Eminent Indian economist Professor Utsa Patnaik (Jawaharlal Nehru University) has estimated that Britain robbed India of $45 trillion between 1765 and 1938, However it is estimated that if India had remained free with 24% of world GDP as in 1700 then its cumulative GDP would have been $232 trillion greater (1700-2003) and $44 trillion greater (1700-1950). Deprivation kills and it is estimated that 1.8 billion Indians died avoidably from egregious deprivation under the British (1757-1947). The deadly impact of British occupation of India lingers today 71 years after Independence, with 4 million people dying avoidably from deprivation each year in capitalist India as compared to zero (0) in China....To say nothing of many other colonies of the Empire, or the submission of China.
CrossCurrents — Imperialism
Britain Robbed India Of $45 Trillion & Thence 1.8 Billion Indians Died From Deprivation
Gideon Polya
1 comment:
Not to belittle what Britain did to India, but these numbers are pretty fanciful and not conducive to good comparisons and thinking. Of course most of that 45 trillion comes from compound interest - not exactly kosher - for then a theft that occurred in Ancient Sumer would surely be accounted as zillions of quadrillions of trillions.
Was just reading Utsa Patnaik on the Great Leap Forward famine in China and the numbers games that people play with it. As she notes, today's serious scholarship shows in reality about 12 million or under died - horrible, but not the 30 million and up that propagandists spout. And 12 or so is the same number as the US State department and CIA estimated back then. The 30+ million comes from the same source as these 1.8 billion dead Indians - counting the deaths of people that never existed. To most demographers, this is not quite kosher.
She makes the important point that the Chinese Great Leap forward catastrophe is publicized and exaggerated frequently. But Russia's demographic catastrophe under Yeltsin was actually worse taking the smaller population in account. Displaying the usefulness for thought of serious, unexaggerated demography. It's unfortunate that she's stooping to the same gimmicks she has rightly criticized elsewhere.
Post a Comment