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Let us talk about the holocaust. And colonialism. Part 2 [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2023-12-28
In this set of diaries, I am exploring some questions that (to me), are central to how we should view ourselves as human. In Part 1, I introduced this set of questions, and the immediate triggers that prompted me to write these questions down. Briefly, the questions are as follows
(1) Was the Holocaust a unique singularity of evil (or perhaps, was it a unique singularity of evil that could only have been directed at the Jewish people), or was it a trivial consequence of something else.
(2) Likewise, was colonialism a unique singularity of something (perhaps a transition from a rural-agrarian society to one that dwells in cities) or was it a trivial consequence of something else. What is colonialism?
To address these questions, I am going to highlight “British” “colonialism” in “India”. Notice the quotes around the 3 words. The colonialism wasn’t “British” (or, at least, it did not start out as British). It wasn’t “colonialism” as per the definition used by most people today; it certainly did not start as colonialism even per the most generous definition of the word. And the country of “India” had not yet been fashioned, either as a political entity, or as a nationalistic project. So, in this Part 2, I will focus on “British” “colonialism” in “India”. I will get back to the core questions in Part 3.
You have likely read several narratives around this “British” “colonialism” in “India”. Perhaps you have seen the movie Gandhi. I will narrate it from the viewpoint of the British colonizers. Now, obviously, you cannot narrate a story from the viewpoint of the colonizers alone ~ you also have to consider the affect of his/her actions on the colonized. But, in most studies of colonization, people tend to go into granular detail when considering the effect on the colonized, and assume that the colonizer is one single monolith, who is either evil, or greedy, or some combination of both. This is where the misconceptions come in. Colonization/oppression corrupts both the colonized (oppressed), and the colonizer (oppressor) ~ neither one of them remains able to pursue life, liberty and happiness. The manner in which both are corrupted are actually intricately linked to one another.
As you read along with this example of British colonialism in India, please watch as how this intricate set of emotions develop on both sides.
1580s Joint stock companies and privateers. When people asks this question: “How is it that a small country managed to conquer the world?”, there are several ways to proceed. But all of them must start with the shareholders act of the 1580s which enabled privateering and joint stock companies. With this as the backdrop, the East India Company was formed, with the intent of pursuing a spice trade with the East Indies (now Indonesia). The trade was enabled by privateers, who were authorized by the state to take up arms and to defend the trade.
1619: Dutch East India Company and trade with India. Unfortunately for the East India Company (or, rather, fortunately), they lost the battle for the spice trade with the East Indies to the Dutch, and were awarded two minor consolation prizes ~ the island of Manhattan and trade with India.
This was a rather fortunate loss, for the Indian provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa were producing the finest cotton, linen and muslin in the world; and those products were in great demand. So they setup shop, with the cooperation of the local rulers ~ the Mughals who ruled over much of what is now India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and portions of Afghanistan.
Initially, the trade was hugely profitable, and convenient, for both sides. The Mughals were not inclined to be naval powers ~ they traced their ancestry to Genghis Khan, to Timur Lane, and looked to Central Asia as their paradise. They viewed the English (and all of Europe) as backwards, and uncivilized, and had no real interest in that trade. The English (or rather the employees of the East India Company) were happy to work this trade, and become a merchant class living in India (like other merchant classes ~ including Jews, Persians and Arabs)
1707 Death of Auranzeb. One landmark moment came in 1707 with the death of the last powerful Mughal Emperor ~ Auranzeb. Traditionally, Mughal Emperors had been liberal and secular. As an example, Akbar (Auranzeb’s Great Granddad) would invite religious scholars from all over the world to his court in an attempt to fashion out a new religion that would encompass all known religions. By contrast, Auranzeb abandoned the liberal secularism of his ancestors, and imposed a strict form of Islam on the population that was unwilling to adopt it. This rupture broke down political alliances, and left the Mughal Empire weakened from within. To further complicate matters, one of Auranzeb’s descendants ~ a man called Mohammad Shah Rangeela ~ was perhaps the most idiotic ruler in all of history. Rangeela’s domain was invaded by Nadir Shah of Persia, and Rangeela marched off to battle with an army of concubines, jugglers, musicians, cooks and other professionals required to live a high life. To cut a long story short, Nadir Shah made off with the Mughal treasury, and left it considerably weakened.
