Inglorious Empire: What the British Did to India

Enjoyable demolition of the recently revived imperialist arguments that the British Empire was good for India using facts rather than generalisations. It's quite a short book, but the bibliography gives plenty of further reading options. I'd not read anything by Mr Tharoor previously but will certainly check out his other books. Overall this was a very easy read and is highly recommended.

Historians bemoan a lack a balance in books. They desire to be an emotionless onlooker give cold hard facts. Tharoor rips up the banal rule book and gives us a fantastic read. As an Irishman I can see the parallels of empire on every page. A common statement in Ireland is that if it weren’t for the nice English buildings we would have no nice buildings at all. They ruled the country for 800 years. An Irishman didn’t have the money to build a home, let alone a palace. Such are the parrallels in India. The British ripped up the age of disconnected village feudalism and brought something much worse the India. Collectivism. Collective poverty. Tharoor starts off with the most striking chapter. The looting of India. If you take anything from this book, it is this line “when the British arrived in India in the 1700s, India was 27 percent of the global economy. When they left in 1948 it was 3%”. People will state the world moved on without India but frankly India was chained to the floor. The British were not there to help. The trains, as Tharoor describes, and as is detailed further in the incredible book Empire of Cotton, were there to speed up the looting, the transfer of Cotton to the ships. The trains were also to be used mainly by the British people and furthermore by their Soldiers. The trains would quickly speed them to point of any mutiny. Tharoors gives details on Indian involvement in WW1 and WW2 where Indian soldiers accounted for up to one quarter of Commonwealth forces. Though not detailed in this book, Indian soldiers were often sent in first. At Gallipoli their bodies became human sandbags. Indeed in WW2, it was the British who declared war on Germany on India’s behalf without consulting the Indian hierarchy. Other shameful aspects of Empire in India are expanded upon. Murder (Amritsar and others) and famine. Of course the Bengal famine, not to mention the almost 100 million Indians who died from starvation during the course of British rule. Famines are not a natural phenomenon. The bibliography of the book is substantial enough (5 pages) to be awarded a credible work of history. No doubt Thatoor is guilty of a slightly one sided argument and choosing the facts in line with the mood of the book. But guess what, British history books for the last 300 years have done something similar so here is the balance historians are looking for.

On the whole, the author makes a very compelling case about the injustices the Raj perpetuated upon India and its people; together with the massive drain and looting of India's resources during the Raj. The reservations I hold however about this work are many. This book reads as a poltical treatise that at times leans far too heavily on the Two-Nation theory of Indian High Politics. The author also glorifies his idol Gandhi far too much, which the record shows, did not represent all of India's interests or views. Lastly, this work ultimately reads as a review and criticism of Niall Fergusson's Empire, which too have its merits and flaws, but is still an interesting read, if nothing more than his imbalanced views. Whilst both Tharoor and Fergusson examine the merits and shortcomings of the Raj, I will concede that Tharoor does well to refute Fergusson's thesis. However, Tharoor plays far too much emphasis on the 'What Ifs' scenarios that could have played out, flirting with an alternate history that may have panned out, had the Raj not exisited. The debate and legacy of Empire and Colonialism should continue, but it would be encouraging to see authors pay more attention to subaltern experiences; together with that of minorities that do not fit neatly into their cental arguments. For me this is what was more disappointing about Tharoor's approach, for he focused too much of the 'national' experience, whilst glossing over the differing regional, cultural, and economic experiences of minorities and the subaltern in British India. His emphasis on Congress history, Gandhi, and the Big Names of the Independence movement is what made this feel a bit unbalanced. That being said, the author has made a good effort in providing a thought provoking account of how we perceive the British Empire and the Raj. A commendable read.

My journey through racism and marginalisation as an ethnic minority brought me to reading this book to find out about my historic roots which was not taught in my school. This book is by far and large the most clearest and concise account of the British Empires rule in India. This book has answered many questions which helped me understand where racism comes from why ethnic minorities feel like second class citizens in the UK and more about the culture of my ancestors. I am really grateful to the author for writing this book and taking the time needed to piece together this peace of history. This book goes into immense detail that at times will shock the reader I would highly recommend a strong mindset before reading this book as at certain points it will trigger strong emotions. I feel so sorry for what had happened to India during its time under colonisation no country deserves that 😞.

