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From visiting England, France, Portugal, and India, including many historical sites and tours, I have learnt from many different perspectives on the colonization of India. In this post, I hope to offer some new perspective, or at least some history which may not be very well-known:
Under the Moghul empire, India was the richest country in the world during the 15th and 16th century. It was the most desired country to be colonized and conquered by the European empire. Colonization attempts began with the Portuguese, then the French, who were content with purchasing cheap spices in the coastal areas of India, bringing them back to their homelands, and selling them at exponentially higher prices.
The English had a different approach—to establish a long-term plan to extract agriculture and mining resources from South Asia for centuries. Unlike the Portuguese kings, who sent military naval expeditions in attempts to conquer India, the English first sent trader. Their names were Ralph Fitch and William Hawkins who visited Akbar’s court. Their successful visit with Akbar was followed by the English establishing a successful company called the East India company. In the 1850s, India became an official colony of the throne.
England saw India as a gold mine—both literally and figuratively. The colonial economy in India was deeply rooted in extraction and agriculture because India was rich in many resources that seemed foreign and luxurious to colonizers. During British rule, they focused on exploiting India’s minerals like gold and spices. India’s soil was extremely rich due to national water sources and climate conditions. This rich resource in farming was forced into cash crops such as indigo and cotton and became a rich resource in England.
Speaking of indigo and cotton, the cotton trade was so lucrative for the British that they reduced their import from the United States in the 1840s which was one of the many factors that eventually resulted in American Civil war. This fact represents one example of how the colonization of one country impacted the domestic economy and politics of the U.S. as well as many other countries around the world. Local residents were the primary source of labor in this economy. India was so lucrative not just from natural resources, but human resources.
One way the English established order was appointing and converting the local head of regions by providing them with Raja/Maharaja/Zamindar social statuses… but at the end of the day, they were mere tax collectors for the English. In many states such as Bengal, the tax collectors lease was auctioned. In return for their protection, the English provided them with military and police security. The structure was that the officers were primarily Irish and English, and the soldiers were Indians whose families could afford two square meals a day. The government ran through an effective and established judicial system which aligned with the British judicial system that worked. Judges were English.
Additionally, the English appointed local administrators under the government payroll to supervise the Maharajas and Zamindars. Since this was a lucrative career, the English could hire the best and brightest from Cambridge and Oxford to take on these jobs. The head of the India State reported directly to Secretary of State for India in the British cabinet. This was the largest revenue generator for the English government.
Unlike the Spanish, Portuguese, and French, the English did not convert all Indians into Christianity. This is primarily due to the fact that the King and Queen of England did not follow the Catholic church, and the British learnt from history that at this time conversion into Christianity would only add risk to govern India.
The British empire believed they were providing Indians the institutions and tools necessary to hold together and run the union. Colonization of India resulted in it becoming one country from the conglomeration of princely states. The English established an effective railroad system and infrastructure of transportation, as well as an education system in which they shared English knowledge and language. The English also modernized India’s society by banning certain social practices (two harsh examples: the Victorian idea of a man marrying only one woman, or banning Sati, a practice where a woman burned herself in the fire of her husband’s funeral).
Since there was a dearth of sufficient highly educated young men to administer the country locally, the English hired the most academically successful Indians to take positions as officers in the military as well as local administrations. This gave the British who migrated there a sense of making it feel like home for them because they had lucrative positions, servants, beautiful weather, access to luxurious resources, and most importantly, a feeling of power.
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A picture of Red Fort – a flag at the Red Fort symbolizes who rules the country. First flew the Moghul flag, then the British flag, and now the India flag. This is a place that signifies a symbol of power dating all the way back to the reign of Shah Jahan and it has witnessed the change in Indian history to British rule.