1757 Battle of Plassey. French Indian War. The 1750s witness the first global struggle between two competing colonial powers. In the US, we refer to this as the French-Indian wars, and think of it as lasting from 1754 to 1763. My personal take is that we should really think of this as World War 1, as the first worldwide struggle between two competing colonial powers. There were battles fought all over the world, and North America was just one domain. Within this context, there was one war that started off on a bit of fake news, and which changes the course of history.
As the war was raging, and the East India Company had business interests that could be threatened by the war, they had operatives all over the world. One such operative came back with news that a heavily armed French flotilla had set sail from Marseille, and was likely headed to India. The French also had small trading posts in India, so the assumption was that the French would try to kick the English out of their premiere trading position in India.
So the East India Company went to the English government and said “look, you have to help us out here, else the French will destroy your tax revenues”. The English government organized a response, which was led by Robert Clive, who had started off as a “writer” under the East India Company (more on this later). Clive arrived in India, and found that the French flotilla was nowhere to be seen. The expedition was based on false intelligence ~ the French flotilla had indeed sailed from Marseille, but it was bound for Canada, not India.
1765 Diwani from Shah Alam
Clive was about to head back to Britain, with his fame (and fortune) secured. As he was about to leave, he received a letter from “Jagat Seth” ~ this was a title, which meant “banker to the world”. The Jagath Seth were an immensely wealthy banking family who helped the Mughal Emperor transfer tax revenue from one province to the Imperial Treasury in Delhi. Taxes collected in one province were deposited to the Jagath Seth in that province, and the Jagath Seth deposited a corresponding amount (minus a 10% transaction fee) into the Imperial Coffers in Delhi. Effectively, the Jagath Seth collected 10% of all tax revenues collected by the Mughal Empire.
In 1765, the Jagath Seth was tired of the antics of the local Mughal Emperor. He had hear about Clive’s exploits during the Battle of Plassey, and was impressed. So the letter detailed a business proposition. We will pay you 1 million pounds if you get rid of this Mughal Governor for us, and we will pay the East India Company an additional 1 million pounds. In addition, we will bribe the Mughal Governor’s general, so that you will not face a serious challenge.
Clive was not one to turn down such opportunities. He rushed off to battle. Skipping over the details, he defeats the Mughal Armies and forces the Mughal Emperor to sign over a “diwani” (which means the rights to manage and tax) for the provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa to the East India Company. This diwani was the subject of my cover photo in part 1. In reality, the scene took place in the Mughal Emperor’s tent, with Clive holding a gun to his head.
From this point on, the East India Company steadily expanded it’s domain. The modus operandi was very simple: (1) They would approach the bankers (the Jagat Seths and others) for finance. The Company boys and the bankers were both city boys who understood contracts, business plans, and returns on investments. (2) The bankers would provide the capital, and the Company would use this capital to raise an army of local sepoys. Typically, the local sepoys were paid about 3x more than what the local Indian kings would pay. (3) The Company would take over a particular domain. Tax revenues from that domain would pay off the bankers, and enable a dividend for the shareholders.
1772-1773 Famine. The Tea Act. The Regulatory Act. Trial of Warren Hastings
By 1772, the Company had expanded it’s influence to much of India. As with any other profit motivated enterprise, it was now looking for other sources of revenue. They realized that opium was more profitable than rice and wheat, so they forced a large number of farmers to switch over to opium (as an aside, this had disastrous consequences in China as well). In 1772, there was a relatively weak monsoon, and the crops failed. A number of farmers were unable to pay their tax obligations, but the company needed it’s revenues. The farmers were forced to pony up regardless (with brutal floggings and executions). With this as a backdrop, the Company was able to meet its revenue forcecast, and the company shareholders voted an increase to their annual dividend.
