There were 31 artificial Indian Famines under British Rule that killed almost 15 million Indians, some estimates say upto 29 millions.
While at the same time 3 lakh tonnes of wheat were exported from deccan plateau in India to England?
Here’s a pic of starving Famine victims under British Raj.
In 1899-1900, the monsoon rains failed in central India causing drought to parch crops impacting almost 60 million people.
Photographer William Willoughby Hooper showing a starving man protecting family from other starving cannibals.
Yes, people actually turned into cannibals due to this famines created by British.
Despite the fact that Britain had been looting India for more than a century, The British Viceroy of India, Lord Curzon,was concerned about his budget and feared that aid to the starving Indians would cause them to become dependent on hand-outs.
Drawing of Indian famine victims by Barbant.
The British stood aside and allowed millions of Indian people in the British Raj to starve to death.
Photograph of a mother helplessly watching her children dγιng in the street during Bengal famine under colonial rule.
What even more cruel was that the “white” tourists started pouring in like vultures seeking thrilles at photographing the misery of Indian people. The invention of highly portable box cameras allowed tourists to record the sights.
A French editorial cartoon lampoons western tourists Well-fed and complacent who came to India to gawk at the skeletal Indian victims of the famine.
Many Indians still hear about these famines through their parents and grandparents.
Most horrible was the famine in AD 1900. It was so horrible people of Gujarat hasn't forgotten about it. They call it "chhapanio dukaal" as it was in vikram savant 1956.
Do read this this whenever anyone tells you that Britain brought civilization and development to India.
Here is an extract from a book that documents how the British took away food grown in India for war and to fill European food coffers for NEXT year as Indians continued to die in the present. Food imports to India were denied by the Royal Crown citing lack of ships.
The British monarchy and specifically, the Queen has never apologized for this mass murder of Indians at the hands of the colonials. This death count of Indians at the hands of the British was more than the people killed in the holocaust.
In the 18th century, India accounted for a quarter of the global GDP. By the middle of the 20th, colonialism ensured that India was one of the poorest nations in the world.
Over 200 years of exploitation, depredation and loot and destruction reduced India to a poster child for Third World poverty.
When the British left India in 1947
- 90 percent of the population was living below the poverty line
- Literacy rate was below 17 percent
- Life expectancy of the average Indian was 27 years. JUST 27 YEARS...!! Read this again.
This is how the British treated Indians.
In the name of free trade, the British came in and destroyed the free trade that made India the leading exporter of textiles.
There is simply no comparison between the accomplishments of India rising from the ashes that the British left India in and what was done in the 200 years before.
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