As an educator in a previous life I would like to see this book made required reading in all British secondary schools. Why? Because it offers the perfect object-lesson in why it is always, yes always, wrong to march into another country under the pretence of a civilising mission. And, just as importantly, it shows why national myth-making leads unsuspecting citizens into very dangerous intellectual and emotional territory. Let’s start with the few quibbles that can be raised in order to discredit the value of this book. It verges occasionally, but only occasionally, on a quasi-rant against the evils of colonialism and the utter iniquities of British rule. It also slips into an emotional use of language, sometimes through unnecessary repetition, in its desire to make a point. The index is woefully inadequate, but it shares this failing with many another work of non-fiction. However, Tharoor has produced a meticulously researched book with thirty pages of notes and references in addition to footnotes (but don’t let that put you off) which comprehensively deals with the British involvement in India as well as many a backward glance to what the country was like before the British government decided it had to intervene in order to support the activities of the East India Company. In that year, 1600, England produced just 1.8 per cent of the world’s GDP in contrast to India’s 23 per cent. India had a flourishing manufacturing industry, especially in textiles, and one of its celebrated universities, Nalanda, had already predated the foundation of Oxford and Cambridge by centuries. When the British finally left, having systematically expropriated as much as they could, literacy rates and life expectancy rates were amongst the lowest in the Third World. Tea was grown solely for the satisfaction of consumers in Blighty, wild animals were slaughtered for the benefit of trophy-hunters, whole forests were cut down to provide railway sleepers and exotic furniture back home, the economy was turned into a largely agrarian base, taxes were extracted to finance colonial overlords and their staff while denying the native population any say in how they were governed. In modern times there has never been a famine in India; throughout British rule there were several. Even today there are British historians who continue to peddle the myths of the huge civilising influence the mother country exercised in the swathes of world territory it once ruled. Read Tharoor and you will be disabused of such fanciful notions. You will also be shocked to read how brutally and inhumanely the native Indian population was treated. It is one of the absurdities advanced by adherents to the Brexit cause that they imagine the Indians of today are falling over backwards to do all kinds of major trade deals with the erstwhile mother country. It betrays a total lack of historical understanding by such modern myth-makers that they indulge their fantasies of a Global Britain keen to resurrect the supposed glories of the past. Amongst the debunking of dangerous national myths is the historical evidence that Tharoor presents to show what an incorrigible racist Churchill was. I suspect that one reason why historians on the right have done all they can to discredit this book is because of the many uncomfortable instances of the great man’s bigotry and racial superiority. Equally unsettling is the history of British withdrawal in the wake of the Second World War. Divide and rule was always the British approach previously, but the fact that they largely stood back while Hindus and Moslems massacred each other while still retaining overall responsibility for the running of the country is an utterly shameful comment on the alleged superiority of the British civilising influence. Read this book in order to understand how shockingly and shamefully human beings behave towards others under their control and how national myths continue to be perpetuated despite all evidence to the contrary.

Born in Africa, came to England in 1963, never really British or Indian. Always felt something missing about my identity. Although the book has not given me a clear identity (mainly l like to think of being a person who lives a large rock in space) it has given me a greater understanding of my parents culture and views. Excellent highly recommend this book to Indians and all brexit and reform voters. Know your own history.