The real problem arose when the monsoon failed again in 1773. Now, even with the floggings and executions, the farmers were unable to pay their tax obligations. This resulted in the Company’s revenues falling off a cliff. Since the banking system in England relied heavily on the revenues of the East India Company, the result was the first major financial crisis of the modern era. The English Crown was forced to step up ~ the East India Company was the first literal example of “too big to fail”. The Crown did step up, but took a 50% share of the East India Company, and introduced a “regulatory act” to reduce the likelihood of future crises.
Effect on American Colonies. At this point, the situation in India was very dire. As per various sources, about 2MM people died of starvation. Farmers were selling off wives and daughters to anyone who could afford to pay. Reports of such depradation reached the American colonies as well, and our founding fathers were horrified. The Boston Tea Party, which was about tea from India, was a symbolic message to the Crown ~ we want no part of the East India Company.
Career in the East India Company: Imagine yourself to be a country lad in England in the 1770s. You are not the brightest bulb in the room, but you are street savvy. Perhaps you are a bully, and know how to throw a sharp elbow. You are not eligible for an inheritance, and are not bright enough to make it as an apprentice to a noted professional. Nevertheless, you would like to retire to a country mansion by age 30. How do you do that?
You become a “writer” in the East India Company. To be eligible, you had to enlist before you turned 16 ~ the Company wanted trainable (and impressionable) young men. Once you enrolled, you were shipped off to Calcutta for 2 years of training. You would learn Bengali, Hindi, and the basics of accounting, finance and trade. At that point, you would become a “writer” ~ someone who writes down tax revenues. You were assigned a particular tax district, and could rise to become a “collector” (someone to collects taxes for that area). You were underpaid by the Company, but you were allowed to (and expected to) generate additional income by forming other business arrangements. Since you were backed by the Company, it was possible to get favorable terms from all business partners. Thus, it was quite possible to make a fortune before you turned 30. Working for the Company was analogous to working for Google, or Facebook.
What this also means is that you now have a financial incentive to be blind ~ blind to the moral failings of Company rule.
1799: Epoch of Company Rule
1799 should be considered the epoch of Company rule in India. Following the regularory act of 1773, the initial barbarianism of Clive has been replaced with more genteel administrators, and most (or quite a few) of the Company’s officers in India are genuinely in love with the country. The Company has defeated the last holdouts (Tipu Sultan in 1799, and the Marathas by 1806), and has developed a governing relationship with the last Mughal Emperor (Zafar). The Mughal Emperor is allowed to focus on poetry, culture and the arts, while the Company’s officers (who were called the “White Mughals”) focus on taxing the provinces and exporting goods. The ruling language remains Persian, and most of the Company’s officers learn to speak in this language. They also develop relationship with the locals ~ as per the Company’s records in the British Library, about 1 in 3 Company’s officers wills their money to local Indian women that they have taken as wives, or to their Anglo-Indian children.
Now, I should clarify that Company rule is not benign at this point. Not by any means. All inhabitants of Tipu Sultan’s capital city were raped and killed over a period of 4 days, for instance.
What I am trying to say is that Company rule is not racist at this stage. The massacre of Tipu Sultan’s capital city is consistent with the global norms of the time; and the Company has a guy (the future Duke of Wellington Arthur Wellesley) who has been assigned the job of ending the rapes/massacres after the prescribed duration (4 days). The enterprise is purely about money. Think of a corporate asset raider who acquires a new company, strips it of its most valuable assets that are sold off, and then manages the rest in a manner that is designed to maximize profit. The relationship is purely exploitative. But it is about money, and not about bigotry.
