The Economics of British Imperialism in Subcontinent
After the battle of Plassey, the subcontinent was on the verge of destruction, overnight the
British took over and started to rule the subcontinent providing and following some agendas.
Those agendas led to a strong foundation of economy for the British people torturing the
subcontinent people.
The first and foremost agenda was establishing a double government, which meant that East
India Company was not the administrator; they were only the rulers of their respective territory
and all the finances will be governed by the british people themselves. The murder of Nawab
Siraj-Ud-Dowla was successful and the British got control over the whole subcontinent, which
overturned the Mughal systems. The British governing body imposed tax on the people of
Bengal, which led to the fleeing of people from the towns in order to be saved from high taxes.
The Bullion currency was taken from the subcontinent and was stored in England.
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Approximately £ 624,375 was imported to Bengal but at the same time £ 6,311,250 Bullion was
also taken from Bengal, so it was clear that the british were looting Bengal. In this looting
process in 1757 the Bengal Treasury was seized.
The East India Company built a major administration in England by using the taxes they got in
Bengal, very few amount of the taxes was used in development of Bengal. The larger amount of
the taxes was used in search for more resources from Bengal and subcontinent. The biggest scam
the british people pulled over Bengal is that, they bought Bengali goods with the money of the
tax they collected from Bengal, in simple words they were buying the Bengal goods for free and
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Dr. Tahseen Ali, Lecture 4, 16th April.
selling them to higher profit to Europe countries, with that profit money the british people were
buying strategic elements. The british people also resourced the industrial revolution with the
resources they took from the subcontinent, they also paid their Mercenary Army with the tax
collected from the subcontinent. The increase in taxation helped british government to increase
the manpower of the Mercenary Army, as the farmers sold the lands and to survive they needed
jobs and they were recruited in the army.
After 1858, Council bills were introduced by the british government for trading, Merchants can
only buy that from London and then do trading with London, which results in zero profit to the
merchants, that is why the profit of every penny floated in London, which the British
government used to develop other anglo-saxon colonies. In other words, Bengal was destroyed in
its pre-industrial age by the British.
The destruction of Bengal led to the first famine in 1770 because no currency was left in Bengal
and monsoon arrived while the british bought all the rice and grains from the farmers and
transported it to London. There was food in the neighboring regions of Bihar but the price was
set high by the british government, as a result the man-made famine grew worse. The taxation by
the East India Company again increased. The relief funds were never distributed accordingly and
the zamindars played more evil. The Bengal Mercenary Army attacked the british and then the
british government became more strict and again a man-made famine came in the 1870s and
lasted up to the 1890s.
In conclusion, we can say the British government followed the capitalist world system to destroy
Bengal to its core because this theory focuses on maximum economic profit and the British
people did that and gained maximum profit to revolutionise England and their other colonies.