This book is an eye opener in many ways. I wished people like Tharoor had written our history books when we were in school. Tharoor, as a world diplomat (who also happens to be Indian) builds the case for 'inglorious empire' in a well balanced manner. His arguments are duly supported by citations and references which are convincing. At some point in time one almost feels cheated as an Indian and questions the intelligence of Indian authorities who took 200 years of subjugation to realise what was happening! Specially as we see in the case of the railways which every liberal British cites as the glory of the empire. How it actually turns out to be an example of tyranny in terms of economics and business. Undoubtedly, the book captures the reader with logic, facts and data but more importantly its Sashi Tharoor's style which one enjoys the most. The language is slightly difficult at times and one might have to refer to the dictionary on your phone or laptop, but then you are prepared for it when reading Tharoor even when he writes for the Sunday columns 😎

This is a great historical book from Shashi Tharoor MP in India & educated at Oxford. Throughout the period of the Raj just as the German's related to the Jews so did the British behave to Indians treating them like "untermenschen" ..... Indians were expected to salute any white man or woman & sufferred repercussions if they did not. This is a hisrtorical narrative based on Mr Tharoor's lecture at the Oxford Union. Subsequent reviews commented that the book does not take into account what Britain did in terms of building railways, etc but Indians sufferred so much during the Raj with man-made famines (being forced to grow indigo or opium and not allowed to grow their cereal crops) wiping out large numbers of people , the Jallianwala Bagh massacre (Anita Anand Patient Assasin) .......& the creation of an Indian army to suppress the Indian people, transportation of Indians without their knowledge to a life of slavery in Mauritius, British Guyana, Fiji (Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh)...underlying all this was a terrible greed to make huge amounts of money out of Indian sufferring, blood and toil.......all these and more led to the demise of the British Empire. Thanks to Gandhi this was achieved with peace though the country got vivisected with great loss of life and a lasting hatred.

Brilliant book. Everyone should read this background to the horrors of the British Empire's presence in and exploitation of India for over three hundred years. Cannot recommend it enough.

The author sets out to argue against the notion that the British presence in India was a good thing. It is a point of view that must be read and considered carefully before any apology for British colonialism is made, with facts and viewpoints often overlooked by those extolling the virtues of empire. Whatever your viewpoint, the argument of the author must be taken into account before you can say your viewpoint is well informed.

This is an excellent polemic and intellectual critique of the British colonial looting of India. It describes in horrifying detail what colonialism really was: the exploitation of a land for the benefit of the colonizers at the expense of the colonized. The book discusses the many unfair impositions of the British on the Indians: the overt discriminatory racism, the taxation, the creation of import and export tariffs for the benefit of British manufacturers and traders, the forced deindustrialization or prevention of industrial development of the country, the famines, and the political subjugation of the country. I thought the book, though, paid insufficient attention to how the British were able to occupy a huge and populace country such as India. To a certain extent, I think it was a coincidence or combination of events that happened to occur at the same time. The Mogul dynasty and central government collapsed, and India was invaded by the Persians, just when the British East India Company and the French went to war all over the world, including in India. The author (Shashi Tharoor) also, I think, misjudges the significance and effects of the European Industrial Revolution and the superior European military performance at the time. By the mid- to late 18th century, a European army and navy could defeat a much larger Indian or Asian army or navy. The European colonization or seizure of Africa and Asia occurred because of a huge superiority in military and industrial technology. To this day, if one country possesses a military or technological - industrial advantage over another country, it will use it for it's own benefit. The people of India, China, and Africa found this out. Another excellent book on this subject is "The Anarchy: The East India Company, Corporate Violence, and the Pillage of an Empire" by Dalrymple (2019).

I had heard of some things done by the British such as the Amritsar massacre, and the poor treatment of Indian people, mostly from films, but I had no idea of the depths of depravity of those involved. I agree with other reviewers, that this kind of material should be taught in schools. I found the book both fascinating and horrifying, like a slow-motion wreck. I admire the author's passion and position on the subject, and his impeccable writing style. As noted by one of the critics, for a Brit, it is indeed uncomfortable reading.

Rekommenderas starkt, då den öppnar upp historien med mycket fakta och kartlägger vad som faktiskt föregick bakom kulisserna. Mycket av det britterna gjorde i Indien har inte kommit upp till ytan men den här boken sätter fingret på det. Sätter hela det koloniala projektet under lupp och belyser de grymheter som gjordes för att maximera vinst.