1800 to 1857: White Mughals, Evangelism and racism
But, when you have one group of people making a fortune by presiding over another country, there is an inevitable source of trouble. Trouble can come from any direction. In this example, the trouble comes from missionaries (or evangelicals) who believe that the natives were inferior, and must be saved. These missionaries were welcomed by the White Moghuls, even though these missionaries were preaching something that was anathema to the White Moghuls ~ that their darker skinned wife, and their darker skinned children were inferior to them because of their racial stock, and must be saved. All this evangelism had it’s desired effect. By the 1840s, only about 1 in 20 of the Company’s officers were now leaving their estates to local women and children. The Company now viewed the locals as inferior, and the locals viewed the Company with a great deal of mistrust.
Consider this degradation from an economic viewpoint. In the 1790s, the Company collected an average of GBP 3.5 MM in tax revenues in India (this does not include money made by the Company in trade, and it also does not include the extra-curricular revenue made by Company employees). At the same time, the total expenditures of the British government was GBP 7 MM. When you have a corporation of this size and economic power, it distorts the society at home in ways that are not hard to imagine. Members of Parliament now looked to retire early, and become well paid Directors in the Company. For this privilege, they are expected to do the Company’s bidding (and accept the Company’s bribes) while they serve in the Parliament. Over time, the Company’s shares are sold to a larger share of the English public, and they also now have a vested interest in looking the other way when the company does something immoral.
Something is bound in happen in this tinderbox. I cover that something in the next section.
11th May 1857; The uprising
Indian history books refer to this as the First War of Independence. British books call it the uprising, or the mutiny. The uprising (or war) started on May 11, 1857. This was the day that changed everything. If you want to draw analogies, this date would correspond to October 7 within the context of the present Israel-Gaza conflict.
As outlined in the sections above, something had to happen. The whole area was one big tinderbox. I won’t detail the exact events, but cannot skip the details entirely. Briefly, the Company’s Army had been massacred in Afghanistan because the Afghans had better (longer range) guns. So the Company wanted to upgrade it’s own guns to newer Enfield rifles that were “rifled” (the bullets were spun as they went through the barrel; thereby increasing range). Because it was rifled, the bullets were harder to load in the muzzle, and had to be greased. This grease was provided with pig fat. Some Indian history books claim that beef fat was also used, but the Company was not that stupid ~ they knew that Hindus considered cows to be holy. What the Company did not know (or knew, but did not understand the significance of) is that most Hindus will also not eat pork (reasons are massively complicated and not relevant).
When the Company’s soldiers were asked to bite into the new bullets and apply the new grease, they refused, killed the commanders, and mutinied. The mutiny started in Bengal in 11th May 1857, but spread quickly and on the 12th of May 1857, it was an uprising that consumed most of North India. About 100,000 (perhaps more), soldiers marched on Delhi and massacred any Englishmen they found along the way. In the news reports that reached England, these stories of the massacres also included stories of rape (which most likely were false per most historians). But the underlying massacres were real.
There are quite a few details in the ensuing battles. It took about 5 months, but the Company finally crushes the rebellion.
1857 to 1858: The Reprisal.
And then comes the reprisal. The reprisal was concentrated on Cities and provinces that the Company associated with the rebellion. In the city of Delhi, the Company’s army collected every male over the age of 16, and bayoneted them (there were not enough bullets). This is not according to Indian claims ~ there are no Indian claims on this number. This is as per the Company’s records. The women and children were spared, but were made to watch as all the killing took place. Most historians estimate that this reprisal resulted in tens of thousands (and perhaps over 100,000) dead in Delhi alone. At the time, the City of Delhi had a population of about 1MM, so you are looking at about 10% of the population being killed in a reprisal that took about 5 days. The last Mughal Emperor was made to sit on a wooden stool and presented with plates with the heads of his beheaded children covered with cloth. Adult males who had fled to the countryside were hunted down and put on trial (and generally convicted).
There was a point to this reprisal. It was designed to invoke a sense of fear amongst the cities that were spared. The stories from this reprisal were supposed to be so brutal that an Englishman could ride on a horse at midnight, anywhere in India, and not encounter a single native with a raised head. What is really ironic is that the residents of Delhi were not directly involved with the mutiny. The mutineers were largely from other provinces who had marched onto Delhi. But an example had to be made of someone, and the adult males in Delhi were as good a target as any.
