Abstract
The period of British arrival, occupation and rule in India has been a controversial subject with
scholars and historians of South Asia. It has raised varied opinions in the past years and decades. The
‘benefactor’ version is very popular with a large number of colonial historians but the other side also
makes up a critical part of the debate. Be it an artless and simple approach, yet invaders and intruders
can hardly be the prophets of change or progress. The East India Company receiving a Royal Charter in
1600 was by any definition a trading venture, and by far only a commercial enterprise that gained a
strong base in India and was able to dominate the colonizers’ race. In the end game the trespassers
eventually reigned supreme and got hold of the land they had come merely to use as an economic
foothold.
As time passed they took advantage of a weakening Mughal Empire, the warring principalities
and thus began subjugating land by the power of artillery.1 One after the other the European competitors
were defeated, and the Company began establishing outposts in Calcutta, Madras and Bombay. Trading
interests soon came to be replaced by greater ambitions of conquests and annexations. Nineteenth
century dawned upon India as yet another invader attempted to seize its land and riches and this jewel of
the East once again fell a prey to the onslaught. Will Durant called the occupation a “calamity and a
crime”.2 Comparing it with Muslim domination he regarded it beneficial for the Indians as;
those invaders came to stay, and their descendants call India their home; what they took in
taxes and tribute they spent in India, developing its industries and resources, adorning its
literature and art. If the British had done likewise, India would to-day be a flourishing nation.
But the present plunder has gone on beyond bearing; year by year it is destroying one of the
greatest and gentlest peoples of history
Rabia Umar. (2021) Britain and the Partition of the Punjab: A Study in Governance, Journal of the Research Society of Pakistan, Volume-58, Issue-1.
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