congress quit the provincial governments when Viceroy declared India to be at war without consulting any political parties. Gandhi and Nehru were supportive of British war effort and were even prepared to resist Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose if Japanese invasion of India had succeeded.
Congress started Quit India movement in 1942 to force British to grant independence to India. With British dependent on American credit and muscle in the second world war, FDR demanded Britain grant Independence to India. Churchill refused(as was to be expected from him about all things Indian) and worsened the effect of Bengal Famine in 1943 by diverting much needed grain away from Indian shores and ignoring famine camps to provide work to the affected populace (as had been done before in previous famines - British were quite adept at famine camps having faced it repeatedly during their occupation) . 2 - 3 million people died as a result of that famine.
With the successful conclusion of Second World War, Britain moved to grant independence to India and Pakistan in August 1947 under the new Labor government. However, the British regime's priority during the transition was to safeguard the retreat of British soldiers and officers to ports and then to ships back home. As a result, riots during the Partition of India and Pakistan killed scores of people and left Britain's greatest legacy in South Asia in the form of the most disjointed and chaotically ruled societies of the world.
Other Books of Interest:
Marathas 1600 - 1818 by Gordon Stewart
The Portuguese in India by M.N.Pearson
The Career and Legend of Vasco Da Gama by Sanjay Subrahmanyam
The Sea Hawk: Life and battles of Kanoji Angrey by Manohar Malgaonkar
Naval Resistance to Britain's Growing Power in India, 1660 - 1800: The Saffron Banner and the Tiger of Mysore by Philip MacDougall
The Illusion of Permanence: British Imperialism in India by Francis G Hutchins
Imprint of the Raj:How Fingerprinting Was Born in Colonial India by Chandak Sengoopta
Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World by Mike Davis
Atomic State by Jahnavi Phalkey
Copyright © 2017 Kunthavaiyin Kaathalan
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