Here, it is useful to acknowledge that such reprisals are an integral part of human history. The Assyrians, for instance, would build a mountain of human skulls as a way to remind potential adversaries of the consequences of opposing Assyrian rule. You could draw straight lines from the Assyrian practices to that followed by the Persians, by Alexander, by the Romans, by the Mongols, by the Ottomans…. The British were not being any more un-civilized than any of our other ancestors.
It is also useful to acknowledge that such reprisals have historically tended to work. One hopeful sign of our modern era is that such reprisals have become less effective.
1858: Company Rule becomes the British Raj
The mutiny had changed English attitudes as well. The English government was a 50% shareholder in the Company following the 1773 Regulatory act. However, the Indian colony was England’s most prized asset, and after the mutiny, most politicians in England felt that such a prized asset could not be left in the hands of a private company. Accordingly, the colony of India was officially taken over by the English crown in 1858. History books make a big deal of this event. I am more interested in what happens over the next 50 years.
1858 to 1915 Bigotry, fear and paranoia
These reprisals had the desired effect on the Indian psyche ~ the era of 1858 to 1910 was marked by most Indians fearing English men/women, and accepting their moral/physical superiority as a race. No less a figure than Gandhi, who was born in 1869 and grew up in this era, viewed the English as the master race, with Indians somewhere down below, and just above blacks (to his credit, Gandhi outgrew such notions before he died). During this time, with very few exceptions, it was generally possible for a single Englishman to ride his horse at midnight anywhere in India, and not encounter a single raised head. You may think I am using a lazy pictorial depiction, but that was the actual metric used by the Government of India at the time.
But I would also like you to stop and consider the effect on the English psyche. In 1857, news about these reprisals had made it back home. 1857 marked the first war correspondent in modern history ~ William Howard Russell (for the Times) had previously covered the Crimean War and enabled the famous “Charge of the light brigade” poem. William Russell arrived at the scene (in Delhi, for instance) after the initial mutiny, but did report extensively on the reprisals. This was a first in history ~ up until this war of 1857, the general public was kept in the dark about the rape and plunder that happened at the conclusion of most wars. In 1858, the English public was forced to confront reports that “their” soldiers (technically, it was still the Company’s soldiers) had pillaged cities. How is one supposed to react to that?
Amongst the English public, the accounts of those reprisals were accepted with glee, with a general attitude of “those natives had it coming”. News of the initial massacres (of 11th and 12th May 1857) of Englishmen was accepted as proof of the natives being savages. And fake reports of rape (which, according to historians) of English women on the 12th of May were also accepted and primed the English public for the next 60 years. There were exceptions, of course, but this was the median reaction.
As a group, England had primed itself into complete lunacy covering paranoia and different forms of racism. The racism spanned different version, ranging from the benign white man who must save the natives (i.e. Rudyard Kipling and “White Mans Burden”) to outright savagery. No less a figure than Charles Dickens viewed all natives as irredeemable savages (per an essay called “The Noble Savage” penned in 1853 and called for all natives to be exterminated following the mutiny (as an aside, despite this knowledge, I still consider Dickens to be one of the greatest writers ever, and enjoy his Christmas Carol ever Christmas). Consider the transformation of the society as a whole. About 300 years before Dickens, Shakespeare had penned an eloquent speech by the Jewish villain Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. The “if you cut me, do I not bleed” speech by Shylock humanized a Jew, even one as villainous as Shylock. By contrast, Dickens had a caricature of a Jew as the child snatcher Fagin in Oliver Twist.
The collective rise of antisemitism in countries that profited from colonial enterprises is not a coincidence. It is relatively easy to understand this from the example of Charles Dickens. Dickens may have been a gifted writer himself, but his 2 sons were not, and had joined the East India Company to make their fortunes. Thus, Dickens was very highly motivated to view the natives as savages, and the English as superior. Once you view yourself as a superior race, bigotry (including antisemitism) is the next logical step. The Cover Photo depicts a drawing circa 1889 of Fagin ~ the Jewish child snatcher in Oliver Twist. Think of how different this drawing is, compared to Shylock with this “if you cut me, do I not bleed” speech in Merchant of Venice.
I also want you to think about the paranoia. The mutiny had not resulted in any rapes ~ that is the consensus amongst most modern historians. However, the English public had accepted these rumors, and were forever primed by it. English officers were paranoid that their wives and daughters would be raped if they ever let their guards down. As I will discuss in a subsequent section, this paranoia had deadly consequences.
1915 to 1919: The Great War
By the time of the Great War, the psychosis on the Indian side had largely been cured. This was down largely to a man you have undoubtedly heard of: MK Gandhi. My narrative would like to skip over the affect on the Indian psyche, but it is not possible to understand the psyche of the colonizer without understanding the effect on the colonized. So I have to cover this to some extent. Besides, I really admire the philosophy and approach behind this, so I am going to narrate it regardless.
Gandhi understood that Indians were in a prison built of fear, and that no progress was possible without a cure for this fear. His recipe for this was simple: (1) Start with the assumption that the truth always prevails in the long run. More recently, MLK Jr described this as the bending of the arc towards a more moral universe. (2) Therefore, if you do your utmost to figure out the truth, and then do your utmost to stick to that truth, then you will be on the side that is victorious. (3) If you do this, then you do not need to fear anything.
I am giving you this backdrop because you will need it to understand the betrayal. When the Great War started, the British Raj needed volunteers from India. Gandhi was the chief recruiter for this, and there was an implicit understanding that in return for help during the Great War, when the war ended, India would be accorded Dominion status within the British Commonwealth. Indians felt that they were ready to govern themselves. But the British clearly did not ~ they still viewed Indians are a primitive and savage people. As an aside, Gandhi’s writings (and speeches) from this time are one giant lunatic mix of contradictions. How do you reconcile non-violence with recruiting and sending off soldiers for a war? I won’t cover that as it is not relevant to my narrative, but that is a very juicy topic in itself.
Anyhow, the details don’t matter much for my narrative. What matters is that the war ended, and the British did not accord Dominion status to India. In fact, they went the other way ~ they introduced new laws that significantly curtailed civil liberties, but was consistent with their worldview of Indians being untrustworthy and unreliable. Gandhi was furious. The new laws had banned any political strikes. So Gandhi called a nationwide “day of prayer”. Everyone would fast and pray (which, in effect, was a nationwide strike).
1919 13th April Jallianwala Bagh
Officially, the British Raj in India would end in 1947. Unofficially, by my reckoning, the British Raj ended on 13th April 1919. It was on this day that the British lost all moral rights to govern. I suspect most Indians will understand this date. The cliffnotes version is that on this day, a British armored company of about 50 Gorkha and Baluchi soldiers, led by Gen Dyer, opened fire on an unarmed crowd of about 20,000 (mostly men, but quite a few boys) that had gathered for a political rally in a park (or Bagh in Punjabi) within the heart of Amritsar. About 1650 rounds were fired over a period of 10 minutes, with Gen Dyer insisting that his soldiers continue to reload and fire. About 1500 died. When the ammunition was exhausted, Gen Dyer and his company retreated through the narrow lanes, and back out of the city. He had stationed companies of soldiers at the gates of the city; those soldiers were supposed to come “extricate” him ~ Gen Dyer had executed this as a military operation against an armed enemy target, and he expected to be trapped by the enemy. Instead, he had killed 1500 unarmed civilians who had gathered for a non-violent day of prayer. He had brought with him an armored car that got stuck in the narrow lanes of Amritsar, and he later testified that if he could have, he would have used that armored car on the crowd.
What I would like you to consider is the psyche of the British officer, where a non-violent political gathering and movement can be mistaken for an armed rebellion; and this mistake could be justified on various grounds. For 60 years (1858-1919), the British officers had been primed with stories from 1857, and they had primed themselves into paranoia. India had moved on to Gandhian non-violence, but Britain was still trapped in 1857.
1919 to 1947 The end of British rule. I have to cover this era as it pertains to where we are now, and how we got here. British rule officially ended in 1947. Clement Attlee was the Prime Minister at the time, and had won the elections of 1945 in a surprise against war-hero Winston Churchill. Attlee was an advocate of an Independent India since at least 1929 (by contrast, Churchill was a true believe in the “natural order of things” and bitterly opposed Indian Independence), so when Attlee defeated Churchill in 1945, independence for India was sort of assumed. It is difficult to fully understand why Attlee was in favor of independence for India, but we can sort of piece together a narrative based on his public statements.
First, we can rule out what it was not : Independence for India was not because the British had discovered that oppression was morally wrong or repugnant. It was not because Britain was reclaiming it’s right to morality. It was not because Attlee respected Gandhi, and had confidence that Gandhi’s people would better run the country. I am very disappointed to have reached this conclusion, for I would have very much liked it to be otherwise. I wanted it to be otherwise.
I am not saying that Attlee did not understand that oppression was wrong ~ at some level, he did. I do believe that Attlee was a decent guy (and I would not say the same for most of his predecessors). It is just that the morality was not what motivated him, and the morality was not what he sold to the British public.
What he sold was a twofer combining racism and economics: (1) Indians cannot be trusted, and we cannot be part of the same union as Indians. (2) India is a poor country filled with hungry people, and we cannot afford to take care of them. And why should we, given that we cannot trust them ?
This twofer was really ironic. If you recall the 3 provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa that had motivated the original trade ~ Company and British rule had reduced these provinces to some of the poorest regions on the planet. In 1944, about 2 million people died of starvation in Bengal alone. This poverty was the direct result of mismanagement (under Company rule) and reprisals (under British rule following 1858), but in 1945, the British public just assumed that it was because the region was overpopulated (and therefore people dying of starvation was a good thing).
In fact, as documented by the historian Mike Davis, Company and British rule was marked by regular famines. Once every 3 years, on average ~ starting with the famous 1773 famine that kicked off American Independence, and ending with the 1945 famine that resulted in Indian Independence. As documented by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen, all famines are man-made disasters. Trivially, you can ascribe various weather events to them (such as failures of the monsoon, in India), but weather events (such as monsoon failures) progress to famines only when the governing entity is callously inept. But, in the backdrop of Company and British rule that had produced this, the widespread assumptions was that Indians are bound to die of starvation.
Thus, Clement Attlee’s rationale was ~ let us get out of India, so that we can pay for our social safety net (his 1945 campaign promised a whole slew of social safety measures).
Post 1947 The absence of any reckoning.
The British empire lasted a relatively short period of time: 1858 to 1947, or about 90 years. To this, you can add the 1765 to 1857 (92 years) marked by Company rule. We are now 76 years post colonial rule in India. How does Britain reckon with it’s colonial past?
A simple and succinct answer is that it does not.
To quote historian David Olusoga
But in our national memory of Britain’s centuries in the sun, the balance between the good and evil that Wallace recognised has been tipped decidedly towards the former. So it is perhaps unsurprising that a recent YouGov poll revealed that 44% of respondents, when asked, claimed to feel pride rather than regret in the long-lost empire. The empire has become reduced to the abolition of slavery, the building of the Indian railways and some vague talk about the rule of law, British values and the spread of the English language. We then collectively recoil in hurt outrage when the Indians point out that their share of the global economy slipped from 23% to a mere 4% under British rule. We’re similarly insulted when the Chinese bring up Britain’s century of state-sponsored, military-backed drug pushing.
This sets up the backdrop for where we are today. Rashid Khalidi, in his very remarkable book “The Iron Cage” argues that the current American worldview is a successor to the British Imperialistic worldview, and includes all the flaws associated with a failure to recognize the Empire and Colonialism. I will cover that in Part 3, and provide my answers to the questions raised.
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